The headline reads: Save the Planet: Eat a Dog.
No, it’s not an anti Filipino satire about poor rural people in the provinces who eat dogs. It’s actually a post in a New Zealand paper that reports on the “carbon footprint” of Fido, Kitty and other meat eating pets.
Victoria University professors Brenda and Robert Vale, architects […]

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We’ve had a few sunny days here in the Philippines to finish harvesting the rice. Our fields are on high ground, so the main problems we face are finding a dry day to cut and thresh the rice, and a rice mill to dry it.
Usually in our area, rice is dried in the hot sun. […]

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One of the more bizarre headlines in the news is a report that two people died in a “sweat lodge” and quite a few more people who were there required hospital treatment.
Any physician hearing of this will suspect the deaths were from one of two causes: One carbon monoxide (which reportedly has been ruled out) […]

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First came Typhoon Ondoy, which flooded Manila and the Laguna area.
Manila had at least one million people displaced from their homes due to flooding, and many whose houses were built in low lying areas were drowned from flash flooding that they did not expect. When even movie stars have to flee to the rooftops of […]

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 Millions of refugees live in temporary camps all over the world today, and few westerners know or care about their problems.
Although most of these refugees will eventually return to the country of their origin, one question is what does one do with those who for political reasons cannot or are not allowed to go home? […]

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The flood waters in Manila are slowly subsiding. Family members who traveled to Manila yesterday for business reported that most of the roads were clear, but that the garbage and mud from the floods were all over the place. Some of the roads remained blocked, including major highway “underpasses” that were now lakes of water.
Several […]

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On my family blog, I often write the headline: Another Day, Another Typhoon.
The Philippines gets hit by about ten typhoons a year, but we live inland so are usually safe.
On Saturday, however, the winds were brisk and the rains very very heavy. Our house has good drainage, but the main street where the vendors have […]

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Ah, the yearly collection for the Catholic campaign for human development is going on, and Catholics are once again asked to put their money into a fund that is essentially run by the left of center ideologues at the Catholic Bishop’s Conference.
What’s wrong with this picture?
Well,  for one thing, few people know where the money […]

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Vancouver: I stopped by the Farmers Market on the lawn of Pacific Central Station, a magnet for people making an effort to follow the Hundred Mile Diet. I bought an organic Macintosh apple to snack on as I walked home.  It was $1.09, an expensive apple it seemed to me.  I bit into it, expecting […]

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The father of the “green revolution”, Norman Borlaug, has died.
Some of use are old enough to remember when famines in Asia were common, and when the “Population bomb” types were predicting mass starvation of millions of poor people.
The famines didn’t happen, because Borlaug, and other agricultural scientists, developed high yield wheat and grains, along with […]

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One headline in the Philippine Inquirer described it as “Just Like the Titanic, minus the icebergs”.
The big news here in the Philippines is another ferry accident, but this one with a happier ending than that of last year’s “Princess of the Stars” disaster, because this time, the ferry didn’t flip over in a typhoon, but […]

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Although that email hoax of a couple years ago, claiming lipstick caused cancer, was a bit over the top, it is a bit worrisome that the FDA has indeed found lead in some of the most widely used brands of American lipstick.
How much lead are we talking? Well, the FDA found lead in all […]

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Barack Obama: The Man vs. The President The uproar over President Obama’s proposed “Welcome Back To School” broadcast, is really telling and I hope its telling him something: i.e., ‘People don’t trust me!’These excerpts from an article in the The Detroit Free Press indicates, there is a lot of concern from parents and the […]

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A lot of nonsense being written in the news about Conservative writer George Will deciding to throw in the towel in Afghanistan.
Afghanistan is a mess. Big deal. It’s been a mess for a couple thousand years, and trying to “win” a war there and put in a crumpets and tea democracy is a bit delusional.
But […]

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Scoping meetings held during August and early September from Helena, Montana to Saint Charles, Missouri are facilitating discussions about the future of the Missouri River and restoration of its associated environs.
At the meeting held at Omaha, Nebraska on August 31, officials of the Army Corps of Engineers (ACE) and Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) presented […]

