Biomass Plant Alachua County

I found some good stuff today on this topic which I knew literally Zero about til today when I resarched some articles online.
We (at the Water Institute) are trying to figure out what kind of cooling system it will use to see how much water will evaporate vs. be re-released to the environment.

The biggest problem I see with the project is that there will be so much power generated that we don't really need, and if operating at capacity, will rake every forest floor and urban median and backyard clean of organic matter for a 75-mile radius requiring 130 tractor trailers a day to bring this wood stuff (average trip is 52 miles someone estimated). We'll be so busy feeding this hungry machine to justify its existence when the power is not really needed while stripping soils of their restructuring and nutrifying opportunities............. poor soil, it always comes last!

Newspaper May 8, 2009
http://www.gainesville.com/article/20090508/ARTICLES/905089985?p=4&tc=pg
City of Gainesville entered a 30 yr contract to have a wood-burning biomass power plant.
Contract is with Boston-based American Renewables who will will build, own and operate the plant.
The 100 megawatt plant will be the largest biomass plant in Florida.
GRU will buy the full 100 megawatts of energy produced at the plant from American Renewables based on a fixed long-term price.
Plant will come online at the end of 2013.
Fuel for the plant will coime from waste wood from the area's logging industry and also, urban yard waste and some pulp wood that is normally used for paper prod.
About 1 million tons of green ('wet') wood will be burned . The city previously adopted stricter standards to insure no harm to forests around the area.
Plant will cost $400-500 million - they are hoping for grants from American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (plant must be online by Jan 2014 to be eligible). 350 temp jobs to build the plant, 45 perm jobs to run it, and 500 jobs to supply fuel in area timber operations (?)

Newspaper Feb 24, 2010

http://www.gainesville.com/article/20100224/ARTICLES/100229681?p=1&tc=pg In comments to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, the Suwannee River Water Management District has raised concerns over the impact that could have on water levels in the Lower Santa Fe River. The plant's cooling tower would require an average groundwater withdrawal of 1.4 million gallons of water a day.

Currently, plans have been announced for two other biomass plants that, if built, could compete for fuel supply within the 75-mile distance from Alachua County considered the “wood basket” for the Gainesville plant. Both are in Hamilton County. In 2007, Gainesville funded a $36,000 University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences study on the availability of biomass fuel for three competing plants. That study concluded there was an adequate supply but the scenario included smaller facilities, three 40 megawatt plants- one each for Gainesville, Jacksonville and Tallahassee.

Relying on 2007 U.S. Forest Service data, American Renewables and GRU projected current logging operations in the region leave behind approximately 1.35 million tons of residue annually and, to meet their projected mix of fuels, they would need 850,000 tons of that a year. From all sources, the plant is projected to need one million tons of wood a year. The reliance on wood waste, primarily the residue left from logging operations and forest thinnings, has successfully worked in the Northeast for decades. In fact, Gainesville has modeled its plans on the 50-megawatt McNeil Generating Plant in Burlington, Vt.

Newspaper Feb 4, 2010

http://www.gainesvillebizreport.com/component/content/article/25-burning-concerns-about-biomass

Compared to coal or other traditional fossil fuels, emissions from burning biomass are significantly lower. Nitrous oxide emissions are 1/10th and sulfur dioxide, which can result in acid rain, less than 1/30th. Also, using biomass fuels results in only 42 percent of the particulate pollution of comparable coal plants. And, burning wood wastes in the field, as is now done during logging and road building operations, releases 10 times more particulates than biomass electrical generation. Biomass energy is essentially carbon neutral, Brinkman says. “It does not add new carbon to the active carbon cycle, unlike fossil fuels, which remove carbon from geologic storage.

Is There Enough Wood to Fuel the Plant?In a sense, a biomass plant is little more than an enormous and efficient campfire. It uses wood to create steam to turn a generator, and it can burn anything from waste limbs and stumps from forestry operations, to broken pallets, your bagged oak leaves—even treated cow manure. But it takes a lot of wood to generate that steam. The 100-MW biomass plant planned for Gainesville will require 3,250 tons of waste wood every day. Getting all that wood to the plant will take 130 tractor trailers a day. (A coal plant of similar size would require approximately 800 tons of coal or 32 diesel truck-loads a day.) Another way to imagine this volume, says Dian Deevey, chairwoman of the Alachua County Environmental Protection Advisory Committee, is to consider that the yearly wood needed is equivalent to 880 square miles of timberland—an area slightly larger than all of Alachua County.

