Comic Journal 8/26 - 8/27

Okay... This is my first post on the famous Glass Center Blog, so please... be gentle.

Before I came out here to NE Texas, I use to keep a comic journal. I would pick the most interesting thing that happened during the day and make a short comic strip out of it. I've decided to start this once again. Since a lot of my life currently centers (no pun intended) around the the Glass Center, I will be posting the strips that apply. Hope you enjoy them. Here are the first two...

guatemalan biodiesel

I was studying Spanish in Guatemala when I noticed an article in a local magazine about a biodiesel startup. Although I had 1 day left in the country, I sent an email to the email address on the article. 24 hours later I was getting the full tour from the head of the organization, while he prepared his last 80-gallon batch of the week.
Alejandro Del Valle's plant produces 500 gallons of biodiesel per week, to service 12 vehicles from the municipal government of Antigua, Guatemala. His starting ingredient (waste vegetable oil) comes from Antigua and Guatemala City, primarily from restaurants that had previously been pouring their used oil into the street gutters. Valle uses a processor that was manufactured in Holland, which can fully react 80 gallons of biodiesel in about 45 minutes.

The most empowering thing that I learned was the following: this organization existed for 6 months before they began collecting oil, and 12 more months until they started processing it.
For us at the Glass Center, this is important. Since our biodiesel production is still not off the ground, we are inspired by this profound first step: start collecting oil.

It makes complete sense, since biodiesel comes after oil... but so far we have been so focused on the actual product (the biodiesel) that we've lost sight of the process that gets us there. Collect oil now, process it later.

I have digressed.

It was a tremendous privilege to meet Alejandro, and I hope to maintain a solid tie with his Guatemalan alternative energy organization.

puppies!

Sparky had 8 of them last week, and we're waiting 7 more weeks before trying to distribute the hybrid bundles of love into suitable homes... want one?

On a related note, Sparky will be spayed during late September, for the sake of sustainability.

Bear Tractor (chicken tractor)

Soon Reed will make a more thorough post about this, but I cannot resist sharing this picture of our finished product:
(A chicken tractor is basically a movable chicken pen, and we have built one that could probably house a family of bears.)

*UPDATE*

We've been using the chicken tractor for a couple of weeks now, and I made a short video of me and Aaron moving the chickens to a fresh spot. Here's the video:

A wonderful visit from our friend Cory

thanks to reed for the use of his camera, and to sarah for her camerawork
here is cory's myspace

Lots of squash, fire

Last week we grew over 150 pounds of squash, partially because we didn't realize how often peak squash needs to be harvested (about every other day; we were harvesting every 4 days). Most of the larger stuff doesn't sell as well in market, but we all still enjoy it (Reed: "it is immoral not to eat squash at every meal")


In other news, we had a fire at the farm. No major damage was done, except for the tractor/mower that started the fire.


Nick can probably tell the story better than I can, but basically he was mowing when the tractor caught on fire (perhaps because the grass was bunching up underneath the mower, but we still don't really know why). Nick ran and called 911, and a fire truck came pretty promptly.

We had to babysit the fire for another 12 hours or so, since it kept trying to resurrect itself from the coals. Probably about 1/4 acre burned, which has since been tilled in preparation for planting!

back at the farm

I'm back at the farm for the first time in 6 months, and it's crazy to see how much has changed. For example, look at this before&after of the blackberry field:
We've also had a few changes in our web presence. Michelle is still doing fantastic work on the website, and Reed & Kevin have been giving regular updates on the google group. If anyone wants to join the google group, send an email to community@glasscenter.org and we'll set you up.