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Reading Little House Off the Grid about a family of four who moved to the Napanee area (not that far from where I live, for those of you not in Ontario) to live in a Clearing In The Woods using solar and wind power and stuff like that there.

While this book will most likely be extremely helpful in terms of knowing what the pitfalls are and how to (hopefully) avoid them... gods, the authors (or one of them, anyway) are getting on my nerves! Preachy-vegetarian, preachy-environmentalist, and not very neighbourly... at least when they start out.
Hoy.
Granted, part of the not-very-neighbourly stuff may have come from being the go-to people when one of a number journalists wanted some kind of "extremist" (or possibly actually-extremist, I'm not sure) enviro-view on whatever was happening in Burlington at the time.
But still. It's irritating to have to deal with that Voice while trying to just find stuff out.

It's funny. Because I read this, and I pick up on the eco-snobbery, but I also pick up on the... "Barhavan" attitudes of the writers, if I can use Ami_B's term. I wonder if it would be pissing me off as much if the authors had been more "grass-roots community solidarity" (yep, I'm totally using those buzz-words to make a point ;-) or if it'd blow right by me.
It would probably still piss me off, honestly, but... I could be wrong. :-\


Anyway.
Right now, I'm looking at solar panels, and how much I would need... I'd like (in the hypothetical situation where I own a house and, thus, have a roof to put these on) something like 1000 watts worth of solar panels on each slope (east and west) of the roof. Or, alternatively, 1000 watts on the eastern slope and 2000 watts (meaning 8 250-watt pannels) on the western slope, which gets hotter and brighter sun in my neck of the woods.
I don't actually have a clue how many watts, say, a full-sized fridge or an electric oven will go through...
It's funny. One of the authors talks about giving away all her small apliances - like the bread-maker and the toaster oven and the microwave - and all I could think was: Yes. But don't all of those use way less electricity than an electric stove/oven? (They do. But this family was using a propane-fed stove, so...)
It's something I'd really like to have a clue about. I know that the authors also had a wind-turbine going on, and I'm not sure how much of their electricity came from it vs their 8-12 75-watt solar pannels.

I mean... I'm using a 100-watt lightbulb right now. Plus my laptop. Plus the slow-cooker. Plus my fridge that runs 100% of the time. Plus my electric (urgh...) heat, which also runs 100% of the time. That's a LOT of wattage going on.
Cancel out the heat, because gods know I don't want to be relying on electric heat, and that takes care of a big, BIG chunk of it. But I don't actually know how much I'd be using. What if I add a chest freezer in there? How much is that?

From Shakesville:
On Saving the Environment (and why it involves *staying* off our asses).


From Amplify:
Male Contraceptive Injections and Sexism.


From Mad Melancholic Feminista:
Matronizing. Eeeeeeeeeeeeenteresting.
AND
How About Living Off the Grid (on consumerism and the persuit of mandatory perfection).

So.

I went to the bead store today.

Picked up new jade (balls), green aventurine chips, moss agate chips, a string of... Indian Agate (looks a bit like fancy jasper, but with nifty patterns in the stone), and a bunch of odds and sods that allow me to actually Make Stuff. Whee!

Also went to the online bead store and placed a large (for me) order:

lapis lazuli, sodalite (x2), hematite (x3[1]), "african jade" - aka opaque green garnet - (x3), little silver-plated balls, little gold-plated balls, and a package of gold-plated lever-backed earring hooks. This stuff won't be here until, like, Hallowe'en. Unless I'm very lucky. ;-)




I want to make Miz Sara a three-strand bracelet with a magnetic clasp. And I'm having trouble deciding whether to do it in moss-agate or green aventurine. Honestly, I may just do one of each. I'm really not sure. :-P

The Indian Agate will be strung onto beading wire as-is (little round balls separating four or five big rectangles) thus becoming an insta-bracelet with the addition of a gold clasp -- this will be one of the DIY presents I make for xmas - this one for my mom).


Anyway/ I have been plotting and beading all evening (well, once I got the dishes washed, anyway). :-)

Made a fresh bottle of sumac/rosehip/hibiscus iced tea -- sweetened with apple juice and a little maple syrup (the latter is a new addition). It's a good combination, I find. :-)


I've decided to try, when I'm buying juice, to get stuff that comes in glass bottles or in cans. This may be a problem when it comes to getting the apple cider in for Midwinter, but beyond that it should be fine.


Along the same lines as the whole cans/glass decision (although I have yet to switch my milk over to glass bottles, I confess), I've been looking at soy and beeswax candles again.
Not like I don't have a zillion candles, but it's good to Be Prepared, so to speak.

Anyway. I'm looking into things. :-)

Won't be buying anything else frivolous for a little while -- rent, food, bus-pass, all that stuff's important, after all. ;-)


- TTFN,
- Amazon.

Passing this on from Hillary:


Just thought I'd let you guys know in case you haven't heard. It's
not really pagan but it has to do with our enviornment and our rivers
so I thought it was important to pass around in case anyone was
interested in participating.

June 8th there will be a rally in Ottawa to protect Canadian Rivers.

