Spill Baby Spill

Having recently spent several weeks along the Gulf Coast stretching from New Orleans and through Pensacola, and then along the “Forgotten Coast” of the Florida Panhandle near Apalachicola, we are acutely aware of not only the natural beauty of the area, but also the fragile nature of the ecosystems there. Already damaged by the cumulative effects of mankind and the back to back damage from a series of devastating hurricanes, this area is now faced with a challenge beyond our imagination. Having experienced first hand the effects of an oil spill in an area not nearly as fragile or teeming with wildlife, I can only imagine what the long-term effects of this disaster are going to be.

With that said, I want to apologize for this disaster because it is entirely my fault. Yes, BP and Transocean are responsible for the failure of the equipment, and yes, our Government is responsible for the failure to regulate those responsible for the equipment, but in the end I am responsible for my insatiable appetite for oil that caused all this to begin with. I am not a big oil user by any means, so even more responsible, and soon to be crying for help are the fishing fleets that rely on big diesel motors to ply the waters and harvest the fish that will soon be dying by the millions. The day they stop using oil to power their boats is the day I will feel that they should be compensated for the losses they will suffer from this. The truth is none of us are innocent, and once again I include myself with my solar powered home and all my good intentions in this statement. I still drive a truck, I still have more products than I care to think of that are made from oil and I am still a major part of the problem.

So we can cry, and we can point fingers, but in the end there is only one culprit. You, me, and the horse (power) we rode in on. I don’t care how “green" you tell me you are, and I spend a great deal of time telling others how “green” I am. MEA CULPA. I am guilty, you are guilty, and now we will collectively pay the price. The government has said that BP will be responsible for all the costs associated with this spill. I know the birds and fish and turtles and all the other wildlife that teems along these shores are looking forward to receiving their first check from them.

I am not an oil spill expert, but I am smart enough to read between the lines of what our government and the scientists are telling us to realize that this is a disaster of epic proportions, and one that will hasten the tipping point for total global ecological disaster by a magnitude that will not be understood for years or even generations to come. President Obama, bowing to pressure from the Republicans, and desperate to find any other solution to our addiction to oil than actually kicking the habit recently proposed (much to my absolute shock and horror) an increase in offshore drilling to reduce our dependence on foreign oil.

There is only one dependence that can be reduced that will help in the end, and that is the dependence on oil and a high carbon footprint lifestyle. Drill Baby Drill only invites Spill Baby Spill, no matter who is in charge. Developing carbon free, renewable sources of energy on a scale equal to or surpassing the nuclear arms or race to the moon may be the only answer that will actually produce any results. So from the car we drive, to the lights in our house, to the plastic bags for our groceries, and a thousand other products we use everyday that we don’t even know are made from oil, like our food, we must all change our ways.

Texas Wildlife & Wildflowers

Texas is well known for its wildlife, from the Coyote Ugly bars in San Antonio, to the beaches on the Gulf Coast, but from the moment we arrived in Texas, we realized that the wildlife here, in the form of birds, deer, turtles, turkeys, wild pigs, and even a panther or cougar of some sort that I saw and nobody could seem to identify, is abundant everywhere. From a maddening good hour before you wanted to wake up, the birds sang a cacophony of tunes that dazzled the senses. At the same time, some of them were predictable, and began each day with the same tune at the same time and led us to wonder, was it the same bird? At any rate, wherever you turned in Texas, there was wildlife in abundance.

One day I came across a group of wild sow pigs that were nurturing their suckling piglets. There were only perhaps a half dozen mamas or so, but there were easily 50 or more tiny piglets traveling aside, “How cute” I said as we drove by them. “Not really” my Texas companion replied. “These pigs are not indigenous to the area, and those 50 piglets will become 400 pigs within a year, and will eat everything in sight, causing huge environmental problem. There is an open season on hunting pigs year round, and hopefully, the landowner here will realize that they have a problem and come down and slaughter as many of these pigs as they possibly can.”

I love animals, and the thought of destroying them really bothers me, but man has created a situation where it is very easy for some of these life forms to get out of control. This includes deer, pigs, and turtles among others, and it breaks my heart to think of having to slaughter them, but we have upset the natural balance, and it seems that all the king’s horses and all the king's men will not make it natural again.

And then there are the wildflowers. Although we left Texas just as the wildflower season was going into full bloom, the flowers here are amazing. Everywhere you go the fields and roadsides are alive with color.

So there were snakes on the road, birds in the trees, deer in the bush, turtles in the ponds, pigs on the run, big cats in the bush, and wildflowers everywhere. Texas is blessed with a plethora of wildlife, but it also has a responsibility to it as well, and I think and hope that they will take it seriously.

SMUD

The particular part of Texas that we found ourselves has an interesting type of soil to say the least. After a few weeks on the ranch, I nicknamed this glutinous substance SMUD. Somewhere between sand and mud, this stuff will suck you in, chew you up, and infiltrate every part of your vehicle and every other available pore and orifice that you can imagine.

Not long after our arrival, one of the guests managed to ignore the warnings to keep the golf carts that were available to them “on the roads at all times”. The reason for this warning is that the SMUD, quickly engulfed the poor little cart and proceeded to swallow it whole. By the time I arrived, the guest (clutching what appeared to be a cocktail) had already fled in horror, and the golf cart was quickly disappearing below the surface. No problem I thought as I headed over with my ¾ Ton Chevy pickup that in addition to pulling the Airstream is also fully capable of pulling a 100 foot tall Douglas Fir out of the ground by the roots .

As I drove ever so slightly off the road to attempt a retrieval, I suddenly felt the truck begin to sink faster than George Bush’s approval ratings. This cannot be happening I thought as I continued to sink further. In just moments, I was up to my axles in SMUD and hopelessly stuck. As the sun was already beginning to sink, much like I was, I decided to come back the next day before attempting to rescue my vehicle, hoping perhaps that tiny Texas gnomes would be kind enough to dig it out during the night. Much to my chagrin, there it was the next morning, still buried to the axles, and still going nowhere. Now I have been stuck in the mud before, but this SMUD is not like anything I have ever seen this far from the beach. I once watched a full-size pickup sink beneath the sand completely on the Oregon Coast, and for awhile, I was afraid that would be my fate as well. Pretty soon though, a few good souls but especially my friend Armando pitched in to help me out, and through a combination of manpower and horsepower, finally managed to free me from what I can only describe as quicksand.

Just a word of advice should you ever find yourself in the middle of Texas surrounded by SMUD. Stay “on the roads at all times”!

Armando

One of the true pleasures of our stay in Texas was the opportunity to work with Armando. Armando was the lead ranch hand, and an indispensible part of the operations. Always there, always smiling, and always ready to do whatever it took to get the job done, Armando is the kind of guy you want on your team and easily did the work of two less dedicated people.

I am an early riser, but everyday when I showed up at the barn to get things started, Armando was already there and already working. God only knows what time he got started, and he was usually still working when I called it quits from shear exhaustion.

When my truck got stuck in the quicksand that they call dirt here, Armando jumped in with a shovel and helped me dig it out by hand. When a few of the cattle got loose on the road, Armando showed me how to use a combination of food to bribe them and brains to fool them into heading back into the pasture. And when we got ready to leave, Armando showed me that between his somewhat limited English, and my very limited Spanish, we had built a bond that I will always remember.

So here’s to Armando..Via con dios Amigo!

Get along little doggie!

One day the ranch owner called and suggested I “go along” on a “calf tagging" expedition. The new crop of young cattle had just been born, and in preparation for eventually selling off these cattle so the land can be returned to a more natural state, all the young calves would need to be tagged. This of course is something which I knew only enough about to be pretty sure I don’t want to be involved, but what the hell, I grabbed a pair of gloves and met Paul out in the field. Paul smiled heartily as I told him that Carol suggested I “watch” them tag some calves. “Watch!” he laughed, “ain’t no such thing as watching!”.

