I'm not real, but I pretend I am in words.
December 20, 2011
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A few holiday charts, via Nick Douglas
October 28, 2011
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(Source: navillusnylamme)
July 23, 2011
July 16, 2011
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Quinoa, a grain-like superfood, has become so popular in Western markets that Bolivians can no longer afford to eat it. Instead, they’re turning to cheap, processed foods, raising concerns about malnutrition in a poor country where it has long been a problem.
For centuries Bolivians lived off quinoa, and it was “little more than a curiosity outside the Andes.” But it has recently caught on in wealthier countries as a healthy alternative to grains, becoming a staple at places like Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods. With demand soaring, prices have nearly tripled over the past five years. That’s great for Bolivian farmers. But it means many Bolivians can no longer afford what has long been a healthy staple of their diet. Quinoa consumption in Bolivia has dropped by 34 percent in five years. “The shift offers a glimpse into the consequences of rising global food prices and changing eating habits in both prosperous and developing nations,’ say Simon Romaro and Sara Shahriari in The New York Times.
Read more about this problem here. What exactly is quinoa, and how do you pronounce it?
Photo: CC BY rusvaplauke
Same sort of thing happened with those soap nuts things, they became so expensive for the communities who had been using them that they had to switch to cheap laundry products which polluted their waters.
(via sidepocket)
June 30, 2011
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4th of July for Math Nerds
by Josh Sundquist
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(Source: therulesofagentleman)
June 25, 2011
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pie chart: What happens if Gay marriage is legalized?
June 24, 2011
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Skateboard business icon dies in S.F. suicide
(06-22) 17:56 PDT SAN FRANCISCO — Eric Swenson, an icon in the skateboarding culture and a co-founder of Thrasher magazine, died Monday in San Francisco. He was 64.
Mr. Swenson shot and killed himself in front of the Mission police station, according to police.
Mr. Swenson helped reinvigorate the skateboarding scene after it languished in the late 1970s. Along with his friend Fausto Vitello, Mr. Swenson opened Independent Trucks manufacturing company in San Francisco in 1978, which makes skateboard equipment, clothes and accessories. Three years later, they and Kevin Thatcher co-founded trendsetting Thrasher magazine.
Independent Trucks made a high-quality truck, the metal connector between the skateboard and its wheels, that enabled boarders to execute the moves necessary for jumps and tricks performed on rails and curbs.
The articles and photos in Thrasher focused on this new generation of skateboarders and pushed the success of Independent Trucks by advertising its products.
“People talk, but seldom act,” the magazine said in a message on its website about Mr. Swenson’s death. “Eric Swenson got things done. Never one to clamor for the spotlight, he preferred the hard work, orchestrating the show from behind the scenes. His mark on skateboarding is extraordinary.”
Michael Brooke, publisher of Concrete Wave, a skateboarding magazine in Toronto, said Wednesday that Mr. Swenson was “one of the critical architects” of the revitalized art of skateboarding.
“Eric Swenson is really one of those guys who drives things forward,” Brooke said. “The funny thing about skateboarding is that a lot of times, there are a lot more followers than there are visionaries.Eric, along with Fausto, were visionaries.”
Vitello died of a heart attack at the age of 59 in 2006 while bike riding in Woodside.
“Too many people who are involved in this industry seem to be taken from us at far too young an age,”
Brooke said. Vitello’s widow, Gwynn Vitello, 61, of Hillsborough said Wednesday that Mr. Swenson was a private individual and “one of the most independent persons I’ve ever known. He was like John Wayne. He kept everything close to the vest. He did things because he believed in them. He was happiest when he was making things and building things and getting jobs for people.”
Mr. Swenson leaves behind his wife, Linda McKay, and sisters Rebekah Engle and Sonja Taylor, both of San Francisco. Services are pending.
E-mail Henry K. Lee at hlee@sfchronicle.com. (via Skateboard business icon dies in S.F. suicide)
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This happens all the time, all over the Unites States, and we allow it.
June 22, 2011
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Internetz
Sometimes, the internet is too immediate, giving us time to click and be seen before we should be, when our outfits are still in disarray, when our words don’t quite seem as neat as they should.
Is this a good thing? Is this us, raw, unencumbered by propriety and artificial constructs?
I spend minutes (minutes!) figuring out which outfit to wear to be seen in public in, but I could type here (fast, I’m very fast, did I tell you?) and click “publish now” and there’d be, while perhaps a small amount of going back, no complete erasure.
In fact, I just did that very thing, but I saved it as a draft. It’s the difference between life and death, I tell you. And it’s all in the wrist.
