A possible solution to global warming – Eliminate global dairy and cattle production
According the United States Environmental Protection Agency the 100 million cattle in the US emit 5.5 million metric tons of methane. Globally, cattle flatulence and belches account for 66 million metric tons and methane is 25 times more potent as a greenhouse gas than CO2 – carbon dioxide. What if we ended dairy and beef operations today? What might be the possible long term consequence? Felisa Smith of the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, may have the answer. She suggests that 13,400 years ago the Americas were extensively populated by large herbivores particularly 12,000 – 20,000 pound woolly mammoths. This was the end of the Wisconsin glacial period and a time of rising temperatures. By 11,500 years ago and roughly 1000 years following...
The Canadian Advantage – Why Canadians are Smiling
During its reportage of the Vancouver Winter Olympics, NBC is covering all thing Canadian and are correctly portraying Canadians as generally polite, reserved, dedicated, hard working and happy. At the Inn some of our fellow workers were talking about how much more friendly Canadians seem to be. Canadians are not friendlier than Americans. Nor are they more generous. Traveling and living in both countries, my experience is that Americans and Canadians are equally generous, helpful, polite and outgoing. But there is a profound difference. Canadians are more “comfortable” – I don’t know how else to put this. Thinking about it, their comfort comes from the knowledge that if they become ill, they will not lose their homes because of high...
Newsweek’s David Noonan is Vegan (for now): Or avoiding being a vulture or hyena
To avoid disease and middle age weight gain, David Noonan adopted the 28 day program in The Engine 2 Diet: The Texas Firefighter’s 28-Day Save-Your-Life Plan That Lowers Cholesterol and Burns Away the Pounds. The diet was developed by Rip Esselstyn to help his fellow firefighter adopt a vegan whole foods diet. Esselstyn has been vegan for more than 20 years and is an athlete and son of Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn, of the Cleveland Clinic, who has long advocated vegan diets for prevention of disease. (Check out Rip Esselstyn’s web site http://www.theengine2diet.com/) Eating a vegan whole foods diet is a credible way to avoid weight gain and disease. Noonan’s conversion is hopeful and perhaps he can affect other people. But this happy development may...
Gypsy, arthritis and acupuncture
Gypsy barely got up. I helped him to the stairs. Before reaching the first step down to the living room, he collapsed, jammed in the stairway. We got him down the stairs. He was in pain and I immediately checked his mouth to see if his gum was pale or that when I pushed against the bone, if the blood returned. No obvious sign of hemorrhaging. He had been on low doses of aspirin since he hurt himself a month ago. Feeling better and better just before coming-up lame on Monday, he had been bouncing around the Inn and following Dana when she carried food upstairs to the offices. (Dana is the head of Big River Nurseries, the Stanford Inn by the Sea’s California Certified Organic Farm). Gypsy quickly “healed” by giving him a full aspirin tablet each...
It’s a Matter of Opinion!
“It’s a matter of opinion!” “No it’s not opinion! It is a matter of life and death. Death is a fact: it’s real. Suffering’s real!” “Well, it’s a matter of opinion!” Three women were in the lobby, two of them proud of their work in sustainable water use. I said, “There’s no greater sustainable action that one person can take than being vegan.” I had no idea what any of them eat. In fact, I knew who they were visiting – a vegan friend of our son. I had no desire to discuss veganism – I assumed that they were literally living sustainably – for that was their passion. But the tall one said, “There have to be options!” I didn’t know what she was...
Keeping Christmas throughout the Year
It is one our coldest nights this year, it’s late and two raccoons, a mother and her baby, who visit every night, are watching us – or that is our dogs, Gypsy and Murphy who are intently watching them. The stare-off reminds us of our love for animals. We contribute to their wellbeing by not in anyway supporting feed lots, piggeries, over fishing and so on. We eat a whole foods, plant based diet. It occurs to us this winter solstice that “keeping Christmas” is perhaps easier for us because each day we have to think about what we eat – particularly if we are traveling. Thinking about what we eat reminds us of our commitment to other species; our commitment to supporting sustainable agriculture and it reminds us of our hypocrisy – we wear leather...
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