Day: February 1, 2012

WASHINGTON (AP) — Snow has gone missing in action for much of the U.S. the last couple months. But it’s not just snow. It’s practically the season that’s gone AWOL.

“What winter?” asked Mike Halpert, deputy director of the National Weather Service’s Climate Prediction Center. For the Lower 48, January was the third-least snowy on record, according to the Global Snow Lab at Rutgers University. Records for the amount of ground covered by snow go back to 1967.

Last year more than half the nation was covered in snow as a Groundhog Day blizzard barreled across the country, killing 36 people and causing $1.8 billion in damage. This year, less than a fifth of the country outside of Alaska has snow on the ground. Bismarck, N.D., has had one-fifth its normal snow, Boston a third. Midland Texas has had more snow this season than Minneapolis or Chicago.

Forget snow, for much of the country there’s not even a nip in the air. On Tuesday, the last day in January, all but a handful of states had temperatures in the 50s or higher. In Washington, DC, where temperatures flirted with the 70s, some cherry trees are already budding —weeks early.

“I am disgusted that golfers are golfing on my cross-country ski course,” said New Jersey state climatologist David Robinson, director of the Global Snow Lab.

But there is lots of snow and dangerous cold — it’s just elsewhere in the world. Valdez, Alaska, has had 328 inches of snow this season — 10 feet above average — and the state is frigid, with Yukon hitting a record 66 below zero over the weekend.

Nearly 80 people have died from a vicious cold snap in Europe, and much of Asia has been blanketed with snow. This January has been the ninth snowiest since 1966 for Europe and Asia, though for the entire northern hemisphere, it’s been about average for snow this season.

 

The weather is so cold that some areas of the Black Sea have frozen near the Romanian coastline, and rare snowfalls have occurred on islands in the Adriatic Sea in Croatia. Ukraine alone has reported 43 fatalities, many of the victims homeless people found dead on streets.

The reason is changes in Arctic winds that are redirecting snow and cold. Instead of dipping down low, the jet stream winds that normally bring cold and snow south got trapped up north. It’s called the Arctic Oscillation. Think of it as a cousin to the famous El Nino.

When the Arctic Oscillation is in a positive phase, the winds spin fast in the Arctic keeping the cold north. But in the past few days, the Arctic Oscillation turned negative, though not in its normal way, Halpert said. The cold jet stream dipped in Europe and Asia, but is still bottled up over North America.

That’s because another weather phenomena, called the North Atlantic Oscillation is playing oddball by staying positive and keeping the cold away from the rest of North America. About 90 percent of the time, the North Atlantic and Arctic oscillations are in synch, Halpert said. But not this time, so much of the United States is escaping the winter’s worst.

“We’ve just had a remarkable run of unusual winters in the past six years globally,” said Jeff Masters, director of meteorology at Weather Underground in Ann Arbor, Mich. “I have to say that winter hasn’t really hit yet. Certainly not where I live.”

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Online:

The Global Snow Lab: http://bit.ly/wFuAtV

National Weather Service map showing snow cover: http://t.co/0HIAPU1j

Weather service map showing warm temperatures around the nation: http://t.co/rpNNt7Sp

In the summer of 1865, a former slave by the name of Jourdan Anderson sent a letter to his former master. And 147 years later, the document reads as richly as it must have back then.

The roughly 800-word letter, which has resurfaced via various blogs, websites, Twitter and Facebook, is a response to a missive from Colonel P.H. Anderson, Jourdan’s former master back in Big Spring, Tennessee. Apparently, Col. Anderson had written Jourdan asking him to come on back to the big house to work.

In a tone that could be described either as “impressively measured” or “the deadest of deadpan comedy,” the former slave, in the most genteel manner, basically tells the old slave master to kiss his rear end. He laments his being shot at by Col. Anderson when he fled slavery, the mistreatment of his children and that there “was never pay-day for the Negroes any more than for the horses and cows.”

Below is Jourdan’s letter in full, as it appears on lettersofnote.com. To take a look at what appears to be a scan of the original letter, which appeared in an August 22, 1865 edition of the New York Daily Tribune, click here.

Dayton, Ohio,

August 7, 1865

To My Old Master, Colonel P.H. Anderson, Big Spring, Tennessee

Sir: I got your letter, and was glad to find that you had not forgotten Jourdon, and that you wanted me to come back and live with you again, promising to do better for me than anybody else can. I have often felt uneasy about you. I thought the Yankees would have hung you long before this, for harboring Rebs they found at your house. I suppose they never heard about your going to Colonel Martin’s to kill the Union soldier that was left by his company in their stable. Although you shot at me twice before I left you, I did not want to hear of your being hurt, and am glad you are still living. It would do me good to go back to the dear old home again, and see Miss Mary and Miss Martha and Allen, Esther, Green, and Lee. Give my love to them all, and tell them I hope we will meet in the better world, if not in this. I would have gone back to see you all when I was working in the Nashville Hospital, but one of the neighbors told me that Henry intended to shoot me if he ever got a chance.

