Garden Update

We had a big pea harvest last week. I had four friend over and we ate the first haul. The next day I picked and preserved (froze) a bunch more. Fresh peas are fantastic!


Below are two community garden photos. You may notice that there are two raised beds. That is because a few days ago I built and planted a second bed, this one with sweet corn. Fresh sweet corn is one of the most fantastic treats, however for us to enjoy this we have to have a fairly late first freeze this fall. That's the case because I planted late! I have my fingers crossed it will work out, but today was a good sign: they started to come up!

The second photo is of a small plot I started because there were some unused plants laying around and I didn't want to see them die. There are squash and the plant that produces the green part of green salsa. I feel like an adoptive parent.

The Open Championship

Tomorrow professional golf's third major championship of the year begins as players tee it up at the British Open. Tiger, however, won't be there due to a totally doodled knee. The last time Tiger was not present at one of golf's major championships was at the PGA Championship in 1996. That year the "Macarena" was #1 and Bill Clinton was busy beating down Bob Dole in the presidential race. Will anyone be watching the Tigerless golf tournament?

Schooooooooool

My journey toward becoming a teacher took its first baby steps this morning. After a meet and greet with lots of delicious foods, we started classes toward obtaining a Masters in Teacher Education.

You'd think I'd have some commentary about how weird it is to be back in class, go through orientation, yadda yadda, but to be honest it feels pretty normal and good. I guess that's a good thing though. So the ship has set sail, let's hope the winds keep blowing strong.

SUVs and Trucks

I generally loath SUVs and heavy trucks that are used for commuting rather than their intended use: work. Vehicles are for moving people and with environmental and financial concerns what they are, people should use the most efficient vehicle that fits their needs. For every extra gallon of gas used because folks drive an oversized vehicle (or walk/ride) there are extra greenhouse gases emitted, increased smog in the air, and more money in the coffers of extreme regimes around the world.

Read that again: Every extra gallon you use sends more money to places like Saudi Arabia and, eventually, into funding extremist organizations. Eventually our soldiers and taxpayer dollars are expended fighting those very organizations we fund.

I was reminded of this when I read a great slogan that was pasted across a billboard depicting a hummer. It read:

Real soldiers die in their Hummers so you can play soldier in yours.

Exactly.

On that note, I've always wanted to paste stickers on SUVs that read, "Osama loves your SUV."

Tour de France, Part Deux

Anyone use the info from the previous Tour de France post to get a date with the cute guy/girl at the bar? Hope so.

Here's some updates:

1. Juan Mauricio Soler, a favorite to compete for the King of the Mountains jersey*, crashed in the first stage and withdrew after crashing in the first stage and breaking bones in his hand.
   
2. If I'm not mistaken, the overall leader--the guy who wears the Yellow Jersey and is leading the race--has changed every day. As of today, however, Kim Kirchen, a rider from US-owned Team Columbia, has led two consecutive days. It's been a wild race so far with many lead changes.
3. Yesterday's stage was the first with big mountains and I saw something that incited a Google Field Trip: At the top of a mountain climb a rider grabbed a handful of newspaper from a spectator and stuffed it into the front of his jersey. Apparently at the top of a climb the riders are incredibly sweaty and use this low-tech method to protect and insulate their body from cooling off too fast as they fly down the mountain.
4. Speaking of going downhill, the riders will reach speeds of 90 km/h (55 mph) while descending some mountains.
   
5. Finally, there are only four American riders in the race, but one, Christian Vandevelde, sits in fourth place overall and is considered a contender for the overall win.

*There are four winners jerseys up for grabs:

1. Yellow Jersey: Overall leader based on time.
2. Green Jersey: Points leader based on winning designated sprints that are spread throughout the race.
3. Polka Dot Jersey: My favorite, the King of the Mountains jersey is given to the rider who demonstrates the best climbing ability.
4. White Jersey: Best Young Rider jersey given to the highest ranked rider under 25 years old.
   

Now, back to watching the race!

This Makes Me Proud

I'm poaching this from Sarah, a blogger over a Beastcorps.

This. Is. Unreal.

I love Pac-Man and have played my fair share of hours at this game, but to achieve this kind of perfection doesn't seem possible. In fact, at about level 10 I found it difficult to simply eat just one of the Bad Blob Guys (not their official name) before they stopped flashing, much less all four.

