When a friend of mine inspected the damage from a fender-bender, what upset him most was the discovery that his bumper was nothing but a brittle plastic husk supported by three pieces of styrofoam. The vehicle was new and probably cost about $35,000.
In the documentary Minimalism, on Netflix, sociology professor Juliet Schor articulated something I’ve been thinking about for a long time. Essentially she said our society is drowning in needless possessions and consumer debt not because we’re too materialistic, but because we’re not materialistic enough, at least in the true sense. (Direct quote is here.)Continue reading We Are Not Materialistic Enough→
I often speak about personal sovereignty, the concept and practice of being entirely responsible for all we do along with the intended and unintended consequences of such. Anyone can talk the walk; it’s another thing entirely too actually walk the walk. That’s usually where concept and reality sharply diverge and in ways we might not think would be a test of our ‘practice’.
And judging by the extensive tunnel network spread across the nearly two acres of grass area I cut (I use the term ‘grass’ loosely because they’re actually closely cut weed fields) I would estimate we have at least two moles and possibly 6 million.
Give or take a few.
I noticed the mole infestation was getting a bit worse just as the late fall days turned cold and I was in the process of winterizing all our power equipment. In addition to changing the oil, cleaning off the dirt and crud, touching up the rusty areas with paint and running stabilized gasoline through the fuel systems, I like to move the most used pieces of equipment into a central area where they can huddle together during the winter months and swap stupid human stories amongst themselves.