This turned out to be true, and I soon found myself knee deep in mud and cow shit and watching in amusement as grown men tried to throw ropes around the necks of the baby calves. Much like archery, I didn’t have a lot of experience at calf roping, so I quickly decided that I would just grab one of the suckers. I was almost instantly successful, and in one of those “be careful what you wish for” moments soon found myself with a “small” calf that probably weighed a hundred pounds and was at least as strong as I was nestled in my arms. Needless to say, the calf was not overly happy about this, and I quickly found out that his thousand pound mama wasn’t either. Snorting and bellowing at me to let go of her calf, I found out that the best defense against an angry cow is a cowboy hat. Unfortunately I had left my cowboy hat, along with my cowboy boots and chaps back where I never owned them, and was grateful when Paul came to my rescue and chased mom off. We got that first calf tagged in short order and emboldened with my success, I soon grabbed another and another. While the Texans were having little success with their ropes, when all was said and done, three out of the four calves we were able to tag that day succumbed to my clumsy but successful technique. Final score JB 3….Cowboys 1!

On the other hand, one of the things I did enjoy was riding a horse, and whenever possible I tried to tag along on the morning horseback ride. These weren’t just horses, these were Paso Finos, and a more enjoyable, easy gait ride cannot be had. The 650 acres held a load of visual treasures in the early morning light, and I never grew tired of seeing the oaks or the cedars, the ponds and the turtles, or the other farm animals out for their morning stroll.

On the Job Training

As part of the work we had agreed to do on the ranch, I became involved in some of the guest and day to day ranch activities. This led to some amusing involvement in things of which I had little or absolutely no knowledge. I keep a quote on my computer that says “I am very experienced at doing that that I have never done before”. Never before in my life has this been so true. It started out with little things, like when a guest requested a one hour “Archery Session with Instructor” that was offered on the website. As there was no instructor on staff, and the only one available was me, I quickly became the staff archery expert. As luck would have it, when I was a kid my next door neighbor and constant torturer David was an expert with the bow and arrow. Try as he might, like so many skills that I tried to acquire when I was young (baseball, roller skating, wrestling, etc.), I completely sucked at it. However, what I have learned is that 40 years later, much of the knowledge that I tried to absorb at that time but that my adolescent body was simply unable to use effectively, has lay hidden under the surface just waiting to surface. Apparently this is much like the pimples that at 56 ears of age one would think you are done with, but which still seem to erupt from time to time.

Anyway, as I nocked the first arrow in the bow and prepared to take a shot, all the while pretending that I knew what I was doing, the kids I was teaching watched in awe. Pulling back the bow I let the arrow fly and much to my surprise and their amazement, nailed a bull’s-eye on the first shot. OH WOW, they exclaimed! HOLY SHIT, I thought silently to myself while outwardly pretending that this is something I do everyday. “OK, now you try” I said, breathing a huge sigh of relief that I was now completely off the hook, and wouldn’t be required to prove myself again. From now on, anything I said was the gospel, and they just ate it up.

My next challenge turned out to be trap shooting. Once again I had never even tried this sport before I was required to be an expert at it, but being an excellent shot with a pistol and a rifle, I though “how hard can this be”. What I found out is that hitting a target that is moving across your field of vision at the speed of light with a load of tiny pellets is something like merging onto an LA freeway from an on ramp while towing a truck and Airstream that are over 40 ft. long and don’t exactly accelerate like a Ferrari. Something I do have experience with. It’s possible but not easy, and you may spoil a perfectly good pair of underwear in the process. Shotguns are a loud and messy affair compared to the guns I am used to and firing one is a rude awakening. Fire shoots from the muzzle and the stock slams into your shoulder with a force that is quite surprising. But once again, just like Leonardo Di Caprio in “Catch Me if You Can”, half of looking like you know what you are doing is successfully pretending you know what you are doing. Pretty soon terms like “lead the target” and “try and nail it before it reaches the tree line” that I had heard from Paul (a real expert) where rolling off my tongue. Before long my “students” where hitting clays like experts and all this from someone who has yet to fire a single shot at an actual target. Later I received a nice “thank you” note and a tip from one of the parties whose teenage kids I had “taught” to shoot. Will the wonders never cease!

Oddly enough, fishing was the last thing I had to look good at, and this is something I do know how to do. However having grown up a fast water trout fisherman all my life, fishing for bass and catfish in a pond was decidedly not something I was good at. In spite of that, I did manage to pull of a plausible lesson for some of the guests that day, but they did not catch any fish which is not all that unusual. Several days later when the real fishing instructor was able to show up, his guests caught a total of 15 fish (catch and release), and it was the first time they had ever done it. I was humbled, but oh well, I did pretty good overall, and as they say, two out of three ain’t bad!

Looking for the Heart of a Saturday Night

Most Friday and Saturday nights were spent at Carol’s restaurant. Not only was it the best place to eat for miles around, it was pretty much the only place to eat for miles around. This does not include the Cat Springs Country Club, a converted gas station complete with the old gas pumps that apparently (since I don’t eat them) serves one hell of a good burger, except on Friday’s when they only serve catfish. Surprisingly, no major golf tournament has ever been held here. As a matter of fact there is no golf course, but if you need a warm burger and a cold beer somewhere halfway between Austin and Houston, this is the place.

Anyway, back to Carol’s. Carol, the owner of the ranch/B&B that we were staying and working at, has built a local clientele based on a very un-Texas like menu, a little good wine, and lots of good company. While we soon knew all the usual suspects that would show up on any given weekend, we never got tired of the way they welcomed us into their world.

We soon learned that the always impeccably dressed in his Texas best Poor Ol’ Bob’s wife G. Marie was a world class country music writer and singer who would often entertain us until late at night after most of the regular guests had long departed. We got to know Paul & Robin, close neighbors of Carol’s that loved to drink a little, OK sometimes a lot of wine and laugh and laugh. Paul soon became the natural target for some of my jokes, and was always able to flick it back at me in style. Paul is a giant of a man with a handshake, a smile, and a laugh to match. And who could forget Skeeter, a Pulitzer Prize winning photographer, Skeeter has adopted Carols ranch at Cat Springs as his home, and tirelessly helps Carol with whatever he can in exchange for an extraordinary place to hang his hat and practice his art Then there was Pete. Pete was a character that would show up after a couple of beers at the Country Club for a couple of more at Carol’s and liven up the party. He also has a heart of gold, and one night presented Kate with a beautiful hand-made “Sunday-Go-to-Meeting” walking stick made of Texas Crape Myrtle with a brass head and tip. Kate was stunned and it is just one of the mementos we will carry with us forever.

These are just a few of the wonderful people we would meet, and does not include Carol’s delightful staff. People like Gina who will soon be headed to Ireland to try her hand at acting in a country where she will stand out instead of being just another waitress/actress wanna-be that line the streets of New York and Los Angeles. Or Cindy who proudly showed us the pictures of her beautiful children including her 10 year old daughter who is preparing to break out of small town Texas and leave for Australia on a scholarship program for which Cindy worked her heart out to support her.

As much as they like to wave, most Texans we met also like to laugh. They have an open, no holds barred sense of humor that not only allows them to laugh at the rest of the world, but also at themselves. Not everybody can do this, and it’s one of the things that makes them so endearing. And when they laugh, Texans don’t let out a little guffaw, or a slight chuckle, the Texans we met preferred a great big belly laugh and a smile as big as their heart. While their sense of humor tends toward the more obvious, they seemed to love my sense of humor which tends toward the subtle play on words and the pun. While most of them did not tell that type of joke, they seemed to love them, and it was very rewarding to have a table full of Texans at Carol’s of Cat Springs laughing that big old Texas laugh.

The Texas Two-Finger

One of the first things you find out about Texans is that they are friendly. They are very, very friendly and they like to wave at you. In fact, they like to wave at you a lot. At first we thought the maybe it was our Oregon license plates, or the classic Airstream we were pulling, but after we had been there awhile, we realized that they wave at everybody and it’s apparent that different occasions call for different waves.

