That's the hand of an organic farmer holding GM soybeans. We pulled them off some plants, still standing, on a walk this afternoon. Funny, isn't it - it's almost December, the ground is too wet to drive any machinery on, and if this were two fields over, it would just be a crop loss. But if you're planting patenteted seed, and it isn't the terminator variety, do you then not only lose whatever money you had invested in that year's crop, but have to play a licensing fee the next year if the soybeans you didn't harvest reseed themselves - even in a haphazard way, even if you didn't want soybeans?
But the sale of the seed is not the biggest joy. The chief point of much of the engineering is to make the crop compatible with the company's own herbicide. Let's not forget that almost half of Monsanto's revenue comes from sales of RoundUp (NY Times, 2 Aug. 01). Let's not forget that they're not devoting their considerable research dollar clout to better crop rotations, or tillage for weed control. No, instead, we are fed the line that they care about us because glyphosate is less toxic than Atrazine. And perhaps I can feel all moral about driving my emissions spewing car everywhere for no reason at all, because hey, I'm actually doing the atmosphere a favour - think of all the emissions I'd be spewing out if it was an SUV! Much the same logic as carbon credits, but that would be a whole other rant.
But all of this must be a good thing, now, mustn't it? It's not like we haven't been directly subsidizing the development of this sort of stuff. I can't begin to tell you the warm fuzzy feeling I get when I see investment to the tune of $4M in a product that I would argue is in the best interest of an agrichemical company above all else. No shit we're talking conflict of interest here.
But putting money into supporting organic certification, *that* would be an unfair advantage, wouldn't it?
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I am not an environmentalist. I don't deserve that title. I don't make enough sacrifices in my life to warrant it. I tend to fall back on the, oh, but it's not as bad as it could be logic I just trashed.
Here's how I see it: we use too much energy. But simply raising the price of energy, that leaves those who are marginal literally in the cold and dark. But why do we not have graduated energy prices - up to x KWH per month is at base rate, beyond that we are looking at a series of ever-increasing rates. x is to be determined by type of dwelling and occupants (yes, I realize it gets more complicated once we start to consider commercial users). Make it so that I can maintain 20 degrees and run the fridge and the like with ease - but so that I would seriously have to consider whether I am in fact too lazy to line dry my clothing.
But then, rising gas prices haven't exactly put a damper on the gas guzzler craze, now have they? I guess income disparity is too great these days - in order to use price as an appropriate motivator to get one element of the population to cooperate, it is either too low to be meaningful for another - or, alternately, so high that it effectively shuts some people out of the game altogether.
Our mentality, however, is still at letting the bottom line determine, and relying on economic costs and benefits as a motivator for behaviour. We've been trying this for years... why is that the only avenue we can even begin to consider? The potential of a solution is limited by the scope of the thinking of its creator.
Ah, but I sound like an idealist tonight.
Yesterday's dusting of snow in Guelph had me screwing up my face much like Calvin (of Calvin and Hobbes fame) and thinking "c'mon, snow!". I wasn't wishing for a snow day like Calvin was (I have way too much to do right now to possibly appreciate a snow day), but I now want to get on with winter things. I want to build a few igloos, and finally get the hang of the skiing thing, and take my snowshoes places, and generally get rid of the fall bleakness. Christmas lights don't look quite the same without the white stuff, either.
There is so much to snow - as I started learning last year when I flirted with the igloo obsession. Did you know it only takes a tiny bit of pressure, and powder snow can turn into solid blocks? You have to get the arms of the flakes to interlock. Too much pressure (and even a little is too much sometimes), and they break, and then you just get crumbs. And if the ground is warm when the first snow falls, and more falls on top of it, you get a crust at ground level that isn't good for anything - in steep terrain, it increases avalanche danger, and in snowshoeing country, it means more breaking through.
I remember getting a "feel" for bread when I worked in a bakery - I could touch a loaf of bread (mind you, we didn't use preservatives) and tell you its age within 12 hours. I could look at it, and tell you if it was sourdough or not, and the major grains. It was simply a matter of handling 60-odd kinds of bread every single day.
I can see getting the same kind of feel for snow and ice, if you spend enough time with it. It's incredibly complex and varied stuff. I have so much to learn. Good thing Igloo Ed is so friendly, he's my snow guru (and the source of much of the information above). Hopefully, some day I can follow him around in person and get him to show me more about snow.
The ice guru position is vacant.
Cars suck.
My car decided it needs a new master brake cylinder and a new head gasket, all in one shot. This required more touching of my car's guts than could be accomodated in a Friday afternoon visit, so it got to stay there for the weekend. And I got to anticipate a big repair bill and be without wheels until Monday at the earliest.
