Wellness Wednesday

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Today I'm continuing with the theme of helping readers keep their health-related New Year's resolutions (and if you've already fallen off the wagon, you can still return to and work on them - it's never too late).  Last week I shared an article about the most popular and most effective diets.  Today I want to point you in the direction of a great free website to help you no matter what diet or exercise plan you've decided is best for you.  It's called SparkPeople and it's chock full great resources, including food, exercise, and weight trackers, meal plans, articles on health-related topics, fun ways to educate yourself and earn "trophies," recipes, and communities you can connect with.  There's even a free online coaching option.  Check it out and give it a try!

Uranium: It's for Your Own Good, Damnit!

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Our area is facing the battle of a lifetime - and future lifetimes.  There's uranium in them there hills.  The family (and their friends and highly gifted and supported politicians) that owns the site where it is located has engaged our community in an ugly fight.  They say they're doing it for patriotic reasons - energy security and economic prosperity for the community - and that modern uranium mining and milling practices are perfectly safe.  In fact, they flew some politicians on an all-expense-paid trip to France to see an operating mine - and they got to spend some time in Paris, again all expenses paid.  Of course, it wasn't a bribe.  "Pro" politicians have also promised huge tax revenue for the state from the mining and milling operation.  In researching this topic, I've found lots of holes in their reasoning.

First of all, the United States has all uranium needs already satisfied.  In addition, we haven't built a commercial nuclear plant since the 1970s.  And forecasts for energy needs for the next 20 years are for nuclear power to make up less than 1% of the supply.  The reality is that China, not the US, would be the likely buyer of this uranium and it seems like they're looking for a safer alternative to uranium for their nuclear needs.  Thorium is more abundant and reactors using it as a fuel source "cannot melt down or blow up....floods, earthquakes, fires, tsunamis or operator error cannot generate critical incidents."  I can understand their desire to find a safer alternative.  This also means uranium prices should drop considerably.

We're also told that "now" we know better and that we can safely mine and mill uranium.  However, the United States is busy cleaning up superfund sites and other problems from earlier uranium mines.  These sites are in the west, mainly on Native American reservations where the residents continue to experience serious health consequences as a result of having uranium mines nearby.  The companies that operated the mines aren't paying for this cleanup; taxpayers are.  This Slate article touches on some of these issues.  Do a Google search to see what happened with uranium mining in the West.

We're the government and we know what we're doing.  Remember Katrina.  The levies were supposed to be safe.  We know better now.  How can the powers-that-be guarantee the safety of storing uranium tailings in a wet climate that is subject to hurricanes?  Everyone downstream from the site is at risk - this includes people all the way to the coast in Virginia beach and even southward to people in North Carolina, people who have no say in the matter.

The "pro" side claims that, while there were problems with uranium mining in the past, modern mines are perfectly safe.  However, residents of Finland are seeing firsthand what can happen with modern, "safe" mines.  A nickle mine in Sotkamo, in eastern Finland, which was established in 2008, has sprung two leaks that resulted in high levels of uranium in the water supply.  Seems this mine was put together in a hurry, has had other problems, and initally the founder of the mining company was not as involved with the leak as he should have been.  At one of the uranium meetings where the state and federal government had representatives, again and again they spoke of safeguards to monitor the drinking water in the area.  Monitoring is not a preventative method.  That's equivalent to old saying about shutting the barn door after the horse is out as the Finnish people whose drinking water is contaminated have learned.  

West Virginia also know firsthand about how promises of economic prosperity can go unfulfilled.  When fracking was introduced there, similar promises of job creation, additional tax revenue, and general economic prosperity were made to residents.  None of it panned out.  These are the same promises we're getting from the uranium industry and the government.  

As far as the potential for employing local residents in the planned mining and milling operation, my husband astutely pointed out, do we really want inexperienced people learning on the job in the uranium business?  Especially when this proposed mine is venturing into uncharted territory with both a state government and regional area (east of the Rocky Mountains) that has relatively high rainfall, regular hurricanes, and a seismic fault line running through the state.  Most employees would be imported - and exported as soon as the mining is complete.  Abandoned towns do not experience economic prosperity.  Think of the abandoned mining towns of the West.

Our politicians (despite their political leanings) and most (if not all) municipalities and major business and community organizations in this area (and in others) have come out in opposition to lifting the ban.  They have said, after weighing the issues, that the end result will be economically devastating to our area.  Even with so-called job creation, the stigma of a uranium mine - and milling operation next door - would keep new businesses away from the area and drive those who could relocate to do so.

A handful of business owners and other residents have banded together to support the mining/milling effort.  One of these business owners is someone whose business I have frequented for almost 10 years, despite the fact that my neighbor said it is the most expensive one in the area and despite that I knew I did not support her politics.  This issue makes it impossible for me to continue using her services.  If she and others like her think that uranium mining will bring them more business, I suspect that instead, they are alienating many of their current clients and customers - and it will hurt them in the long run.  Unless, of course, they are investors in the company that plans to do the mining/milling.  It's hard to know because, as far as I can tell, there is no public list of the investors.

