Jessica > Recent Status Updates

Well, that last note must have been prior to whatever caused me to give up. Haven't even looked at this in years. Probably won't bother to go back to it.

P. 235. GR page update wonky.

The entirety of the authors' description about Lebensraum (and it's failure) is "We all now how this one ended."

I can't even begin to imagine the series of people who had to read through that line before this book got to publication who all thought it was okay to sum up the Holocaust with that one line while also indicating that growing grains in Germany resulted in the Holocaust.

Insights! 1. The locavore movement must have changed significantly in the last 4 years 2. The authors use the most extreme form of locavorism & the inherent non-logical complaints/solutions within & refute it with equally extreme & non-logical globalism complaints/solutions. There is absolutely no attempt to actually find a reasonable answer to agriculture for a growing planet. Their universal dismissal is vapid.

HAS to be a vanity press. Between being disdainful/insulting & not being maintaining the thread of their own argument this book is a mess. "Agri-intellectuals." Problems: preserving farmland AND building vertical farms. More refs to citrus in Maine (who?!?!) Lots of saying what will be said & then quoting someone else. Usually irrelevant like the window analogy. Summ: Out-of-context facts tossed into a word salad.

I don't know what the hell these two are on about. More loaded language (CSAs are "schemes.") The take-away reads: don't eat produce grown anywhere near you, ever, because farmers are crooks and consumers are so very stupid. A few %s thrown around in the last paragraph to set up the next chapter because, you know, they're economists. Thinking there must be real argument in Canada over this that I am unaware of.

A very broad overview of global food system with emphasis on France. Lots of interesting historical example of closed agriculture, but bare minimum on details. Continues to misconstrue "locavore" to 'back to the land" et al., but clearly intends to launch the rest of argument from this base. None of the examples provide information on their economic feasibility even though that is what the proposed focus is.

"It is our hope that readers come away from this book with the understanding that buying or abstaining from buying local food should be a shopping decision, not a moral or political one." Because you should never give a shit about what you support morally or politically! Mo' money... FYI: authors from Canada.That note is about as relevant as most of what I've read of this book so far. It's gonna be a long read.

The authors in their preface: "We make no bones about the fact that what we present is our personal take on several complex issues." Science be damned! Current fav: Q: "If our modern food system is so bad...why do we now enjoy...longer and healthier lives..." A: Pharma & medical care, OSHA, no recent major wars, shall I continue? Ugh: use of the word "activist" over less loaded words (proponent, supporter, believer)

I'm gonna have to keep notes cause these folks are either being intentionally obtuse or being intentionally inflammatory. They allow Blake Hurst to set the tone on the very first page with a statement comparing the idea of food miles as "horse manure" "...in the same way that we know we wont' get to take the prettiest girl home is we drink Bud Light." What the hell is that?

Sheep and Goats: p127: facial recognition of humans and can be soothed by photos of familiar flock-mates when separated. Respond to emotional facial expressions of humans. p129: recognize 50 sheep and 10 humans w/2 year memory p136: respond to names p143: goats recognize symbols

Pigs: p94: learn own name and verbal communications p95: can make comparisons based on color, odor, location. one-trial learning. p97: understand joystick affects movement on screens p103: remember up to 30 other pigs p104: pigs raised alone or less playful and avoidant of new experiences p119p: "Pigs mourn themselves to death..." Susie Coston

Chavez Nat Mon: 2012. p351- Chavez and Dolores Huerta found Nat Farm Workers Assoc becomes United Farm Workers. p352- rock quarry then 1918 Stony Brook Retreat (TB san) closed 1967. p354- Nat Park Svc established 1916 by Woodrow Wilson. p359- EO Wilson says half the Earth must be wild for us to survive p360/61- list of words removed/add to Oxford Junior Dictionary ex- acorn/allergic, adder/alliteration, almond/analog

Glacier: 1910. p342- 1850=150 glaciers, 2015=25. p344- 1948 Mescalero Red Hots - Nat Am fire crew, mostly WW2 vets, created Smokey the Bear legend. Nat Am's continue to make up good portion of firefighter/watch in Park syst. Heart-pounding essay about being in 2003 wildfires by way of adding some commentary on climate change.

