Vlomans Kill this afternoon
I was thinking they should rename the Gulf of Mexico the Dead Zone.
After all, a lot of it is a Dead Zone from depleted oxygen from too much nitrogen and warm temperatures. In 2024, the dead zone was 6,705 square miles, which is larger than average and roughly the size of New Jersey.
Plus then they could sell Grateful Dead things at tourist shops at beaches along the shoreline.
Maybe I will ride on this Valentine’s Day ♥️ 
Not to too cold and windy this morning, but gray. I don’t love taking the bus or walking laps on the Plaza. Just one way though, as I think the trail will be crap and I probably should take the road. You know I’ll be attempting the bike path. I’m crazy.
Still it beats busing it to work and walking laps in the Plaza. 
I did that yesterday and it was fine but I get tired of walking laps in the Concourse with the same gray walls and sketchy people hanging around. Of course, you never know these days if somebody is schizophrenic or just talking on their cellphone. 
Both have been increasingly common in the Plaza. 
Keeps the state troopers employed. The bike ride gets me my exercise in, plus saves on the bus fare.
Made cornmeal pancakes this morning, 
this time adding some oatmeal, whole wheat flour and spinach to fortify them a bit. I often use just cornmeal and eggs with baking powder and a little bit of salt, plus shredded onions and turmeric but I wanted to try to something different. Change is a good thing, even if eggs are still mad expensive 
though I bought that big container of eggs a few weeks back, as they’re such a good source of protein. Apparently because I think a lot about including a lot of natural fiber in my foods my internet advertising feed is full of advertisements for Metamucil.
I am very opposed to vitamins and supplements of all types, as if you are missing something like that from diet, 
you really should be eating real food to get it. 
If you need fiber, eat more vegatables. And maybe whole-wheat flour and oatmeal for your soluble fibers. I do use a lot of sugar substitutes though, because I think they are a way to avoid excess calories while giving a lot of sweetness to things. 
But soon once maple syrup taping season is underway, I’ll switch back to real maple syrup but not in glass because I hate breakable, unburnable glass.
I was annoyed about another high heating and electric bill this month at $122, which I get the grand scheme of things with inflation isn’t much still I was hoping for two digits. 
Maybe it’s because I had the heat up a bit when the landlord was over to repair the fridge and it’s been cold. Or more likely, I’ve gotten very comfortable with the heated blanket cranked up like a sweat lodge at times in bed, even though I keep the heat everywhere else at 50. 
Plus I’ve been taking longer showers, which means the hot water tank works harder. Also think the landlord improved the insulation next door when he renovated that unit, plus while I’m not finding any new air leaks that I can find I am sure insulation isn’t great here, and it’s been such a windy winter, even if it’s not the coldest ever. Truth is by this weekend’s trip called off due to snow, I’ll probably save that amount just by staying home and reading. 
I was so hoping to get out of town this weekend 
for the holiday, but it keeps going between a ton of snow, less snow, more rain and ice, and who knows. I knew for a while Madison County was off the agenda, but I had thought Schoharie or certainly Rennselaerville could have been a possibility, but nah. And it’s going to get even colder after the snow storm, so there isn’t going to be much snow melt next week. Maybe I’ll take off next Friday and do a long weekend, but I don’t know there is a lot of snow to dig out even that campsite in Rensselearville. 
I do want to have a fire though and look at the stars at some point. Maybe it won’t be until that first week of March. At some point things will warm up.
I got Valentine’s Day Candy 
for my employees this year. Probably have to have a meeting to hand them out today. And drop some over at the other departments for people who are such a part of my team. It’s good, I actually forgot to buy onions, mushrooms, and tofu this week when I ran over to get Valentine’s Candy but it worked out as I ended up eating other things so it’s all good. 
Change is not a bad thing, despite what so many people seem to think these days. I get change can be painful and uncomfortable but sometimes you got to move on.
R. F. K. Jr.
Many people are warning that R. F. K. Jr. poses a clear and present threat to public health with his use of conspiracy theories and vaccine skepticism. They are alarmed that he now oversees the federal health bureaucracy, that is going to take government in dangerous directions. He’s part of President Trump’s many initiatives to move quickly, break things, try new ideas to fix an already seriously broken system.
Lynne Jackson the other night was saying to me she can’t believe anybody voted for Donald Trump. I bit my lip and nodded along. But let’s be honest, many things have been broken for a long time in our country, people are dying prematurely from unhealthy eating, lack of exercise, while our cities get surrounded by ever growing mounds of waste, our cities smoggy, burn and flooded because of the vast amounts of energy we are dumping into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide which is changing the climate. And don’t get me started how fucked up societial institutions are with their high taxes and poor quality of services provided by government at all levels. Not to mention how blacks and others are getting the shit beat out of them by cops and robbed by the government and scammers alike.
