• Tag Archives research

  • Mid-Session, Mid-March

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    Imbolc                                           Waxing Awakening Moon

    A sunny, bright day, but cooler.  44 right now.  Temps will trend downward over the next week toward more normal March weather.  This week we’ve melted all of our snow away, unusual.

    Put in a large order at Mann’s bee supplies for deep hive boxes, honey supers, frames and foundations, hive tools, feeders and pollen patty mix.  Kate’s taken over the woodenware phase of the process, agreeing to put stuff together as it comes.  This is great for me since handling such matters tends toward large amounts of frustration and blue language.

    Spent yesterday AM doing travel arrangements for Kate’s trip to Denver (car) and her trip to San Francisco (air), writing our CPA, signing up for a healthy eating class from Brenda Langston and moving money around.  A fussy, businessy day with our business meeting in the AM.

    The mid-session for the Sierra Club Legislative Committee finds us fighting defense on the Nuclear Moratorium and the Polymet Mining proposal, pushing a few bills, but, for the most part, working in the trenches.  An old flame of mine, now a tax staffer for the Minnesota Senate used to say “No one’s wallet or rights are safe while the legislature is in session.”  That emphasizes the need for constant surveillance as bills go into committees, especially after Friday, the 2nd deadline which winnows legislation down further.  As bills miss deadlines, authors begin to look for creative ways of pushing their legislation like getting it added to omnibus bills or arranging for amendments once a bill is on the floor of either house.

    Today is a day for Liberal II:  Liberalism-the present (and, I think, the future since I have no slot this year to finish a trilogy.)  Research all day.  Writing starting over the weekend perhaps.  So I’d best get to it.  Later.


    📂This entry was posted in Bees Great Work Travel 📎and tagged

  • Learning, Always

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    Imbolc      Waning Wild Moon

    What a treat.  Janice Laurie, the MIA’s librarian, gave us a quick once over of the resources available in the library.  They have a JSTOR subscription, an Artfull Index subscription, plus several other expensive database collections available online in the library and through the computer in the docent lounge.  This makes me want to give up everything else and just dive into art history.  My first venture with it in depth will be the William Holman Hunt and the Pre-Raphaelite exhibit coming in June.

    All the while the lectures about the Middle Ages, the High Middle Ages right now, keep me company as I shuttle back and forth.

    The sun came out today and improved my mood quite a bit.  I shook myself a bit this morning and said Carlos, you can choose.  You can lean into the day instead of away from it.  Seemed to have some positive effect.

    My small black notebook remained behind when I left the library this morning.  The librarian told the guard to look for the guy with the Harry Potter glasses.  Me.

    Kate and Anne went to see the Lipizzaner stallions perform at the Target Center.  They had lunch at the Chambers Hotel before hand.  Meanwhile I learned about art history databases.  Different strokes…


    📂This entry was posted in Art and Culture World History 📎and tagged

  • Tech in the Service of Political Change

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    17  bar steady 30.19  0mph NE  windchill 17 Samhain

    Last Quarter Moon of Long Nights

    The best way to predict the future is to create it.   Peter Drucker

    Quick note.  No, I’ve not gone away.  Just had a busy day.  Picked up the red car and drove it without incident into the Sierra Club and back.  Yeah.  Meetings at Sierra Club with Margaret and Michelle on anti-racism training and communications work during the upcoming legislative session.  I will have a lot to do:  research, weekly updates, action alerts, perhaps co-ordinating some op-ed and letter to the editor material.

    Home.  Nap.

    Just spent an hour compiling research into usable slots.  Handy with Google.  Technology in the service of political change.

    An invitation to do some modest work in the Permaculture arena, too.  Helping Reed Aubin put together some material for a talk on Permaculture and ethics.  Should be fun.

    Gotta hit the treadmill.


    📂This entry was posted in GeekWorld Great Work permaculture Politics 📎and tagged

  • Home Work

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    8  bar steady  30.27  0mph NW  windchill 6   Samhain

    Last Quarter Moon of Long Nights

    A busy morning here at the homestead.  I played around with various formats and methods of research for the Sierra Club legislative committee.  One setup uses Google News Alerts and Google Docs to create a real time log of news articles, web entries and video feeds on the five issues the LegCom will target during this years legislature.  This much I can do at home.

    My new datalogger for my weather station has not yet succumbed to my troubleshooting, but I imagine I’ll wrestle it to the ground sometime soon.  Something about ports seems to be hanging it up right now.  Requires detailed attention and I have to set aside time for that.

    Kate and I had our business meeting.  In spite of the negative financial weather swirling around we’re fine; not as wealthy as we were in, say, August, but fine nonetheless.

    Good news on the car front.  It was only a blown tire as far as they can see.  Everything else looks fine.  Under $400 bucks and I’d imagined multiple thousands.  Quite a relief.  We decided we’ll keep this one running until the plug-ins make sense.


    📂This entry was posted in GeekWorld Great Work Politics 📎and tagged

  • Winter Well and Truly Begun

    Posted on by Charles Comment

    8 78%  25%  0mph SW bar 29.86 steep rise winchill 8  Winter

                            Full Cold Moon

    Tomorrow is Christmas Eve.  Christmas will come to a snowy world here in Andover, a white landscape for the celebration; the moon on the crest of the new fallen snow does give a lustre of mid-day to objects below.

    We spent a quiet evening at home, reading and watching the Vikings, frustrated again.  Perhaps they’ll pick their game up next week.  We’re into the the second week of the nutrisystem and I’ve gotta say it seems like a good plan.  The only negatives so far are that some of the food isn’t great–not bad, but not great–and I still get hungry late in the night.  Like right now.  The upside is that Kate has lost 4 pounds and I’ve lost enough to not feel squished into my jeans anymore.  I’m going to weigh myself at the end of the 1st month and the end of the 2nd.  I do feel lighter, better.

    After Christmas we come to our version of the Mayan’s five useless days at the end of the year.  These have always been days when I’ve chosen to focus research on a topic of special interest.  This year it will be immortality.  There is this novel that keeps trying to get born and it has something to do with immortality although what I don’t know.

    This is a special time for me, a time to think, to consider the year past and the year to come.  I love the snowed in , cold outside feeling.  It’s just right for this kind of inner work.


    📂This entry was posted in General 📎and tagged