Thursday, September 29, 2016

Monday, September 26, 2016

Video Experiments


Video Experiments

Collages, really.
Putting together images
I love.
The first 2 I labelled "Adult day care"
The beginning of my analysis, pondering,
Can we have virtual adult day care?
Still pondering.

The third is more healing art.




Saturday, September 24, 2016

Monday, September 19, 2016

Thursday, September 15, 2016

Rerun: Travelogue for the Universe: Comments

Note: when the leaves start turning, you better know how you're paying your property taxes in Vermont. The town can sell your property being as little as 6 months late. Or not.
As Vermont embarked on creating equal education for each child, 
they made it all very complicated.
Yet the idea of an ethics panel failed to gain popularity.
My advice to people owning property where tax sales are a
Bully auction,
Change the law. 
Meg


Travelogue for the Universe: Comments: **warning if none if this makes sense to you, that is quite beyond my ability to fix it. meg Comments Was trying to post all of my com...

Tuesday, September 13, 2016

Latest on #Fracking Gaz Pipeline Fight

Follow links to tweets about pipeline (un)safety


Plea for help,,

Solidarity

Dear pipeline fighters, 

Right now dozens of people are blockading construction of the Fracked Gas pipeline in New Haven VT, putting their bodies on the line solidarity with escalating international resistance to the Dakota Access Pipeline. 

We are asking everyone who can to donate directly to the Red Warrior Camp and the Sacred Stone Camp. Can you give $10 (or more!) today to support this historic resistance? 

Abenaki elder Carol Irons spoke out from the blockade, "We come first to honor the Lakota people. This is Abenaki country, we are brothers and sisters with the Lakota and all other indigenous people. It's time for an uprising." 

You can directly support this uprising right now by donating to theRed Warrior Camp and the Sacred Stone Camp

Both the Dakota Access Pipeline and the Vermont Fracked Gas Pipeline are being constructed by the same on-the-ground contractor, Michels Inc. Said Jane Palmer:
 
"We can’t ignore the destruction that is Michels has caused here in Addison County and it is not okay for us to ignore the same destruction in Standing Rock or anywhere else in the world where water and land and air is forsaken by the fossil fuel industry,”

Please help resist this ongoing destruction with a donation to the Red Warrior Camp and Sacred Stone Camp today!

Solidarity,
Anna

Guest Blog: Boosting body image as kids head back to school

Boosting body image as kids head back to school: As parents get kids ready to head back to school, they have a long list of things they have to prepare for. Often, talking to kids about body image is not on that list, though the pressure will in...

Sunday, September 11, 2016

15 years ago

15 years ago

It happened.
It happened to innocent people,
Rippling,
Reverberating,
Tearing heart and soul.

I wrote this 5 years ago so I could recall the details of my experience.
From afar, we grieve for the fallen we do not know.
We say prayers for the victims
And heroes.



Saturday, September 10, 2016

The puppet master


The puppet master,
Cast adrift in a
long-term care facility,
Created a helper.

The night nurse,
Tried to explain to
The head nurse,
Where did the laptop go?

Thursday, September 8, 2016

Visitors


The Visitor stunned,
Wide eyed cave dwellers in awe,
Had their savior arrived?

 Sunrise over Raven Ridge,
A.k.a.
Dean Mountain
Monkton,Vermont

Wednesday, September 7, 2016

The Drummer Drums #Fracking away, away

Dear Vermont's pipefighters,

The Camp of the Sacred Stones and the Red Warrior Camp, both leading the resistance to the Dakota Access Pipeline, have put out a call for solidarity actions that target the corporations and financial institutions that are building and financing this pipeline through native lands. 

Michels Corporation - the contractor building the Dakota Access Pipeline through the land of the Standing Rock Sioux - is also building the fracked gas pipeline in western Vermont.

In solidarity with the #NoDAPL resistance, join Vermont's pipefighters and march onto an active Vermont Gas/Michels pipeline construction site to shut them down for the day. We'll be holding up the indigenous-led struggle 1500 miles away and raising money to send to this resistance out west. 

Meet on Tuesday, September 13 at 9:00am at the Vergennes Park & Ride - the corner of Routes 7 and 22A. Please join us in this time of need. And spread the word.

Onward,

Jason

P.S. - This Friday evening, September 9 come to the benefit concert to protect Geprags Park. Great music and a great cause. 80% of the proceeds go to the Protect Geprags Park legal fund; 20% of the proceeds get sent west to the Standing Rock Sioux.
-- 


Bike ride for Multiple Sclerosis


I read the young man's plea for sponsors,
Fighting the MonSter,
Multiple sclerosis.
He's training for 200 miles.
Please donate if you can!

Press this link to donate to Eric!

Tuesday, September 6, 2016

A dark day


Early Morning #Fracking fighters Report....call for help, solidarity

Woke up early again,
Maybe it was so I could post this plea for help,
Money, prayers, good thoughts requested.
And hey, 
The weather is stunningly beautiful this year.
I see a red leaf here and there.
Air fresh and clear.
Mother Earth,
We love her so.
Meg



Hey Everybody!
 
Here’s an update from Rachel on the state of play with VGS and events happening this week, along with yet another plea for help raising funds for our legal fees.  We are so grateful to all who have already donated so generously – you have kept this campaign alive.  THANK YOU SO MUCH!  We are reluctant to keep asking, but we know you will understand: legal challenges are costly. But we can win this one. It’s worth it!
 
Treasurers report: In the last week of July we went like gang busters, raising over $5,000.00 in one week! With that, for the first time since we started this fight, we were able to pay our lawyer in full. Then August happened. We ended the month with nearly $12,000.00 in new legal fees and donations amounting to less than $5,000.00. So, we are falling behind, and we still anticipate taking our case through appeal(s).
 
