Friday, July 11, 2008
Progress
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It seems to be a day for head-shaking over human foolishness- what with Wall Street and Fannie-Freddie on greased skids and all- so this just really seems totally appropriate to add to the soup- At last! :-)
38 years living "ultra" green- still going. How to. How not to. Why. Why not.
about me-
It's a play on Grandpa, and green, as in environmentally aware, and Pa, as in ... Pa. An actual grandpa twice, and a Pa three times.
68, kids from two marriages, currently with a 12 year old zooming around the house. The house is as advertised, a very small log cabin in the woods. Tiny. It's like living on a yacht; no closet space, which is maybe half of why #1 went away.
I've been living "ultra" green for 40 years. Off the grid always, business too. Electricity from solar; and a little gas backup in winter. Composting toilet, heat with wood. Not vegetarians; hunter/gatherer/gardener. Not opposed to people living in cities.
Good health; bad health. Good times, bad times. Poverty, intentional and not. Great friends. Unfriends.
The good news: STILL living Ultragreen. It can be done. I'll talk about how here; including towns and cities.
Education: MS and an "ABD" (all but dissertation of a PhD), in Biology. Focus: evolutionary ecology, botany, genetics, parasitology, mammalogy, behavior, ethology, psychology, language,... marketing...metallurgy... No, really, and I left some out, because you won't believe me anyway.
68, kids from two marriages, currently with a 12 year old zooming around the house. The house is as advertised, a very small log cabin in the woods. Tiny. It's like living on a yacht; no closet space, which is maybe half of why #1 went away.
I've been living "ultra" green for 40 years. Off the grid always, business too. Electricity from solar; and a little gas backup in winter. Composting toilet, heat with wood. Not vegetarians; hunter/gatherer/gardener. Not opposed to people living in cities.
Good health; bad health. Good times, bad times. Poverty, intentional and not. Great friends. Unfriends.
The good news: STILL living Ultragreen. It can be done. I'll talk about how here; including towns and cities.
Education: MS and an "ABD" (all but dissertation of a PhD), in Biology. Focus: evolutionary ecology, botany, genetics, parasitology, mammalogy, behavior, ethology, psychology, language,... marketing...metallurgy... No, really, and I left some out, because you won't believe me anyway.
Key to the Characters:
Spouse: my ex-wife
Spice: plural of spouse, obviously; current wife
Smidgen: 12 yr old daughter
Beelar: oldest son; 39 yrs
Middle Child: next son; 36 yrs,
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Basic Green Practices in the Little House
1) Off the grid. 38 years. Solar electricity
2) Limited power- house electricity has 4 golf cart batteries.
3) Composting toilet. Outside. (eew, you do that indoors!?)
4) No road to house. You gotta walk.
5) No running water in house. Water pumped by wind.
6) Showers solar heated; outdoors.
7) Heat with wood. One stove in house-..
8) Cook with wood 8 months, propane in summer
9) Most of our fuelwood now is from trees we planted
10) No refrigerator. 40 years, now. You don't need one either.
11) Big garden.
12) Eat locally when possible, not obsessive about it.
13) No pesticide use ever, gardens or crops; not even organic (ok, except a little in the outhouse and the greenhouse...)
14) Earth sheltered solar greenhouse (aren't they all solar??)
15) Shut up about it. Nobody likes preaching.
16. These are our choices- yours are yours.
2) Limited power- house electricity has 4 golf cart batteries.
3) Composting toilet. Outside. (eew, you do that indoors!?)
4) No road to house. You gotta walk.
5) No running water in house. Water pumped by wind.
6) Showers solar heated; outdoors.
7) Heat with wood. One stove in house-..
8) Cook with wood 8 months, propane in summer
9) Most of our fuelwood now is from trees we planted
10) No refrigerator. 40 years, now. You don't need one either.
11) Big garden.
12) Eat locally when possible, not obsessive about it.
13) No pesticide use ever, gardens or crops; not even organic (ok, except a little in the outhouse and the greenhouse...)