First, there’s the graceful “Rodeo Queen” wave that you are likely to get from a total stranger sitting on their porch as you drive by. Then there’s the “Howdy Y’all” wave which is much bigger and more enthusiastic and is likely to be given when you pass a group of Texans out for a horseback and Lone Star Beer ride which they are frequently known to participate in. But perhaps my favorite wave, and the one that will damn near wear you out giving it, is what I call the “Texas Two-Finger” wave. This ubiquitous wave is given by most country-dwelling Texans to nearly every truck that passes by. I say truck because I never actually drove a car in Texas, and I’m not sure it has the same status as a truck, but when you are driving a truck, Texans honor you with this wave. It is a subtle little wave compared to the others, and involves clutching the top of the steering wheel and then raising the first two fingers of your right hand in a salute to passing drivers. Maybe it’s because the countryside is so vast out there, and just seeing another human being can be a cause for celebration, or maybe it’s because Texans are just so damned undeniably friendly. Either way it becomes a reflex after a while and something you actually miss when you travel out of state or go to Houston which apparently many Texans would like to believe actually is out of the state.

After three months in Texas this had become such a habit that I absentmindedly did this little wave as we headed east through Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and finally into Florida. In some cases people just glared at me or I got no response at all, while in others I got the famous one-finger salute so well known outside of Texas. I finally had to make myself stop altogether as I was afraid I was drawing the attention from some of the local police. It’s funny how something like a wave can be so much a part of life in one place, and so out of place in another.

Welcome to Cat Spring Texas!

Of all the States we have visited, one of those we least thought we would spend much time in was Texas. We had both “been” to Texas before, and although the people here were always very friendly, neither one of us had seen much here that we thought would bring us back. What we found out is that Texas, like California only even more so, is so big that you haven’t really “been” to Texas until you have traveled thousands of miles through all types of terrain.

We also found that the people here are not only very friendly, they have a ribald sense of humor, love to eat, drink and party together, and make everyone feel at home.

We ended up in Texas for two reasons. One, you kind of have to go through it to get from Louisiana to New Mexico. Two, we had been invited to the tiny town of Cat Spring by the owner of a 650 acre ranch that also operates as a very unique Bed & Breakfast. Scattered across the acreage is a plethora of small cabins, cottages, and farmhouses available for guests. Each one is tastefully done in variety of themes, and guests come here to get a taste of ranch life and away from the big city. The ranch owner who is interested in returning a portion of the ranch to a more natural prairie state, and “greening” up her operations had invited us to visit and discuss a possible consulting position as she moves forward with her project. The opportunity to spend some time on the ranch and discuss the possibilities for the future was very tempting, so after spending the holidays in New Mexico with my family, we headed back to Texas.

The ranch is situated in the bucolic rolling prairie lands that begin at the edge of the Texas Hill Country. Studded with massive live oaks and dotted with ponds, the ranch is currently home to a small herd of cattle, some horses, chickens, peacocks, geese, goats, a pot-bellied pig, dogs and cats, along with a few emu, antelope, bison, a kangaroo, and even a camel. The long-term plan that they are working on is to remove the cattle and restore the pastures to their native prairie grasses and wildflowers. This is a process that is slowly gaining popularity in Texas, a place where cattle are king, and an exciting trend for the future. The ranch owner also wants to establish a wildlife preserve here where some of the native species such as fox and quail can return and flourish.

Sitting halfway between Austin and Houston, Cat Spring is a tiny little town with only one stop sign, a Post Office, a couple of Antique stores, and Carol’s at Cat Spring, an incongruous gourmet restaurant operated by the owner of the ranch. This would become our home and the source of our adventures for the next three months.

Three Rivers New Mexico-Ghosts, Rattlesnakes, Petroglyphs, and Trains!

Our friends and artists Cameron and Pamela Blagg who we visited in Montana (Our Visit to the Blagg's) had told us they would be in New Mexico in December to give Sue Tassinari, their partner at their Art Gallery and Trading Post in the former Ghost Town of Three Rivers, New Mexico a little time off. As we were planning to be at my Mom’s in Albuquerque for Christmas, we figured we could fit a visit in. I love Ghost Towns and the history that surrounds them, so I couldn’t wait to get there.

As we drove past the Trinity Site where the world’s first nuclear bomb was detonated, the desert spread out in front of us for as far as the eye could see. I have always appreciated the stark beauty of the desert, but I’m thinking “not much of a place for an art gallery”! Much to our surprise, in the middle of this desolate landscape, Three Rivers jumped out of the desert and appeared like a shining oasis. This classic stucco New Mexico building with its jutting portico, exposed wood support beams, and bee hive shaped anteroom, just reeks of history. It has been everything from a Biker Bar, Restaurant, Post Office, Trading Post and God knows what else in its lifetime. The Blagg’s bought it in a severely run down condition, and have with the help of Sue and some of the locals, restored it to not only its former glory but a new state of beauty. Complete with an old schoolhouse, the town is a mere shadow of its former self. Once a bustling whistle stop, after the trains no longer stopped here for water, the town dried up and died.

Cameron greeted us with a big smile at the door, and we were soon parked out back with an absolutely stunning view of the snow-capped Sacramento Mountains. As it is winter, the trees that normally make the grounds surrounding the Trading Post green were barren, but from the pictures we had seen, you could tell that in the summer this place was gorgeous in that high desert sort of way.

The Blagg’s had invited us to stay as long as we wanted, which is a huge mistake when you are dealing with a couple of boondocking, Airstreaming, gypsies like us. After over 17.000 miles of traveling, I had some maintenance work to do, so we took them up on it. While we were here, we also wanted to do a little sightseeing, and check out the Three Rivers Petroglyphs Site in particular.

This area is known for its overly large rattlesnakes, but luckily it is too cold for them this time of year, so they were all hibernating. Sue told Kate some pretty good stories of her encounters with them. I like snakes, but prefer the non-venomous kind, and as I was about to spend the next couple of days lying on my back under the trailer, I was not too upset that they were nowhere to be seen.

Our arrival at Three Rivers had nearly doubled the current population here, and along with Cameron and Pamela, actually increased it five-fold from its normal high of one. As Cameron has been debating the installation of a new water system, we wondered if our arrival as terminally unemployed workers might somehow make the water project “shovel ready” and qualify the town for some much needed Obama Bucks! With a 40% unemployment rate (us), a few million bucks would go a long way here, and based on some of the other projects we have seen that have qualified, this would be money well spent.

As we settled in for our first night, we began to hear the trains. They started as faint ghostlike screams out on the desert and then rolled into long lonesome whistles and finally rocketed through the Airstream like an eight ball hammering into the corner pocket. It is a good thing we like trains, because they were frequent, long, and mighty close by. Having lived in a house in Bend for a short time that was so close to the tracks that over the years the framework of the house had actually gotten loose, the house would rock and roll like Elvis before he donned a white cape and got fat. So needless to say we were used to it, and it soon became part of the routine.

At the Three Rivers Petroglyphs site there are over 20,000 Native American Petroglyphs and I drove up to take some photos in the early morning light. As the first rays of the sun played across the rocks, I thought about the people who once lived here and created these works of art. What were their lives like? What inspired them to create these drawings? Was it a desert when they lived here? I later got a chance to chat with Joe Ben Sanders, a friend of Sue’s who is the premier expert on not just the petroglyphs in this area, but the history of all the native peoples and the settlers up through modern times. Joe is a true local, born and raised, and an unassuming gentleman who I never saw without his signature cowboy boots and hat. From his laid back country manner, you might think he drove trucks or raised cattle for a living, but Joe is a trained archeologist and I listened intently as he told me his theories about the Indians who once lived here. Joe has developed a somewhat controversial theory that the modern day Hopi’s are the descendants of these Indians, and bases it on years and years of studying the petroglyphs both here and throughout New Mexico. What most people see is a random scattering of drawings almost like graffiti, from a people who disappeared long ago. What Joe sees are the legends of the Hopi, still handed down today from one generation to the next. His passion for the subject and the area has spawned dozens of books on the subject, some of which are available at the Trading Post. You can see the Petroglyphs at my photo gallery on our website at: ……..

