Weekly Roundup for July 3rd through 9th, 2011

It was another busy week on Crazy Eddie's Motie News, as I posted eleven entries to this blog during a seven-day period again. In fact, it was so busy that I didn't get around to posting the weekly roundup until now, Sunday evening. Going on a field trip with my Geology classes all day Saturday and then going to a colleague's pool party Saturday night didn't help. As I've written before, I can't be all doom all the time. Good thing I was able to program my Saturday posts in advance.

As usual, I started off the week with part one of a four-part sustainability news linkspam, Sustainability news from Michigan's research universities for the week ending July 2, 2011. That series continued with part two, Sustainability news from midwestern research universities for the week ending July 2, 2011. As with last week's part three, I posted this week's part three, Sustainability news from national commercial sources for the week ending July 2, 2011, last. In fact, I didn't get around to doing it until Friday. Don't worry, that won't happen this week, for no other reason that I won't have that kind of part three this week. Like last week, there was a themed part four posted before part three, An update on The CoDominion planning for sustainability. I don't think there will be one of those, either. If there is, it will be news from local sources, as I was having way too much fun last week doing other things on this blog to actually post about them.





Speaking of "having way too much fun last week doing other things on this blog," I got into the "swim" of this month's NaBloPoMo theme by posting about sustainability bloggers swimming against the flow. That series started last week with Woman in Oak Park swims against the stream, plus Nablopomo for July, but I didn't return to Julie Bass until the end of the week. Instead, I decided to have some fun with James Howard Kunstler first.

Kunstler inspired the four posts in the series, beginning with James Howard Kunstler swims against the stream on marriage equality. Kunstler may consider himself a liberal, but he's very much the classic conservative on a range of issues. I pointed that out in Happy 4th of July from James Howard Kunstler's Tea Party!--I did tell you that I observe three patriotic holidays as part of my blogging, Canada Day, Independence Day, and Bastille Day; two down, one to go! In that post, I not only highlighted Kunstler's positions that conflict with most liberals, but also told him and his readers that the ones that don't fit right in with those of the Coffee Party. The next two posts followed up on the first one, beginning with James Howard Kunstler swims against the stream on gender role equality, too, which I mirrored to my LiveJournal. The mirror post spawned a lively discussion that I commented about in Follow up to women in Kunstler's fiction. Sex roles and sustainability? Hey, I specialize in sustainability in unexpected places--Slutwalk in Grand Rapids and Sustainability in archeology, anyone?

I then moved on from Kunstler, for this past week at least, to his estranged neighbor in Elaine Meinel Supkis uses anime and draws fan art to make sustainability points, which updated a three year old review of her on I posted to my LiveJournal. I plan on posting more about Elaine, as she really marches to her own drummer--generally in a good way.

Not all who swim against the flow are bloggers. Some of them might be nations, as I explained in The end of an era: last space shuttle mission. I think the United States is in danger of acting out one of the great tragic tropes of science fiction in real life if it abandons manned space flight. After all, this blog is "sustainability with a science fiction slant"--a phrase never before used on the internet, if Google is to be believed--so of course I'd look at the event that way.

I ended the week by returning to Julie Bass and Oak Park's "War on Veggies" with Brief update on Oak Park's war on veggies for week ending July 9th. Unlike Kunstler and Meinel Supkis, Julie's story is up close and personal and has real world stakes for her. It's also gone viral, as the first post in the series dealing with her, Oak Park Woman plants vegetable garden; city objects was number one for the week for the second week in the row, winning the "back catalog" category. Not only was it the most popular for the week, it's been number one for the day for three days in a row, and number one for the month. Over the past weekend, I've watched it climb the top ten all time list until it's now the third most viewed post in the history of this blog. As I wrote in the first post of this week, Oak Park's "War on Veggies" goes viral, "Behold the power of Drudge."

That concludes last week on Crazy Eddie's Motie News. Stay tuned for more "swim" posts as well as the sustainability news linkspams.