14) Earth sheltered solar greenhouse (aren't they all solar??)
15) Shut up about it. Nobody likes preaching.
16. These are our choices- yours are yours.
Blog Archive
Once and Future Topics
- pushing on icebergs
- Death by Retirement
- you can't have your Earth, and eat it, too.
- let's all chant "I can't."
- non-corrosive - culture
- real "sustainability"
- Toxic Growths
- The Walls Of The Erlenmeyer Flask
- you DO live what you believe
- We Have Not Yet Begun To... think.
- does my lightbulb make a difference?
- loopholes - Lost Horizons
- worms
- unintended consequences
- such a promising species
- purpose
- what's best for my kids?
- government
- predatory lenders; parasitic business
- primates
- change- and barriers
- violence for kiddies
- cultural senility
- genetic engineering
- the Religion of Science
- biodiversity
- the wealth of nature
- the nature of wealth
- salt
- work/ time
- how to talk to a normon
- the phone is a joke, right?
- finger pointing
- "the only way"
- where have all the mammoths gone?
- the odyssey of communication
- thermodynamics and the waterwheel
- small wind turbines
- grab that toid and run
- fad fad fad
- teflon? antibiotics? RF?
- compact fluorescents - lead in Rome
- 30 years of quietly NOT holier
- spare time
- the THWASPCO
- fat fat fat
- one size gives all fits
- unstated assumptions
- unplugging your fridge
Basic Practices On This Blog-
1) I do not have time to dig out all the references for you- if you doubt something I say here, google it immediately- and don't bug me if I'm off by a couple of degrees.
2)"Eat compost and die" type comments will cheerfully be deleted. They won't even tick me off, I just feel pity. Really. So if I were you, I wouldn't bother. (Note to other bloggers- this requirement for basic politeness works- total # of mean comments deleted by me so far ~ 5; spammers deleted ~ 10)
3) Long comments on posts are quite welcome; don't worry about it.
4) I WILL try to answer questions, but it may take me a while to get to them.
2)"Eat compost and die" type comments will cheerfully be deleted. They won't even tick me off, I just feel pity. Really. So if I were you, I wouldn't bother. (Note to other bloggers- this requirement for basic politeness works- total # of mean comments deleted by me so far ~ 5; spammers deleted ~ 10)
3) Long comments on posts are quite welcome; don't worry about it.
4) I WILL try to answer questions, but it may take me a while to get to them.
5) I don't do memes. Sorry- fun, I know, but I really don't have the time.
6) I can't do email, either; I'm already drowning in the stuff from my other life; and I can't get into giving personal advice. If you want to contact me, just make a comment with your email address in it; I'll get back to you if I can.
6 comments:
Ewww! That was absolutely disgusting and hilarious! This idea could have been used in the movie Wall-E with those folks on their hover chairs.
Greenpa, I googled to see who/what Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are (our Canadian stock market people were also talking about them this morning) and all I can find is a candy company and a mortgage company. Is that what these things are?
Great video - I love the Onion!
would have been a great idea last year when food was still affordable! (sorry, my gallows humor is showing.)
--sgl
They CANNOT be serious! All together now "Oh yes they can"....LOL! Blow mindfulness...if you're eating just eat, if you're walking just walk. Multitasking rules okay....I am joking.
I bet people will buy this too - it will be marketed as a "fun" thing to do and there it'll be - another "wasteaspace" on the market.
Do you think they might have a few braincells spare to work on something useful for once?
Put a saddle on me and strap a feed bag on. That was hilarious!!!! I'm glad I stopped by, I haven't laughed out loud like that in a long time. My kids came running in to see what was so funny. This my day and ruined all at the same time. This is our future, isn't it? Sad. Gotta love the Onion.
Good news for aspiring farmers:
http://calculatedrisk.blogspot.com/2008/07/financial-times-us-builders-forced-to.html
"... farmland close to cities that has often been the seedbed for new housing developments is becoming less valuable to builders, at the same time as farmers want more of it. ..."
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