It goes to show what a person can do if he puts his mind to it.

Yuck

It doesn't happen very often, in fact I cannot think of the last time, but when it does it's really really really gross.

Yesterday I picked the first bunch of raspberries from our bushes and sat down to enjoy them in a bowl of shredded wheat. I plopped down at the table, poured in the cereal and milk, added the raspberries, pulled up a newspaper, and took a bite.

Then took another bite.

Something was wrong.

Up to this point I was concentrating on reading the newspaper, not looking at the cereal. Then I looked... and saw floaties. The milk was curdled.

I stopped eating, but I must admit that I picked out the raspberries and ate them. I couldn't bear the thought of wasting the first "crop." Judge me if you will.

Shrinkage?

No, not that kind of shrinkage. Today we're talking about the downsizing of food products at the grocery store. While listening to NPR today I heard an interview with Ben Popken, the editor of The Consumerist, a blog about stores, consumer products, and anything where consumer things go wrong.

Today on "All Things Considered" they were discussing how food products available at the grocery store are getting smaller while prices are staying the same. Ice cream containers are getting smaller, cereal boxes have fewer ounces, margarine tubs are shrinking... all without announcing this to the consumer and keeping prices steady. I'm not sure how I feel about this, but my gut tells me it's wrong.

If packaging remains the same then it is deceptive. There are two schools of thought here: 1) The consumer needs to be aware and protect herself or 2) Producers should make ethical decisions that provide consumer protections. Thankfully we do not live in a black and white world and the reality is some of each philosophy is true. Blogs like The Consumerist help counterbalance big corporations when they pull this type of move.

All that being said, I'm convinced that M&M bags are smaller. Period.

80.43

Question: What is the distance traveled, in miles, by Zachary and Brian by bicycle this morning?

After a little more than eighty miles, three thousand vertical feet, and about four hours on the bike, I'm beat.

Balloon Man

Last year Kent Couch tried to travel from Bend, Oregon to Idaho... via air... specifically a flying lawn chair... powered by big balloons. Awesome. Last year he made it Union, Oregon, a small town just 15 minutes from my hometown.


I didn't take the picture, thanks to Pete Erickson for the fine shot from last year's attempt. Pretty spectacular, right?

This year he tried again and, lo and behold, he made it! It's pretty incredible. Not only is it a long ways, but the mountains he crosses are a bunch of 8,000 foot peaks. Anyhow, cool stuff happening here in Oregon.

Deposits: Part Deux

After writing this about can deposits, talking to folks at the community garden last night about the giant floating trash heaps in the oceans, reading this post by my friend about half marathons and plastic bags (Catchy tagline, eh? Click the link for the story.), recalling how my hometown ships our trash 45 miles to a neighboring town because we filled our dump up, and after receiving 3 cents off my groceries at Safeway because I brought my own bag, I got to thinking more about deposit programs. The basic premise: put a deposit on everything.

What if cardboard or newspapers were worth 10 cents a pound? How about plastic packaging running a cool 25 cents a pound? What if all things used for packaging and consumer goods had a deposit you paid up front but could recoup if you brought it back to a recycling center?

The philosophy is simple: put a value on everything so it creates a market for that waste. If companies had to pay the money to dispose of returned packaging then they would be incentivized to reduce, recycle, and reuse old packaging.

Currently that cost is on you and me: we buy a product, in the products price is the cost of the packaging, then we have to pay the garbageman to dispose of that trash. Instead, with a deposit system, the price for all of that would shift to the producer. If they used less packaging they would have a lower price, thus improving their competitive edge.

Living green means much more than emitting fewer greenhouse gases. It means eating food that has fewer chemicals applied to the land, it means using less water so rivers and aquifers don't run dry, and it means using less stuff--plastic, paper, etc--so as to create less trash. Wouldn't creating a value for what is currently considered waste do a lot to move us in that direction?

Can Deposit

In Oregon there is a 5 cent can deposit. For those of you not familiar with the process, whenever you buy qualifying beverage products--currently aluminum cans, glass bottles, plastics pop bottles, and, starting next year, bottled water--you pay 5 cents per can/bottle up front and when you bring it back to the recycling location (usually the grocery store) you get your 5 cents back. It's a cost neutral incentive program designed to increase recycling.