While we were in the area we took in the White Sands National Monument, the old mining town of Ruidoso, and Lincoln City, the hangout of Billy the Kid. We also stumbled across the ironically appropriate “Post Apocalypse Reclamation Center” in the nearly deserted downtown of nearby Carrizozo.

We ended up spending nearly two full weeks at Three Rivers as the Airstream repairs took longer then anticipated, and the hospitality and the ever-changing beauty of the desert were a joy indeed. If you ever find yourself on HWY 54 headed North out of Alamogordo (and who doesn’t!) stop by Three Rivers and say hello to our friend Sue. There is always a pot of coffee on, and as the two bikers who stopped by while we were there had heard, it is the best in New Mexico.

For more photos of the Petroglyphs and New Mexico CLICK HERE to visit our website.

Christmas in Cuba-New Years in Nowhere!

My Sister’s family has a small cabin just north of Albuquerque in Cuba, New Mexico. Despite the fact that I managed to piss most of my family off through some disparaging remarks about Albuquerque after our truck was vandalized there, they invited us to spend Christmas with them anyway. That is the beauty of family, no matter what kind of grief you give them, eventually they always seem to love you anyway.

Snow had fallen the day before we arrived, and although it made it difficult to reach the cabin, it was beautiful. The storm had passed through and left some bitterly cold but strikingly blue skies behind. My sister had arranged for us to stay at a friend’s place just down the road and when we arrived we found a quaint little cabin nestled in the pines and glistening in the snow. Already pretty warm from the solar potential created by the large windows and brick flooring, the woodstove soon had the cabin cooking, and we looked forward to a quiet night in front of the fire.

As we settled in for the night, I thought about Christmas, which is a somewhat confusing time for me. I appreciate in so many ways what some people call the “true meaning of Christmas”. It is a time for family, for friends, for giving and receiving, and for cherishing the gift of life and all the people we know and love. On the other hand I am appalled by the commercialization of Christmas, from the ritual of “Black Friday” to the conspicuous over consumption that it inspires. As we are on the road full time and it is much harder to send or to receive gifts, we have been largely spared from participation this year. Our Spartan lifestyle on the road has also led us to find that what we really don’t need is more “stuff”. But my family managed to shower us lightly with gifts that we could use (food), gifts that we could love, (self-made art and music), and gifts that we could laugh at, then return (the Obama Chia Pet).

Christmas with my family was a joy and a pleasure. New Years spent with just the two of us on the New Mexico desert was a joy and a pleasure as well. Sometimes it is just another day, and sometimes it is full of meaning, but it is always full of life.

A Good Planet is Hard to Come By

Nestled in the foothills of the Santa Catalina Mountains just outside of Tucson, Biosphere 2 rises from the desert like a gigantic diamond with thousands of jeweled facets gleaming in the sun. However all that glitters is not gold and Biosphere 2 is no exception. Plagued by controversy and labeled by many as a “failure”, this massive experiment has managed to prove that Biosphere 1, our planet, is an incredibly complex system, and that man’s puny efforts to replicate or control it often produce less than the desired result. We recently spent the day there and here is our report.

Funded by wealthy oilman Edward P. Bass, the initial project was designed to study how man might create artificial earthlike sanctuaries in space and on other planets, as well as to learn more about how our planet does what it does so seamlessly, flawlessly and seemingly effortlessly. What looks like a giant greenhouse, is in reality a complex set of systems designed to regulate the water, air and soil that was to be the key to the inhabitants survival. What they learned was that mother nature has spent billions of years, not millions of dollars to perfect her systems, and that there are so many pieces to the puzzle, that missing even the slightest detail like forgetting to seal the concrete which resulted in a gradual loss of oxygen, can be a disaster. But unlike Biosphere 2, where the occupants always had the option to open the doors and step back into Biosphere 1, we have no options when it comes to our survival.

As with any experiment, the outcome is not always certain, that is why you conduct it. So Biosphere 2 is considered by many, as living proof of how resilient life is on this planet, and yet how fragile, surviving only within a narrow band of environmental parameters. If, like the designers of Biosphere 2, we miss a few details about the impact of human activities on the ecosystems, the results may be, just like at Biosphere 2, the shutdown or collapse of those ecosystems.

When the first eight Biospherians were sealed inside the structure in 1991, the whole world was watching, and the problems began almost immediately. Food production was inadequate due in part to unusually cloudy skies caused by El Nino. Plastic used to reinforce the millions of cubic feet of glass reduced the UV radiation reaching the inhabitants resulting in vitamin deficiencies. Cockroaches, brought into the experiment as they were considered important for their ability to breakdown organic materials, began to overrun the place. And the people, both constantly under the microscope from the outside, yet hopelessly trapped with each other inside, began to breakdown as well. Yet remarkably, these eight people stuck it out, and for two years they worked and lived in this sealed goldfish bowl with no inputs from the outside world. The diminishing oxygen finally resulted in new oxygen having to be imported from the outside world, but in all other respects, they lived and breathed and ate and drank from the same materials, recycled endlessly, that they had entered with. When they left, they were all 25 lbs. lighter, their skin tone reflected the lack of natural sunlight, and while relatively healthy, they all looked like hell. I can only imagine the strength it took to tough it out.

By the time the second group of Biospherians entered the structure in 1994, many of the original environmental bugs had been worked out. However six months later the human factor would bring the entire mission crashing to an end, and Biosphere 2 would never again be operated as a sealed environmental test.

Today, time has taken its toll on the habitat within the structure. The various Biomes including the 850 square meter ocean complete with coral reef are in different states of health. The coral reefs, much like our own, have collapsed completely, and the science being conducted is now being changed to help us understand the effects that global warming may have on our ecosystems. The rain forest is slowly being dried out to replicate the effects of drought, and the CO2 levels in some of the other Biomes are being increased to study those effects as well. The University of Arizona now operates the project, and it appears they have saved it, at least in the short-term, from the destruction many thought would occur when a land developer who has plans for a resort hotel and housing development bought the property in 2007.

Stephen Hawking, the brilliant mathematician has said that the survival of the species may depend on our ability to leave this planet at some time in the future. I would argue that why should we waste our time and precious resources trying to find or create a new home on a distant or inhospitable planet, when we have a perfectly good one right here. Biosphere 2 has proved that it is not any easy job to steward a planet. We have a lot of work to do.

For more info and pictures, CLICK HERE to visit our website.

6 months, 17,000 Miles, 32 States, and One Lifetime Later

As 2009 draws to a close, Kate and I find ourselves in the desert of New Mexico taking a bit of a hiatus from our travels. In part because we found that trying to do one of our shows or visits became more difficult as the holidays approached, in part because we wanted a chance to visit with family and friends, and finally because we needed a bit of a break from the rigors of the road.

So what have we learned in 6 months, 32 States, and 17,000 miles of traveling? Well, first of all it has been an incredible journey so far. We have met a multitudinous array of people, and virtually without exception, from North to South and East to West, these people have welcomed us warmly, treated us kindly and opened their hearts and their homes.

Sure, there were a couple of jerks, like the guy who sprayed the side of our vehicle with gravel when he became impatient in a line of cars and did a “burn out” next to us. Or the gal that sat there in front of a gas pump and finished a long cell phone conversation while our Airstream sat sticking our in the road and snarling up traffic. Or the vandals that decided to take a hammer to the side of our vehicle in New Mexico. But these were pretty minor annoyances in comparison to the hundreds of people that toured our Airstream, or the dozens that offered us a place to stay, a warm meal, or a hand with anything we needed. Many of these people were family, many were friends old and new, but many of them were complete strangers, and as we count the days to Christmas we are counting our blessings as well.