It's not really a big deal, not having the bunny for a few days. I've always been a bit annoying with my mantra of, I don't want to live my day-to-day life in a way that depends on having an automobile. So a weekend without a car shouldn't be a big deal (though I did have to bail on plans with Elke). I have a bike! And if I want to go to the farm, it's on one of my favourite summer after work bike ride loops. And that's what I did.
But why is it so funny (if you're in a car, and with your equally evolved companions) to drive really close to some cyclist fighting with a brutal headwind and then when you're this close, honk your horn? The ride out on Saturday was not the most enjoyable ride ever. But yesterday, I started at the farm, and did a 35km loop that took me down the escarpment and back up, along roads that I'd never been on. Now that was fun. And I wimped out on biking back to town.
But I want my car back. After all, my bike is still at the farm, and how else am I going to go get it?
Last week, I drove through Ottawa rush-hour traffic every day - and I knew it was rush hour and that traffic was "heavy" because the local CBC morning show told me so. Today I drove through Toronto just before noon, and traffic was so light that the signs were on the usual "stay alert, stay alive" and similar message cycles, not on traffic comments. The 401 from Oshawa to Mississauga around noon on a Monday required more alertness and had similar traffic volume to Ottawa rush hour.
I can't begin to talk about how glad I am that I am, by and large, not dependent on traffic rhythms. I walk to work. We don't really have traffic rhythms in Guelph - it's always slow going through this town, not because of traffic volume but because of the traffic lights that I'd say are random in their timing. Except they're not, they're not random at all - they have a very complicated pattern that is designed to turn amber just as you get near it. It is more noteworthy for me to cross this town and get two green lights in a row than it is to stop at every single intersection.
I'm all for increased carbon taxes and making it less inconvenient to drive than alternative modes of transportation, but I fail to grasp what this achieves. Grumpy motorists? Increased idling times? Less smooth traffic flows and thus a greater consciousness of cars everywhere? I'm very conscious of cars every morning, there are not very many choices on my way to work - I have to cross the river, and both bridges I have available are busy routes. The volume of exhaust I swallow probalby negates any health benefit from walking up the hill. But at least I'm not stopped at every light!
(Why is there no footbridge over the Eramosa between Gordon and Victoria? I would like a footbridge.)
Crossing from Hull to Ottawa at dusk today, Iain said, I think you should document days like today on your web page too. He was right. A couple of hours earlier, I sat in the Black Sheep Inn, pint in one hand and sandwich in the other, and I commented that I couldn't remember the last time I'd felt so relaxed. There's a lot to be said for spending the day driving around on back roads north of Ottawa, listening to music on the stereo that cost more than the car, under bright sunny skies, when there's a dusting of snow on the hills. It feels good to talk with somebody who's known you for almost 20 years, and it feels just as good to not talk and get lost in your thoughts and the onion layers of Outkast on the stereo. Good snacks, good vibes, good laughs, good times. It doesn't have to be an epic adventure to be a wonderful day.
And then, just like that, one day you realize that all the leaves are down. For weeks, it was bare patches - and trees that still clung to their leaves, even if they lost some every time the wind picked up. This past weekend, it got cold enough that the the mums outside my door died. But, after all that grey and rain, it was sunny. So I took a few hours to go outside on Sunday.
I went to Luther Lake - or marsh or swamp or fen or bog, whatever you want to call it. Apparently, all four of these wetland types are represented here. I didn't investigate enough to find this out, though, I think I only saw swamp. When I got there, the first small lake I saw was frozen over. I assumed it was only a very thing crust, and hurled some pebbles out. They bounced. So I picked up increasingly bigger rocks - even the one as big as my fist, that I threw in a high arc, just bounced and then skidded away. It was thick enough that I couldn't have bashed my way through it with a canoe. It was also really cold - exposed to the wind, I was not happy.
Further in, I found the abandoned house - abandoned ruin, rather. It sat in a clearing, and was sheltered from the wind. I sat on the house's former stoop, and drank my tea. Then I stomped on into the swamp, to give the waterproofing on my boots a test. The ice was not thick enough to hold me for more than a couple of steps. The waterproofing does not work at the seam where the tongue meets the toe box. So much for my excitement at having melted SnoSeal into every possible crevice.
The hot tea was truly the best part of the outing. And it was nice to see the sun again. You know winter is close when you take your thermos everywhere.
On my radio today, all this fuss obout the Brits and their ranking of the 100 greatest novels of all time. I have read 24 of them. Actually, truthfully, I've read 23 and half of two more. Almost all of them before age 20. Only a very small number of those would make my list - the proportion is small enough that I am not inspired to start reading the rest of these classics now.
But then, I read to be entertained. Whether or not it qualifies as litt-ritt-ur, I could not care less. If it sticks in my head, if it makes me think, if it keeps me awake longer than I planned on staying awake because I don't want to stop reading, I like it. But I'm unlikely to see Mendel's Dwarf, A Prayer for Owen Meany, The Diviners, Animal Dreams, Stones from the River or Making History up there.