Category: house
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Recycling House Mates
Hi, my name is Don Thorsen and I’ve recently moved into La Casa, here in Urbana Illinois. Maria put up on our wall a poster of C-U from around circa 1972(?).
And I was able to pull from my just moved belongings a drawing from 1974 of “Earthworks” the co-op grocery store also shown on Maria’s historic poster.
The ideas and ideals of community, versus say commodity, have been around longer than any of us, but I’m pleased to once again be a part of a household of active, interesting folks! Be seeing you around.
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A gift in the mail – fire salt
I received a letter this morning from a longtime friend, Chris Juby.
I was hungry…
In general we are a low-sodium house, but I always put a bit of salt on my personal meals. Of course he was correct: the fire salt goes great with fresh eggs. Made of: chiles, habanero, citrus, garlic, shallots, cumin, salt, allspice, and vinegar, good on popcorn, potatoes, and eggs. Someone’s getting eggs for easter, thanks jubes! -
Urbana Chicken Effort – 5 Year Update
Lately we’ve had several revelations about chicken keeping in Urbana, IL. It started when Ronna dug up this 2004 article from the New York Times while doing research on Urbana city ordinances. The article begins, “A movement is underfoot in Urbana.” Well, this is an update on Urbana chickens 5 years later.The article titled “From City-Reared Chickens, Farm-Fresh Eggs” (10/4/2004) quotes city attorney Steve Holz (*arrested development chuckle) “There is no restriction on livestock or poultry in the city [of Urbana].” It goes on to say that “the city can take action against owners if they keep the animals in a way that hurts the health or safety of the neighborhood.” So thats it. Keeping chickens in town is %100 legit, until they become a problem.
I joined the yahoo group Urbana Chicken Effort awhile back, which I presume was the original communication tool for the “movement” that the article mentions. With 32 members signed up, the list is still used to coordinate feed and chick buying.
The other revelation occured when Heather ran into Danielle Chynoweth at the IMC. According to Danielle, our oldest chicken, Ginger, was originally owned by Molly Stentz and is estimated to be 8 years old! The 2004 NYTimes article quotes Stentz as saying, “There are so many people in my neighborhood who are doing it. It’s low-maintenance and fun.” This means that our elderly Ginger is one of the original Urbana Chicken Effort chickens, and she’s still ticking!
So, La Casa is curious to know more about the history of Urbana Chickens. How many people are keeping chickens in town these days? Do they take as many photos as us? How can we help each other and encourage more chicken cooperation? Please comment and let us know how your ladies are doing.
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Another weekend recap!
Jacob, Andrew and Ronna re-sodding our muddy front yard.
A beautiful grass island was formed.
The neighbor’s yard was covered in spring time flowers!
Sophie howled and barked at dogs across the yard. -
Jacob Bounces Layup Off Shed on 8th Hole at Lohmann, Animated Gif
My housemate Jacob threw his first round of disc golf today at Lohmann Park in Urbana, IL. He impressed us on the 8th hole with an awesome bounce shot off the shed that earned him his first duece. I’ve been making photographs at Lohmann Park for several years, but I’ve never made an animated gif, until now.
Jacob bounces his second throw off the shed and nicely lays up for a duece Thanks for making it out to play Jacob 😉
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plantingplantingwateringwatering
go superfood! More beds are being dug for our lightly ambitious garden. As of today actual seeds that have been placed in the soil of the garden itself are: sugar pod peas (yummm!), about 5 different lettuces, carrots (scarlet nantes, danvers), chard (5 color silverbeet, ruby red), purple radishes, yarrow, moonflowers, persian cress, yellow mangel beets AND chia. yes, chia of chia pet fame. But talk about an underutilization of a plant. The seeds of this good old indigenous plant are what could be considered a superfood. Here are a couple of links so that if you want to know more you can:
Chia Seed – The Ancient Food of the Future
p.s. Someone mentioned that Seeds of Change is now owned by the Mars candy company, which is too bad, but at least we got our seed packets via the time-honored art of dumpster diving.
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H2O, the wettest element
La Casa’s full of people who care about things like, you know, the planet, resources, not wasting those resources, etc. So it’s been a frustrating several months during which we watched our water bill steadily climb (usage, not just cost) heard water running in the pipes and watched the water meter dial clicking along despite the fact that no one was using any water. We walked through with plumbers who looked at this and that and then just shrugged their shoulders. But the sound got worse, the usage kept climbing and the basement flooded more than seemed necessary for the Spring thaw. Finally, a plumber met here with a rep from the water company who pinpointed a pipe (that I had myself pinpointed 2 months ago, showing it to the plumber[arg!]) from which the sound seemed to emanate. This pipe shot off through the foundation to god knows where. Somewhere out into the ground around the house where it seeped back in only to be pumped back out by our sadly busy sump pumps. A terrible cycle.
