Snowmen

Lila and her friend Cedar were making snowmen today, when a passer by stopped to take a picture. He uploaded it to the PI's photo blog.

10 Years of Christmas Crafts

Every Christmas, we make presents for our family and special friends. That's right - we MAKE presents. Molly and I were trying to remember all the things we made in the last 10 years - here is what we have come up with. I'll see if I can get pictures.

2008 - Felt Christmas ornaments
This year we will be giving out Ornaments for your tree felted with care in our kitchen.

2007 - I can't remember

2006 - Hmm, did we do anything this year?

2005 - "Home Made" music CD
This was an actual CD with music performed by each of us, solo and in various ensembles.

2004 - Lightswitch plates
We took plastic switchplates from the hardware store, and decopaged them with all sorts of things. One of my favorites was the Ant & Bee set!

2003 - Masks
Paper mache maskes, molded on our own (and friends) faces! My parents called this one "wierd!"

2002 - Decopage Chinese Takeout boxes with Cheese Biscuits
We had to let the glue dry long enough so the fumes would not infiltrate the cookies. Also, Molly made some gorgeous pillows this year.

2001 - Picture Frames
Picture frames made out of boxes and other sundry items, containing pictures of the kids when they were still cute. This was one of our earlier decopage attempts.

2000 - Straw Ornaments
We took bynches of straw and formed them into Christmas ornaments.

1999 - Paper Stars
This is the earliest Christmas craft that I can remember. We took colored wak paper and folded them into complex star shapes. A lot of work!

Separating "real" from "secondary" market forces

We worship an idealized market. And yet, in real life it proves to be a fickle god. Like Zeus it throws thunderbolts at hapless earthlings on a whim. But looking closer, can we determine what portion of price movement are due to fundamental supply and demand issues, and what portion is due to the actions of all the secondary participants?

Is this possible, anyone?

Today's New York Times (read the story here) points out that demand for oil is down this year - the first time since 1983. It would be interesting to correllate the actual demand/consumption of oil with its price. If we did so then we could quantify the effect of real demand on the price of oil - whatever is left over must be due to secondary "market" forces (e.g. speculation).

Another argument for Local Market Economies

I like this article by David Korten in this month's Yes magazine. He is taking about how to create a sustainable economy. I haven't read the whole thing yet, but this quote caught my eye:

Smith envisioned a world of local market economies populated by small entrepreneurs, artisans, and family farmers with strong community roots engaged in producing and exchanging goods and services to meet the needs of themselves and their neighbors. His vision bears little resemblance to the Wall Street economy of footloose global capital, credit default swaps, reckless speculation, and global corporate empires.

Rising Yields and Nutrition

It is no secret that agriculture has achieved increasing yields over the last century. Several techniques have been used, from hybridization, to denser plantings, to liberal use of petroleum based fertilizer. And others.

The Organic Center recently sponsored some research in which they studied the level of nutrition in staple foods as it related to these increasing yields. Their conclusion: while the yields of corn, wheat, and others increased, the nutritional value of the crops have generally decreased.

Here is a quote:

But American agriculture’s single-minded focus
on increasing yields over the last half-century
created a blind spot where incremental erosion in
the nutritional quality of our food has occurred.
This erosion, modest in some crops but significant
in others for some nutrients, has gone largely
unnoticed by scientists, farmers, government and
consumers.

Read the entire report (small pdf) from the The Organic Center.

Against the Grain

I am stuck in the airport today. Luckily I have a copy of "Against the Grain" to read. This book was written by Richard Manning. He has been laying a case as to how the activity of agriculture has hijacked civilization. It is a good read.

One of the points he covers is that of subsidized agriculture in the United States. We all know that agriculture is heavily subsidized, and I for one used to think that this was an unfortunate necessity to preserve the way of life of American farmers. However, it is clear that the life of the american farmer is already unrecognizable from how it was 30, 40, 50 years ago. Modern corporate agriculture, the chief beneficiary of the subsidies, has displaced the self-sufficient, independant, clear thinking farmer.

Agriculture is not a closed system. It requires many inputs from the outside, mostly in the form of fertilizer. The fertilizer contains nitrogen, which helps to channel the crop's energy to producing big, ripe fruit. There used to be a problem when fruit got too big. In the case of wheat, it would get so big that the stem could not support it, so farmers had to moderate their application of manure and other nitrogen fertilizers. This problem has been mitigated by hybridization of wheat to product plants with smaller, stockier stems, that won't fall over.

The runoff from all this fertilizer is causing huge problems in our waterways. There is a part of the Gulf of Mexico called the "Dead Zone" - a place where nothing lives - that is caused by excess nitrogen in the water.

Farms used to include livestock, the manure of which would be used to fertilize the crops. In addition, some of the crop was saved each year for seed. Also, farms used to grow several crops, which would be rotated to preserve the nutrients in the soil. According to Manning, this has all changed. Seed is purchased each year from the big Ag companies - (e.g. Archer Daniels Midland, Monsanto). Fertilizer, produced from petroleum, is likewise purchased from outside. Crop rotations are not necessary as chemical applications can replenish the soil nutrients. Furthermore, government paychecks are super important to the farmer. He knows he can count on them when a crop fails, so he has an incentive to plant on poor land - he'll get payed anyway.