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Category Archives: Rural issues

A new Verizon tower: major big deal

Saturday, December 1, 2012

The top of the tower When someone puts new communications infrastructure in a data-poor rural place like northern Stokes County, it’s a big deal. Verizon is finishing up a new tower in the Lawsonville area, and it’s exciting for the folks around here. When cellular towers started popping up in the countryside 10 and 15 […]

Also filed in Technology | | Comments (1)

Technology arrives slowly in the sticks

Friday, September 21, 2012

The iPhone line outside the Verizon store at Madison-Mayodan, 7:45 a.m. I bought an iPhone 5 today. But there’s a story there. For the past four years, I’ve used a cell phone that weighs 10 pounds. This is because, when I first came here to live in the woods, nothing else would work. A powerful […]

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The future of rain

Saturday, September 1, 2012

Projected change in summer rainfall by 2080-2099. See link below to full chart. Is it surprising that servants of the oil industry continue to deny climate change, even though they aren’t really fooling anybody? A poll last year found that 83 percent of Americans believe the world is warming, including 72 percent of Republicans. But […]

Also filed in Political issues, Relocalization, Sustainable living | | Comments (0)

The Winston-Salem Journal steps up

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

One of the frustrations we’ve dealt with in fighting fracking in Stokes County — and in North Carolina — has been getting the attention of the Winston-Salem Journal. The potential fracking areas in Stokes and Rockingham counties are right in the Journal’s circulation area. We’d been trying for weeks to get the Journal to tell […]

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Where to start?

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

The garden, this morning It’s been over a month since I posted. The abbey has been caught in a whirlwind of spring projects, spring farm work, and community organizing. I really appreciate the emails from those of you who have written to make sure everything is OK. Retirement is not supposed to be like this. […]

Also filed in Culture, Food, Political issues, Relocalization, Sustainable living, The land | | Comments (3)

In Wisconsin, the farmers join in

Sunday, March 13, 2011

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel The protests in Wisconsin are growing, and now the farmers have joined in. The Crooks and Liars blog mentions this telling commentary from a Fox News shouting head who thank goodness I’ve never heard of, Jay Townsend: TOWNSEND: I take away this. Number one, elections have consequences. Number two, unions will never […]

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Population growth? Run for your life…

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Sometimes I have survivor’s guilt. I got in my Jeep, I drove and drove and drove, and I escaped the corporate life. Not only that, but many people struggling to get closer to the troughs in the corporate feedlots tried to eat my lunch back then, but I beat them back. It was self-defense, but […]

Also filed in Economic issues, Relocalization, Retirement issues | | Comments (1)

Hard times: How would we respond?

Friday, June 11, 2010

Wikipedia: a sugar plantation in Cuba Though I try not to be too gloomy, I, like many others, am afraid that there’s a significant chance that there may be hard times in our not-too-distant future. In fact, I’m afraid we may be in for a double whammy. Whammy No. 1 would be a long period […]

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Farm subsidies

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine Did you know that the federal government provides billions of dollars in subsidies to millionaire and industrial growers for producting animal feed? And that fruit and vegetable farmers get only 1 percent of these subsidies? That’s one reason the Big Mac is so cheap — government subsidies pay part of […]

Also filed in Food, Political issues, Sustainable living | | Comments (1)

Over the river and through the woods

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Round trip — more than 100 miles I drove to Yadkin County today to visit family. It was good weather for photography, and the leaves were just beginning to turn, so I figured it was a good day to document the route from northern Stokes County, where I live, to the Yadkin Valley, where most […]

Also filed in Culture, Relocalization, Stokes County, The way we were | | Comments (3)