We also learned, and hopefully taught many others that you can reduce your footprint on this planet without giving up all the comforts we often take for granted. Yes, you have to make adjustments. Like turning the water on and off as you shower, which saves a remarkable volume and still leaves you feeling fresh and clean. Or how to operate a composting toilet, which although is a bit more work, the feeling you get from NOT flushing down several gallons of fresh drinking water each time you get rid of your excrement actually makes you feel guilty when you do use a regular toilet. But the biggest thing we learned is that although we lived with a lot less, we still lived in relative comfort and style, and that “giving up” things doesn’t have to be sacrifice, indeed it can be a joyful liberation.

Sometimes we learned that which we already should know. Like how the fact that our water is a finite resource becomes painfully clear when you have only a 30 gallon tank of it, and you have to think about where that next 30 gallons is going to and coming from. And as we predicted the Airstream has become for us a microcosm of the real world, and of our planets potential future. A world where water is in short supply, where our waste of all types must be carefully recycled, where when it gets hot or cold outside, it gets hot or cold inside, where a safe place to sleep at night is not a given, and where each of us considers more carefully the effects of our actions on the environment.

The first thing you learn from small space living is that no matter how few material possessions you take with you, you need less. During months of preparation for this trip, we carefully went through each item to determine it usefulness, and like many travelers we have been shedding items ever since. When you think about it, we are all just travelers on this planet. Here until the end of our journey, we will either leave it clean and ready for the next round of visitors, or trashed like some funky campground full of pop bottles, candy bar wrappers, and cigarette butts.

Our children and grandchildren are the next visitors to this campground people, what on earth will they find? We all use too much, we are all guilty, and if there is even a glaciers chance in hell of stopping catastrophic climate change, we all have to do more to use less. Here in this great country that we have been blessed to be born in, where nearly all of uses more than our fair share of our precious resources, will have to bear more of the burden for change or the less fortunate people of this world will suffer terribly as our resources become increasingly scarce.

Decidedly, not everyone we met agreed with our views. Indeed some disagreed passionately. But what was interesting is that everywhere we went, people were willing to talk about it. I remember in the 1960’s when the war in Viet Nam was raging and the struggle for civil rights had reached its peak, and it seemed like most everybody was on either one side or the other. War protesters and civil rights demonstrators were beaten in the streets by the police who were clearly aligned with the powers that be, whether it was the military industrial complex or the institution of racism, and meaningful dialog was hard to come by.

But today, and I believe due in a large part to the courageous struggles of the 60’s that changed our society forever, people seem at minimum willing to talk, and frequently willing to listen. However as they say, talk is cheap, and as we just learned in Copenhagen recently, we can talk a lot and get little or nothing done. The time for action is upon us, and personally we have decided to act. We hope from our actions will come results, and from those results, a chance to keep learning more about how we can shape the future. We hope you will continue to join us.

Best wishes from the road!

John & Kate

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The Gas Museum

As we were headed toward Taos on our way to visit the Earthship Landing Zone, we passed an amazing pile of gas station memorabilia and a sign that said “Museum”. Intrigued, we pulled in and started to take some pictures. Before long we were greeted by a man who appeared from the back of the property. Surrounded as we were by the thousands of pieces of old gas stations and other automobile paraphernalia, I said “Wow! Nice collection! How long you been doing this? ” “Bout two weeks” he fired back, chuckled and wandered off towards an old Coca-Cola cooler that was sitting on the front porch.

Reaching in to the cooler, he wrestled around for a few seconds and came back up with a small wrapped package about the size of an ice cream bar. I had noticed the sign out front, in addition to saying “Museum”, also said “Moon Pies”. Having not seen a Moon Pie since some time in the 60’s, I assumed the sign was just part of his collection. But lo and behold, here he was clutching an honest to goodness Moon Pie! As he unwrapped it to eat, I couldn’t help but notice the Moon Pie almost looked like it had been around since the 60’s, but he happily began to munch on what had been one of my favorite treats when I was very young and before my Mom realized they probably weren’t the best snack food in the world.

His collection was incredible, and included everything from vintage gas pumps to oil cans and posters, and even an old typewriter of the same make and model I remember my Dad banging away on a few hundred years ago. With obvious pride he showed my brother-in-law Simon and I around the museum which was packed so tight you get barely get down the aisles. Out in the parking lot sat a nearly complete, although quite dilapidated small diner on wheels. Everything was still there, from the 50’s style bar stools to the sink and stove, and even some of the pots and pans. Johnnie, as I found out his name was, was planning on doing a full restoration this summer and selling some ice cream out of it to go with his Moon Pies.

Simon bought a small trinket, and I made a donation which I found out Johnnie gives to the local Humane Society each year. As we drove away, I realized that someday all the paraphernalia of the fossil fuel powered automobile age will end up in a museum. Perhaps Johnnie is just a little bit ahead of his time.

To enjoy more photos of the Gas Museum and New Mexico CLICK HERE to visit our photo gallery.

Earthships Land in the New Mexico Desert!

While enjoying a visit with my Mother and my Sister and her family in Albuquerque, we took a little journey and headed up to Taos for the day to visit the “Earthship” community that is growing on the edge of town. The Earthship concept has been designed by Michael Reynolds who has been pioneering the development of eco-friendly housing for over 35 years, and whose innovative designs have been built around the world.

Nestled into the desert under the brilliant blue New Mexico sky, the Earthship community pops up from the sagebrush and juniper just outside of Taos. Located about a mile or so past the stunning Rio Grande Gorge, the community has been slowly blossoming on the arid landscape for over 20 years. If you are not familiar with the Earthship concept, the homes are built using a variety of readily available recycled materials, and feature solar and wind power systems, rain-catchment cisterns, gray and black water recycling, and are a showcase of low-impact living and design.

Visitors to the community are greeted at the visitor’s center and are shown a short video to familiarize them with the concepts. Accompanied by a guidebook (which you return before you leave so as to minimize their printing!), you then take yourself through the building on a casual self-guided tour. While not a complete or lived-in home, the tour allows you to see all the innovative details of the construction, as well as the energy and water saving systems incorporated in their design.

A 3000 gallon water cistern with an active water feature dominates the main room, and lush gray-water fed planting boxes in front of the passive solar windows were teeming with flowering plants and vegetables even in the middle of winter. Some of the stucco on the interior walls has been left unfinished to reveal the used tires and aluminum cans that along with the rammed earth with which they are filled, is the dominant feature of their construction. These three foot thick walls which are built into the earth on three sides provide the superior insulation that allows the passive solar features of the south facing structures to provide more than enough heat to keep the homes warm on the coldest of desert nights. Like many solar homes, getting rid of excess heat is sometimes more of a problem than using it, and the Earthships are graced with a plethora of skylights that not only bring a great deal of light into the recesses of the homes, but allow the occupants to release the extra heat when needed. The solar powered electric and the gray water filtration systems are also visible and described in detail. The very hobbit-like dwellings also feature a delightful use of recycled glass bottles which poke through the walls in intriguing patterns and send beams of colored light into the home.

Surrounding the visitors center, the rest of the Earthship community stretches out across the desert. However as a result of the south facing earth-berm design, from the tall windows that grace the front of the homes you see little of your neighbors except the floor of the desert that seems to crawl up the backside of their house.

After working tirelessly for many years, Michael Reynolds and the Earthship team is finally being recognized for their innovative designs, and was recently given funds by the State of New Mexico to build a new larger visitors center. They are also actively building pilot project homes around the world to help spread the Earthship mission and as we departed into the bright desert sun, we hoped for their success.

For more information and pictures CLICK HERE to visit our website.

