Saturday, September 30, 2006

grocery list

Well, I managed to make it to today without any bumps and now tomorrow I am off to learn strawbale construction. This is my first "living by myself without female significant other" grocery list:

2 each five-grain organic tempeh
2 blocks RGBH-free cheese, one monterey jack, one sharp cheddar
3/4 loaf Great Harvest bread
1 head organic garlic
4 each organic onions
1 1/2 pound red lentils
1 1/2 pound brown basmati rice
1 bag organic potato chips, yogurt and green onion
1 jar of local honey
2 boxes organic green tea
1 box "sleepytime" tea
4 free-trade bananas
5 pounds local organic yellow potatoes
1 can organic refried black beans
1 can roasted garlic salsa
1 package 8" flour tortillas
2 thai rice noodle packages
1 box organic Kashi cereal
1 box organic soymilk
1 pound local butter
1 jar Hellmanns mayo
6 eggs
1 jar Spike seasoning
12 pack Leinies
12 pack Sierra Nevada


What do you think?

Tuesday, September 26, 2006

internship

So in a few days I am off to intern at Happy Dancing Turtle http://www.happydancingturtle.org for October and November. Happy Dancing Turtle is a partner with Hunt Utilities Group http://www.hugllc.com/ which is a family owned for-profit. It seems that HDT is housing me and HUG is supplying most of the tools, projects, and technical training. Check out the HUG site for pictures of the buildings and projects they are working on and to get a sense of what this is all about. I will be learning strawbale and cob construction, as well as refurbishing solar panels. So I should be done by Thanksgiving.

Friday, September 22, 2006

Thoughts on a rainy day #1


When an ideal is envisioned one must work toward the fruition of that idea. An ideal is something that one creates as a building block of one's moral and ethical reality. When we work toward an ideal, we work toward the idea of something better, which indicates the power of the idea, the power of imagination and thought, the mind. What is the mind? Is the mind the brain? Is the mind the electrical impulses in the brain? Is the mind the individual electrons that make up the impulses? When you deconstruct anything, it becomes nothing.

An ideal can be good or bad. We all have the idea that we are something more then the physical being that we seem to be. We call it spirit or soul or atman or ghost. Most of us don't feel the need to define it. Is it real or as it a collective hallucination?

Then faith emerges to prop up the ideal. Without faith the ideal becomes unreachable, unrealistic, and there is no impetus to reach the ideal. Without faith in the ideal it becomes nothing. So faith arises out of the individual spirit, the jiva in Sanskrit, out of our "minds" and our "hearts". Without the faith that the ideal can and will be realized there is no reason to work toward the ideal. It's an example of quantum physics in that we create what we we see by seeing it, we destroy what we don't see by not looking. In any case, the more you take it apart to look at its parts the more it resembles nothing.

The ultimate ideal is God. God can be described as everything, or within everything, or as a separate being. It is ridiculous to describe God as anything less then everything, as a God apart from everything makes everything look ridiculously like nothing. If God is everything, our jivas are God, as well as everything else. It's simple but important.

Why work toward something good? Why not? Why move or breathe or walk or sing at all? The reason is that you want to become happy, that you want others to be happy. And to be happy you want to know God, and God is nothing less then love, and love is joy. Essentially all existence is joy. At the essence of our enlightenment experience is comapassion and the realization that we are not seperated, that we are all utterly connected, and this brings joy to us.

Thursday, September 21, 2006

a response to my organic farmer blog

Noah said...

All your points are silly. Let's take them one by one.

1. How is it better to support your local economy then the poor Chilean farmer? Is an American better somehow? Is someone who lives close to you better?

2. If the product is being made in Chile there is even less harm to the local watershed then if it is grown by a local organic farmer.

3. The vegetable is probably fresher, but that doesn't necessarily mean it is any more nutritious.

4. You will only save a small amount of petrolium products for your vegetable. Large ships use a lot of oil, but they also carry huge ammounts of produce.

5. Your local farmer care no more about you than the large corporation. They're both in it for the money. But the local organic farmer asks for more of your money.

Also, you say that food co-ops were started to help poor people. If that was the case, it is no longer. They are the gathering places of snobs.

Give me a big Safeway or Albertsons any day.

4:33 PM

Delete
Cosmic Monkey said...

Noah, why do you prefer a Safeway or Albertson's to a small co-op or grocery store? Is it because you like being the anonymous shopper, you like the giant buildings pulsing with wasted energy, the glib and unresponsive staff...You need to reevaluate why you prefer a giant box store before I can really debate you about local organic agriculture. You want to pay 5 cents for an apple from mexico? Go ahead and suck down those pesticides and herbicides, go ahead and feel happy about subjecting those farmers to these chemicals. Your points are not thought out:

1. It is better to support your local economy because that is where you live. Don't you want to support your neighbor, build a relationship with the farmer, recirculate your "hard-earned" cash in your town? this has nothing to do with being "better".

2. There is no harm to the local watershed when a product is farmed organically. None.

3. Fresher vegetables are better for you. There are more enzymes and vitamins. This is a scientific fact.

4. You don't honestly believe this? The farther away a vegetable comes from the more fuel is used in getting it to your plate.

5. The small local organic farm cares about the community and the earth. There is no other reason to get into organic farming. There is not alot of money in it. The farmer might as well work at UPS and get health insurance and a decent wage, rather then work their ass off every day for no money and no insurance.

I said in my blog that the co-ops were started to help the poor get bulk commodities, and now they have turned into rich peoples dietary centers. But I think it's important to support them anyway, the same reason I think it's important to support your community even if you think it's full of assholes. Only you can be the change.

1:05 PM

Wednesday, September 20, 2006

You can't understand anything until you have sprouted a seed

No you can't. Not until you've seen a small seed burst with infinite energy out into the universe, expanding forever outward toward the only thing that matters, sex. Whether you sprout a handful of lentils or a ten foot corn plant, seeing magic take place on the linear tightrope of time opens the mind up to the possibilities of the galaxy.

Friday, September 08, 2006

Isle Royale

Well we just got back from a six day trip to Isle Royale National Park in Michigan.

The weather was beautiful the whole time, no rain. Our first boat ride out last Tuesday was canceled because of the waves being too high, so we had to wait around for another day. The boat ride out was fun, buit 3 hours is a long time no matter what you're doing. When we got to the island, we and a few opther backpackers were instructed on the "leave no trace" principles, which was irratating.

The hiking was hard but rewarding. My partner got huge blisters on her toes the first day and we had apply bandages frequently, but she hiked through the pain with hardly a complaint.

Our favorite time was spending a full day on the beach, where we did yoga, meditated, and watched the waves. I also met a giant bull moose on the beach.

The last day was pretty hard. We hiked around 14 miles up and down ridges in the sun and we were tired and in pain overall. But we also agreed it was the most beautiful part of the hike.

I will blog more about it later, and perhaps add pictures.

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