Wednesday, May 25, 2005

I have some momentum going on a poem about Pyramid Lake. Narrative, but with patience maybe I can pare it down to an interesting core. The wind blows so hard. I've had no sales the past 36 hours, so I can stay home, save some gasoline. I still have to repair this table, which has been upturned on my office floor for a week drying out. I dragged it to California from Bisbee, Arizona, where I bought it in 1998 at a junk store from someone who said they'd found it in the woods near an abandoned miner's shack near Silver City, NM. I used it as a plant table for years, left it out in the weather here all winter. I had planned to take it to the dump. But I've given away my ('50s formica curvy-chrome-legged) dining table as part of the pre-move load-lightening activity, and it would be nice to have a place to sit and eat one's cornflakes. So I have to figure out how to re-attach the detached leg. Rusty screws in their rotten stripped-out holes. I suppose I'll have to drag out the power drill. Table legs are so tricky. I found two old juniper rounds I might be able to split some firewood off of. Now that we needn't be so fuel-frugal, it would be nice to have a blaze going in the little woodstove on chilly evenings. And it's plenty chilly today, though bright, with the wind whipping around. I watched a DVD of Ram Dass: Fierce Grace last night. It's been awhile since I saw it. Afterward (& during) I cried and cried... (Godit'sgodIseegod--at once harrowing and too beautiful to withstand.) I hope to make a whirlwind roundtrip to Chico this weekend (250 miles down the mountain one-way), Saturday morning maybe, if the Aerostar is fixed, to get something there I'll need to take with me to North Carolina when we move. I'll show you a picture of it once I have it. It's a surprise. While I'm down there I'll try to meet with my grandbabies. Rats, email--I just sold something. Ah well. 12:18:51 PM    comment []

Click here for "the story of one man, one tree, and nearly 400 violins" in the Toronto Star: ...[I]t is maple that constitutes the soul of a violin, and Tchalkouchian has an almost spiritual attachment to the supply of wood he culled from a single tree high in the Caucasus nearly four decades ago, the same tree that has served as the raw material for some 400 of his violins. It was vital that the tree be found at a high altitude, he says, for such plants grow slowly and their wood is therefore particularly dense. By cutting the maple in winter, Tchalkouchian ensured that the tree would be slumbering. This, too, affects the quality of its wood. Finally, it was essential that the maple be harvested on a moonless night. Without the moon's gravitational pull, he says, the sap recedes through the fibres of the tree, much as ocean waters ebb in the absence of the moon. Such wood is drier and therefore lighter... (photo MICHAEL STUPARYK/TORONTO STAR) Thank you River Above for sharing this strangely affecting story with me. You're absolutely right--it has the power of myth. 11:04:35 AM    comment []

Excellent rice pudding I made last night--basmati rice, sweetened with maple syrup, currents, chopped dates. Breakfast this morning with cream and hot coffee. Mmm. 10:44:02 AM    comment []

The most exciting research I've read about in some time... Excerpt from the WiredNews report: The key to Craven's cool world is converting the ocean's thermal energy. The first step: Sink a pipe at least 3,000 feet deep and start pumping up seawater. The end result: an environmentally sustainable, virtually inexhaustible supply of electricity, freshwater for drinking and irrigation, even air-conditioning. Here's how it works: Refrigeration Cold seawater circulates through a closed loop of pipes that replace the coolant and compressor found in conventional air-conditioning units. Irrigation Pipes carrying cold water run beneath fields of crops, sweating freshwater to irrigate plants and chilling their roots, promoting faster crop cycles. Desalination Cold seawater passes through Craven's "skytowers," which contain closely packed radiator-like networks of pipes. The frigid pipes sweat in the tropical heat, producing- freshwater condensate. Power Generation Pipes draw warm water from the ocean surface and cold water from the seabed. The warm water enters a vacuum chamber and is evaporated into steam that drives an electricity-producing turbine. The cold water condenses the steam back into water for drinking and irrigation. Click here for the full story. 10:40:20 AM    comment []