According to a report by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, more than a thousand new farmers markets have opened so far in 2011, bringing the total number to 7,175 — almost triple the number that were around in 2000. What this tells me is how much consumers really like the “social nature” of farmers markets
Football season is nearly upon us once again. While I always look forward to this fall tradition, this year I am even more excited at what this all-American sport has in store. For could it be that this favorite form of mass diversion could signify something more than just having a beer with buddies while
This past Friday I did something I haven’t done in about five years, although it’s something that most people do regularly without so much as giving it a thought. I drove to various local neighborhood destinations, rather than hiking or biking. And, to be frank, I don’t plan on doing it again for a while.
A recent article in the Wall Street Journal that ran under the headline “Bottle Recycling Plan is Left at the Curb” described how $60 million had been invested in this 120,000-square-foot Coca-Cola facility in Spartanburg, S.C., that is now sitting mostly idle. It was, I thought, a perfect illustration of the need for new approaches
In recent blogs, I have talked about changing the paradigm and retooling the model of how we look at sustainability. The more I think about it, the more I think that we can figure this out in ways that we probably haven’t considered. Just the other evening, for example, I was having a discussion with
In an exchange from a 1990s TV series, “Mad About You” a wife portrayed by Helen Hunt says “My mother sure knows how to push my guilt button,” to which her husband, played by Paul Reiser, replies, “She should – she installed it.” Guilt is something that mothers – Italian and Jewish mothers in particular,
On the front page of this past Sunday’s edition of the Los Angeles Times was a story about the end of the gaucho in Argentina, which noted that on the Pampas, growing soybeans has become much more profitable than raising cattle. Reading the article, I was reminded that the term “commercially sustainable” describes an enterprise
Could the obesity epidemic — and a general weight gain in the U.S. population — be adding substantially to our energy-use requirements and thus to our “carbon footprint” and stress on the planet? Think about glass versus plastic containers for any type of product, such as peanut butter, brewed tea or mayonnaise. Glass on average
What a week! U.S. credit downgraded from AAA to AA+, followed by a precipitous (if temporary) drop in the stock market. Thirty-five Americans killed in a seemingly endless—and some would say pointless — conflict in Afghanistan. Riots out of control in, of all places, London. But what all this bad news signals to me is