The Lower Ninth Ward-The City Below the Sea

While all of us have heard that the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans was devastated by Hurricane Katrina, few of us have actually seen it. What most of us are not aware of is that it was not devastated, it was utterly destroyed. After the flood waters receded, many of the homes had floated completely off of their foundations and were not necessarily even on the lot where they had once stood. Those that were still left standing had been filled with water up to the roof lines, and between the thick layer of mud that was left behind and the mold that soon blossomed from every surface, they also had to be demolished. What was left for nearly as far as the eye can see in some areas was block after block of nothing but the remnants of the fronts steps and concrete foundations upon which they once stood. For the most part, these were poor people before Katrina came and took what little they had to begin with. Over four years later, little has been done to restore these neighborhoods, and many of the residents will never return. Most have found new lives in places like Houston, a city that opened its arms to the busloads of refugees that poured out of the city.

We were not quite sure what to expect when we arrived on one of the rare cool and sunny days when the humidity is not stifling. We were there to tour the handful of homes that are being constructed by Make it Right, a non-profit organization spearheaded by Brad Pitt, and dedicated to helping rebuild this neighborhood. We were also there to answer the question that many of us ask ourselves. Should it be rebuilt?

As most of us are aware, the city of New Orleans sits on land that is largely below sea level. The wisdom of rebuilding a city that lies in such a precarious position, particularly in light of the potential for rising sea levels and increased hurricane activity associated with global climate change, has of course been questioned. As we toured the area however, here and there in the homes that had managed to survive, and in those that had been rebuilt, one could feel the spirit of this poor but once proud neighborhood struggling to rise from the ruins. In front of one of the few remaining FEMA trailers, a handwritten plea to the President and the people of this country not to forget that this was once a place where people lived and worked and had babies and died, stood as a stark reminder of that. Below it another hand painted sign showing the spreading base of a large banyan tree proclaimed “Roots run deep here”.

And deep they are for many of the residents and former residents of this area. Beginning before 1000 BC when the Mississippian culture built mounds and earthworks in their communities along the Mississippi and Ohio river valleys, and continuing when the French explorers, fur trappers, and traders arrived in the area by the 1690s, some making settlements amid the Native American village of thatched huts along the bayou, this area has been continuously occupied by a variety of cultures for thousands of years. Indeed the white settlers who came here considered what eventually became New Orleans, the “city that had to be built” lying as it does at the confluence of the Gulf of Mexico and one of the most important trade routes in the world, the Mississippi River. Today, many of the residents are direct descendants of the natives, French, Spanish, and African American slaves who helped build this city and its unique blend of cultures. For many of them, generations of their families have lived and died here, buried in the above ground catacombs made familiar to my generation by the acid-trip graveyard scene in the iconic movie of the 60’s, Easy Rider.

What is astonishing is the amount of work it took to build this city below the sea, and the equally incredible effort it takes to keep that sea and the rivers that feed into it from reclaiming it. From the bottom of the Lower Ninth Ward, the dikes and levees that hold back these waters rise way above your head, while the water itself on a beautiful sunny day like this is mere feet from their tops. One can only imagine the sights and sounds when the fury of Katrina breached those levees and filled these neighborhoods like a bathtub without a drain. In many ways this is sacred ground, and the occasional cross or memorial to the nearly 2000 people that died there are a stark reminder of what happened that day.

I happened to be in Miami less than thirty days after Hurricane Andrew did its number on that city, and the damage was tremendous. However when I returned there again on business less than a year later, it was already becoming hard to tell that the storm had ever occurred. Because it was a fairly affluent and well-insured city, money poured into rebuilding Miami. In the more affluent areas of New Orleans like the Garden District, or the French Quarter, where money flowed to rebuild these areas like the whiskey flows to feed the tourists, there are virtually no signs of the damage. However, due to a combination of a lack of insurance, a federal government that has a damaged economy and two foreign wars on its hands, the fact that this was a poor neighborhood to begin with, and that the question of whether we should rebuild still remains, four years later almost nothing has been done to rebuild the Lower Ninth Ward.

While it may seem odd and almost like shaking their fist at them, Make It Right has chosen to rebuild only a stones throw from those infamous levees. Using some of the latest in green building materials, and constructing them on stilts that would have protected them from even the highest water in the area, each of these brightly colored homes is unique, much like the people who live here. As we toured the neighborhood, these residents waved at us from the porches and yards of their newly constructed homes. Only fifteen of these homes have been built so far, but what is plainly clear is that they are not just rebuilding homes, but attempting to rebuild a community.

Should we rebuild this city? I guess that depends on who you ask. For the people we saw stubbornly rebuilding their homes there, I would have to say the answer is yes, yes we will.

To learn more CLICK HERE to visit our website.

Grass to Gas

As one travels through the South, the incredibly invasive species known as Kudzu is everywhere. If you have never been in the South and have never seen Kudzu, then you cannot imagine the havoc that this plant is causing on the landscape and the environment. When I say everywhere, I mean hanging from the trees, power lines, buildings, road signs, and even cars that are parked too long will soon disappear from sight as the vine crawls relentlessly forward. This stuff is unstoppable. It can grow over a foot a day and up to sixty feet a year and it will eat anything in its path. If you cut it down, two plants will spring up in its place. First introduced to the U.S. in 1876, the planting of this non-indigenous species was actually encouraged by the Soil Conservation Service from 1935 until the 1950’s when it was discovered that we had unleashed a monster. It now covers over 7 million acres of land in this country and will soon cover millions of acres more.

As we gazed upon this vast sea of bio-mass that not only needs to be removed, but is free for the taking, we wondered if Kudzu was a viable material for making cellulosic ethanol. A little research on the internet led us to Agro*Gas, a small company in Cleveland, TN that has not only looked at it as a source of feedstock, but has developed the technology to make it work. A few days later we were able to speak with Tom Monahan, one of the principles in the company, and an expert on bio-fuels.

Tom is passionate about the subject of bio-fuels, and we quickly discovered that he sees a future in which his grandchildren can still enjoy the same quality of life as we, but without the damage to the environment. Tom sees biomass every where, and Agro*Gas has developed a proprietary method for extracting the sugars needed to produce ethanol from a wide variety of feed stocks. The problem is, there is currently no money coming to these types of projects. Somewhere along the line, the powers that be decided that corn based ethanol was the way of the future. For those of you familiar with the story of corn in this country, and its complete control by the likes of Monsanto, Du Pont, and Cargill, this will come as no surprise. Apparently using readily available bio-mass that does not depend on genetically modified seeds, petrochemical fertilizers and pesticides, makes absolutely no sense at all.

Tom also made it clear the unlike the corn ethanol industry, his company not only does not seek government subsidies and financing, they abhor the thought. They have what they believe is a viable technology for producing economically feasible bio-fuels from a variety of feed stocks, and they will be damned if they will let the government get their hands on it and completely screw it into the ground like they have done with everything else. To be truly economically feasible, this technology needs to stand on its own, without the need for subsidies that support so many of the so-called “alternative” energy programs in this country. It’s amazing, they actually believe that if you don’t have a system that can stand on its own and start to make money from the get-go you don’t actually have a viable business model. In this day and age it is rare to see this kind of entrepreneurial spirit.

What really makes the Agro*Gas system different is that it is designed to work using almost any bio-mass feedstock for its input. Corn ethanol plants, upon which we have spent billions of dollars in research and subsidies, are designed to run on one thing and one thing only, corn. Corn is food, and unless you are someone like Cargill who will profit immensely from the process, the idea of turning food into fuel when there are millions of tons of non-food bio-mass just waiting to be used is insanity. The Agro*Gas process can turn almost any type of agricultural waste of which there are many and most of which the producers actually pay to have hauled away, into fuel.

In addition to fuel, much like the “cracking” process that turns a barrel of oil into everything from cosmetics to plastic bags, Agro*Gas sees fuel as only a small part of the chain of products that can be produced by the breakdown of cellulosic feed stocks. They are actively pursuing many by-products of the bio-fuel process that may be commercially viable. Indeed much like gasoline that was burned off as a waste product by the early refineries in this country, the fuel side of the process is actually not the center point of the production. There are a variety of products that can be produced from this process that can contribute to a commercially viable process. The entire business model revolves around small regional plants that can turn local produced bio-mass into regionally consumed products. This is Buy Local-Use Local defined.