R. F. K. Jr. is most known these days as a vaccine skeptic. But I also remember him from years ago back when he had a mid-morning progressive radio show on WPRI and other stations. Back when he was known as the crusading environmental lawyer, maybe always prone towards sueing polluters with an eye for cash but also helping to fight against some of the worse cases of dumping and abuse of the Hudson River. Our river is a lot better off because of the precedence he help set out in law.
Things are changing in America, in many ways a lot quicker then one might expect. But the old system and way of doing things was broken, and needed to change. And honestly, I think he has some interesting ideas – we should be looking more to harness the power of psychedelics both recreationally and to treat mental illness – and old thinking about fats, especially as it relates to minimally processed foods like whole milk and meats enjoyed in moderation, do need to be reconsidered based on contemporary science. Sorry Greenies, there are no healthy granola bars, even if the label says they are organic oats and cane sugar and packaging is to be recycled at least in your mind. An apple or orange is far healthier option.
A field fire, while potentially destructive and costly to a farm’s crops in a first year, usually leads to much greener fields as new grass grows into the nutrient-rich ash left by the fire. Often communities grow stronger after a fire, flood or hurricane, even if there is initially a lot of destruction and loss. Indeed, there is a lot of evidence that is what is needed.
The old way of doing things was failing. We needed a reimagination, not just an automatic rejection of all new ideas as being dangerous and foolish. Are all of the unconventional policies of the Trump administration a good idea? Probably not, but only time will tell. Yet, when an old idea fails it’s important to try a new idea, which was too often lacking in liberal society, that was too addicted to defending the status quo. If all things are failing around you, shouldn’t you try something new, even if the experts believe the new idea is risky or potentially harmful?
When you are in a hole, you really should stop digging. At least for a few minutes to see where all the digging is leading to. Even when the experts say you should continue to dig. And maybe you should reconsider the advice of the experts, as even smart, well-researched people make mistakes and get overly bought into an idea even if it turns out to be wrong. And maybe it is time to try something new.
21.6 acres
That’s the size of the Pine Bush parcel that developers want to turn into sixteen or so large suburban houses in the Pine Bush as shown on the mapper that I wrote for Save the Pine Bush.
That number sticks in my mind because that’s around the acreage of land I eventually want to own for my off-grid cabin and homestead. You know enough land to buffer from neighbors so not to smell their burn barrel or hear their noise, be raise livestock and other food, be able to have big fires without bothering others, and have an ample wood supply for heating.
Like any planning board meeting, the Guilderland Planning Board went through the initial proposed site plan, and took an initial hard look, a skeptical one in preparation of most likely approving it, as Save the Pine Bush fights back. Yet, it all seems so erily similar to the books I’ve been reading about building a house, developing a homestead, transforming raw land. Because essentially that’s my vision, assuming that when I do eventually own land, there are no structures and infrastructure on it.
Yet at the same time, it seems to pull my cogonative dissodence, thinking that I’m dreaming of developing a similar parcel, transforming a piece of so-called raw land aka woods or maybe farm field into a homestead. I know it’s different to build a small off-grid cabin, compared to a million dollar plus suburban road to 15 plastic-covered McMansions and lawns, but it’s still consuming land, domesticating and controlling it with livestock and farm equipment. It’s no longer open woods once you put a house and barn on it, no matter if it’s a few hundred square feet compared to dozens of large suburban houses as disconnected from the surrounding land as can be.
I am not that worried about the economy 
I am less worried then many people about the economy. Maybe because I feel fairly secure at my position and I’ve built up savings and investments over the years, but if Trump crashes the economy with his tariffs so be it. There is nothing I can do to change the economy, and it’s unlikely any recession is likely to last more then a few years. Even if it takes many years for the markets to fully recover from the downturn, I’ve been investing over the past decade and a half, and things are diversified and bought at different times.
I am very skeptical about a very long or deep recession. For one, the American economy is so big and diverse. Politicians fortunates rise and fall on economic news, incumbents don’t want to be seen as doing nothing to reduce human suffering. Moreover, most business leaders nowadays derive the the majority of their wealth not from cash but from stock options, which means if the stock market is in the crapper, CEOs and other leaders have very little money to throw around until the economy recovers. Not to mention, access to inexpensive stocks wouldn’t be a bad thing, as I want to invest more at a lower rate to have more growth for those days when I finally have that homestead I actually want.