But, at least it was finally figured out and the plumber cut the pipe at the faulty cut-off valve and capped it. The sound of running water has become a wonderful, but almost eerie silence. Now the water meter doesn’t click along that fast EVEN WHEN water is actually being used, and not at all when it’s not. Yay! One really great thing we learned via conversations with the Water Company is that, even with untold gallons pouring uselessly out of our house, we use an unusually small amount of water. It makes me happy that our efforts to be conscientious are that discernible. Still, to make it up to Mother Earth for all the wasted water we just installed low-flow shower heads, purchased via internet at: http://www.urbangreengoods.com/
Perhaps you would like to get one.
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garden progress, weekend recap
There were several changes made to the garden landscape this weekend.
Ronna sowed a bed of peas and lettuce
Rob, Rob, and members of the Catholic Worker House turned the old compost pile.
Mac, Kannan, and JohnE pulled up some sod to make a vegetable bed for the members of their house.
We began digging a hole at the end of the canal system that runs through the garden. We spent a lot of energy and the pond that forms will probably get really gross. We did use the topsoil to raise a few vegetable beds in order to alleviate the Sping flood that we’re expecting.
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bicycle rack – new location, what does everyone think?
Drew and I moved the rusted bed frame bike rack out from the house a bit. Is everyone happy with the new location? Please reply with a comment 😉
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House Meeting, march 16, 2009
I wouldn’t normally blog about a house meeting, but our meeting today was really enjoyable and I wanted to explain how we organize ourselves and stay informed. We set aside an hour each week to discuss things of importance related to the house. An agenda is made up on the spot as we begin by proposing what things need to be addressed. We depend on whiteboard and dry erase technology to keep track of the meeting, and notes are taken with someone’s computer. All notes get posted to our internal house wiki that contains a variety of things no one will ever see but us.
Today’s meeting was beautiful. Food was prepared and we ate outside on the pic-nic table. Fresh eggs served from cast-iron, mmm, mmm, mmm. We were short one housemate, Jacob, who was at a cybernetics conference in Washington. We had a lot to talk about but the meeting went quickly and we were soon done and working in the garden. With the warm weather and time-change I can sense that we no longer need to worry about seasonal depression. I have a bit of a sunburn to prove it, too.
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House Concerturtle
Last Friday, March 6, La Casa (under the MCery of friend & former resident Anna) hosted Concerturtle (!) – an evening of performances of (mostly) new experimental works. Three residents (including your humble narrator) participated in music-making. We packed our living room with delightful human beings, kept our guests in grape juice & popcorn, & followed the festivities with a talk-back session & a bonfire in our garden. I (for one) thought it went swimmingly.
The “Program”:
- False Statement Bulletin, by Jacob.
Hi there,
Do you remember this assignment? Here are two versions:
“Write a statement that you want to be true.”
“Write a statement that is unfortunately false in current society.”I want this assignment to linger in the air for a while. I find that I’m never quite done with it. Dr. Parenti recommends exercising your “desiring muscles” frequently enough that they at least don’t atrophy.
So, I’m starting a weekly bulletin: This Week in Desire Statements. Send false statements and related artworks & project links to unfortunately DOT… false AAT… gmail DOT… com, and every Friday (I hope) I’ll put
together something out of it.Thanks,
Jacob Barton- The Solution to the Problem btw Israel & Palestine, by JARband.
More about this piece here.
- Playing (with) Policy, by AnAndR.
- The Squirrel’s Nut, a story composed & told by elizaBeth.
- Bagatelle No. 1, performed by Snow Leopard & Jacob.
- Duke of Uke & His Novelty Orchestra, performed by Dave, Lorene & ?.
- Rigadoo, performed by JP, Erin, Charlie & Kendra.
Rigadoo plays some hot bluegrass & Celtic music with traditional instruments & a set of mesmerizing “chakra bowls”; the Duke of Uke plays funky tunes on ukulele (accompanied, in this instance, by electric bass, tuba, & backup singin’); Snow Leopard arranged Bagatelle No. 1 (by whom?) for keyboard & udderbot; elizaBeth shared a draft of a story for children pointing to the absurdities of capitalism with talking rodents!
We six La Casans have inherited a tradition of house concerts – a tradition I happen to adore. I can think of no better venue for a show than a good friend’s living room!
UPDATE: some photos from the event,
La Casa Grande Colectiva 