Sustainable living

This post by slawson01 led me to this journal entry by a survivalist, which in turn led me to this YouTube video on urban homesteading by an old hippie:

I guess once you agree you want to take responsibility for your own life, it doesn't matter whether your demon du jour is the evil corporation or the evil government. If you control your food, water, and heat supply you control your destiny.

And now I think I'll go eat a homegrown tomato and think about rain barrels and homesteads in Tunkhannock or some such...

My Vacation, Part 5 of 9 -- Saturday, July 25, 2009

First news of the day: Roy thinks he's coming down with a cold. Fortunately, I have a few Cold-Eze.

We had coffee on the porch with Al the Aggregate Guy from Detroit, his wife, and another couple, up for their kids' camp open house. A woman who is canoeing the Susquehanna and delivering art for a festival later this summer is also on the porch. We talk about places to eat. We agree the Wyalusing is not haute cuisine, and canoeist volunteers that there's a wonderful place in Tunkhannock. We heartily recommend the Wyalusing for bar food and rhapsodize about the hamburgers. Al volunteers that his daughter has pronounced herself sick of summer camp's Very Health Whole Foods Cuisine and is dying for a greaseburger, so they're sold. The talk turns to the Marcellus Shale, frac sand, extraction etc. The canoeist is foursquare against it. Al is not sure what he thinks. We talk about new techniques for purifying and re-using the water to minimize the impact on the environment. Roy is pretty knowledgeable about the business of taking the water away in tank cars for processing.

We had breakfast at the Weigh Station again -- Roy was less pleased with the mushroom/provolone omelet of the first day and I was less pleased with the grilled pepper, spinach and feta omelet. But we were satisfied. I also got some pictures of the charming River Walk and some of Towanda's earlier historic buildings.

( can you sense I don't want to give up this vacation quite yet? -- more photos and text )

Squee!

090806_03kipling
Originally uploaded by lb_philly.

I can haz Kiping!

My 32-volume Collected Works, which I believe is complete except perhaps for a very few Varia. Perfect condition except for one sun-faded volume, which I confess I photoshopped a bit here to make it less obvious.

A mad extravagance, the maddest thing I've done for a very long time. I told Roy it was my birthday present and my Christmas present.

Health care reform I could support

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/06/AR2009080602933.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

Via Little Green Footballs.