January 2009

Imbolc is coming up, a Pagan holiday at the beginning of February.  Have you decided how to celebrate Imbolc?  Do you have a menu for your Imbolc feast?  What about themes and correspondences?  Here are a few of the many ways you can celebrate Imbolc.

Grazr is an online service that enables you to combine multiple news sources into a reading list, then turn that list into a live stream.  People can subscribe to the stream via RSS feed, or you can display it in a widget.  A free account lets you create multiple reading lists and one stream; paid accounts allow multiple streams and other perks.  But how can you really make Grazr work for you?

Chances are, you already have a birdfeeder in your yard, surrounded by birds with their feathers puffed into little balls.  But where do your birds go when they finish eating?  Wild birds need shelter from wind, snow, rain, and predators.  You can help them by providing some.

Today a friend asked me what to use besides plastic garbage bags.  There are several options, including compostable bags, biodegradable bags, and biobags.  Recycling and composting can also lighten the load of what goes into the landfill.  Standard plastic is a disaster because it never degrades, just reduces to fine particles.  Here are some alternatives.

I’ve read the extrapolative science book The World Without Us, and watched the documentaries National Geographic: Aftermath - Population Zero and Life After People (History Channel).  So here’s a thought experiment about what would happen to my home terrain, in central Illinois, if humans ceased to exist.

The World Without Us by Alan Weisman.  Picador, 2007.  Trade paperback, 416 pages.  ISBN-13: 978-0-312-42790-0.  Four stars.

            This book is the inverse of science fiction: imaginative science fact.  It begins with the same question -– “what if?” –- but uses research to extrapolate what would happen to human artifacts and to the Earth in general if all humans abruptly vanished.  This covers odd scenarios such as total plague, rapture, or alien removal rather than catastrophic ones such as nuclear war or asteroid strike.  The results are fascinating, sometimes disturbing, sometimes oddly hopeful.

Some people believe that modern urban design contributes to the fragmentation of community and other social problems.  The following article discusses the use of rats to test city design layouts.  While this cannot analyze the vitally important “local color” created by the shops, people, building materials, and culture — it might produce useful information about traffic flow (both on foot and in vehicles).

A quick blog search or look through a blog directory will turn up good blogs and bad blogs … and a few ZOMG WTFBBQ!!! blogs.  What makes the difference?  Is it the blog templates?  The blog software?  Or is content the king, and the peasantry of presentation irrelevant?  Do some people just not know how to have a blog? 

Raising chickens is a good supplement to your food supply.  Chickens produce eggs and meat, both better from homegrown than commercial sources; and chicken droppings make excellent fertilizer.  They come in many attractive colors, making them fun 4H or show prospects.  Late winter to early spring is the season for buying day-old chicks, so start planning now.