How to be Idle

The concept of this book makes sense to me, yet I can not wrap my head around the idea of being “idle”. This may be because I was raised in a household that believes hard work will get you to what you want. Though he says the same thing doing so in only a few hours and a few days is bizarre and unknown. I do believe in participating in activities that you enjoy and feel that they are important but have the concept of “work before play.” There are many things I enjoy and I often don’t get to do them now because school work requires so much of my attention and time and have always felt that I would have more time after college (when I have a job) to do those things. The type of job I want is physically and mentally demanding and is a type of “9-5″ job (depending on the area I work in I might start at 7 or 8 am). Then I would have the rest of the day to do things.

The hardest concept I have is staying in bed past 10 am. As a child up until high school I had no problem staying in bed past noon. However even if i do not set an alarm I am up by 9 and at the latest 10. I can not physically stay in bed very long. Many people tell me I am weird because I like to take morning classes. I however function better in the morning and enjoy being up. Typically I am awake or half away before my alarm goes off at 7 30. Most of the time I wake around six and doze. Does this mean I can be idle and just happen to have an early internal clock? I’d like to think so.

Overall I disliked the book. To me I felt like the author was just whining about have to work and would rather lay about and think. Hard work is not bad for anyone and being up with the sun will not kill anyone either. In fact I think the build peoples characters and can be very beneficial  Some of the coolest animals are up before dawn and how would you ever know if you never got up to see them?

how to be idle… and enjoy life

Tom Hodgkinson really knows how to live life. doing the lest amount of possible work to just get by, sounds like alot of my best friends. people all across america do all this work to get money so they can be happy. we need to appreciate the small things that make life beautiful, like sleeping in, bacon, a stiff cocktail, fishing, naps, ice cream. the only problem i notices is that there is no chapter on reading or writing so if i were a true loafer i wouldn’t have read this book. there noting more i love then sleeping in and having a lazy Sunday or Saturday but i couldn’t live like this every day. with hard work come a great feeling of accomplishment , mowing the lawn, painting the fence, fixing something, going on a difficult hike, these are all things that require time and effort but when finished you feel a scene of self empowerment. i think being idle is wonderful there is nothing that relieves stress more then doing nothing, but i think if you did noting all day that one would get stressed and worry about things. i could be wrong but if i did noting for a week or so i would have a feeling that i am worthless.  anyways i really like the book or at least the first half that i have read and i am defiantly going to finish this book.

Eating animals… cuz they are yummy

as humans are at the top of the food chain one would expect a wide verity of food available for consumption. we get to enjoy food from the land and the sea. before main steam livestock production people would have to hunt or fish for their protein filled meat. most of the time the animal got away and there would be no meat to eat. eating meat was a small part of our diet hundreds of years ago. with the rise of livestock factory farming we rise animals for the sole purpose of killing them. now getting are hands on meat or fist is almost to easy. I was unaware how much factory farming contributes to global warming, i just never really crossed my mind because every one is always talking about cars. I also like the part on why we dont eat dogs, because in america we eat some pretty nasty stuff but not dogs. its interesting how we have chosen certain animals to grow and consume. i also thought the techniques used to maximize production are crazy. how they put egg laying chickens in darkness for 4 weeks to represent winter then turn on lights to represent spring. manipulating nature scares me. these chickens are grown so big they cant stand, cows are eating corn that cant be digested, sea animals are being killed for shrimp consumption. i have crazy thought of zombie chickens haha. It would be interesting to see who would survive if we stop factoring farming and when back to hunter garter style of food production, where you had to work for the proteins in meats and fish. 

Eating Animals, Continued

Environment and Society

Paul Robbins, Hintz and Moore talk about many different aspects of the environment that humans connect directly to. It is a great book, although it’s more like a text book then the other books we have read so far.I will probably keep this book at the end of the class because it has some really great insights.

The authors begin talking about population growth and the “carrying Capacity” of the earth and it’s resources, the continuous growth of the population has an impact on the environment. But many other environmental issues go unnoticed until they are already problems, a way to gain more attention to these problems is to have “common property” properties that don’t belong to any particular person but also don’t belong to everybody.

The authors then focus on the Wolves and how their fate is linked to global biodiversity and evolutionary processes.They are also tied to humans in many other ways.

