Interesting Links

[helwen]

http://themoment.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/06/20/the-post-materialist-energys-past-future/
This one has some photos of stuff from the Orkneys. Might be of interest for historical and/or sustainability reasons.

L noted the highback chairs would be good for keeping heat from a fire in/around you too, not just keeping a draft off your neck.

Our own bed is a canopy-style, and now that we're in a smaller bedroom we don't need to curtain it in the winter-time. The box-beds are interesting, and I wouldn't mind having a slightly higher storage space under our bed, but I do like being able to hang up the laundry on our frame during the dry winter-time, better than having more storage. Although the story about the evicted couple was pretty funny...


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Article on Project Laundry List

That got Lee thinking. One dryer, he knows today, eats up to $100 or more in power each year while emitting up to a ton of carbon dioxide. Collectively, America's more than 80 million dryers annually burn 6 to 10 percent of all residential electricity — second only to refrigerators and the equivalent of 30 million tons of coal or the output of the nation's 15 least productive nuclear reactors.

Lee, 33, sees clotheslines as the solution. But a growing number of housing complexes and communities, viewing them as eyesores that lower property values, have gone so far as to ban them.

Aiming to change attitudes and laws, Lee founded Project Laundry List. What began as a college campaign to promote clotheslines has grown into an internationally known nonprofit organization "to educate people," according to its mission statement, "about how simple lifestyle modifications, including air-drying one's clothes, reduce our dependence on environmentally and culturally costly energy sources."

NB: Yes, I do still use the dryer from time to time, even a few times this summer because of the funky weather we've been having. But I much prefer hang-drying -- better for the clothing and less ironing on my part. And of course with electricity going up in cost...


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Page from Energy Bulletin on the difficulties people are having today, with increasing fuel and food prices

Detroit's population has dropped to under half what it used to be, with attendant problems of unemployment, crime, and the highest high school dropout rate in the country...

Senator Bernie Sanders started asking questions of folks on his web site, like how the rising costs were affecting folks... here's a couple of samples of answers:

A mother and father in rural Vermont: "Due to increasing fuel prices we have at times had to choose between baby food/diapers and heating fuel. We've run out of heating fuel three times…. The baby has ended up in the hospital with pneumonia two of the times."

A man in north central Vermont: "As bad as our situation is, I know many in worse shape. We try to donate food when we do our weekly shopping but now we are not able to even afford to help our neighbors eat. What has this country come to?"

... And the third article on this page is also in Vermont,

On June 11, Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie held a press conference to declare an emergency in advance of this winter's heating season. Dubie admits he has no explicit authority to declare such an emergency, but he thinks that just saying the word "emergency" can focus people's attention and spur collaborative activity.

And boy, did a lot of announcements follow. The next day, Gov. James Douglas gave a speech to announce what he called the Vermont Fuel and Food Partnership and established a Cabinet-level task force (which he named Dubie to co-chair, along with incoming Administration Secretary Neale Lunderville) "to focus every effort and every resource Vermont can bring to bear to help manage the effects of higher energy costs on Vermont families."

Folks might like reading this last one in particular, because the politicians are actually getting their act together and proposing things to help the folks who are struggling to have both food and heat, and keep from getting sick.

Comments

[shalmestere.livejournal.com]

I line-dry most of our clothes: we don't have a yard to speak of, so we put up clotheslines in the basement :-)

[helwen.livejournal.com]

That works :) We had lines in our basement in Holyoke too.

[tashabear.livejournal.com]

I love the box bed, but the only time I'd really need it would be Panteria. I'd like a canopy bed, though. palegreyminion and her family were so warm inside their curtained canopy that they had to take off blankets.

[helwen.livejournal.com]

I suppose the box bed would be nice either camping or if I lived somewhere that wasn't well-insulated.

Box or canopy though, airing them during the day's a good thing to do, to stay healthy in the winter. But yeah, it's nice not having to have as many blankets on the bed!

[harpnfiddle.livejournal.com]

looking at the high backed chairs puts me in mind of the American Colonial "settle" - a high-backed seat for more than one, with wings to trap heat from the fire. They were sometimes too narrow front to back to be truly comfortable - had to sit up very straight - typical New England / Puritan/ Yankee

[helwen.livejournal.com]

Oo, I think I've seen one of those. Yes, I think if I were to have one of those, I'd make it a little wider/cosier.

[silverhawkdruid.livejournal.com]

We have an outside line, and use it in the summer, along with everyone else in the neighbourhood. Aah, there is nothing so colourful as rows and rows of clean laundry waving in the breeze. :-)

In the winter we use indoor hangers, to take advantage of the heating. I hang stuff on radiator hangers, a wooden clothes airer which fits in the bath, and on special hooks behind doors. Any available space, basically. I didn't replace the last drier when it conked out, and it is currently outside, waiting to be taken apart and recycled as a plant pot and a spare container for compost, I hope. Inside I hang stuff on radiator hangers, a wooden clothes airer which fits in the bath, and on special hooks behind doors. Any available space, basically.

[helwen.livejournal.com]

Yup, we've done some creative hanging in the winter :D Thankfully we have a wood clothes rack (airer) and the canopy bed frame (metal). I've hung things on the shower curtain rod in the bathroom as well. Can't hang things on the doors because they're wood... oh, and I've taken these expandable window screens we have and laid them flat between two chairs -- usually for sweaters.

[silverhawkdruid.livejournal.com]

I guess you could say 'any space in a storm' LOL. Neat idea with the window screens btw. Very creative!