Blogging! Now with less photos!

I still can't bring myself to buy batteries for the camera...actually, I can't find time to buy batteries for the damn thing, and the moment I do, the photo-type-deal will resume.

So, onto the eat local thing.

There was a thread on the knittyboards that got a little snarky...what with folks saying that they didn't have a farmer's market, ect, ect...

I went sluthing, just for shits and giggles on LocalHarvest http://www.localharvest.org, and wanted to see what I could get if I lived in Arizona.
See, there was a woman who claimed that she could get nothing but peppers and potholders.
Uh, not so much...

I was curious about why so many had so much hate for this book...seems that people felt it was unnecessarily political, and were turned off by the fact that she left the Southwest because she felt like the climate, the car driven lifestyle, and the non-water-havin' of the area were not condusive to leaving a small carbon footprint.

Well...it's not. Seriously. That's like being upset that someone leaves SouthBeach, Miami because they don't feel intellectually stimulated.

Major urban areas in the southwest can't fill their own water needs. They beg, borrow, or steal water from other parts of the country. If the damns broke, and couldn't be repaired, there wouldn't be enough water for the residents. The Colorado River now trickles into nothingness.

If one decides to live there, one should know. No judgments from me, just stop being deluded.

Now, if you live in Tuscon, you can eat local, maybe take a bus, and stop trying to grow roses, maybe plant some native plants in your yard, and you can reduce your footprint. It's not impossible.

It does take a little work to recycle...and in Chicago, it's really questionable to recycle at all. Our system sucks. However, almost everyone can compost their kitchen waste, and reduce the amount of garbage bags that end up in landfills.

It's maybe a little more work to buy veggies and fruits at the Farmer's Market...you might have to shop when you might like to be sleeping...but, here at the little house in the ghetto, we think it's worth it. If you don't...that's okay.

Not everybody can bike or bus to work, but almost everybody could decide to bike or walk to some small errand once in a while...I know people who take their car everywhere, even if it's close enough to walk.

I still buy wine made all over the world, but I'm trying really hard to drink local beer.

I don't know, it just seems like we don't have to make these grand, sweeping plans, or stop living in a way that makes us comfortable...just be mindful, and do what we can, when we can do it.

Is that really so political?

I guess so. I'm not sure why, but in many people's minds ecology=hippy.
I live with an ecologist, so it's just sorta part of our lives, everyday.
I don't want to destroy habitat, or kill things with noxious chemicals because I will enjoy my life a little more without tumors and with animals and plants.

I remember when I found out that most household cleaning can be done without a ton of chemicals, and that vinegar and salt are a kick-ass tool. I still buy windex and bleach, I just use it really sparingly.

Having had a health crisis when I was younger of the vaguely spooky kind, I'm more willing to embrace things that don't have a proven tumor-growing effect.

Is that political? or personal?

Oh, and i'm not going to say I'm sorry for getting all heavy, or possibly offending someone.
I think that we, as women, are taught to 'be nice', which turns into 'be nice in public, but say and do really nasty things behind people's backs". And I hate that.

Oh, and I might start trading yarn for soap at my farmer's market, and I'm jazzed about that, just jazzed.