Response to Desert Solitaire

After reading Desert Solitaire I caught myself thinking a lot about my relationship with the wilderness, or desert, compared to Abbey’s relationship. He has no interest in interacting with people. He is only concerned with his relationship with the environment. Throughout the book he frequently gets annoyed by the tourists who think there should be changes made such as paved roads and food places. He thrives in being alone with nature and hates when this nature is disrupted by careless people who don’t understand. Personally, I’m all for being surrounded by nature, but being essentially by myself in the wilderness for months does not sound ideal. Abbey has a passion for the desert that most people don’t have and don’t understand. Abbey says: “There is something about the desert… There is something there which the mountains, no matter how grand and beautiful, lack; which the sea, no matter how shining and vast ad old, does not have” (273). It is very rare for someone to feel so passionate about the desert, and I appreciate that. I agree with him in that the desert area should not be modernized and should not be reconstructed into a tourist destination. Making it more tourist like kills the mood and reason for people to come out and visit. However, that led me to think that if people don’t make an effort to come out and visit, the desert and other environmental habitats could be completely modernized due to a lack of interest. So, is it worse to modernize a little and have people come and be interested or to have no one come and get the areas torn down? I can see Abbey’s perspective though- he has an unreal love for the desert that many people don’t have and don’t understand.

While reading the text I came across this line: “Long enough in the desert a man like other animals can learn to smell water” (131). It made me wonder if people can actually start to smell water. I tried to look this up on google, but there were no real sources to verify or deny this claim. What do you think? Can you smell water?

Desert Solitaire made me realize how difficult it is to live in the desert. Of course deserts have stereotypes of them being hot and dry, and according to this book that is very true. Abbey was caught several times with not having enough water. He even had to suck on a pebble to keep from dehydrating. The desert is a very dangerous place to be in by yourself. One of the tourists died from lack of water and was found after two days. This website gives some overall dangers of being in the desert.

National parks

This idea I think is the best around! Making people leave their cars at the entrance of a park and having to bike every where within the park. Because the roads will still be their staff at the park can transport the campers lager things while they enjoy themselves. Food and restrooms facilities will still be available but everything will have a different perspective. The author have a very good point when he says people just rush through many national parks and don’t take the time to roam around and take in their true beauty. I my self can attest to this. When I was eleven my family and I took a two-week trip out west and hit many of the main attractions (Grand Canyon, painted desert, petrified forest, Grand Teton, and many others). Though we did explore some of it, I would have loved to spend more time exploring. Overall I found this idea to be very good. This would help preserve the parks but still allowing people to see it

Desert Solitaire

This book as great in contrast to the first days of class and how we talked about what nature and the wilderness is for us. None of the mentioned things were the desert, it’s almost as if we don’t consider the desert nature at all because of it’s limiting factor over some fauna.

The author explores how nature was lost from humanity way before today and how humans are the principal destructors of nature. Some parts of this book were really boring I kind of had a hard time concentrating on what he was saying because many times he seemed to contradict himself.

Response to The Meadowlands

The first thought that popped into my head when reading The Meadowlands was: “Is this place real?” It is indeed. Although I usually don’t trust Wikipedia as a reliable source, I trust this article to confirm its presence. I find it unbelievable that there is a place like this that even exists… right outside a large city too! When people question whether humans are negatively effecting parts of our earth, all we have to do is show them this place. The disgusting water, the rotting garbage, the mosquitoes, and the dead bodies are only some of the factors that make this place uninhabitable. Most, if not all, of these characteristics are a cause of humans. I find this concept interesting- how far will humans go to change the environment in order to take care of themselves?  Or are they even taking care of themselves? Do they really need to build a mall? Do they need to dump their trash this way? Do they really need to dump dead bodies there? At what point is it too much?

While reading, another factor I found very interesting was the antennas sticking out from the ground. The new antennas were described as: “The four new antennae were each four hundred feet tall, and buried in the marsh beneath each one were radial antennae, each of those jutting from the base of the tower every three degrees like the spokes of a submerged bicycle wheel” (Sullivan 61). There was a conflict with these antennae in that residents of the Meadowlands didn’t want them painted red and white, but instead they wanted them to blend in with the rest of the Meadowlands. However, this was an airplane safety issue. Therefore, blinking lights were put on the antennae. I found it ironic how the residents didn’t want to attract the eye of anyone to the antennae, and by putting blinking lights on them it made them even more obvious. It makes me think- should antennae even be allowed in The Meadowlands and natural environments? How far should society go to modernize environmental land? I understand that antennae are safety issues, but should they be there in the first place? Below is a picture of what the red and white antenna would look like, and a picture of the blinking antenna:

The Meadowlands brought up dead bodies a great deal. It seemed whenever there was a murder or disappearance the first place the police and investigators would look was The Meadowlands. This is a bit discomforting and creepy. However, it made me start to think- are dead bodies good for the environment? Obviously they carry a lot of disease and infection, but they will decompose, right? According to an article by Were You Wondering, insects thrive in dead bodies. It’s a very disgusting and disturbing process, but it’s food for them. However, I also think that the body and all of its remains can pollute water systems and spread disease. Personally, I don’t see them as being good for the environment, but it’s a natural process which makes me wonder. Thoughts?

Updates for Fall 2012

Source

Basic updates (syllabus, schedule) complete for Geography 360 Environmental Geography, Fall semester, 2012.