I want to know particularly what the good chance is you propose to give me. I am doing tolerably well here. I get twenty-five dollars a month, with victuals and clothing; have a comfortable home for Mandy,—the folks call her Mrs. Anderson,—and the children—Milly, Jane, and Grundy—go to school and are learning well. The teacher says Grundy has a head for a preacher. They go to Sunday school, and Mandy and me attend church regularly. We are kindly treated. Sometimes we overhear others saying, “Them colored people were slaves” down in Tennessee. The children feel hurt when they hear such remarks; but I tell them it was no disgrace in Tennessee to belong to Colonel Anderson. Many darkeys would have been proud, as I used to be, to call you master. Now if you will write and say what wages you will give me, I will be better able to decide whether it would be to my advantage to move back again.

As to my freedom, which you say I can have, there is nothing to be gained on that score, as I got my free papers in 1864 from the Provost-Marshal-General of the Department of Nashville. Mandy says she would be afraid to go back without some proof that you were disposed to treat us justly and kindly; and we have concluded to test your sincerity by asking you to send us our wages for the time we served you. This will make us forget and forgive old scores, and rely on your justice and friendship in the future. I served you faithfully for thirty-two years, and Mandy twenty years. At twenty-five dollars a month for me, and two dollars a week for Mandy, our earnings would amount to eleven thousand six hundred and eighty dollars. Add to this the interest for the time our wages have been kept back, and deduct what you paid for our clothing, and three doctor’s visits to me, and pulling a tooth for Mandy, and the balance will show what we are in justice entitled to. Please send the money by Adams’s Express, in care of V. Winters, Esq., Dayton, Ohio. If you fail to pay us for faithful labors in the past, we can have little faith in your promises in the future. We trust the good Maker has opened your eyes to the wrongs which you and your fathers have done to me and my fathers, in making us toil for you for generations without recompense. Here I draw my wages every Saturday night; but in Tennessee there was never any pay-day for the negroes any more than for the horses and cows. Surely there will be a day of reckoning for those who defraud the laborer of his hire.

In answering this letter, please state if there would be any safety for my Milly and Jane, who are now grown up, and both good-looking girls. You know how it was with poor Matilda and Catherine. I would rather stay here and starve—and die, if it come to that—than have my girls brought to shame by the violence and wickedness of their young masters. You will also please state if there has been any schools opened for the colored children in your neighborhood. The great desire of my life now is to give my children an education, and have them form virtuous habits.

Say howdy to George Carter, and thank him for taking the pistol from you when you were shooting at me.

From your old servant,

Jourdon Anderson.

Farming has a lot of romance in it. The idea of tilling the land, growing something from scratch and providing for yourself from the gifts of the land is a primal urge that runs through even the most cynical techie. Well, you don’t have to give up your iPad to get a piece of the farming pie with the growing interest in “urban farming,” which is finding ways to bring the farming lifestyle to cities, high-rises and other urban environments.

Farming and technology have always had a strange relationship. Traditional knowledge says that technology and the urban sprawl are at odds with the quiet, live-off-the-land mentality of farming. Modern farming was made possible, however, by technological inventions. Plows allowed people to cultivate previously inaccessible earth, the industrial revolution allowed farms to become bigger and more efficient, even genetics have played a part in helping our produce grow in colder weather and grow in size.

Of course, too much technology and too much modification can backfire, as with the controversies around factory farming in the U.K. or concerns that genetically modified foods might not carry the same nutritional values as their hand-grown counterparts.

Green markets and home gardens are popular for urbanites seeking to take farming into their own hands. While cities around the world are becoming hot beds for urban farming, we’re taking a look at some neat ideas in Japan, the UK and America that span the gap from personal projects to multimillion-dollar innovations.

Have a read through and let us know what cool urban farming projects are happening around you.

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UK: Postcards, Crowdsourcing and Fish Feces

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 Postcardens — These tiny little gardens are made of, what else, greeting cards. The idea was to create both a memorable card and a functional way to grow something sweet. The cards obviously aren’t meant to grow full tomato plants, but it is a way to green up your desk space. Each postcarden comes with cress seeds that will start to grow in a few days and last for about two weeks. Postcardens were created by A Studio for Design and can be sent by mail.

MyFarm — Here’s one for all the FarmVillefans. MyFarm is a real life farm in Cambridgeshire, England, that is allowing the digital crowd to decide how to run its day-to-day operations.

