Information Overload

In Lethbridge, a group called Lethbridge Guerilla Gardeners has organized around Loralee Sand Edwards’ guerrilla gardening project last summer. I’ve been thinking a lot about her initiative this summer to include more of the community in the project. The response from people here has been really great– talk about taking over the boulevards, planting vegetables that anyone can harvest, uniting people who live near each other in a common goal. It’s direct-action. Such a short and straightforward path to both solving the problem of, and citing resistance to, the global food crisis, economic downturns, troubling multi-nationalism affecting local environmental ecosystems, and the effects of our dependence on oil.

So, I’ve done a bit more reading and have found two sites that I will be following more closely over the months to come as we begin our gardening season and Rod and I start to restructure our lives to be more closely in alignment with what we really want them to be.

The first is Heavy Petal, a Vancouver gardener. What a great name, and a fun read.

The second is called Elements in Time, another Pacific Northwest blog about a couple who moved from LA in search of a more sustainable lifestyle. I had a lightbulb moment with her post here, about Redefining Normal. The spark was not necessarily with the things on the list she gave, which I’m pretty comfortable with, but with the idea of redefining normal, and looking carefully at personal behaviours that perhaps may have been justified in the past. It’s about making adjustments to the norm in a personal and holistic and non-violent way. I’m pretty excited about the idea and am just waiting for the moment to hash it out with Rod.

Tomorrow morning at 6am, our summer begins.

Nearly everything is done. All remaining items on the list are handle-able, especially when I think about the foolishness of how the week began. 68 portfolios to grade, the book project hitting every snag, work stuff bleh, and the house in a shambles. Then there was the house-hunting. We just got back from looking at our second house today. I am still in awe that little things like getting the hotel in London booked, getting the taxes in the mail, all the other paperwork, pausing to eat– actually got done.

So, we leave for our first real vacation in five years tomorrow, and I am delighted to report that today, so far, has not been fraught with stress and anxiety. In fact, it is more of a pleasure to keep at it, like following through on a forehand stroke when you know you’ve hit the ball in just the right spot.

Fish tacos! Sundresses! And we’re leaving the computers!

So far the best thing about Facebook has been the birthday reminders.

I have a new book. It’s beautiful. A beautiful object. Beautifully designed and written. I want to carry it around with me just to hold it. Except, I don’t want to get it dirty.

When I opened my eyes this morning, the first thing I saw was the tree outside our window covered with an inch of snow.

Saturday was gorgeous and we spent the day taking care of things around town. At the end of our errands, we ran out to the liquor store on Mayor McGrath to get Rod some beer. This liquor store is far away, but it has the best deals in town, and we like it even more now that we discovered the secret escape route onto McGrath from around the back.

So we’re leaving via the escape route, and Rod goes, “Hey look, somebody dropped a bottle of wine.”

–minor pause–

“Should we go get it?”

Did that even need to be spoken out loud? It was a unanimous and immediate decision. Rod looped Ruby around via the “mainstream” entrance and past the liquor store and around again to the secret back ramp. Luckily no cars were coming, because the bottle was on the driver’s side, Rod stopped the car in the middle of the lane, opened his door, grabbed the wine and there we went off laughing away down the strip.

1. A big summer looms. This will keep everyone up to date.

2. It’s a good way to practice CSS. Eventually.

3. If you’re teaching Net.Art, you should probably have a blog.

4. We need more blogs!

Well, Rod’s already gone and gotten the paper, made breakfast, and served up two pots of coffee. He’s working on the crossword now. On my agenda today are: finish the video projects, make headway with the book grant, and go to Chris’ birthday party. So what am I doing? Starting a blog.