If you can help, please donate now HERE!
 
Read on for further update and upcoming events
 
Thanks, Cisco
 
******************
If you are following the news you will have noticed that Vermont Gas’s pipeline project is getting a lot of bad press!
 
First the Public Service Board looked pretty bad when they tried to exclude the public (who they supposedly serve) from participating in the eminent domain hearings over Hinesburg’s Geprags Park. A federal judge had to order them to open the hearings. 
 
Then the project took another beating when an accountant, who was hired by DPS as an expert to review VGS’s records on pipeline expenditures,stated in prefiled testimony to the Public Service Board, “I have reviewed invoices to cost reports for some 40-plus years and to my recollection have not encountered so much difficulty in tracing in supporting documentation. 
 
Then VGS was slapped on the hand by their buddies at the Department of Public Service, which is questioning 35 million of the project costs on the grounds that the expenditures were  “imprudent”.  That’s not counting the costs that are insufficiently documented according to DPS’s expert. Gaz Metro shareholders will not be pleased!
 
Then, after endless repeats of VGS “on time and on budget” mantra, it came out that they have, internally, been saying that the project could take until April 2017 to complete. DPS is estimating May 2017. Reality strikes.
 
It’s encouraging that state regulators are finally realizing what everyone else has been saying for over two years now, but we’ve also seen DPS act like they’re going to crack down on VGS and then do nothing in the end. This is no time for complacency. We need to keep hammering away, educating the public, building our movement and questioning the pipeline.
 
Our lawyer, Jim Dumont, continues tirelessly and doggedly to challenge VGS and the regulatory bodies.  Most recently, he argued that “The entire project is at this point in violation of ACT 250.” His argument is based on how the project is defined, as a “transmission” versus “distribution” line. The implication is that the Public Service Board has always lacked jurisdiction to approve construction of this project!  OOPS
 
In fact, just about the only one who seems to have anything positive to say about VGS and their pipeline, is good old Don Rendall, who apparently felt so maligned that he penned an Oped in the Free Press to reiterate how gas is clean and green and cheap, in vacant sugared tones. Of course, his pal, Chris Recchia, Commissioner of Public Service has also been on a media blitz talking about why the project still makes sense. Too bad his inconsistent positions don’t make any sense.
 
WE HAVE A LOT OF MOMENTUM GOING AGAINST THIS PROJECT!!! Even some of the most jaded long time pipeline battlers are telling us they feel teensy twinges of optimism!  We cannot let up, in fact we need to ramp up!  Now is the time to rally our forces and take this over the top.
 
UPCOMING EVENTS THIS WEEK:
 
This coming week, Wed Sept 7th, oral arguments on a petition filed by Conservation Law Foundation back in July 2014 will finally be heard at the Public Service Board.  This case challenges the whole project, in that CLF is arguing that the project that was granted a CPG is not the “same” as the final project currently underway. CLF argues that VGS was required under the Public Service Board’s own rules to request an amendment. Such a request would open up the project to scrutiny by all of the parties, and VGS would have the burden of proof to show the project is still in the public interest. THIS COULD BE BIG! 
 
There will be a rally at 10 a.m on the statehouse lawn on Wed., and the hearings begin at 11 at the Pavillion Auditorium (photo ID required). PLEASE COME and show your solidarity with CLF and the whole Vermont pipeline resistance movement! The PSB may try to delay justice, but we will not allow them to deny it. Rules are rules, and VGS needs to apply for an amendment no matter how stupid that makes the company and regulators look!
 
With so much going on it seems important to take time for some FUN! That is why we are putting some fun into our fundraising with a FANTASTIC line up of music on Friday, September 9TH with Dave Keller, Joe Adler, Daddy Longlegs, Laura Simon, a crazy fun raffle and more. Doors open at 6:30 and the show starts at 7 p.m. in the gorgeous barn at Richmond Solar Farm, 2899 Hinesburg - Richmond Road, parking across the road on Beaver Pond Hill Rd.   Tickets are available at protectgeprags.org (scroll down) or via Eventbrite: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/protect-geprags-fundraiser-music-in-the-barn-tickets-27361322452.  Or, reply to this email to reserve a ticket for purchase at the door.  We suggest a $40 donation per ticket but sliding scale tickets will be available at the door or you can reserve one by replying to this email. Donate what you can afford, and come enjoy a great night of fun and community building). PLEASE share out to your friends and contacts as we need to fill the barn and have a long way to go in the coming few days!
 
In Hinesburg, we are waiting for the PSB ruling on the eminent domain case against Geprags Park.  We expect the PSB may authorize  eminent domain despite the facts that (1) condemnation of a public park would violate VT law and (2) VGS has not investigated alternative routes as the law requires. We will be poised to appeal it, and take it to the Supreme Court.  Doing so will take a lot of time and energy from all of us.  We need your support, especially to keep up with legal fees that continue to mount. 
 
We have a winnable case!  We can STOP THE PIPELINE 
If you have already donated: Thank You SO MUCH!  If you can donate now, please do so HERE.
 
P.S. We are in solidarity with Standing Rock Sioux resistance to the Dakota Access Pipeline. A portion of proceeds from our Friday Music fundraising event will go to them. We are all one.

Sunday, September 4, 2016

From James Kennedy...Last Request


Sunday morning seemed to be a great day for a musical post.
James showed up just as I was wondering what to post. 
Enjoy! Meg.

Saturday, September 3, 2016

From WCAX website: Sen. Leahy on issues impacting Vermonters, re-election bid

Sen. Leahy on issues impacting Vermonters, re-election bid: He's Washington's longest serving Senator-- Patrick Leahy joined us live in studio to discuss some of the biggest issoxues facing the state of Vermont.


Thanks, Eva McKend,
For posting this. . Meg

Friday, September 2, 2016