The farm is 2,500 acres with all manner of crops and livestock. A group of 10,000 online “farmers” will then get to work with the farm manager and vote on the farm’s major decisions, all for an annual fee of $47. That may seem steep, but it’s not significantly more than some people spend on micro-transactions on fake digital farm games. The farm manager will help inform his online farmers about life on the farm, but the decisions will ultimately be left up to the crowd. It’s an ambitious way to blend education and the Internet, but one that just may turn couch-farmers into real-life farming enthusiasts.

Farm:Shop — The Farm:Shop team is hoping to create a widespread community of urban farmers creating specific crops who bring their grown goods to a central Farm:Shop to sell. It’s sort of like a CSA, but instead of communal giving, there are communal sales. What makes the project even more interesting is its focus on “aquaponics.” This farming method hooks up water from a tank of fish to a watering system for produce. Aquatic waste and effluents are toxic to fish, but are nutritional for produce (think fish-based fertilizer). The plants are fed with this water — which cleans the water for the fish. It’s a symbiotic relationship with little actual waste. The only trick is finding a place to put all those fish.

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Japan: Bottlecaps, Rooftops and Underground Gardens

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 Merry Project — Growing rooftop gardens is practically luxurious compared to these tiny gardens housed in bottle caps. Each kit costs about $2 and comes with seeds for planting. Because of the cap’s small size, most of the seeds are for herbs and other smaller produce, but Merry Project is hoping to expand its offerings, according to Springwise.

Green Potato — The project from NTT Facilities isn’t just about growing produce. The organization seeks out abandoned or wasted space and grows sweet potatoes on the roof. Sweet potatoes, aside from being delicious, are also able to grow in harsher conditions such as, say, on the roof of a Tokyo office building. NTT Facilities plans to expand the project to other Tokyo office buildings, according to TokyoGreenSpace.com.

 Pasona O2 — We’ve all heard of growing plants outdoors or on roofs, but what about converting an old underground vault into a green space? That’s just what Pasona O2 did, using light-emitting diodes, metal halide lamps and sodium vapor lamps to grow rice, fruits and vegetables underground. The whole project is tended by young people and aspiring farmers. The only downside to the hydroponic outfit is the high energy consumption, according to Treehugger.com. Still, it’s hard to argue with the cool factor, the fresh produce and the jobs Pasona O2 creates.

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U.S.: USB Kits, Plant Mats and Industrial Gardens

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Easy Bloom and USB Greenhouse — Your computer can help you go green. Who knew? The Easy Bloom Plant Sensor reads and analyzes growing conditions at specific points in your house or yard by measuring a variety of factors, including sunlight, humidity, soil moisture and drainage. Greenthumbs might not be impressed, but nothing can crush an amateur grower like the seeds of your effort expiring.

The USB Greenhouse takes an opposite approach to Easy Bloom, creating a computer-powered safe haven where even the most stubborn of plants will grow. The greenhouse is relatively small — don’t expect to grow tomatoes — but there’s still plenty of room to cultivate something tasty. The greenhouse will also send you reminders to water your plant, though you’ll have to leave the thing plugged in for it to work.

Ready-to-Plant Mats — If you like having plants but don’t like actually planting them, these mats from Amber’s Garden might just be for you. The mats come packed with seeds spaced out and planted at the optimal depth. The mats can then be “planted” in your garden or cut into pieces to create a tiny garden. You can start harvesting after about a month, with several varieties including salsa mix, pumpkin patch, Asian garden mix and more.

 Vertical Farming — Definitely the most expensive and most elaborate idea in this list, Vertical Farming challenges the idea that farms need to be, well, horizontal. Vertical Farming proposes creating high-rise-like farms to be filled top-to-bottom with plants. The small, slender design means Vertical Farms could be placed in central locations in a city. The plants would subsist on a hydroponic system and could be harvested with relative ease. The idea is that Vertical Farms will cut down on emissions and transportation costs by bringing the farm inside the city. Critics have cited the enormously large amount of water and energy needed to support Vertical Farms — as well as the fact that the farms may not actually save that much money compared to traditional, horizontal farms.

 

Big Box Farms — Skyscrapers aren’t the only buildings with a green thumb. Big Box Farms builds small farms inside industrial warehouses using a special, patented rack technology. The companies racks allow farms to be built in practically any warehouse space with added benefits. Big Box Farms says its technology eliminates contamination, runoff and the need for pesticides, while reducing the amount of water, land and fertilizer needed to grow healthy produce. There is also an option for brands to set up a private rack complete with branding and shipping help. Big Box Farms is tight-lipped on just how its racks are so good, but if it can back up its boasts, the future may just be green.

What have you seen in your own city? Let us know in the comments below.

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Series Supported by BMW i

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