Our area does need jobs and the money spent on convincing politicians and businesses in other parts of the state to lift the ban could be better used creating jobs in clean energy and other areas. Our county, the largest in Virginia, lacks high speed internet.  If that infrastructure was added to this area, not only would jobs be added with the actual construction project, but it would open up many opportunities.  Our neighbor to the south, North Carolina, is investing in solar parks - why not here?  Germany, a country much farther north than our area, already generates one-fourth of their energy through solar and wind power.  Why not here?  There are so many other safe options for economic development.

Knowing that people in other parts of the state, people who are near other uranium deposits, are worried about mining in their area, our dear state legislators who are "pro-uranium" have cleverly crafted the bill so that it excludes any uranium site except for the one located in our county.  How wrong is that?  If it's safe and good for our community, it should be for everyone.

So, if people who desperately need jobs say no to lifting the ban and if the idea of "energy security" isn't true, what is all this about?  I'm not one to believe people set out to be evil or that there are planned conspiracies, but I do believe that ego and money tend to combine to make the perfect storm.  And I believe that's what is happening here. 

We don't want your "economic prosperity," damnit!

Quote for the Day

Source:  Wikipedia Commons

"Poor man wanna be rich,
rich man wanna be king,
And a king ain't satisfied,
till he rules everything."
~Bruce Springsteen

Farm Friday

It was a busy day today so I'm posting late.  A few highlights of the week:

• Launched my etsy store where I'll be selling my aprons and other crafty things I come up with.
• My new food processor arrived thanks to an unexpected gift of an Amazon gift card.
• Stocked up on some staples at Weaver Street Market, a food cooperative in Hillsborough, NC.
• Lola Jane (you remember her) returned to Charleston.  She's a coastal girl and missed the sea.  I expect she'll be back to visit Georgia again this summer.
• I took down our Christmas decorations.  I decided to be more traditional this year and leave them up for the entire 12 days of Christmas, taking them down the day after Epiphany.
• I've discovered yet another way to continue down the path of sustainability.  I now hang many of my clothes to dry on a clothes rod in the laundry room and/or a folding rack in the bathroom.  It saves about three dryer-loads a week.  It's actually very convenient as I put the items that will go into my closet on hangers so they're ready to go when dry.
• Got back to yoga today after a very long break....Namaste!
• I finally baked a nice loaf of white bread without using my bread machine (I'm pretty proud of it, hence the photos).  I've never been able to bake anything but a rock (not including quick breads or my most recent discovery of a crusty bread that I blogged about a couple of weeks ago).  I purchased some whole wheat bread flour at Weaver Street Market so I can make healthier loaves in the future.  This YouTube video was my inspiration  (I had to convert the British measurements to American):

Have a great weekend!

Poem: A Farm Picture

A Farm Picture

by Walt Whitman

Through the ample open door of the peaceful country barn,
A sun-lit pasture field, with cattle and horses feeding;
And haze, and vista, and the far horizon, fading away.

Wellness Wednesday

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Since it's January and so many of us make resolutions pertaining to our health and diet, I thought I'd share with you what U.S. News and World Report has to say about some of the most popular diets.  Read their rankings and details here.  The DASH (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) Diet was selected as the best overall diet as it is not just about weight loss but about healthy living.  The diet was originally developed to reduce hypertension, as it says it in their name, but weight loss can be a side benefit.  The Mayo Clinic endorses this diet and has details on how it works here.    The Oregon Dairy Council has links to some DASH resources here.  

I was happy to see that both the Mediterranean Diet and the Flexitarian Diet, both of which emphasize mainly plant-based foods, came in at numbers three and six in the top ten overall best diets.  The Vegetarian Diet was ranked number eleven, with "might miss the meat" and "can be lots of work" listed as the "cons" for the diet.  However, it seems to me that steaming a bag of frozen vegetables is a lot less work than grilling a steak, but being a vegetarian, maybe I'm a little biased.

Etsy

Well, I've finally done it.  I've put the finishing touches on my Etsy store and can now sell my aprons more easily.  I procrastinated on this project because 1) my camera isn't very good so I knew I'd have to take multiple shots in multiple settings to get decent photos (I think the photographer is partly to blame) and 2) I knew it would be a lot of work.  But now all that is behind me.  

For about three years, I sold my aprons at farmers' markets, craft shows, and wine festivals.  It was fun - I met a lot of nice and interesting people.  But the time, energy, and expense of hauling my little E-Z UP tent, tables, display items, etc. to and from events plus setting up was a lot of work.  Then the economy tanked.  So I quit for the most part.  A couple of times I sold my remaining inventory at craft shows as fundraisers for Danita's Children and then Grace + Main.  This year I decided I was ready to get back into it.  I missed the creativity and I missed the people, but I decided to do it very small scale  - and to sell on Etsy, as well.  

A table of my aprons, back in the day...

If you're interested, you can find me by going here or searching "RensaissanceGarden" (no spaces) in the shops on Etsy.  I plan to make more aprons and add a few other items to make the shop more interesting.  I'm really looking forward to a new season of creativity.

Let me know what you think.