Entries Tagged 'civilization' ↓

Researching a novel is tremendous good fun. A lot of the time I have no idea where I’m going to end up. Today’s adventure led me, among other places, to this post on neighborhood secession by Matthew Mullenix.

It’s a quick read and not very in-depth, but has some sound ideas. Essentially that by focussing your consumption, trade and energy in your own neighborhood, you can largely opt-out of the system. And if a whole neighborhood does it, it can be a quiet sort of secession. I was particularly moved by his April 1st follow-up comment:

Who will regulate the safety of the food and our health? I think that’s an interesting question and prompts us to ask if regulation of food safety is the same thing as ensuring food safety? It also begs the question: From what does federal regulation protect us?

Today’s case of pastacio contamination, much like the recent peanut scare, offers an important role for federal regulation; but it only becomes so important because our food system is based on interstate commerce and the industrial-scale blending of basic ingredients (like nuts, or corn) into thousands of other food products that will be sold around the world.

Such a system entails tremendous risk, chief among them the fact that once a contaminant is found to have sickened one person, hundreds of thousands have been exposed. It is a huge corporate system that requires a huge layer of government oversight, both at odds against each other and neither capable of managing the inherent risks.

Compare this to a local food system, the smallest being the production line that extends from my garden to my kitchen. That supply chain is short and secure. The producer (me) and consumers (my family and friends) are a limited group who know each other well. We insure food quality by tending personally to its production and preparation, and we share whatever risks that entails. Worst case scenario (a soft tomato?) is that only a few will ever suffer from a system failure.

Thus, my garden is in the best interests of national security. Albeit, the nation that is our family.

This is worth clicking on to see closer up.

This is called Gato. Stealing power from public utilities. This was shot in the Rocinha Favela in Rio.

These are search suggestions in Safari, powered by Google suggest. They make great (and depressing) found poetry.

My new favorite nearly-syllabic-correct haiku:

where is the love
where is the swine flu
where is the undertaker

Bored? What, you finished with all those degrees already?

(ouch, though the last question seems to be well-enough answered by the preceding 9 questions)

Things you cannot escape from: Death, taxes and… iphones!

I love that “How can I keep from singing lyrics” is one of the top suggestions. As I’ve always suspected, music is a virus.

And as far as: How can I get taller?

Good luck with that, people.

Had Twitter not popularized stalking, ’who should I follow’ would be pretty creepy. Actually, scratch that, it still is.

Who should I follow
Who should I marry
Who should be invited to the rehearsal dinner

….seems like maybe someone is getting a bit ahead of himself, here.

Who is my god?

I’ve alarmed the cat by several dramatic readings of this in my quiet office now.

will I ever marry lyfe jennings and get pregnant, and will it be love? Here’s a quiz!

There’s an excellent post over at  Fake Steve Jobs about what, I expect, we all consciously or instinctively know about our culture right now. Fake Steve’s rant is inspired by this great comparison of the fears of Aldous Huxley vs George Orwell in comic form, the words of which were taken from the book Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business by Stuart McMillen, which will definitely be going on my must-read list.

Brave New World is still one of the most amazing books I’ve ever read.

I recently finished Feed by M.T. Anderson, which was an incredibly adept, modern take on Brave New World and highly recommended.

Now then, I’m off to play Risk on my iPhone. And did I mention it’s efffking hot here?

WTF? I live in Portland! The city will drown in a sea of heat wave.