Still Winter

My Idea For The Stimulus Plan...Obama, take note!!

I believe we can make a quantum shift into a green era, but it won't be through bi partisanship... I thought of an answer to the proposed stimulus plan...We have 435 fairly equally populated districts in the USA...each represented by a person in the House. The Republicans are being obstructionistic, ideologically they still believe in fairy tales like 'trickle down'...Give each congressional district a billion dollars to use as they see fit for infrastructure, work projects, or tax breaks for corporations...That's 435 billions of dollars. Then, take another 400 billion dollars and allow the federal government, under Obama's administration, to stimulate demand through creating jobs, etc...that Obama wants. Win-win...see what happens. See if the Republican districts all of the sudden become more affluent...and create more jobs...or if the working poor in those districts lose more jobs...and become hungry and angry.

The Hunger Moon

I've had as many as 17 deer here at one time this winter, that was on New Year's Eve...so it seemed like a gathering of sorts. Generally we have 13 deer visiting, with a hardcore group of 9 of those being individuals I recognise (and have named) and who recognise me... For the past couple of weeks I've heard wolves howling in the forests...not close, but not distant either. Two weeks ago during a snowshoeing trek on our trails we happened upon big cat tracks (I've seen a mountain lion here in the past). The day before yesterday I saw no deer...and the evening was eerily quiet...not a sound of anything moving...every critter in the woods stealthy and on guard. Yesterday 3 of the friendliest deer showed up, the three that are always together...we call 'momma', 'black ears' and 'nubbins'...but they were fidgety and nervous. No sight of anyone else. Today, of those 3, only momma and nubbins came by...but oh so wary...nubbins dashed away after only visiting for a few minutes...ears back and the hair on his withers up... The group have split up...cautiously lying low...The Full Hunger Moon is coming.

Genetic Defect Destroys Earth!!!

Common chimpanzees and bonobos (the other chimps) have 24 pairs of chromosomes...we, on the other hand, have 23...it seems somewhere along the line pairs 2 and 3 fused... The three species have very similar skull formations at birth, although homo sapiens sapiens maintains that structure pretty much intact without many changes, while the chimps structure (and other apes) change and mature. I submit that fusing of numbers 2 and 3 chromosomes is a birth defect which is genetically inherited, and took humans away from the natural order...and kept us 'locked' in mental infancy...where the universe revolves around us and we break everything that's put in front of us, and fight, kick, scream and throw tantrums...once humans reach sexual maturity they reproduce with abandon...decimating other species (some of which were used for food) into extinction...and destroying the 'playpen', the earth. And like children, humans live in constant fear of when 'daddy' will get home, and take off his belt to punish us. Please bow your heads in prayer.

Full Moon, January 2009

As I write this, after playing music for the past hours with a friend (whose fingertips became bloodied from the strings and strength of his playing)...I ponder what is going on. Collapsing markets. Foreclosures. Job losses. Anger pulsing from deep within people's ids and egos. Israelis' jets and drones raining down punishment upon an impoverished, imprisoned people...angered by the poverty and embargos...and yet, the wealthy feel justified. Okay...back off. I didn't mean for this to take a political bend... Soft....fingers tracing circles lightly on a glistening forehead. Your gentle voice... I'll be 61 on the next full moon. Was I ever 50? I don't remember. I believe I've always been a child-like person. Playing. Fearing. For you all, I wish the strength of peace and love...wherever in the world you are. There is no now...there is no tomorrow...there is no yesterday. It's all mystery, and that is fine with me.

Buy Nothing Day

http://lauraflanders.firedoglake.com/2008/11/27/the-church-of-stop-shopping/ Reverend Billy and Savitri D of the Church of Stop Shopping on the day after Thanksgiving. It’s known as Black Friday to many but to Rev. Billy and Savitri D, it’s Buy Nothing day. And with an economy in decline the Church of Consumption, where everything was a profit center, has taken a hit. What will replace it? Rev. Billy and Savitri D say that instead of looking to the corporations we can look to ourselves. Support your local economy. Give time not money. Hell, make something. Reverend Billy's Ten Commandments THOU SHALT 1) Forgive people, yourself and everybody else. We all shop too much. 2) Know your Devil. Shoppers are only dancing in the land of ten thousand ads. Consumerism is the system. Corporations are the agents of the system. 3) Respect the micro-gesture. Magicalize the foreground. Fore-go the plastic bag and grab that bare banana– Amen! 4) Practice asking for Sweat-free, Fairly-traded products. That's the rude that's cool. 5) Buy less and give more. Giving is forceful, the beginning of fantastic new economies. 6) Buy local and think global. Love Your Neighbor (buy at independent shops) and Love The Earth (walk to, bike to, mass transit to – the things you need.) 7) Citizens can buy or not buy, produce or not produce. We can change to a sustainable personal economy. Then corporations and governments will change. Envision the history of a product on a shelf. Workers and the earth made that thing. Resisting Consumerism is an act of imagination. 9) Complexify. Don't be so easy to figure out. Consumers tend to regularize. Shopping at big boxes and chains make us all the same. Viva la difference! 10) Respect the heroes of the resistance. A small band of neighborhood-defenders who staved off a super mall with years of protests? Beautiful. It's our turn now.

We Can't Have Our Earth And Eat It Too!

If every fertile woman in the world was limited to one child...and it somehow began tomorrow, our current 6.5 billion human population would drop by 1 billion by the middle of this century. (If we continue as projected, it will reach 9 billion.) At that point, keeping to one-child-per-human-mother, life on Earth for all species would change dramatically. Because of natural attrition, today’s bloated human population bubble would not be reinflated at anything near the former pace. By 2075, we would have reduced our presence by almost half, down to 3.43 billion, and our impact by much more, because so much of what we do is magnified by chain reactions we set off through the ecosystem. By 2100, less that a century from now, we would be at 1.6 billion: back to levels last seen in the 19th century, just before quantum advances in energy, medicine, and food production doubled our numbers and then doubled us again. At the time, those discoveries seemed like miracles. Today, like too much of any good thing, we indulge in more only at our peril. At such far-more-manageable numbers, however, we would have the benefit of all our progress plus the wisdom to keep our presence under control. That wisdom would come partly from losses and extinctions too late to reverse, but also from the growing joy of watching the world daily become more wonderful. The evidence wouldn’t hide in statistics. It would be outside every human’s window, where refreshed air would fill each season with more birdsong. ~Alan Weisman, "The World Without Us"