The problem, however, is that 5 cents may not be enough. While riding a bicycle on country roads I see dozens of cans and bottles coloring the ditch. The other day I asked my two fellow riders what they thought about increasing the can deposit from 5 cents to 25 cents. It is still cost neutral--the 25 cents up front are returned when you bring it back--but with a higher deposit people have an even greater incentive to return their cans and bottles.

Brian and Tim (the cyclists) argued that that would cause people to stop buying as many beverages, but I'm not convinced. I think about how gas has tripled in cost yet people continue to drive all the time. Would an additional few dollars in up front cost, the equivalent of one gallon of gas, cause people to slow their consumption of beer and pop, especially when they get that money back?

How about you all? What are your thoughts about increasing the can deposit? Anyone out there reading this in a state where it is 10 cents (Michigan)?

UPDATE: From Mike in comments, here is article from NYTimes Magazine that has more info about deposits. It also answered one of my questions about if a higher deposit induces higher recycling rates. In Michigan (I originally said Maine, but corrected it above) the deposit is 10 cents and there return rate is the highest in the country at 97%. Good to know.

Le Tour de France

I'm blogging from The Tour!!!

Well, I'm blogging from my couch as I watch The Tour on TV. Nearly the same?

My guess is most of you aren't intricately interested in The Tour, so instead of boring details, this blog can serve as your source of talking points, or bits of news, in case you find yourself at the bar or some party talking with a cute guy/girl and the subject comes up. Rather than go drop-jawed "uhhhhhhhhhhh" you can sound interested and knowledgeable thanks to my blog! Here goes:

A) The first stage* was today, a 197.5 kilometer stretch from Brest to Plumelec.
B) In the past the race started with a week of flat stages that favored sprinters, but this year they have eliminated those flat stages in favor of more grueling hills.
C) As a result of doping charges the team favored to win, Team Astana, was banned from the race.
D) Last year's leader, Alberto Contador, is part of that team and therefore won't be able to defend his title.

*The race is 21 days long (plus a couple rest days) with each day's race called a "stage." Each stage all the riders start and finish at the same points and the leaders are determined by how much time they gain by by the end of a stage.

I've always loved watching the race, but now that I've been racing I think the viewing experience will be different. I know the feeling of riding in the peloton, the pain of dragging you and your bike up the side of a mountain, and the thrill of moving down the road at 25-30 miles per hour (or faster).

Unfortunately professional cycling has become synonymous with performance enhancing drugs. Team after team, individual after individual have been caught sticking needles in their asses. Just yesterday while riding with a former semi-pro rider from Colorado, she told me that there was significant doping by her male and female counterparts who were only semi-pro.

Still, with all the scandal, I love watching the cycling and sightseeing as they meander through France.

New Fuel?

While I much prefer the idea of car free towns where people are transported by bicycles, public transportation, and their two good feet, the reality is people are addicted to cars. The fact is that gas prices are going up and it's due to nothing more than simple economics: demand keeps going up but supply is not. The bottom line is that cheap oil is thing of the past.

So, we can either keep emptying our pocketbooks buying oil from countries like Iran, Saudi Arabi, and those dastardly Canucks, or we can search for alternative sources of fuel that will decrease pollution and keep money in the United States. Of the Big 3 alternative fuels they all have significant limitations:

• Biofuels: Use lots of water, cost a lot, and (some argue) drive up the price of food
• Electricity: Batteries aren't quite good enough to do what most people expect from a car
  
• Hydrogen: Bad, terrible, and worse. Lots of reasons why hydrogen isn't the future.

So what about this:



Want one?

Bad Friend

I've never had this happen.

While on my big East Coast swing I borrowed a book from a friend's boyfriend: Kurt Vonnegut's Timequake. The plan was to read it along the way and mail it to him when I finished the book. Everything went according to plan until I received this:

*In an attempt to protect the identity of those involved I have covered The Boyfriend's name with an old dirty ear plug.

Evidently the book exploded out of Packaging Jail and escaped. Oh no! In my book (pun intended) one of the major Friend Sins is borrowing something and losing it, no matter where the fault lies. Ugh.

I'm supposed to fill out some forms in hopes that they find the lost contents or, perhaps, I can recoup the loss financially. It goes for $.29 on Amazon, but the sentimental value is priceless. Oh my.

My apologies J-Dizzle and M-Flow (identities protected!!!!).