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Yes, the Academy of Family Physicians has been hijacked by the Democratic party to push their health care bill.
My latest email tells me:
We are closer than ever to achieving significant health care reform in America. Unfortunately, propaganda and misunderstanding about pending legislation threaten to derail its success.
“We” are closer? That implies that all Family physicians […]

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Yes, it’s recess time for the US Congress, and there are some red faces in Congress because the Wall Street Journal and the local newspaper in Seattle just noticed a cushy trip to the Galapagos, the Great Barrier Reef, and the South Pole as a fact finding trip to discover “global warming”.
One would think that […]

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Many currently say that John McCain made a “dreadful mistake” by choosing Sarah as his running mate.  He did.  But not for the reasons one hears being bantered about by the MSM and other political punditry (both right and left).  They and the GOP Hierarchy have already proclaimed Sarah as a loser and have tossed […]

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Former Alaska Gov Sarah Palin attacked the Administration’s Cap and Trade proposal in an editorial in the Washington Post this morning and she made some very valid, very important points about the problems with Cap and Trade but her argument was focused on energy production.
Here is my “top three” list of problems with Cap […]

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We refer to nature often enough, you would think that we know what it is. Moose, moss and dung seem natural. But what about salami, socks and singing in the shower? Does it matter?
It might if you are gay, an animal rights activist, or a shareholder in Monsanto. Appeals to naturalness have featured in debates […]

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Funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act 2009 will soon be put to use improving numerous federal wildlife refuges across the United States.
There was $280 million allocated for “830 projects to build visitors centers, improve infrastructure, and bolster conservation at national wildlife refuges and hatcheries across the country,” Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar, […]

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According to Treehugger, a recent poll reveals that one in three kids think the earth won’t exist when they grow up.
Twenty eight percent are upset that the polar bears and other animals will become extinct, and 59% of urban kids think the world won’t be as good when they grow up.
I’m not surprised, given the […]

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The environmental movement has come a long way in the past few decades. Environmentalists were viewed as a bunch of aging tree loving hippies with strange ideas. Now, environmental issues are at the forefront of the news, global warming, pollution, waste, and the misuse of natural resources, to name but a few.
I do not claim […]

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With the way the economy is these days, saving money takes new importance. One of the ways to do that is by making smart choices about energy efficient appliances and making your home more energy efficient. This book, designed for homeowners aims to just that and argues that any home can be improved from an […]

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The first act of Piracy that I can find occurred in 1635 by Thomas Smith at an Indian trading post, in the Susquehanna River. He was in fact a very educated man, and an agent for the Virginia Secretary of State, William Claiborne. This was acting out in rebellion against Lord Baltimore, who was insisting […]

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a timely rant…..by Darvin Dowdy
Do you hear it?  A resounding Death Knell  ( link1 ) for the Republican Party?  Has the cloaked Grim Reaper  ( link2 ) cast its shadow  of doom over the Conservative Movement?   The slow cadence of the funeral dirge has already begun as the procession  moves toward the two gravesites. 
But wait.  […]

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Yesterday was Palm Sunday, and I am happy to report that our “palms” are eco friendly: we had one of our workers climb up the wall to one of our smaller palm trees and cut a couple branches.
These workers then showed our granddaughter Ruby how to weave them into several designs, including one that is […]

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In these stressful times you might find yourself having trouble dropping off to sleep.  So many things to worry about, you know?  Well if you are in need of a good sedative tonight but are wanting to avoid heavy medication, may I recommend, hot off the presses, the “Republican Road to Recovery”.   Gingerly presented, courtesy […]

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More than $26 million in grants to protect and restore wetlands and other habitats have been approved by the Migratory Bird Conservation Commission, under the North American Wetlands Conservation Act.
“More than $24.2 million of the more grant funds will support 25 projects in 21 states and Puerto Rico, with partners contributing an additional $60.6 million […]

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Last week, when Retired General Vitalis Musungwa Gava Zvinavashe died, he was mourned by many on both sides of the political spectrum.Indeed, Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai attended the funeral, even though he himself is in mourning after the tragic death of his wife.
As the (government controlled) Herald  pointed out, he joined the revolution against the […]

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