Tom let us know that they realize that they may not get rich from their process, but they firmly believe that it is the right thing to do. Based on our evaluation of anything that bucks the trend of big business or government, and takes on the Cargill’s and Monsanto’s of this world, we would wholeheartedly agree with them that they will not get rich. Most probably they will get delegated into the realm of good ideas whose time will never come because it makes too much sense. It is our hope that the Richard Branson’s and the T. Boone Pickens of the world will recognize the difference between the world that Cargill creates, and the world of the sustainable future, and step up to the plate and actually make a difference.

Vintage Airplanes, Cajun Sushi and Southern Hospitality

Yesterday, as we wandered the streets of Natchitoches, LA (pronounced I am told by the locals “Nack-a-tish”although it seems to be missing a syllable) I saw a poster for a Vintage Aircraft Fly-In and 1940’s Hanger Dance. Always a sucker for vintage aircraft, and looking for a place to spend the night, we decided to drive out to the airport where this event was scheduled to begin later in the day. We found the “terminal” as it were, a small nondescript building near the entrance, and I wandered inside. I told the young man at the counter that we were “here for the air show”, and asked if he knew if there was anyplace we could park the Airstream for the night. He did not, but he quickly introduced me to a very friendly gentleman named Larry, who it turned out was the Airport Operations Manager.

As soon as I mentioned that we were here for the show and told him a little about our vintage Airstream, Larry’s southern hospitality gene went into overdrive, and two phone calls, one locked gate, and a drive across the tarmac later we had ourselves a choice spot on the grass right between the hangers and next to a small lake! We also got a Welcome Kit from the Chamber of Commerce and two free tickets to the “Aviator’s Reception” party to be held that night at a local restaurant. We felt like royalty, and after a visit from some curious members of the staff at the airport, we set up camp for the night.

As evening approached, and armed with the secret code that Larry had given us for the automatic gates that control entrance to the airport property, we headed into town for the reception. We had met one of the promoters Marc earlier in the day, and as we came around the corner still nearly a block away from the restaurant, he began waving us down and then welcomed us warmly. We were beginning to understand that southern hospitality is more than just a cliché. These people are some of the friendliest folks we have ever met, and throughout the evening, people would come up and introduce themselves to “that couple from Oregon” and welcome us to their community.

The Aviator’s Reception was being held oddly enough in this land of Cajun and Creole, in a Japanese restaurant, and we were treated to a huge spread of Sushi and other Japanese delicacies. Before long a local band set up and began a great evening of cover songs done in a decidedly Louisiana style. I ended up on stage playing a tambourine for their rendition of “Brown Eyed Girl” and as we excited the building later that night, the lead singer called out his thanks to “John from Or-y-gone!”

After a surprisingly quiet night at the airport (not much coming and going here in this small town) the next morning we watched as the planes flew in and then wandered around the grounds looking at vintage aircraft and making some more new friends. Tonight we can listen to the Big Band sounds of the 40’s as the dance is in the hanger we are camped behind. Our special thanks to the wonderful people of Natchitoches!

Containers Become Homes in North Carolina

We recently had the pleasure of spending a few days with our friend Jennifer, in Boone, NC. I met Jennifer through my work with the Sustainable Furnishings Council, and she is a joy and a pleasure and one of the inspiring young people I know who really cares about the future for her generation, and the generations to come.

While we were holed up at her cabin overlooking the hill country of North Carolina, we had a chance to visit with Ethan Anderson from Dwellbox. Ethan’s company is a East coast leader in the development of “container” homes, a small but growing segment of sustainable design that revolves around the use of used shipping containers. These shipping containers, of which there are thousands and thousands , just sitting around waiting to be used or recycled, are readily available, waterproof, structurally significant, and relatively cheap.

The containers can be stacked and welded together in a variety of configurations, and then various openings can be cut out for doors and windows. In a matter of a few days, the basic structure is up and ready for the finishing touches. Complete houses can often be built in less than 90 days, significantly lowering the cost per square foot, and using far fewer wood products in the process. Structurally, the containers are designed to ride on the deck of an ocean going vessel loaded with tons of goods, and riding out thirty foot waves and torrential rain. I’m pretty sure they are adequate for the average household.

Because of their modular design, and the fact that they can be cantilevered out up to 14ft without additional support, the opportunity for creative designs including, carports, overhangs, and rooftop gardens is tremendous. Advances in eco-friendly insulation, interior finish materials, solar, rain catchment and gray water recycling systems can all be combined to create a cutting edge small space home on a budget.

We met Ethan at his office in downtown Boone, and learned quickly that he is a rapid-fire talker, and full of enthusiasm for his buildings. We headed over to their first project, a spec home on the property next door to Ethan’s own home. A small studio style apartment with an ample deck sat over the small garage nestled below. Ethan, an avid mountain biker was renting the space to one of his buddies/bike mechanic, and apologized for the rather lived-in condition of the place, including a pile of bikes in the garage. We promised to look around it and spent the next half hour learning more about the construction details of the project.

Container homes are brilliantly simple, and Dwellbox has overcome many of the challenges associated with plumbing, electrical, insulation, and interior walls with creative solutions. Perhaps the biggest challenge was convincing the local building department who, unlike some cities on the West Coast, was unfamiliar with the process, and a bit skeptical to say the least. Through their perseverance, they finally got the city to sign off on it, although not without first having one of the inspectors, a large gentleman I am told, spend some time bouncing up and down on the solid steel sub-floors just to convince himself the thing was structurally sound.

After our energizing meeting with Ethan, we drove by one of their other projects, a 1600 sq ft home outside of town that they had recently completed. This home was a good example of what can be done by creatively stacking the containers.

In addition to residential homes, Dwelbox is working on a variety of other designs including a Mobile Learning Lab, and a temporary shelter design that could replace the use of FEMA’s famous toxic trailers after Hurricane Katrina.

For more pictures or to learn more CLICK HERE to visit our website.

Sending Out An SOS (Save Our Species)

I participated in an interesting thread on FaceBook lately. My friend Sally had reposted one of my posts on a piece about the disappearing glaciers of Kilimanjaro. One of her friends had responded by calling bullshit on global warming. The exchange went back and forth and a number of other people stuck in their two cents, but in the end, it was essentially a conversation between me and another gentleman who does not believe that manmade CO2 emissions are something we should be particularly concerned with. He did not believe that science has enough evidence to call manmade CO2 a culprit in global climate change, or that it even exists, and he was adamantly against any government regulation to limit those emissions. His point was that we simply do not know enough about how things work to make a judgment call. We argued passionately back and forth, and in the end neither of us really changed our position much. We both still believe strongly that the other is wrong.

As a result however, I did come to realize, both through his arguments and some other things I have come to understand lately, that one thing is certain, and perhaps it is good news. We do not need to save our planet. In spite of years of arguments by treehuggers and conservatives, naysayers and doomsayers, recyclers and political extremists, pundits, hippies, weirdoes, whackos, and those that just want to cash in on a buck no matter which side they are on, rejoice in the fact that there is no doubt, THE PLANET IS GOING TO BE OK!!

One of the main points the gentleman I sparred with appeared to be making was that there have been plenty of periods on this planet when things were warmer or colder, or wetter or drier, or maybe just full of a lot more dinosaurs than we seem to have today. But the point is, things change and Mother Earth really doesn’t give a damn. She likes trilobites and dinosaurs just as much as whales and humans. However She also doesn’t really give a hoot when She decides to sentence one of us to extinction either. As it turns out, She likes Asteroids and Ice Ages, Global Warming and perhaps even Nuclear War, just as well. She will simply, through the process of evolution and adaptation, adjust the life forms to fit the current situation on the planet accordingly.

