Hamlet’s BlackBerry: Dealing With the Crisis of Overconnection

February 19, 2013

...fast pace of technological change makes “BlackBerry” a quaint reference in 2013–the book, however is more relevant than it was in 2010). Powers does not take a finger waving “eat your Brussels sprouts” approach. Rather, he acknowledges the immense potential and usefulness of computers and smart phones while offering sage advice on using them intelligently. He draws on an unlikely set of philosophers, inventors and writers: Socrates, Seneca, Johan...

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Return of the Walkman?

Mr. Homegrown

February 2, 2015

Appropriate Technology, Water and Power

15 Comments

...(Sport WM-FS397, to be exact). Here’s an “exploded” view: The BBC, back in 2010, gave a 13 year-old a Walkman to review. Here’s what the kid said: It took me three days to figure out that there was another side to the tape. That was not the only naive mistake that I made; I mistook the metal/normal switch on the Walkman for a genre-specific equaliser, but later I discovered that it was in fact used to switch between two different types of cassett...

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Do Hens Make Noise?

Mr. Homegrown

January 7, 2008

Animals, Chickens

13 Comments

...Tim R. Birkhead, in an article entitled “For whom does the hen cackle? The function of postoviposition cackling,” posit that cacking is a way for hens to get the message out to nearby roosters that they ain’t in the mood. As Pizzari and Brikhead put it, “One function of postoviposition cackling may thus be to avoid the costs of sexual harassment by signalling to males a particularly unsuitable time for fertilization.” This contradicts earlier theo...

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Our new front yard, part 2: theory

Mrs. Homegrown

November 13, 2015

Back to the Garden, front yard series, Garden Design, Gardening

12 Comments

...California, once upon a time, before they were grazed down to nubbins and replaced by Bermuda grass. I don’t know what my neighborhood looked like before the colonists arrived. It was farmland before it was developed into housing in 1920. Prior to that it may have been a ranch–it seems likely, since most of LA was ranch land. What it was before the Spanish put sheep and cows on it, I don’t know, but it could very well have been rolling grassland...

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Plastic or Wood?

Mr. Homegrown

June 7, 2007

Thoughtstylings

4 Comments

...these are the new rules. We are going to phase as many plastics out of the homestead as we can. We won’t toss what we have in the landfill right now, but when it is time to replace it, this is how it’s going down: Wood and metal utensils instead of plastic Glass storage containers instead of Tupperwear Wool blankets instead of Polarfleece blankets Down filling instead of polyester filling (even for allergy sufferers)* Silk and wool fabrics for ath...

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