America needs ‘Los Archers’
Posted on | October 29, 2009 | No Comments
Norman Painting (left) as Phil Archer in the BBC serial "The Archers." The photograph was taken in December 1954, four years after the show's launch as a propaganda tool to improve agricultural practice after World War II. Photo: Frank Morley and Getty via The Guardian
THE NEWS today of the death of Norman Painting, 85, the actor who for almost 60 years played Phil on the British radio series “The Archers,” is as good a time as any to suggest that America steal his act.
Click here for why
The Dry Garden: ‘American Meadow’
Posted on | October 28, 2009 | No Comments
CALIFORNIA nurseryman John Greenlee has a new book, “The American Meadow Garden: Creating a Natural Alternative to the Traditional Lawn.”
Yay?
It should be yay. In 1987, he created what is now the oldest specialty grass nursery on the West Coast. Greenlee Nursery, first in Pomona and now in Chino, is where artist Robert Irwin went when landscaping the grounds of the Getty Center. During the last 22 years, as a nurseryman, garden designer and writer, Greenlee has emerged as the single most recognizable voice of the Western anti-lawn movement.
Click here to keep reading this week’s Dry Garden column in the Los Angeles Times.
Las Vegas loses water rights to key valleys
Posted on | October 28, 2009 | 6 Comments
UPDATED 10/29/2009 9am
IN A phenomenal reversal for Las Vegas in its 20-year quest for water from the Great Basin Aquifer, the Southern Nevada Water Authority has been stripped of rights to 18,755 acre feet of water a year, or enough for more than 37,000 homes, which it had been allocated from three key basins.
The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports today that Nevada District judge Norman C. Robison has ruled that the State Engineer “acted arbitrarily, capriciously and oppressively” when he cleared the authority to pump more than 6 billion gallons of groundwater a year from Cave, Delamar and Dry Lake valleys.
Above and beyond the amount of water involved, this is a crippling strategic blow to the authority. Located in neighboring Lincoln County, Cave, Dry Lake and Delamar valleys are critical first sites* for the proposed well-fields that will feed what Las Vegas envisions as a nearly 300-mile-long pipeline to eventually be run north to the foot of the Great Basin National Park.
Click here to keep reading about Las Vegas’ reversal of fortune
Image of the day: Sea monster imagined
Posted on | October 27, 2009 | No Comments
An artist's impression of a 45-ton pliosaur attacking a somethingelse-osaur. Picture: Natural History Museum, University of Oslo, Norway. For the history of the first discovery of a skull of the 'T-Rex of the ocean' in the Arctic permafrost in 2008, more scary artist's impressions of underwater attacks and first class paleontological fun, click on the pliosaur to be taken to the Oslo Natural History Museum. Fear not, the text is in English.
The fossilized skull of a “sea monster,” which may be the largest of its type ever found, has been unearthed on the Dorset coast, reports the London Guardian today. From the report:
“These creatures were monsters,” said David Martill, a paleontologist from the University of Portsmouth.
“They had massive muscles on their necks, and you would have imagined that they would bite into the animal and get a good grip, and then with these massive neck muscles they probably would have thrashed the animals around and torn chunks off.
“It would have been a bit of a blood bath.”
For a nice Guardian graphic of the animal plus a map showing where the skull was found, click here.
The week that was, 10/18-24/2009
Posted on | October 25, 2009 | 3 Comments
From LA Sketchbook: Singing in the Main, LA Observed, October 20, 2009. Image courtesy of the artist. For more of Steve Greenberg's cartoons, click on the geyser.
The bill does not authorize a long-envisioned canal to move water around the delta southward. But … — “State water hearings to start next week,” Fresno Bee, October 24, 2009
The state would be required to reduce per-capita urban water use by 20% by 2020, but … — “State water hearings to start next week,” Fresno Bee, October 24, 2009, both Bee mentions via Aquafornia
“… that very well may have been a statistical blip.” — Joe Ramallo, Department of Water and Power spokesman on 44 major leaks in the month of September, “Three more water mains rupture in Los Angeles,” LA Times, October 21, 2009
“It’s a serious problem, don’t get me wrong, but it’s been a problem for a long long time.” — Los Angeles Department of Water and Power general manager S. David Freeman interviewed after three pipe ruptures in one day, “Water main roulette,” the Patt Morrison Show, KPCC, October 20, 2009. Via LA Observed
“We’re not convinced it’s a water main break. It could be a fire pipe.” — Thomas Bagley, spokesman for the Boston Water and Sewer Commission, “Water main break closes Boston office building,” Boston Herald, October 19, 2009
Old Chatham Golf Club directors had voted in 2001 to waive the governor’s monthly membership dues. That saved [former North Carolina governor Mike] Easley about $50,000 while he was in office, a break he did not reveal on financial disclosure forms. — “In drought, Easley’s club got water,” Raleigh News and Observer, October 18, 2009
Click here to keep reading The week that was
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