We’re signed up for Earth Hour: 60 minutes of lights out to save energy and try to nudge more leaders into taking climate change action. We did this last year and turned off the lights, the music, the entertainment center and most of the computers. I think Ian read by candlelight. I was probably trying to get something done (grr, deadlines) but ran the laptop off the battery. Our brother-in-law went for extremes and threw the main for his house; I’ve got too much stuff in the freezer for that, though. They are looking for 1 billion folks to pledge …

This list comes from MoveOn.org: 10 things you should know about Obama’s budget plan (but probably don’t) The plan: Makes a $634 billion down payment on fixing health care that will go a long way toward paying for a more efficient, more affordable health care system that covers every single American. Reduces taxes for 95% of working Americans. And if your family makes less than $250,000, your taxes won’t go up one dime. Invests more than $100 billion in clean energy technology, creating millions of green jobs that can never be outsourced. Brings our troops home from Iraq on a …

I meant to write this weeks ago, but couldn’t seem to find the time (colds, work, school, the death of our tv, garden prep… you know, life). There were a lot of particularly good bits in President Obama’s inauguration speech. But this is the part that popped out for me: … Our journey has never been one of shortcuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted — for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of …

There’s a lot I don’t understand about economic stimulus packages. I barely understand economics. Never mind, I don’t. But I have a couple of thoughts about debate in Congress about the current stimulus package: I honestly don’t get the logic behind the “tax cuts stimulate the economy” reasoning. I get that if people had more money, then maybe they’d spend more and that would benefit the economy. And that if businesses had less to pay in taxes then maybe they’d use the surplus money to create more jobs. But those seem like rather big maybes. And it could be argued …

The folks at Food Democracy Now! have a little petition going with recommendations for various Under Secretary of Agriculture positions, twelve individuals who are “champions on issues of sustainability” and who have spent their lives “standing up for independent family farmers”. If you eat, care about what you eat, would like to see policies that support small family farmers before multinational agri-business conglomerates, or think that maybe an on-going habit of stripping the fertility out of our soil and then letting it blow away just so we can get one more bushel of corn is a stupid thing to do, …

So, in the middle of December, Seattle got sat on by an arctic air mass that kept our high temperatures just on either side of freezing. Then, naturally, a storm or series of storms moved in and dumped all kinds of moisture through that arctic air mass, resulting in snow. Quite a bit of it, which is unusual for Seattle, since we’re so close to sea level and all. And because of the arctic air mass, the snow didn’t go anywhere, which is what it would have normally done. Nope, it sat and got snowed on again. Apparently, this kind …