Unexpected Leisure

August 26, 2011August 27, 2011

DIY Medical Care?

This raises a question. Just how much health care can you do on your own? What's the threshold for practicing medicine without a license? Obviously, applying a band-aid is okay, but a home liver transplant is not. Nor is prescribing controlled medications. But in between those areas, more or less, there is a lot one can do. Read more [...]

August 23, 2011August 23, 2011

Singing for Fun and Subversion

Making music is one of those things that is probably more fundamentally human than most of us realize. Think about it. Every human culture in every geographic space, and in every time period for which we have evidence one way or the other, humans are a music-making species. Read more [...]

August 22, 2011August 22, 2011

Refugees of Unemployment

He said that the edge that came off most of the candidates was unsettling to him and no matter how confident or outgoing or friendly an interviewee was many of them displayed the same subtle body language and speech ticks he had come to recognize in refugees fifteen years ago. Read more [...]

August 21, 2011

Reconnecting and the State of the World

The big question is, "What next? What will happen? What should happen?" I don't have any more answers than the next person, but in the coming weeks I hope to restart things here and press on about what kind of future we can build for ourselves and each other. Read more [...]

July 16, 2011

Reaping Many Good Things

I have maintained that local efforts to reshape the nature of our economy can do much to alleviate the continuing economic catastrophe. One that is happening in my home town of Salem, Oregon is a program that helps people obtain free food while helping others who face food insecurity. Read more [...]

July 4, 2011

This Way Out

One of the most pernicious things we hear in the media every day is that the economy cannot survive without mega-sized financial and other corporate institutions, which is one reason they are allegedly "too big to fail." We have no other choice. Smile and know your place. Read more [...]

June 22, 2011

Need Health Care? Rob a Bank

In spite of Health Care reform, the number of uninsured Americans is growing at an alarming rate. This is what it's come to: James Richard Verone, of Georgia, attempted to steal one dollar from a bank Read more [...]

May 25, 2011

Repair it Yourself: A Manifesto

IFixit is a group dedicated to the radical notion that people should be able to repair their own stuff. To that end, they have set up a web site with a growing collection of repair manuals, how-to tutorials, and places to order parts for just about everything that is remotely repairable. At least that's the idea. Read more [...]

May 20, 2011

A Japanese Alternative to the Grocery Bag

One aspect of the Japanese art of wrapping and transporting is the furoshiki (literally "bath spread"). This is a square piece of cloth used to wrap items for easier transport, to protect items from dust in storage, or as a gift wrapping. Read more [...]

May 7, 2011

The Role of Stuff and How It’s Changing

One of the schools of thought that came out of this community was the Veridian Design Movement that was active near the turn of our century. They were concerned with how we ought to consider living and our environment in the 21st Century. Read more [...]