Alcatraz: 1972. Recreation Area not Park. 1850-purchased by Fuller for military use. Imprisoned Confederate soldiers. 1933-63-federal pen 1969-72-Indian occupied. Visit to Ai Weiwei exhibit and reflections on civil disobedience and imprisonment.

p308: DeChrisopher 2015 speech: ...We know that those at the top of the power structure in this country are scared of this movement and you should be because we're coming for you, we're coming for your power and we're coming for your privilege and we are here to undermine the concentration of wealth that is oppressing the planet at the same time, oppressing people across the globe in so many interconnected ways....

Canyonlands: 1964. Letters giving scope of threats of losing land to oil/fracking/fossil fuels. p268-Red Rocks Wild. Act (2009). p271- Tim DeChristopher: We must let ourselves be shattered by the hopelessness of the crisis...the opposite of hope is empowerment. p281-petrichor: loosely, the smell of rain caused by ozone (O3) p289- Grand Canyon not 5-6M yrs, perhaps 70M years. Frustrating essay; damage done; injustice.

Gulf Islands: Seashore not Park. p227-To bear witness is not a passive act. p231-Margaret Curole (resident) compares ecological disaster of Deepwater Horizon to Longfellow's Evangeline. Essay about Deepwater and discrepancies between media and reality, government and big oil cover-ups (or at least lies) and impact on as well as resiliency of, wildlife. Threatened nature of Mississippi Delta region even prior.

Gates of the Arctic: 1980. p210- "Wilderness is not my leisure or my recreation. It is my sanity." Meditative essay with no park info. Eerie descriptions of wildlife. I have only ever heard folks associate Alaska with anger and angst - so fascinating that here it is again.

Big Bend: Chihauhan Desert, 1944. p179- Virga - rain that evaporates before hitting ground. p184- 180 degree ground temps p185- wind, water, light. Lawrence Fodor koan boxes p187- story of vermilion Mercury (elephant) & sulphur (snake) = cinnabar. Color - a Natural History of the Palette by Victoria Finlay. My favorite essay so far. Very little historical info. Story of tenuous restoration of minnow Gambusia gaigei.

Cows: p. 63: problem solve and show joy at doing it. p69: "tool" use p72: 50 cow faces, 10 human p82: milk production reduced by rough treatment, yelling, and unkind treatments. General social animals that show grieving behaviors, empathy and group dynamics including deferring to the elders and more intelligent as leaders.

Geese, Ducks, and Turkeys: Geese are monogamous and loyal to flock members. Turkey imprinting - Joe Hutto's Illumination in the Flatwoods. More than 20 vocalizations; emotions via snood color. "curious to a fault." Ducks have regional accents. So little info on these three - can we infer some of the chicken info applies to most fowl? The photos tho - wow.

Intro and Chickens: 22: chicks make memories before hatch - mother's vocalizations; object permanence; expectation; delayed gratification 29: learned behavior in addition to instinct 30: learn from hen and each other; can learn from video 33: can count 34: seek out novel experiences 40: more than 31 call types and onlycall if someone there to hear it Call Me Chicken by Rev. L. Joseph Tauer

Effigy Mounds: 1949 by Truman using Antiquities Act. Also not in list - Monument not Park. p166: "...we form our future by being caretakers of our past." Does not fit with the rest of the essays - short, very little info. List of tribes signing protest re: 2009 audit revealing $3.4m spent on projects not held to environmental reviews or tribal consultations takes up an entire page of the essay's ten. Meditation.

Gettysburg (cont): Not listed as Nat Park in back of book list - typo or technicality (ie: battlefield not park?) No dates of Congressional declarations, etc. Interesting info about park guide training and exams. Interesting view of re-enactors & guides and continued biases. The reversal of historical whitewashing (Robin Winks.)

Gettysburg: (1863) p120: 4m/11m Southerners were slaves. p121: ranger's threat re: Kennedy refusal to attend anniversary and Obama's "I hope he thinks twice before going to Dallas." p133: Basil Biggs story - buried bodies p137: Cyclorama painted by Paul Philippoteaux in 1883. p146: friend: "There will never be another war that leaves the trees standing." ("witness trees") Staggering numbers of death and injury.