It's easy being green (-ish)

Is climate change a fact or a fad? Is global warming a conspiracy? It doesn't matter. I know that many of my actions are destructive to the environment, I can see it in my trash. So, I decided to be proactive. A couple of years ago I took the initiative to green my home, and my behavior (details were posted on my blog). Some recent changes are added below:

• Installed a recyclable steel roof. This lowered heating and cooling electricity consumption, and I do not have to change my roof with toxic shingles every 15-20 years
• Insulated the basement
• Re-insulated the attic
• Installed ceiling fans to circulate air / help cool / distribute heat around the house
• Use a rain barrel to collect water and to water the garden
• Replaced the washing machine to low-consumption (water and electricity) front loading one
• Replaced clothes dryer to low energy one (though we use the clothesline whenever weather permits)
• Replaced the dishwasher to low energy / water consumption one (considered ditching it altogether but found out that dishwasher uses less water than hand job)
• Replaced the fridge to energy efficient one
• Use a broom to sweep the floors (instead of vacuuming)
• Changed all light bulbs to mini-spiral fluorescents
• We compost all organic material, and that which cannot be composted in our garden goes out with the city green bin program
• We recycle every scrap of paper, plastic, glass, etc…
• We buy all our veggies and fruit from a corner store that is supplied by local farmers
• I bike to my grocer 2-3 times a week instead of driving once a week to buy huge loads of stuff
• Planted numerous trees and shrubs in our yard (the kind that thrive on low water consumption)
• Planted a wall-creeping plant to help shade the house (and to hear the happy bird concerts)
• Use bio-degradable soaps and cleaning supplies such as natural soap, baking soda, vinegar, etc.
• Do not buy chemical cosmetics, only all natural
• Do not eat meat (agriculture is a devastating carbon monoxide, methane and nitrous oxide producing industry)
• Built bat houses to help combat mosquitoes (but, really, to stop my neighbors from using chemical sprays)
• Installed "leaching pit" (only in the country because city does not permit those)
• Purchase only those products that use skin tight packaging, and / or, strip it in store and make it known what I think of excess thrash
• I tell my supermarket store owner what I think of open top fridges and freezers
  
• In the winter we set our thermostat to 17C and put on a sweater if necessary
• Limit the use and purchase of cotton garments, using hemp instead
• Any construction involving wood uses bamboo (easily renewable)
• I tell SUV driver what I think about the size of their penises, and place literature behing their windshield wipers (see www.earthonempty.com ) BTW: I want to ditch my car, but am not convinced that I can make it without one on this continent where car is often indispensable | considered getting an electric car, but am not convinced that we need more nuclear power plants to charge them
• I do not fly anywhere on weekends, using those cheap airlines, as many Europeans do
• I do not buy bottled water
• I do not subscribe, nor buy any newspapers or magazines (although, these I ditched long before I thought of the environment)
• I take part in anti-military rallies "The world’s military burns a quarter of the world’s jet fuel and emits 70% of ozone depleting CFCs. The US military generates more hazardous waste than the five largest chemical companies combined" in Losing Control by Paul Rogers
• I refuse to submit my manuscripts by mail (insist on emailing)
• I do not print my manuscripts to edit -- use split screen instead
• Am considering writing the next novel on a typewriter (but, am worried that will use too much paper on rewrites)
• Am petitioning my local and federal government to ban recreational ATV / water scooter / snow mobile use (each releases as much CO2 as 250 cars)

The above is by no means a complete list. I'm not suggesting that I'm a saint. I know I cause damage to the environment, but I also know that the only way to stop it completely is to eradicate the entire human race. So, I do my best to leave as little footprint as possible.

Feast for the eyes

Europeans to feast their eyes. To sample such great Mexican icons as Rivera, Siqueiros or Orozco, Europeans had to cross the Ocean. Now, for the first time, one has only to cross the English Channel. Great Mexican prints are available for viewing at the British Museum in London. The exhibit has an interesting slant: Revolution. What else?

The current exhibition at the British Museum of Mexican printmaking in the early 20th century is the first ever in Europe. For most people, Mexico is more often associated with one of the leading art forms of Twentieth Century―the huge murals of “los tres grandes” of Mexican art: Diego Rivera, David Álfaro Siqueiros and José Clemente Orozco. MORE

Exhibit runs till April 5.

