B e t r a y T h e A g e

It was a dreary rainy day with matted leaves and partially naked trees getting ready for a hibernation of sorts. Misty clouds and fog obscured the mountains around us, half hiding, as if they were playing a game of hide and seek. Many of the vegtables are in their final throws as the season changes and tells them to to relinquish their bounty. What to do? The photographer in me wants to post a picture, however, imagination is a powerful tool that pulls out smells and sights from years of stored up experiences, so I post none today. I picked the leeks this morning from what started as puny little sprouts now with massive dark green leaves and stocky snow white roots. I picked three for the potato leek soup we had been holding of on making until today. The recipe called for basil, chives and parsley, all picked from the same plot. A pot cooked this afternoon a released it deliciousness for the evening meal. We baked a meatloaf with carrots, and some of the onions so we would have it ...

Gorgeous, beautific day in autunmal Vermont today. Spent the day raking leaves with loved ones, loading the truck with wood and stacking a row on the front porch in preparation of blustery days ahead. What more could one want, really? Breathing, loading, raking, vibrance, laughing, it's what we do this time of year.

The Dalai Lama visited Middlebury College today on the leg of a short tour through the US. Tickets were sold out quickly, though it was possible to watch through closed circuit TV at a variety of locations at Middlebury, and it was streamed through the colleges website. I got to watch it at home, coffee in hand this Saturday morning. What can be written about this man in this limited space. He is the nearest thing we have to Ghandi. I talked to someone at a work who was pissed that the tickets were "sold out." I told him that he could stream it from home, and he said " I want to feel his presence." Ya, we all want to feel his presence. His themes are compassion and respect.......he bolded stated that he is a marxist in regards to the equal distribution of income, yet praised capitalism for the tremendous innovations that have resulted. The dude is unflinching in his ability to seek the truth, no barriers, no limits. His holiness emanates love. I believe that hi...

Carpooling has been a hit in France and may be coming to a town near you. Let's jump in! More...

Markey/Waxman Report

I was reading somewhere, that one of the challenges we face is that the consequences of a changing climate are not always felt locally. That the consequences of unleashing ancient hydrocarbons buried for millions of years do not necessarily hit the average person over the head in order to get more action on these issues. It is well documented that the naysayers, though unbacked by science and reason, hold a disproportionate control over the media who timidly have been unwilling to present climate change as the biggest challenge ever to face humanity. Here in Vermont, we have little in the way of energy resources and are dependent mostly on importing our energy. James Hanson, the NASA scientist who blew the whistle years ago is not sleeping very well these days as he wonders if we have reached the tipping point where nothing we do may mitigate the disaster that we are experiencing in the natural world and for what is in store for us. All things local make more sense when it comes t...

Mitt will take us to place that is difficult to comprehend..

Stepped out of human turmoil for awhile today, a purging of sorts. Hiked with old friend Lillian, Jean-Marie, and new friends visiting from Massachusetts. Three of the new friends were Biologists. I assumed that they suffered more than most in regards to understanding the degradation of the natural world. Quite to the contrary, they talked about the heroism all around us....I was told that they were also more aware of the great efforts to improve things, to bring about solutions.........We all need a good dose of that.. While hiking a trail traversing valley's and peaks in Lil s neck of the woods, we came upon a man alone on the trail viewing the vistas.....came to be he is a musician and plays Irish music with a number of different groups. We talked of a great many things both Irish and music. How striking to find a kindred soul who admires Kevin Crawford of Lunasa as much as I do. I leave with an invite to play trailing in the breeze....... Lastly, a young couple repelling ...

I am coming to face to face with homelessness daily. In Vermont there appears to be no Section 8 Vouchers available, and organizations that process Section 8 Grants are not even taking names for waiting lists. Meanwhile I hear about a family with 5 kids staying in a motel and tonight is going to be the last night. No one knows where they will be tomorrow. We could you a good dose of widespread outrage right about now.

Rutland Farmer's Food Center is a farmer's market like no other. It is probably the best Farmer's Market in Vermont and has grown to become a vibrant and important organization in this central western city. Take a moment to watch the video and you will most likely be inspired by the character that makes up many of the residents of Rutland. A movie "The Blood of This Town" most exemplifies this spirit based on the annual blood drive in Rutland and its off the charts success.

http://nyti.ms/gKVevb

Here is a thought provoking piece from today's Times. Having been active in the locavore movement where I live, I have experience with the issues expressed in this piece. I like the message that the writer poses and that is " let's not ignore some of the larger problems" and does a good job of putting the energy used in agriculture into perspective. What are your thoughts? "But the local food movement now threatens to devolve into another one of those self-indulgent — and self-defeating — do-gooder dogmas. Arbitrary rules, without any real scientific basis, are repeated as gospel by “locavores,” celebrity chefs and mainstream environmental organizations. Words like “sustainability” and “food-miles” are thrown around without any clear understanding of the larger picture of energy and land use. The result has been all kinds of absurdities. For instance, it is sinful in New York City to buy a tomato grown in a California field because of the energy spent to truck it...

