Salsa

(blurry picture)

I never made salsa before in my life, although I've eaten lots of it. Well today a friend offered to show me how to can veggies, and salsa seemed like an appropriate choice as a first attempt. He brought the pressure cooker ans some other tools, and I had everything chopped up and put into neat little bowls just prior to his arrival, ready to be combined at a moment's notice.

So now I have ten jars of salsa (oops, I gave two away and now have eight) and have learned a valuable tool of preserving food in case our food supply and distribution is disrupted, as is commonly suggested. Having a temperate climate conducive to growing crops pretty much year round and sufficient access to fresh water may prove to be two of Cascadia's best assets going forward as food production becomes more regionalised.

But it's good to know that in a few hours I can realistically produce four cases of salsa, or pasta sauce, or beans, or any of the thousand other things I could probably can can. I wonder if I will pursue food preservation further? It was all around fun to spend this Saturday in the kitchen cooking and socializing. And fortunately all the produce came from Washington. Well except for the tomatoes from Mexico.

Food & Credit

I had coffee this morning with some guys from the County. In Whatcom County, there is the tree-hugging ultra-liberal crowd that lives in Bellingham; then there are the uber-conservative religious zealots that live out in the County. The ones I had coffee with were the latter group - a bunch of great people, but the oddest thing of this meeting was that we share exactly the same sentiments about the impending food crisis in this country, whether attributable to peak oil, climate change, ineffective government policies or inept government on all levels.

They told me of the plight of farmers not being able to get credit to buy seed and supplies to plant their crops this spring. I've read about this, but they were the first people I spoke with that were on the front lines of this impending crisis. And two years of record high commodity prices ended with the bottom falling out of the market at the end of last year's harvest. Interesting times lie ahead for the underappreciated farmers of this country.

I know for a fact that many (most? all?) of these loan programs offered by the U.S. have had dismal results with the best of intentions (or not?) by our clueless and unconcerned elected officials. I read that the Energy Policy Act of 2005 signed by Idiot Bush - not a dollar of those funds were disbursed. Again, our government is failing us and we expect them to save us.

The more I read about it, the less far-fetched this looming meltdown and food crisis seems.

Time

Although time crawls by at a snail's pace here in Bellingham, on certain levels it flies by. This is the third year that I've been involved in the Bike to Work & School Day here in Bellingham and it gives me time to reflect on the past years and see how far I've come, but yet how much more my roots are growing here in Bellingham. I think many city have a vibrant community, I just never felt the desire to become that active in anything, as I knew the many places that I lived were merely stations on my way to the end of the line, which evidently was Bellingham.

But I am a sucker for volunteering. People tell me how wonderful it is that I am involved in things like the urban gardening, the food bank, the biking activities, and probably a bunch of other thing that don't come to mind. But I really enjoy doing these things and I always find them to be fun. If I stop having fun, I stop participating. Simple.

Our society is so conditioned in the sense that one needs to spend money to gain reward, fulfillment or satisfaction. What a bunch of gullible dumb asses we are. No wonder we are broke, fat and miserable as a societal whole: Seeking extrinsic elements to fill our empty lives.

Speaking of filling things, my garages seems to be filling with strange bikes.

Spring

Here's a picture looking across Cornwall Ave. It was a warm day and fortunately I needed to ge into town three times on my bike to run errands: post office, IRS, bank - places like that.

I went out for afternoon tea and when I went to the Public Market, a friend told me that my picture was in a magazine. I thought something written locally, but it turns out it was the Permaculture Activist - certainly not something with the circulation of Newsweek, but still sort of neat. I really am not a big permaculturalist, but I sort of like the ring of the word (sort of like existentialist). I am more along the lines of an urban gardener, and it's good that our little movement is building some momentum and gaining some recognition.

A long and fun day. And you can feel spring in the air. And the energy here shows. Yeah, it's dreay and drizzly until July, but the warmer weather is great. And days like today are very welcomed.

I've gotta bolt because my computers says 2% battery life remaining....

Monday

With another day of dismal economic news, now is not the ideal time to be launching a business. I've been busy and have been unable to read the economic news in depth, but it seems that the country has grown into a rather accepting table position regarding the current economic malaise. I wonder if those people that are way over extended on mortgage and car payments is as pervasive as the press hypes?

I guess I am lucky in the fact that my home hasn't really lost value, as it is what is commonly called a 'starter' home. People usually by this house to start off and move to something bigger and uglier. I call it an 'ender' home, as it will be the last home I ever own, and I plan on being carried out of it at room temperature in about forty years. And what's amazing is if I just double up on the principal - right now it's around $250 - and viola, my mortgage goes down from a thirty year to a ten or fifteen year note. And the payment increases a few dollars ever month, which isn't too bad. An it turns out to save me tens of thousands of dollars in interest payments (hopefully) over the life of the loan (if I can keep this up).

I don't know why I posted this picture above. It's of I-81 back in PA where I grew up. Oh, now I remember. It's becuase I am going back there in June and am getting ready to plan my trip. For the first time ever in my life I will try to use frequent flyer miles.

Sunday

Today was a day that I did my standard Sunday routine. I thin a day off is in order and it looks like it will be Wednesday. But the snow from last week is gone, and I wish I could write the many thoughts that enter and leave my mind during the day.

But my routine for the past few Sundays (and longer) has been helping a friend run his shop in Happy Valley. It is nice because it gets me out of the house and I can get some work done (like writing pro-forma finacial statements, like today) with fewer distractions. And it puts a few bucks in my pocket too, which isn't bad. It's nice being able to pay cash for everything, as I've shifted into mode of buying everything with cash (or paying it off in the month that I bought it) like my new bicycle and laptop.

But the one guy I work with might be leaving for to get his PhD in a few months and the boss is looking to hire someone. When asked, we tell interested parties that a graduate degree is required to work as a clerk there; I too have an MBA, working as a convenience store clerk for minimum wage. So funny, but I've learned that many times the person selling me a coffee or sandwich in Bellingham probably has more education than I. I guess after all the stress of my other projects in life, this job is a relief and relaxing and quite fun to do. Not to mention the characters that come through the doors. I look forward to Sunday mornings.

Tomorrow is back to the salt mines. But it's a path I chose and I would choose no other course. Life is pretty funky right now. And the pockets of nice weather we have in the springs tends to heighten the moods of most.

Crazy

Today I sat in front of my dreadful computer working all day. All day. So when I left to go down to Fairhaven on my bike I was overjoyed at getting out of the house and onto my bike. So apologies for not writing more tonight. But thank goodness for the freedom and refreshment on two wheels.

But I thought it would be cool to find a neat map of Bellingham, as I am woefully low on pictures that I took. So I will look for a random one and then go to bed. Tomorrow is a busy day and it looks like another wet one. I missed the the temp in the forties and drizzling.

The picture is a random summer one of Magilla taken down by the bay. She's such a cow. I couldn't find a decent map of Bellingham to post, so she'll have to do.