Unfortunately about a week ago we were made aware that new
legislation is in the works to change the NWPA. Which deals with
Naviagation rights on the rivers. So far they are having meetings to
change the act so that Navigation rights will not apply to rivers
with obstructions or waterfalls. ie everything that we like to boat
on. Which means they can build roads, highways, bridges etc. right
in the middle of the rivers and we can't stop them once they pass the
act. Once passed we can't boat on those rivers anymore and the
enviornment around will suffer polution and damage.

This won't just affect whitewater boaters this affects any Canadian
who has enjoyed their right to put a canoe on a river and go where
the water flows.

From 7 to 9 at night there will be a vigil for Canadian rivers on
Parliament hill.

We are really hoping to get a lot of people out to this because we
need numbers to get attention.

Try to make it if you can. The organizers have put a lot of work into
this at short notice all we have to do is show up and make there work
worthwhile.

For those who like to boat (canoe/kayak/ etc.) there is a big group
who are making there way by boat to Parliment to show how many there
are and how much it affects us.

These are the links (I think) to the boaterboard discussions.

http://www.boatwerks.net/boaterboard/viewtopic.php?t=6708

http://www.boatwerks.net/boaterboard/viewtopic.php?t=6699

So, in addition to finishing the cleaning up this morning,and dropping The Husband a note to tell him that I miss him, I spent most of the morning reading the "No Impact Man" blog, and most of the afternoon doing a floorplan for another eco-house -- this one to be built on one of those crazy long-and-skinny lots that sometimes turn up in Hintonburg.
(Ideally, there'd be one showing up in... a couple of years, on Oxford Rd. or - what a Sign that would be - Armstrong St., with a south-facing front-yard. For about $100K. I know there's one available now -- 99' deep by 33' wide -- for that price but, (A) I don't know the exact location, and (B) we can't afford to get the loan to build a house from scratch right now).


See, as I've mentioned many times before, I want an ecologically sound house. Reclaimed/Sustainable materials, earth sheltered on the north side, green roofing and/or solar panels (to supply the electricity and heat the water for our tankless-hot-water-system/radiant-heat-floors), big garden space, significant compost bins, and the whole bit. :-)

That said, I *don't* want to have to move out to the boonies beyond North Gower (sp) to get that house.

So I decided to try and design a lay-out for a house that looks like it belongs in a city, even if it does have a burm built onto the back (covered for its entire height of, like, thirty feet, with multi-seasonal bulbs and, to a lesser extent, creeping juniper and/or something else with a really good, extensive-but-shallow root system).


What I came up with is a house that is... sort of like those "ranch" houses. There's a front porch that elevates the main floor to about 3' above-grade, and the front half of the house is 'bungalow', while the back half has two floors. The roof of the 'bungalow' portion would be a green roof -- a creeping-sage 'paved' patio/terrace framed by a perimeter of cubic meter planters in-which I would grow annuals like squash, beans, peas (maybe), and tomatoes (and, perhaps, asparagus) that I would, for the most part, support themselves on the chain-link fencing that extended another meter up past the edge of the planters, so that when I stood on the planters to harvest stuff, I wouldn't risk breaking my neck in a fall.

This (below) is the floor-plan for a build-it-from-the-ground-up house in Hintonburg, on a damn-skinny lot. Assume the usual bamboo flooring through-out, R2000 insulation, grey-water system, and huge banks of triple-glazed, well-screened windows on the eastern, southern, and western sides (even in the basement).


( 8.5 x 11 Floor Plan of House )

*~*~*~*~*

Not bad, eh? :-) (Though I suspect that the basement bathroom only needs the one door).
That blue block on the north end of the house is the 'burm'.
The veranda on the front of the house would be made out of, like, poured concrete reinforced with rebar, or something, because it has to hold up some of those cubic-meter planters, but I think that would look really classy (depending on how it was done - with nice arches and so-on, I think) and also be sturdy and strong.
Oh, and the red 'L' in the south-east corner of the living room (main floor)? That's where the "lan cupboard" goes. (See? I'm learning).

Oh. Notes: Bedroom #1? Is actually 10' x 20' -- I changed some stuff around and didn't correct the spacing. (Those little red squares are roughly ten feet apart, and the burgundy ones are about eleven feet apart).
Also: I think it would be better if Paul's office and the fourth bathroom shared a wall, the bathroom did not have two doors, and the house-side door to Paul's office would be directly opposite the door from the office to the clinic space. That would make it very clear that the whole area was really quite usable as a Secondary Suite of the sort that one could rent out to a student, or offer to a mother-in-law, or whatever, should the need arise (or if the place were owned by a different family after Paul and I retire to the hip, eco-friendly seniors residence of our choice at the ripe old age of eighty-five. :-)


So, what do you think? :-)
Particularly Ami_B (who has an idea of how houses are built) and Arndis (who is in design school and also into earth-friendly housing) and Tchang (who is into specifically earth-sheltered houses).


I'm quite excited about the idea, myself. :-)


In other news: I made tandoori sole with spinach for dinner (with the last of the wine brought by lmondegreen - thank you dear), and it was quite, quite tasty. I might even be able to feed it to Paul. (Assuming the tandoori didn't screw with his stomach). I have some left over for lunch tomorrow (I will also be taking some of Torrain's awesome-and-spiffy vegan spelt chocolate cake - thank you dear). :-D


Life is so, so good right now. :-D


Off to read. :-D

- TTFN,
- Amazon. :-)