Terrifying news about industrial pork. This should come as no surprise to anyone who knows anything about CAFOs, but it's still pretty gruesome.
Luckily there are good resources on where to buy food that won't kill you - or anyone else. Except the pig. Oh no, not the pig.

Our Backyard Garden mentee, Traci (click here for a terrible picture of her in her garden), is having a work party at her home in West Oakland this Saturday at 1 p.m. If anyone would like to come, please let me know. It's not far from BART, and I'd be happy to give you a ride to and fro if you'll help. We're gopher-proofing her garden, which I've ( Read more... )

Finally.

If Obama gets the nomination and 98 fails by a lot, I will consider it a Tuesday well spent.

Yet another environmental threat that no one thought about until now. Seems that nanoparticles used in some commercial applications might be unfriendly to humans. How sad that government can't keep up. It might make a cynical person think that our system of regulatory controls was broken and something new was needed.

The Sierra Club has created this excellent little video, "The True Cost of Food." Oversimplified, of course, but points to some home truths about the hidden costs of industrial agriculture.

I woke up reflecting on the various services this nice planet of ours provides. The novel I was perusing last night ("Starmind" by Spider Robinson) is set on a space station and a major point in the plot occurs when a solar flare makes everyone batten down the hatches. Isn't it nice how we hardly have to think about solar radiation down here on the ( Read more... )

TSArassment [zah - rass - ment]: The mixture of tedium, humiliation, scrutiny and neglect one must endure to get on an airplane in the post-9/11 era. The term may be enlarged to compass such treatment one endures elsewhere ( Read more... )

Gandalf: "I was delayed."

Obi Wan Kenobi: "So what I have told you was true . . . from a certain point of view."

Dumbledore: "I cared about you too much."

Also, Freefall is an excellent webcomic that features an uplifted wolf engineer.

It's great to see some research on the agricultural capacity of land for different diets. I'm glad they're looking at the different carrying capacities of different types of land.

Meat-lover post on Gristmill. Let the flames commence!