Urban Wilderness

Moving bloghosts again – 4 May 2006

urbanwild — Thu, 04 May 2006 15:15:01 +0000

I found a Blogger/Blogspot template that has the look and feel of my old blog. The colouring is different and it allows me to post my Bloglines, Blogroll and Flickr in full mode instead of links. Nice

As I go along, I’ll repost my archives as well as my current news

OK…the spelling is the closest I can get on blogspot to what I had before:
http://urbanwildnes.blogspot.com/

The best way to keep track of where I am is to subscribe to my Feedburner feed:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/UrbanWilderness because I know I will move again.

Cheers,

Probiotic info from Holland

urbanwild — Mon, 01 May 2006 03:59:18 +0000

From Holland we have:

Gut Flora: independent, reliable information on probiotics

Their goals: “The foundation ‘Gut flora in health and disease’ strives to be the European knowledge centre in the area of gut flora and probiotics.

Has a some links to articles on the ‘net

Guardian – Tory pisses off….

urbanwild — Sun, 30 Apr 2006 23:52:24 +0000

onto compost.

Oh how I love British wit: We need more brave men like him to speak out…

Go green with urine, says leading Tory
Gaby Hinsliff
Sunday April 30, 2006

Observer
The Conservative Party chairman is urging the nation to pee on its compost heaps to help the environment.

Francis Maude, who admitted he and his family were slightly ‘psycho’ about recycling, delivered the unorthodox gardening advice after being asked what his personal contribution was to the green cause on Radio 4′s Any Questions?

Maude also said that he planned to buy a greener car when the time came to replace the family vehicle. He said: ‘If I share a tip with the audience it is that if you pee on your compost, it has a double environmental whammy – it speeds up its decomposition so you can get it on the garden more quickly, and it also saves water.’

Bob Flowerdew, of the Gardeners’ Question Time panel, argues that urine contains potash and nitrogen which is a rich fertiliser. The urea in urine is said to speed chemical reactions involved in breaking down organic material.
-30-

And in my own area:

On an average day in the GVRD, approximately
580 litres of water is used by each person at home and at work (including all residential, industrial, commercial, institutional, and agricultural sectors). Average daily water consumption for the GVRD is about one billion litres.
The one-day record for water use was two billion litres – enough to fill BC Place Stadium.

http://www.sfu.ca/~ssbc/research/SSBC%20Water%20and%20Sewage.pdf

Google search urine fertilizer

Technorati Tags: urine, fertilizer, compost, humanure, politics

Probiotic bacteria aids digestion

urbanwild — Sun, 30 Apr 2006 08:56:40 +0000

I'm tracking stories about probiotics. Friendly microorganisms can be a benefit to both people and the planet.

A health dividend without side-effects
By Jane Clarke, The Times nutritionist

THE development of a flatulence-free bean should be a comfort to the tens of thousands of Britons who suffer from digestive problems, but could also bring health benefits to a wider public.

The Venezuelan research is part of continuing studies into the use of what are known as probiotic bacteria to aid digestion. The scientists fermented one such bacterium, Lactobacillus casei, with the beans to decrease the proportion of soluble fibre, a cause of flatulence.

Lactobacillus casei’s benefits have been known for some time and it is a key ingredient in probiotic yoghurt drinks, but the new technique should deliver the bacterium in exactly the right quantities. Its presence should counteract all the negative social effects of the beans while retaining their health benefits.

Bean enthusiasts will probably not be helped much by this development as their systems have become used to eating beans. But those who avoid beans because of worries about flatulence should benefit greatly.

Beans are a cheap source of protein and contain no saturated fat. The modified beans will also have higher levels of insoluble fibre, which has been linked to reduced cholesterol and hence could improve the health of your heart.

If this work is successful then there is no reason why similar methods cannot be applied to other notoriously windy foods, such as cabbage and Brussels sprouts.

Old entries being posted on blogspot

urbanwild — Sun, 30 Apr 2006 06:58:54 +0000

Urban Wilderness

Cell phone couplehood

urbanwild — Sun, 09 Apr 2006 09:04:50 +0000

In a local branch of a major coffee haus:

Guy talking on a cell phone, being cuddled from behind by his girlfriend.
Seeking attention?
As I move by the couple I notice that she is talking on cell phone too.
To each other?

Adding the links slowly

urbanwild — Sun, 05 Mar 2006 18:24:30 +0000

The manual process of adding links always takes longer than I think it should. Of course, once I get started, I just can’t do one.

Need to learn to multitask better.

Protected: Had to be there

urbanwild — Sun, 05 Mar 2006 18:16:53 +0000

This post is password protected. You must visit the website and enter the password to continue reading.

Vancouver raises the Olympic Flag

urbanwild — Wed, 01 Mar 2006 11:02:57 +0000

Photo courtesy of Tzatziki

Went to see it on my way to work today a few hours after the official ceremony and it is impressive.

Even though I’m not the biggest fan of the Olympics coming to Vancouver, I keep getting the sense that this is not Canada’s Winter Olympics but the Vancouver / Whistler’s Olympics.

It is probably my ambivalence towards Canada east of the Rocky Mountains – I grew up in Toronto and have lived in BC since 1981 – that makes me feel this way.

For the moment, I’m going to enjoy it.

-30-

Technorati Tags: vancouver, whistler, olympics, 2010, flag, urbanwild

Getting back online

urbanwild — Wed, 01 Mar 2006 08:52:19 +0000

Shortly after I was back in the swing of things, recovering from my own hard drive failure, my blog host went down. No data recovery possible. There is an explanation here: Unrecoverable Drive Failure

I was lucky. I was able to get my data back [ka-ching! but worth every penny] and because I downloaded archives of the blog on a regular basis, I only lost three of my most recent entries.

Others were not so fortunate. Here’s a list of people who have moved elsewhere from Diary-x and reading their entries from the past few days gives a good indication of the what they lost and how they are choosing to deal with it: Stay in Touch

They are a dedicated bunch those dx-ers!! While the original owner has decided to throw in the towel, people are rallying around to revive the site.

First, they started communicating with each other while dx was down at LiveJournal and have decided to revive the site under a different name: Codexed. I’ll see how it goes. I like the WordPress interface so far, especially being able to add categories to my postings.

Of course, it will take time to get all the postings back online, rebuild my link lists and get it looking the way I like it.

That will be fun.

-30-

Technorati Tags: diary-x, internet, livejournal, codexed, community, urbanwild