this has been a strange and interesting trip.
4.29.2007
4.25.2007
Grün, grün, grün sind alle meine Gedanken
Today's NYTimes Dining & Wine section is all about Green.
An article about Prince Charles, and his organic farm, product line, and star status in the organic community.
An article about green wine, quite apropos right after my visit to the Nissen vineyard in Hartington.
And then an article about locavores, those people committed to eat only food grown or raised within 100 miles from where they live.
This all comes on the heels of another excellent editorial by Michael Pollan, the author of The Omnivore's Dilemma, a multifaceted analysis of issues facing us all as consumers of food in today's world, with concerns about health, carbon footprints, local economies, and sustainability.
The current article -- and truly important yet shamefully overlooked issue at hand -- entitled You Are What You Grow, links our current problems with obesity, immigration, and the farm economy with the architecture of the sorely out of date and misguided farm bill. It's up for renewal again this year, and, as Pollan points out, is yet to be seen as a food bill, not just some abstraction that only affects the people "out there." Read it.
As one of the residents of this so-called "out there," I see, feel, breathe, and unfortunately eat the effects of agricultural policy daily. The pesticides put on subsidized corn that has drained our water supplies and, through the false prophet/profit of ethanol, has raised world corn prices to destroy the tortilla economy in Mexico and therefore forced Mexican farmers off their land and northward to seek out employment in the factories (and often the meat processing plants whose "products" consume some of the same subsidized corn) and thereby infuriate the local farmers who don't realize that they, in fact, are simply a link in the perverse system of global agribusiness. The "culture", I believe, in agriculture, is simply not linguistically acceptable anymore.
And on the nutrition side of things, it is simply unacceptable that we grow fields of high-fructose corn syrup, then sell it more cheaply than sweet corn, more cheaply than real vegetables and fruits. This, perhaps, is the most perversely regressive policy of our country, that we drive those in poverty to the least nutritious calories by government policy.
I agree with Pollan: it is time for the farm bill to come under scrutiny -- to shed its image as something affecting "those distant farmers" and be rebranded as a food bill that affects us all.
Goddamn, I wish I knew how to make people care.
An article about Prince Charles, and his organic farm, product line, and star status in the organic community.
An article about green wine, quite apropos right after my visit to the Nissen vineyard in Hartington.
And then an article about locavores, those people committed to eat only food grown or raised within 100 miles from where they live.
This all comes on the heels of another excellent editorial by Michael Pollan, the author of The Omnivore's Dilemma, a multifaceted analysis of issues facing us all as consumers of food in today's world, with concerns about health, carbon footprints, local economies, and sustainability.
The current article -- and truly important yet shamefully overlooked issue at hand -- entitled You Are What You Grow, links our current problems with obesity, immigration, and the farm economy with the architecture of the sorely out of date and misguided farm bill. It's up for renewal again this year, and, as Pollan points out, is yet to be seen as a food bill, not just some abstraction that only affects the people "out there." Read it.
As one of the residents of this so-called "out there," I see, feel, breathe, and unfortunately eat the effects of agricultural policy daily. The pesticides put on subsidized corn that has drained our water supplies and, through the false prophet/profit of ethanol, has raised world corn prices to destroy the tortilla economy in Mexico and therefore forced Mexican farmers off their land and northward to seek out employment in the factories (and often the meat processing plants whose "products" consume some of the same subsidized corn) and thereby infuriate the local farmers who don't realize that they, in fact, are simply a link in the perverse system of global agribusiness. The "culture", I believe, in agriculture, is simply not linguistically acceptable anymore.
And on the nutrition side of things, it is simply unacceptable that we grow fields of high-fructose corn syrup, then sell it more cheaply than sweet corn, more cheaply than real vegetables and fruits. This, perhaps, is the most perversely regressive policy of our country, that we drive those in poverty to the least nutritious calories by government policy.
I agree with Pollan: it is time for the farm bill to come under scrutiny -- to shed its image as something affecting "those distant farmers" and be rebranded as a food bill that affects us all.
Goddamn, I wish I knew how to make people care.
4.20.2007
Le Week-end
David Sedaris was as wonderful in person as he is on the radio. Candor, wit, timing, beauty, all in wonderful harmony. He recommended a Zombie Survival Guide as required reading.
