Cuckoo for coconut oil?

Went to NYC this weekend and gave away some of my creations that I’ve made thus far…my cutting board and the very first spoons I’ve ever carved. In making these, I have become increasingly interested in how wooden objects are made, how woods vary, and how to maintain the wood in the proper manner. Who knew there was SO much to learn about wood? Though I knew it was the case, I am still surprised that there is life beyond a 2x4, ha!

Lately, I am into learning about different treatments for wood, especially for wood that will be used in eating, such as cutting boards and spoons. I have learned that once again, it is simply a matter of common sense; if I would not eat the oil, I should not put it on the wood I will be eating off of. Seems self-explanatory, no? Then again, susceptibility to rancidity must be taken into account. For example, I should not treat wood with olive oil since it is much more susceptible to rancidity than say walnut oil or almond oil. …but walnut oil is not extremely common, is it? I opted for coconut oil…I read it is a good way to treat wood due to its low rancidity…we’ll see how it works out. Secondly, something I did not even realize, which may be an extremely important topic to consider if giving wood gifts as a present, is allergies. If someone is allergic to walnuts, don’t treat the wood with walnut oil. Same with coconut. Makes sense, but if you are not allergic to any foods, it is not something that would immediately come to mind in choosing finishes.

So I am getting a good lesson in finishing wood, but what I really need to practice more is joinery…will hopefully practice and return with a post later in the week. The other thing I want to reflect on and discuss in a blog post is non-profit and for-profit structures, which has been a major discussion throughout my whole travels. I am wanting to evaluate the viability of something like Yestermorrow operating in a for-profit structure. I have much to say regarding this idea, and so perhaps there will have to be two posts this week! By the way, I will post much of the home repair stuff I am learning on the BuffaloBasics blogsite as well, just to continue to increase access to a wide variety of audiences...it will be the same post, but there may be additional information on upcoming workshops at my house in Buffalo. Taught by me, taught by Brendan and Pat, taught by Maura...a very loose free school structure!

Class 2: DIY Hot Water, the PAIN mound.

Last weekend I took a class called DIY Hot Water Systems. The class was based on the idea of the Pain Mound, a concept championed by scientist Jean Pain, of France. A Pain mound, according to the instructor, uses the heat generated from the process of decomposition to heat water lines fed to your house, in turn decreasing the need for additional water heating appliances that consume fossil fuels.

How does it work? The simplest explanation is that water lines are buried within a tightly packed mound of decaying organic products, the water in them heats up as they travel through the mound, and they re-enter the house at a much higher initial temperature, thereby reducing costs for water heating.

Is it realistic? For Vermont, perhaps. A rural setting is preferred given that the space required for such a massive Pain mound would be the size of many city backyards. Also, in a rural setting there are no neighbors to complain about an unsightly mound whereas in the city, you can be sure to expect some inquiries from neighbors, not to mention inspectors.

Cost-benefit? At this point, the cost outweighs the benefit in my opinion. Though I have no evidence for it, it would seem that the cost of wood mulch, plumbing fixtures and piping and the labor involved in building the pile would be greater than the money saved on simply heating water using fossil fuels. If, however, the benefit of not being reliant on fossil fuels is more important than any costs associated with being off the grid, then perhaps it is worth it for you. For me? Not so much.

If you are interested in learning more about this concept, how it was built, the specifics of costs associated, the BTUs generated from the pile…I’d be more than happy to share documents…get in touch with me by leaving comments or by emailing me…

WfW, not WWF silly!

I took my first class here at Yestermorrow this past week, and wouldn't ya know it was called Woodworking for Women (WfW)! A topic near and dear to my heart...women in "nontraditional work."

...hang on, who decides what is non-traditional anyways?? sheesh!

The instructor for the class was Lizabeth, a woman carpenter whose father was also a pediatrician! Funny coincidence! I spent the whole week making a shaker-style end table, learning about routers, mortisers, dado cuts, different kinds of finishes...it was a really good introduction to the woodshop, and now I feel totally at home creating furniture and other wood products.

Arrival at Yestermorrow

I was home for a brief week and now I'm off again. To Vermont this time! The next 6 months of posting will be the documentation of the second half of my current journey: the yester(half)year.

Vermont is rural as rural can be. There is NO cell phone service, so I leave my phone in my bedroom, which caused me to spend the first 3 days searching for my cell to check the time. Even my phone's alarm clock fails to work out here. By the fifth day I have come to terms with it; I no longer have any sense of hours in the day and only judge times by my nose...I can smell meal times from the smells of the kitchen.

The Yesterfamily is an odd bunch. Only time will tell, but in the end I will most likely continue to conclude that I hope to never start a non-profit if I can avoid doing so. There are many inefficiencies that would simply not exist if this school were run as a for-profit business that remained socially responsible.

This posting will most likely become weekly at this point. By the time the day of chores and work is over, I'm too wiped to write a daily post. Coming up: what I'm learning and working on here at the Yesterplex.

Heidelberg Project

I did not interview anyone from the Heidelberg Project, but I remembered speaking with the project's founder 2 years ago at the Great Lakes Building ReUse Conference in Buffalo and thought I should check it out. What a crazy/interesting place!

In the years of its existence, it has been a rather controversial project. Why? To some, Tyree Guyton's work is just prolonging the demise of the abandoned and unsafe buildings in their neighborhood. To others, it is a tragically beautiful depiction of the abandonment of Detroit. And to others still, it is an amazingly creative space and a spot of light in an otherwise destitute area. I myself am not certain how I feel about it.

