Friday, Feb 16: 7 - 9 pm
How to Grow All Your Own Produce in 2 1/2 Years:
An (r)Evolution Disgused as Organic Gardening
$10-$7 suggested donation
In this slideshow presentation, we will learn how to mimic nature in creating fecund gardens. Marisha will introduce the concept of permaculture. We will learn a framework for creating perennial forage systems, gardens that provide for many human needs with a minimal work.

Saturday, Feb 17: 10 am - 4 pm, $40
Urban Design Charette
Today, we will explore the permaculture design process in games and activities to help us envision what sustainable possibilities we can create for urban gardens. We will be directly applying the design work that we do during this workshop to the public corridor in front of Fertile Ground on Sunday during the workparty.

Sunday, Feb 18: 10 am - 4 pm, Free
Hands-on Implementation and Workparty
Come join us as we evolve the public corridor in front of Fertile Ground into a food and information sharing cornucopia. Since the recent passing of Amanda Farrell, we have decided to dedicate this public space to her memory. Please bring any plants that you would like to donate. Let's embody the possibility of an abundant urban food system through this demonstration garden for Amanda!

Fertile Ground

For those concerned with all things Camp Quixote here is some news of note. Hearing is Monday.

Feb. 19 Scheduled for public hearing in the House Committee on Housing at 1:30 PM. (Subject to change)

HB 2244 - DIGEST
Declares that, due to concerns about maintaining freedom of religious expression, faith communities shall not be restricted from hosting temporary encampments for the homeless. A temporary encampment may be subject to reasonable compliance requirements related to public health and safety. However, no county, city, or town shall set less than ninety days as the maximum duration for homeless encampments.

See the text of the bill here.

Been clicking through YouTube and am pretty amazed at the amount of video from Iraq there is and how many people have put music to.

So far, Iraq: "Bullet with a Name on It" is my favorite.

Here's a pretty good video of a Blackwater mercenary sniping.

Here's an NBC story with a few Soldiers talking about what's going on in the states.

Another good montage.

Although this one is probably the most sobering.

Serving in the military today is like saying you fought for the Roman Legion. We are a military power that people will talk about thousands of years down the road.

Oh, and be warned that some of these videos may be graphic and/or offensive. In reality, it's - well - most of the rest of the world's reality. The Industrialized World is really the only segment of the global population that is able to enjoy relative peace and security. The fight for survival is happening outside the walls of the comfort that we enjoy.

We're not fighting for democracy. We're fighting to maintain a standard of living.

We want to design, build, and maintain a community that, in all ways, puts out more than it consumes.

That may seem like a big, expensive task. It's not. Not in Olympia. We have the resources and the knowledge in this town to completely revolutionize the idea of "housing developments" as we know it.

We're envisioning a partnership between the city, private businesses, non-profit groups, community groups, and The Evergreen State College. All of these groups would come together, working side by side with residents of Camp Quixote to build a self sustaining village. For students, it would give them the opportunity to apply the skills they're learning while helping house people and teaching people valuable skills that they may not have access to.

We want an alternative energy system utilizing solar, wind, and alternative fuels that allows us to put excess electricity into the grid when we can.

We want to farm our own fruits and vegetables and and raise our own livestock, producing enough fresh, local, organic food to be able to give away the excess to the community kitchen at the Salvation Army or Food Not Bombs, thereby improving the meals served to folks who don't have the resources to eat healthy meals.

We want to build 20x20 loft structures for residents to live in. We want these to be completely green built with special consideration given to the land they sit on.

We want to develop and adopt a zero waste policy and strive toward completely eliminating waste by turning it into a resource.

With all of the ideas that have been floating around lately I may have left a couple out, but these are the major issues. If you have any ideas, or comments, I'd love to hear them.