Tonight, I'm cashing in on the Saddle Creek dollar, shooting a Cursive show. Tomorrow, I'm driving to Hartington, NE to take pictures and interview a vineyard proprietor. Then Mathias
is having a
(I shit you not that is the Google image search for "poetry party.")
I want to be outdoors doing nothing right now.
Tonight, I'm cashing in on the Saddle Creek dollar, shooting a Cursive show. Tomorrow, I'm driving to Hartington, NE to take pictures and interview a vineyard proprietor. Then Mathias
is having a
(I shit you not that is the Google image search for "poetry party.")
I want to be outdoors doing nothing right now.
4.19.2007
4.18.2007
Springtime
The temptation to take pictures everywhere with this adorable little iSight that Ira Glass the Mac has is just too great. Hell, I'm bloggin' outside!
Zizek in a new film
Slavoj Zizek, certainly one of the most fun film theorists to read -- if you're into that kind of thing -- has become a movie star himself once again, this time in a film by Sophie Fiennes. It's called The Pervert's Guide to Cinema, and focuses heavily on the psychosexual fantasy world with which the cinema is so imbued. Fiennes apparently has managed to insert Zizek into scenes from several films to critique them as they play. What decadent fun!
Unfortunately, it's playing at the MoMA, not just any theater near you.
4.16.2007
PLANNED PARENTHOOD'S PLANS C, D, E, F, AND G FOR IRAQI INSURGENT CONTROL.
Thank you, McSweeney's.
For information on specific plans, please click here.
Fostering democracy in Iraq can be a magical experience—provided that you, the paternalistic government, are prepared for the responsibility of occupying and nurturing a nation-state in its infancy. If you aren't, you may end up breeding unwanted insurgents and, consequently, overstretching both your military budget and the patience of voters. Below are five strategies from Planned Parenthood for Iraqi insurgent control, from least to most effective.
For information on specific plans, please click here.
4.15.2007
easy like a sunday morning
enjoying espresso, guitar, and an amp that makes a noise like wind.
a warm laptop, a warm lapcat.
my litter box in it
is a dead penguin
flippers up
my highway on it
is a dripping trainset
sinking slowly
my relatives from them
is learning to choose brown or red
taking brown ones only
a warm laptop, a warm lapcat.
my litter box in it
is a dead penguin
flippers up
my highway on it
is a dripping trainset
sinking slowly
my relatives from them
is learning to choose brown or red
taking brown ones only
4.11.2007
This I Believe
Ok, right now, I believe in the power of MySpace. I received a message from a guy in Providence who is trying to solve a mystery. He'd found a little book with "Made by Ande W. '05 for Elisabeth Reinkordt" written in it.
It's my long ago lost and sadly left for thrown away journal from my trip to Tokyo. I wrote a lot in it at a pivotal point in my life -- 6 weeks before finishing college, 2 months before moving back to Nebraska, 4 months before getting married -- and then managed to lose it just a few weeks after getting back to the states.
It was, as I suspected for a while, in the hands of someone at the GCB (a Brown-campus bar located in the Grad Center dorm complex). Now, his mystery is solved, and I feel like I may soon finally be reunited with a whole heap of memories.
How strange and wonderful that this guy chose to do some MySpace research, found my film profile, and wrote me, 2 years later, about his find.
--
I don't even care anymore if I wrote stupid shit in it that he read.
It's my long ago lost and sadly left for thrown away journal from my trip to Tokyo. I wrote a lot in it at a pivotal point in my life -- 6 weeks before finishing college, 2 months before moving back to Nebraska, 4 months before getting married -- and then managed to lose it just a few weeks after getting back to the states.
It was, as I suspected for a while, in the hands of someone at the GCB (a Brown-campus bar located in the Grad Center dorm complex). Now, his mystery is solved, and I feel like I may soon finally be reunited with a whole heap of memories.
How strange and wonderful that this guy chose to do some MySpace research, found my film profile, and wrote me, 2 years later, about his find.
--
I don't even care anymore if I wrote stupid shit in it that he read.
it was warm for a while.4.09.2007
Ira Glass the Mac
...Book Pro, that is. It's goodbye, sweet Dolly, hello Ira Glass.
How happy am I that I drained my bank account today?
That happy.
How happy am I that I drained my bank account today?
That happy.
4.05.2007
4.02.2007
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