The decorated buildings and sculptures made of old building materials at first look seem to suggest a different vision of the future--of what could be. Instead, I believe it is more an artist's depiction of the creative energy of people. Not an exact vision but more of a suggestion that even in the most forgotten and abandoned of places creative energy and hope still exists. I think that it is this powerful message that I connected most with while looking at the installations on Heidelberg Street. More than the artist's canvas and the political commentary behind the wild air vents snaking out of a ruined roof and the stuffed animals tacked on the side of a house, this message hits at the core of the current rebirth of Detroit. It is just one part of the message being sent through the Detroit: City of Hope (DCOH) campaign, but it is a strong one at that...yes Detroit has problems, yes many buildings are falling apart, but we can take back our neighborhoods, we can use our creative energy (which the Heidelberg Project has been instrumental in highlighting) and come up with realistic solutions that benefit US as a community.

Speaking of, DCOH is another entity on the list that I thought I should check in on. I contacted longtime organizer (and former autoworker)Rich Feldman to speak a little about this idea of a loose organization whose main goal is to connect businesses, nonprofits, people, etc. in order to create a network of caring Detroiters, excited to work with each other to achieve a better future for Detroit. DCOH and my visit with a pretty amazing lady will be in my next post.

For now my questions are: Why are artist communities seen to be an indicator of progress? Are they actually? Can you have artists move into an area without gentrifying it in the process? How do you get neighborhood artists invested in the area and community building rather than turning an area into a space that largely functions as an artists canvas with little to no community involvement? When is that ok and when do you need to integrate creation of art pieces and community?

Soup and Support

I was supposed to be meeting my couchsurfing host Leeann at an event called Soup. If you're not familiar with couchsurfing...you should be. Anyway, I was invited to this event via facebook, and when I checked the event page I saw a link to another event during the day...Spruce up Spaulding. ...What is Spaulding?

This is Spaulding.









Glass bottles are broken in the planters, trash is sticking to overgrown weeds, and the building has been abused, set aflame, and subsequently forgotten. To many, Spaulding Court is an abandoned piece of junk. To the people working at Spruce Up Spaulding, the building is a treasure! You may not be able to see in the picture, but given the potential for future community interactions within this specially designed space, I tend to agree with the latter group. The building is essentially designed to smush people together, a design that I think can often be helpful in engaging people within a community since it forces increased levels of communication and tolerance for others. As I volunteered in cleaning up the planters and work on some plumbing, I pictured a future with food growing in the planters, implementation of smart retrofit techniques, etc. That's the beauty of Detroit nowadays...anything is possible. Learned how to use aquatherm, a material that surpasses pex in performance! Hoping it becomes more readily available in plumbing supply stores in the US...expands and therefore does not burst if/when water freezes in pipes, has straight runs like copper which are easier to install than the curved, bendable pex, melts together to form a tighter seal than pex, etc.

I went to Soup after volunteering at Spaulding Court, and loved the idea. Every Thursday this group gets together, makes soup, and charges $5 for dinner. The awesome part about it is that the money paid to get soup goes toward funding a community project. There are 2 people in attendance who have 3 minutes to pitch their idea and why they need start-up funding. The others in attendance vote on which group deserves to receive funding, and then the money is given to the winner! Sure, it's only a couple hundred dollars, but think of all the free publicity as well! Even if you don't win you still get the undivided attention of all the people in the room for 3 whole minutes, to speak about and sell your project.

Same Circle Syndrome

I left Minneapolis early early morning (sorry I missed saying goodbye Andrew, you were a wonderful host!) in order to catch the ferry from Manitowoc to Ludington. It cost a pretty penny, but on the last leg of my journey…anything to keep from driving more, no? So I hopped aboard the S.S.Badger, cruising ever closer to the last stop on my 3-month road trip…DETROIT.

Detroit is everything I imagined only on an infinitely larger scale. In a way, the abandoned buildings served as a reminder of home—forgotten streets and forgotten neighborhoods fading into history—but there was a pervasive shift in the wind which was in no way similar to the some wind patterns in Buffalo these days. I’m speaking of the winds of change, of course. Perhaps that is an overly negative judgment of my hometown; there are plenty of amazing people and organizations within Buffalo, but there is less of a cohesive energy...? Less of view that the entire city is behind this shift in the wind?

The first people I visited with in Detroit were from two different training and conservation corps. Instead of speaking directly about their organizations, I want to mention something that came up in the conversation which has really gotten me to reexamine my own experiences in Buffalo and the role I want to play in the future. What we discussed was something I like to call "same circles syndrome." It's awfully easy and comfortable to find yourself surrounded by the same people who are working within the community building realm. We're all on similar committees, we hold events which we all attend in support of each other, and we see each other in both professional and informal settings. If we never wanted to, we could successfully avoid interacting with our actual communities at all! ...But how does that reflect the wants and needs of the community? How can we call a neighborhood or our work successful if we base success on numbers in attendance versus on who attends or how people are becoming engaged in the org and taking ownership of their own communities?

I noticed in Detroit this divide of sorts; one which I do not care to repeat. There is a major divide between one side--the "creative minds," the "community builders," the out-of-towners coming to try their ideas on a fresh canvas--and the other side--people who have been around forever, "the community." At many events I attended it was often a group of the former, the same circle people, mostly not reflective of the demographic in Detroit. And here I find it can be very much the same...is it unavoidable? I sure hope not. I have much more to say on this topic, especially concerning Detroit...how some people seem to get it and successfully avoid the same circle syndrome, while others are consumed by it...but I think this is enough to reflect on and think about now...