To build on (e:Libertad)'s & (e:Vincent)'s recent posts (e:Libertad,51746) and (e:Libertad,51740) and (e:Vincent,51726) ...

There are acts of nature beyond man's control.

Oil in water is one of them. The stuff is about as easy to clean up as molten lava. Here's the only number you really need to know about this subject:

14

That would be 14 as in 14 percent, as in the amount of oil recovered after the Exxon spill. Exxon spent more than $2 billion. It skimmed like crazy. It washed beaches. It steam-cleaned rock. It swabbed cliffs. It hauled off driftwood and oil-soaked boom and anything else it could get its hands on that had oil stuck to it, and it got 14 percent of the oil. America doesn't seem to understand -- and journalists who are supposed to know more than the average man in the street truly do not not seem to understand -- once the oil is in the water, we are not getting much of it out. We are screwed.

Massey Energy Co.

Shell Oil bought East Resources for $4.7Bn today. East is pretty much owns the mineral rights in Tioga County. In other words, Shell now owns Tioga County. <blink>

In 1792, coal was discovered in Bloss and became a dominant economic force until the early 1980s. There are some mining activities still occurring in the western half of the county. This weekend is the 18th Annual Blossbu*g State Coal Festival . Tioga County Concerned Citizens Committee is still working to clean up the acid mine drainage that makes the Tioga River "dead" from Fall Brook to Mansfield. (See (e:heidi,49800) - the river rocks are orange from the AMD and the falls stink of sulfur.) As if that environmental damage isn't enough, that same creek, a tributary of the Tioga, which becomes the Chemung, which turns into the Susquehanna, which drains into the Chesapeake Bay, now sports foam discs (probably Airfoam HD) from nearby gas well drilling.

It's all tied together for me.

Full moon rising last night...










Gordie the Chicken Whisperer is planning to sell eggs at the Bloss farmers' market on Saturdays. He gets 20-30 eggs a day from the chicken coops at the office. Organic, free range.




Bodhi's 7 weeks old!

Why does a salad cost more than a Big Mac?

left until i'm done with my second year of law school!

Tomorrow I have an exam from 9am - 4pm on zoning & land use.

sleeping baby, jealous but calm Nisha. Now they're both sleeping on my lap!

I've had my Asus eee pc model 900 running a random Linux distro since Sept. '08 and it still works fine. I like using it for taking notes at school, and i'd use it more at home, but I can't figure out how to upgrade essential software like FIREFOX! Can't watch Hulu without an updated flash installation. Google docs is protesting the old firefox. I'm open to switching to a different OS, but I like having this one non-M$ machine. Can anyone help me?

My cousin and his kid designed this cake for a Cub Scout cake auction.

Bodhi was born on Monday - isn't he adorable? (e:heidi,51217)



But there's something wrong with his lungs. Jill got out of the hospital today, but he was transferred to a larger regional medical center with a NICU a few hours after the c-section. At first they said he had pneumonia, then that he had fluid in his lungs from the c-section, and now they said something about emphysema. *worry worry*

It's passably okay when someone 70+ calls me "young lady." It's really not okay when the speaker is approximately the same age as I am. It's so dismissive both on age and gender grounds - I can't possibly be able to speak knowledgeably about the topic because I'm young! and a girl! grrrr.

I'm so stressed (again). I had a final paper due last week that I totally procrastinated on and I don't think I did very well because I didn't think through the issues sufficiently. Oh well, it's only 1 credit and doesn't really count for anything. A B is sufficient.

I have a final tomorrow at 6. I had a 12-hour day today, starting with the 440 client and ending at 8:15 in my oil & gas law class. I (politely, via email) called the prof out on being wrong on PA law about oil & gas severance and property taxes and he still couldn't admit he was wrong, and gave this convoluted answer about "in theory, PA has no property or severance tax on oil & gas" uh... there's not a huge difference between theory and reality on a statement like "we conclude that there is no authority for imposing a real estate tax on such [oil & gas] interests" IOGA-PA v. Fayette County (2002). The reality *is* that there's no tax on oil & gas in PA, unlike coal, limestone and other hard things underground that people want to dig up and burn or use. He described the final paper and gave the deadline. The deadline is really unworkable for me, given that I have to go out of town this week to deal with all my clients at home for quarterly tax filings, so I asked for an extension - the first time I've ever asked for an accommodation - and got turned down flat, even though he had said to contact him if there was going to be trouble with the deadline. wtf. it's okay to get sick right before the deadline, but not to be responsible about it and say that it's not workable in advance. I just love all the assumptions about "this is what *real* practice is like" and "it's about being disciplined". baloney. like he knows what -my- life is or will be like. i'm not a cookie-cutter 20-something with no fucking experience.

approximately April 17 I'll have a chance to breathe for one day before tackling the backlog of schoolwork that's accumulated during this out-of-control semester. I hope to be done with finals by May 14. and then i'm going to spend the summer dancing in the sun. or in the rain. or by bonfires. or in lafayette square.

I've been working on a baby blanket since January for Jill's third child Bodhi, who will be born April 5. I finished it in time for the baby shower that I was the slacker-host for. I'm really proud of it so I'm posting a rather extensive set of photos.

Crocheted with Lion Brand Yarn LB Collection Cotton Bamboo in Magnolia, Snapdragon and Chocolate Dahlia using my great-grandmother's size G hook. It took 25-30 hours. Please note, crocheting and reading law texts are incompatible activities. However, crochet and hot chocolate at Cafe Taza are highly compatible.

Early February.


Finished - detail




A's shoe box was too big.


One of the shower games was the most eco-friendly packaging. Since I was judge I couldn't win, but you know I totally did. The 100% compostable Sunchips bag is shiny on the inside. It was A's idea.


Squished it in a box I found at Uncle Dudley's so the Sunchips bag would fit around it.


All wrapped - I crocheted the rosette and string, too.


I didn't put a label or card on the box, and it was the first present Jill picked up to open, so she's asking who this is from.



"You made this??" In our six years of working together, I had never mentioned that I crochet. She was astounded.


She later said, "This is my dream blanket! I might have to hang it on the wall."


Some table decorations from the shower. Kelly and Jill had spent lots of time planning the shower and then Kelly's son Christopher (one of the triplets) ended up in the hospital with pneumonia for nearly two weeks so she couldn't even go. And since I'm a slacker and have no idea what to do for or at a baby shower, Jill ended up doing all the work. She's still a little grumpy at me, although the blanket helped win me some points.



All I really did for the shower was buy some bamboo plants in cute elephant pots at Wang's 99 Cent City on Sheridan. Honestly, who thinks it's a good idea to have a single, childfree late-thirties woman host a baby shower?