Now, this all works fine and good, unless you happen to be one the life forms slated for extinction. I am sure that if the Dinosaurs had had their druthers, they would have continued to rule the earth for another 500 million years. We on the other hand, apparently being the one of the first species on this planet which actually has a choice, appear to be generally unconcerned about Mother Earth’s possible rejection of our species in the not too distant future. The fact that we may have elected to take most other major life forms with us in this mad dash for extinction doesn’t really matter to Her either.

So, my point is that both we and Al Gore can totally relax. The planet will be just fine. Hotter, colder, drier, wetter, bombarded by cosmic rays, or covered in ice, She will survive. The question we must ask ourselves, and be darn glad that we actually can, is if whether or not We and many other life forms will survive and more importantly if We really care.

Our history and religions tell us that we seem to think we hold some special place in the Universe. If this is the case, we need to be working on our placeholder if we intend on staying there. You can bet that if the Dinosaurs had seen headlines in stone tabloids that screamed “Killers Asteroids Headed Toward Earth” they would only have turned away and continued to devour other life forms. We on the other hand can at least look at the large body of scientific data that is being generated and decide. Will we open our eyes and look at global climate change as the asteroid that may be bearing down on us, or will we go on consuming the natural resources and other life forms around us until our fate slams into the planet like a runaway train. Most dinosaurs had brains barely large enough to support their life systems. We on the other hand appear to have been blessed with an incredible quest for knowledge and new technology. In the end however, perhaps it will be the dinosaurs that were blessed. As the world around them changed irreversibly, they simply looked up and perhaps thought “strange weather we’re having”.

So,we all need to make a choice. Will you do what you can to help save not the planet, but our species, or will you bury your head in the piles of garbage we are creating until Mother Earth decides she is done with us and sends us to the trash heap of evolution. Personally I shouldn’t really have much reason to give a damn. I have no children, and the world I hand off to the next generation is their problem, not mine or my progeny. But much like the Lakota Indians we met on this trip, we believe in the circle of life. Kate & I both have nieces and nephews that are every much as part of our families as children might be and I think we owe it to them to try and do something. I suspect however that many of you may have children or grandchildren or hopefully someday great grandchildren of your own and that you might have a hard time explaining your apathy to or downright disdain of the increasing evidence for man-made global climate change to them. “What did you do Grandpa” they will ask as the world that supports their life changes around them. And just like the War in Viet Nam that my generation suffered through, I will be able to say “I fought. Not in the war, but against it. And I’m proud.” What will you say?

Return to Pine Ridge-The White Plume Saga Continued

With all of our travels, I have not had a chance to finish the remarkable story of Alex and Debra White Plume who we were fortunate to visit at their home on the Pine Ridge Reservation. If you missed the first installment of this story, I suggest you visit these pages on our blog to catch up.

Bring Back the Way-Our Visit to the Pine Ridge Reservation

Our Visit with Alex White Plume

The Treaties and the First Crop of Hemp

The Bust

As the helicopters and Suburbans full of DEA Agents swept on to their property, Alex and other members of their family went out to meet them. Alex was determined that if they were going to steal his crop, they were going to have to arrest him in the process. He had contacted the U. S. Attorney for the area and invited him to witness the harvest so that everyone could see that this was industrial hemp and that no deadly marijuana was being grown here. Now this attorney was here to watch as the DEA destroyed the hard work of these people just days before they could reap what would have been their first commercially viable harvest.

Alex positioned himself in front of his crop until the DEA agents changed his mind by pointing their automatic weapons at his head. “Don’t make this hard Alex” the attorney implored him. Still determined to be arrested so that this action would end up in court and where he stood a damn good chance of blowing the DEA’s case for making illegal raids on a sovereign nation, Alex told the attorney he could either arrest him or Alex would “kick him in the shins” and began to dance around him taking little jabs at his legs. “Please don’t make this hard Alex” he implored and walked away as the DEA held Alex at bay with their rifles.

Soon the DEA had pulled down the crop and in the process of dragging it across the field, spread thousands of seeds and next years crop across the land. They then loaded up the White Plumes hopes and dreams and fled the reservation with their illegally confiscated goods.

This game of cat and mouse would go on for the next several years as the White Plumes continued to plant their crops and the DEA continued to steal them. The Feds finally came up with the idea of simply getting an injunction against them. This would allow them to put Alex in jail for violating the injunction without the benefit of a trial that the Feds knew they would lose. With this lose-lose proposition in front of them, the White Plumes finally relented, and stopped planting their crop. Some people think they have given up and wonder why they don’t take this case all the way to the Supreme Court. But that is easy to say when you don’t have to feed and cloth your family and even more importantly when your basic beliefs tell you that the Feds have no jurisdiction in this case and the Supreme Court is a white mans court and not applicable on Indian land.

The White Plumes struggle to grow hemp will continue and is being played out by farmers across the land. Nineteen states have now legalized the growing of industrial hemp, and wait only for the Federal Government to recognize the difference between hemp and marijuana.

Here are some excellent links to learn more:

PBS-Standing Silent Nation
Friends of the Lakota
Bring Back the Way

Some Rich Men Came & Raped the Land...and Nobody Caught Em'

Recently we passed through the coal country of West Virginia and Kentucky on our way to Lexington. This is a land of sharp contrasts, steep canyons, tall limestone bluffs, and deep poverty. As we wound our way through the little towns that dot these canyons, many of them bearing dark black scars from the coal that is being ripped from the earth there, we passed a strange blend of boarded up businesses and run down houses right next to state of the art schools that seemed strangely out of place. We hoped the schools represent this areas hope for the future and that the people here understand that by educating their children instead of sending them into the mines to suffer a slow and painful death, perhaps they can carve out some kind of real future for them.

While coal will continue to be mined here for many generations, the process is being increasingly automated, and thankfully for their health but furthering their poverty, the number of workers needed continues to decline. In the meantime however, coal mining continues to dominate this area. Trains filled with coal line the tracks that run down the narrow canyons for miles. Black seams of coal protrude from the bluffs and the mine shafts and conveyer belts spring from the hillsides high over the towns. There is a kind of dark grey tint from the coal dust that covers everything. Every once in a while a Burger King or a Wendy’s pops up with it’s shiny façade designed to mask the bleak existence of these hard working people, but right next door the shuttered windows and rusting cars can’t hide the broken dreams of the businesses and people that once flourished there.

But by far, the most insidious thing that is taking place in this part of the country is the practice called MTM or Mountain Top Mining by the coal industry. It is more accurately called MTR or Mountain Top Removal by its opponents. Recently this practice has been receiving more attention as the likes of Daryl Hannah and other celebrities who are working to end it. If you not familiar with it, this method of mining will shock you to say the least. First any and all vegetation is indiscriminately removed. Then the blasting begins to remove the “overburden” which actually consists of the topsoil and any rock that lies on top of the coal. This overburden is then dumped into the surrounding valleys and becomes “holler fill” where it buries the small streams that run through them. The coal is then removed until all that is left of the mountain is a flat barren plain. Although the coal companies were originally supposed to return the mountains to their “pre-mining contours” in most cases they are given waivers allowing them to create "a level plateau or a gently rolling contour with no highwalls remaining." The Bush administration in one of their more brilliant moves further eroded any protections by changing the rules to allow the dumping of the overburden directly into the headwaters of the streams. Under these heinous violations of the Clean Water Act, as well as any sensible interpretation of the Environmental Protection Agency charter, almost 500 mountains have now been destroyed and over 1000 miles of streams have been buried. The EPA estimates that by the end of 2010, over 1.4 million acres will have been leveled with the permits they have issued.

I urge you to learn more about massive ecological damage being inflicted by MTR and to help end this practice. Our use of coal to generate over 50% of our energy is already causing us huge problems by releasing massive quantities of greenhouse gases as well as other pollutants like Mercury into our ecosystems, but MTR is like coal mining on steroids and the effects are devastating. Here are some excellent links to learn more:

www.mountainjustice.org
www.wikipedia.org
www.ilovemountains.org