Oh Yes, How Soil Works

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Oh Yes, How Soil Works

7/2/2020 by iHeartRadio

Web player: https://podplayer.net/?id=109086334
Episode: https://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/pdst.fm/e/chtbl.com/track/5899E/traffic.megaphone.fm/HSW8616995642.mp3

There is maybe nothing that sounds more boring than hearing two people talk about soil, but friend, prepare to be amazed at the details of what makes this amazing substance the life blood of Earth itself!

While maybe only scraping the surface of soil science, this podcast has the dirt on dirt.

The Powerball Revolution

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The Powerball Revolution

7/2/2020 by Pushkin Industries

Web player: https://podplayer.net/?id=109086097
Episode: https://chtbl.com/track/39E17/traffic.megaphone.fm/CAD9439991498.mp3

In Bolivia, a political activist radically reforms the voting process for… student council elections. Who else does he convince? Revisionist History. And maybe a fancy private school in New Jersey.

Electing people by drawing a name out of a hat actually can be a very democratic way to elect people that can expand participation in government by minorities and expanding diversity.

Leisure camping

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People on the internet only see the fun part of my working road trips, not the reports being written, memos and emails sent, the phone calls and all the other stuff.Or all the time I’m monitoring power and data consumption, the position of the sun and shadows for solar power. It seems like a life in paradise but it’s actually quite busy and with all the other things that go along, I’m so much busier that working from home or even just leisure camping.

July 8, 2020 Night

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Good evening! Partly clear and 67 degrees at the Green Mountain National Forest. 🌃 There is a west-southwest breeze at 7 mph. 🍃. The dew point is 65 degrees. The muggy weather ends Tuesday around 10 pm. 😓

So after my spade ♤ of bad luck 🍀 yesterday I moved to a new campsite near the Somerset Bridge and the Airfield camping area. Not as quiet and remote as the other area, I’m close to a good swimming hole 🏊 and I have a lot more solar power and ability to enjoy the stars ✨ on a clear night. Radio 📻 reception isn’t as good so I have fewer choices on live radio here – no New Hampshire or Vermont Public Radio here.

It was a busy day, warm but not as oppressive as it’s back in the city. 🌆 I did go for a few short swims and cool downs during the day but most of the day I was up to my neck finishing up another one of those 30 page memos 📝 and then this afternoon it was a big spreadsheet project. 📊 Rained for a while, actually it poured for a while at the four o’clock hour so my final hour ⏳ of the day was spent working from inside my truck cap. Internet worked fine most of the day 📶 and I had no trouble accessing the VPN connection for all the files 📂 I needed from the server. I also used the 120 volt fan in the tent 🎪 with my laptop and that worked good to keep things nice and comfortable.

While I’m still finding litter 🚮 at the campsite and are picking it up when I find it, I am quite happy with this campsite near the swimming hole even if it’s not the remote country of yesterday. 🐺 Being able to wash and cool off in the heat 😎 makes it a lot more enjoyable.

I am thinking I will stay through Saturday morning, when it looks like it will be rainy. ☔ By then the worse of the heat wave will likely break and I will have all day to drive home at my own pace rather than rushing home before 9 o’clock or leaving after 5 pm.

Tonight will have isolated showers before 10pm. Patchy fog after midnight. Otherwise, partly cloudy 🌧, with a low of 64 degrees at 4am. Three degrees above normal. Maximum dew point of 66 at 11pm. West wind 5 to 7 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%. In 2019, we had mostly clear skies. It got down to 59 degrees. The record low of 41 occurred back in 1963.

Tonight will have a Waining Gibbous 🌖 Moon with 83% illuminated. The moon will rise at 11:11 pm. The Buck 🦌 Moon is on Thursday, July 23. The darkest hour is at 12:58 am, followed by dawn at 4:48 am, and sun starting to rise at 5:22 am in the east-northeast (58°) and last for 3 minutes and 26 seconds. Sunrise is 43 seconds later than yesterday. 🌄 The golden hour ends at 6:05 am with sun in the east-northeast (65°). Tonight will have 8 hours and 50 minutes of darkness, an increase of one minute and 8 seconds over last night.

Tomorrow will have a slight chance of showers, then a chance of showers and thunderstorms after 10am. Mostly sunny , with a high of 83 degrees at 3pm. One degree above normal, which is similar to a typical day around July 13th. Maximum dew point of 68 at 10am. Calm wind becoming southwest around 5 mph in the afternoon. Chance of precipitation is 30%. New rainfall amounts between a tenth and quarter of an inch, except higher amounts possible in thunderstorms. A year ago, we had mostly sunny skies. The high last year was 86 degrees. The record high of 103 was set in 1936.