The Future Alway Comes How many times did we stand in front of the black polished marble heart and think about when Mack would arrive here? And today he gets ready for tomorrow Tonight the moon shined ever so handsomely framed by clouds that never existed before until I adored them tonight I also saw a face in the moon as I drove that ribbon of empty highway from Castleton to West Rutland This earliest of projective tests still toys with us despite our smartness We see what we want Isn't it a bit unsettling? The weather? It still feels like the middle of July as I remember it Though no lightning bugs, they visited and left in June For those who listen and watch there is a change all around us I think it came to me in a dream at Kathy's While the wind came suddenly with a pounding rain and whipping trees I was confused at first But then it became recognizable to those who listen and watch My dream was that it had started You know that when you strip away all of the distractions ...

EAST MONTPELIER, Vt. — Erica Zimmerman and her husband spent months pasture-raising pigs on their farm here, but when the time came to take them to slaughter, an overbooked facility canceled their appointment. With the herd in prime condition, and the couple lacking food and space to keep them, they frantically called slaughterhouses throughout the state. After several days they found an opening, but their experience highlights a growing problem for small farmers here and across the nation: too few slaughterhouses to meet the growing demand for locally raised meat.

It's been an interesting year. I have been completely distracted by my personal life during the past year or so. My partner of 32 years was unfaithful and we split in January of 2009. The first 6 months of 2009 were quite dark. The last 3 months of 2009 have been among the best of my life since meeting a new woman. The darkness pushed me into some interesting directions such as photography (I've become the house photographer for the local theatre) running,and some unintended adventures. Life can be quite the lesson. I have pretty much neglected this blog as I have stepped back from interests in such worldly affairs. One can only keep their head in the sand for so long. I can't say that I regret terminating the local newspaper, firing the cable company, discharging netflix, and saying goodbye to Vonage. I have not become a recluse, however, I have removed much of the media clutter I suppose. Yoga has been a good trade I would say. I started this blog in 2004; some things ha...

The gods must be furious. It's the only explanation that makes sense to Jia Son, a Tibetan farmer surveying the catastrophe unfolding above his village in China's mountainous Yunnan Province. "We've upset the natural order," the devout, 52-year-old Buddhist says. "And now the gods are punishing us."

For years now, many members of Congress have insisted that cutting carbon emissions was difficult, if not impossible. It is not. During the two years since 2007, carbon emissions have dropped 9 percent. While part of this drop is from the recession, part of it is also from efficiency gains and from replacing coal with natural gas, wind, solar, and geothermal energy. The U.S. has ended a century of rising carbon emissions and has now entered a new energy era, one of declining emissions. Peak carbon is now history. What had appeared to be hopelessly difficult is happening at amazing speed. For a country where oil and coal use have been growing for more than a century, the fall since 2007 is startling. In 2008, oil use dropped 5 percent, coal 1 percent, and carbon emissions by 3 percent. Estimates for 2009, based on U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) data for the first nine months, show oil use down by another 5 percent. Coal is set to fall by 10 percent. Carbon emissions from burning all fo...

As the world looks around anxiously for an alternative to oil, energy sources such as biofuels, solar, and nuclear seem like they could be the magic ticket. They're not. Read more....

"Like others in the so-called good-food movement, Allen, who is 60, asserts that our industrial food system is depleting soil, poisoning water, gobbling fossil fuels and stuffing us with bad calories. Like others, he advocates eating locally grown food. But to Allen, local doesn’t mean a rolling pasture or even a suburban garden: it means 14 greenhouses crammed onto two acres in a working-class neighborhood on Milwaukee’s northwest side, less than half a mile from the city’s largest public-housing project." Read more....

So the House passed the Waxman-Markey climate-change bill. In political terms, it was a remarkable achievement. But 212 representatives voted no. A handful of these no votes came from representatives who considered the bill too weak, but most rejected the bill because they rejected the whole notion that we have to do something about greenhouse gases. And as I watched the deniers make their arguments, I couldn’t help thinking that I was watching a form of treason — treason against the planet. To fully appreciate the irresponsibility and immorality of climate-change denial, you need to know about the grim turn taken by the latest climate research. The fact is that the planet is changing faster than even pessimists expected: ice caps are shrinking, arid zones spreading, at a terrifying rate. And according to a number of recent studies, catastrophe — a rise in temperature so large as to be almost unthinkable — can no longer be considered a mere possibility. It is, instead, the most likely ...