Diego Rivera: Emiliano Zapata


Diego Rivera: Frida Kahlo

Birthday Party with Anton Chekhov

Today is Anton Chekhov's 150th birthday anniversary, so I thought I'd celebrate by reading his short stories. What a party!

Chekhov's nameplate on the door to his apartment


Chekhov's grave

No Literary Advance? No problem!

When Deanna Zandt signed her contract with Barrett-Koehler to publish her first book, Sink or Swim: Making Waves of Change in a New Social Media World next April, she knew the house did not give advances, relying instead on a more author-friendly royalty structure. To help fund her research and give herself the opportunity to devote full-time to writing, Zandt, a media and technology consultant, reached out for financial assistance and sent a fund-raising letter to 500 potential backers. The appeal was directed mainly to the communities that have been the focus of her life for many years: feminists, organizers and political activists.

“Relationships are everything, and we can help each other,” noted Zandt. “Sink or Swim is about the power of technology as a social networking tool for those on the sidelines of technology advances—women, people of color and more.” She hopes her fund-raising effort is an example of practice what you preach. Zandt's goal is to raise $15,000 to cover expenses, travel and research. Donations totaling $6,558 have come in since she started her appeal June 23, with $4,558 raised through her e-mail/Twitter campaign and $2,000 in a matching fund set up by large donors. The owner of the Two Boots pizza chain in New York has also contributed $100 a month in pizza to cover some of Zandt's outlay for food. “I'll even trade some of the Two Boots' gift certificates for research help,” Zandt said. She said she chose to publish with B-K even without an advance because “it was much more important for me to work with someone so supportive and aligned with my own beliefs about the need for progressive community development in our culture.” SOURCE

SadoMasochistic pleasures of sleepless nights

I often can't sleep at night, and last night was no different. I've learned that trying to force myself to sleep just doesn't work, and it is best to use the time for other means. Usually, I read. Last night I turned to sadomasochism.

First I read a couple of works by Marquis de Sade, father of sadism. Most people know who de Sade was, and what he wrote. Unlike de Sade, who is often considered one of the literary classics, Leopold von Sacher-Masoch is virtually forgotten. His writing lacked certain vivaciousness that was so abundant in the Marquis' works. Yet, without von Sacher-Masoch there would be no masochism. What makes these two go so well together? As wikipedia has it : Sadism is pleasure in the infliction of pain or humiliation upon another person, while masochism refers to gratification from receiving the same. Both authors indulged their imagination in describing bodily and emotional pleasures from said practices. Venus in Furs is the latter author's best known work. Download a free ebook and peep into Wanda and Severin's passionate reveries.

Who is a literary agent?

Made numerous additions and corrections to my literary agents and book publishers directory.

Who are agents? Well, let Raymond Chandler enlighten you:

Throughout the history of commercial life nobody has ever quite liked the commission man. His function is too vague, his presence always seems one too many, his profit looks too easy, and even when you admit that he has a necessary function, you feel that this function is, as it were, a personification of something that in an ethical society would not need to exist. If people could deal with one another honestly, they would not need agents.

The agent never receipts his bill, puts his hat on and bows himself out. He stays around forever, not only for as long as you can write anything that anyone will buy, but as long as anyone will buy any portion of any right to anything that you ever did write. He just takes ten per cent of your life.

Auschwitz espionage

A fascinating story of a Polish military spy who willingly entered Auschwitz concentration camp to organize insurrection.

A biography of Witold Pilecki, one of the unsung heroes of World War Two, has been published in Italy.

Entitled A Volunteer,  it was written by Marco Patricelli, a lecturer in modern history at the University in Chieti. The ANSA Agency  stresses in its review of the book that Pilecki’s war-time exploits and his tragic post-war plight remain virtually unknown in the West.

In 1940 Witold Pilecki allowed himself to be arrested by the Germans and sent to Auschwitz, where he organized a conspiracy among the prisoners with the idea of an insurrection in the camp. He was the author of the first report on the murder of European Jews that was passed over to the Allies. After three years in Auschwitz, Pilecki escaped from the camp, reached Warsaw, joined the Home Army’s intelligence department and formed a secret organization within the Home Army to prepare resistance against a possible Soviet occupation. He fought in the 1944 Warsaw Rising.

After the end of the war he went to Italy and joined the Second Corps. He was sent by the Polish intelligence to Poland as a spy. However, he was captured and executed by the communist authorities in 1948. SOURCE