In four weeks on August 5 the sun will be setting in the west-northwest (294°) at 8:07 pm,🌄 which is 24 minutes and 46 seconds earlier then tonight. In 2019 on that day, we had sunny and temperatures between 83 and 54 degrees. Typically, you have temperatures between 82 and 61 degrees. The record high of 99 degrees was set back in 1955.

The Flow

I haven’t posted anything to my blog in the past day, because I had a bad day yesterday.

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I haven’t posted anything to my blog in the past day, because I had a really bad day yesterday.

I figured it not best to belabor all the things that went wrong yesterday. Plus I was tired from work, hot and sweaty and did not feel like speeding a bunch of time blogging.

  • I started out the morning burning my eggs that I was cooking.
  • I go to clock in at nine and I’m having trouble getting the website to load
  • My work laptop battery was totally dead and the sun was hazy so the low voltage relay kept tripping and I had to reset it
  • I did make it through the day and necessary work got done but itwas frustrating and nerve racking
  • With the heat coming and my desire to wash off I decided to get ice at the Wardsboro General Store and then go for a swim at Grout Pond
  • I get to the Wardsboro General Store and there was a big sign – no ice available
  • I drive down to Danbury VT and the 711 store there is out of ice
  • Big construction project there with delays
  • Pulling out into traffic I come very close to slamming into another car on the unfamiliar road
  • I go to Family Dollar in Wardsboro 15 miles out of the way, they don’t sell ice
  • I get two bags of ice at Shaws but I don’t realize how big they are until I’ve paid $8.
  • I have too much ice, end up dumping out one of the blocks I brought from home
  • Come back via Somerset Road which I’ve been avoiding because it’s so washboarded
  • Because I’m so far south, it’s no longer worth while to go to Grout Pond
  • I get back to camp, still hot and sweaty, decide to head back to the little brook behind camp
  • I brought my crocks figuring I could at least wash off my dirty shoes but find a big enough hole to go all the way in doing some skinny dipping as I left my bathing suit at camp
  • I get back to camp and start cooking beef and refried beans
  • When I put the refried beans on the store the mixture of the water and grease in the can of beans explodes into a giant fire ball, burning a big hole in one of the screen doors in my almost brand new tent, burning my arm, setting the table on fire briefly and my burned a hole in my t shirt
  • The burns were only first degree burns but they hurt like a mother trucker – at first I was concerned that I might wake up to blisters all over my arm but it just was very red and sore
  • I am very upset to see my new tent destroyed, although based on the location of the hole, I believe I can sew and overlay a piece of soft window screen from the hardware store and get a tight enough fit to keep out the bugs
  • The tent was only $120 including tax but I do think I can repair it adequately to keep out the bugs even if it ain’t perfectly pretty.
  • In some ways the location was in a pretty good place as I have the solid sides of tent where I can sew in the replacement screen
  • But that said, I’m still quite upset about it all
  • I ended up covering the hole with a tarp for now and when I get home I’ll fix it
  • It could have been worse, the propane exploded or even just the burns on my arm more severe and ending up in the burn unit
  • I soaked my arm for a while in the river today and it’s feeling better
  • I have a plan to patch the tent and think I can get materials locally and sew it or if necessary online
  • I’ve learned my lesson with grease and water, if this happened at home I would have burned down my apartment or at least did serious damage to the kitchen – it was that big of a fire ball
  • I’m just so disappointed on what a day of mess up it became but nothing that serious I guess

So that was my Tuesday and why I didn’t post much yesterday. Sometimes it’s better to just say nothing.

As the nurse office in my elementary school said on a sign: “If it’s not fatal, it’s not serious.”

The Push To Turn NYC’s Polluting Peaker Plants Into Publicly-Owned Solar Power – Gothamist

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The Push To Turn NYC’s Polluting Peaker Plants Into Publicly-Owned Solar Power – Gothamist

Looming over a playground in one of the poorest neighborhoods in Queens stands the enormous Ravenswood Generating Station, the 23rd largest power plant in the country. Its functions are to operate as a fossil fueled peaker plant, providing an extra surge of electricity during ‘peak times’ of high energy demand, such as when everyone turns on their air-conditioning during a heatwave.

While peaker plants were originally intended to only be used once or twice a year, they now run in New York City on a more regular basis to meet the city’s growing energy demands, particularly in the evening when more lights and devices are turned on. If one spends some time by a peaker plant they may feel a little nauseous. They may feel worse if they reside near one.