American Renewables reports that it will draw on an extensive area for the fuel: “The project will require approximately one million tons of fuel annually, which will be procured within a 75-mile radius of the project site.” Thus, the biomass plant’s sourcing support area could be as much as 17,662 square miles, equivalent to the area, coast-to-coast, from Valdosta to Leesburg. Dr. E. Dwight Adams, retired UF professor of physics and former member of the Alachua County Energy Committee, worries whether such a large mass of wood will be sustainable and, if it is, whether freighting it here is good for the environment. “My main concern is that there may not be enough good fuels in the region. We’ll have to use wood trucked in after hurricanes and tornadoes,” Adam says, adding that he’s concerned about the impact of removing all that wood. “I wonder if we’re robbing the soil of nutrients,” he says.

“The primary fuels will be forest residue, mill residue, pre-commercial tree thinnings, used pallets and urban wood waste that are generated by landscaping contractors, power line clearance contractors and other non-forestry related sources of woody debris,” wrote Drs. Douglas Carter and Matthew Langholtz. “Supplementary fuels could include herbaceous plant matter, agricultural residues, diseased trees, woody storm debris, whole tree chips and pulpwood chips.”Levin Gaston, chief operating officer at Wood Resource Recovery in Gainesville, a business that specializes in wood debris and yard waste recovery, recycling, composting and site management, scoffs at those who say we’ll run out of fuel. “There is plenty of biomass out there,” he says. Gaston also argues that burning biomass significantly reduces the materials dumped in landfills, cuts greenhouse gas emissions and curbs our reliance on costly and unstable supplies of fuel, such as foreign oil.

Newspaper March 24, 2010

http://citylimits.blogs.gainesville.com/10590/sierra-clubs-stance-against-biomass-plant-shows-rift-in-environmental-community/
Sierra Club opposes the plan, but the board chair, Rob Brinkman supported it and resigned as chairman because of this rift. He believes there is enough biomass to supply the plant, the other board members fear deforestation!

Newspaper May 3, 2010

http://www.jaxobserver.com/2010/05/03/debate-about-gainesvilles-proposed-biomass-plant-continues/
Gainesville does not need this energy... probably no new need for energy until 2023.
So plant or GRU needs to be able to sell surplus energy to someone.
Lots of air pollutants is a concern. Why create so much energy and pollution here where we don't need it? is an argument.

Newspaper May 28, 2010

http://www.gainesville.com/article/20100528/articles/5281002
FL PSC narrowly approved the proposal to build the plant! In Feb they were poised to deny it to give city officials time to answer about concerns.
Gov. Charlie Crist and the Cabinet have the final say on the project later this year (November) - and FDEP has to review too.
Hunzinger is the general manager of GRU and is for it saying we should go towards renewable energy.
Craig Lowe points out that the city has low risk, just has to buy the power from American Renewables, not assume the risks they are assuming! he also said it could probably benefit from future carbon regulations and avoid probable future taxes on coal.
Plant to use leftover wood from tree clearings collected from a 75-mile radius around Gainesville, harnessing carbon that would have been released anyway (because they burn wood piles in those cleared plots).

Newspaper July 11, 2010

http://www.gainesville.com/article/20100711/OPINION03/7111001/-1/archive?Title=David-Still-The-purple-pipe

Together, the Suwannee River Water Management District Governing Board, the city of Gainesville, Gainesville Regional Utilities (GRU), the city of Alachua, and the Gainesville Renewable Energy Center (GREC) are signing a Memorandum of Understanding that will result in the savings of hundreds of thousands, and eventually 1.4 million gallons, of fresh groundwater per day through using water from purple pipes. Through this model public-private partnership, GRU and GREC will build a purple pipeline to deliver reclaimed water from the city of Alachua to the proposed GREC facility, thereby reducing groundwater pumpage in the Santa Fe River Basin.

Newspaper Aug 1, 2010

http://www.gainesville.com/article/20100802/ARTICLES/8021001/1002
A study released last month seemed to indict biomass as a fuel source, indicating that it gives off more greenhouse gases than coal. Study was based in Massach where they used whole trees. Here, 78% of fuel would be wood waste, leftover limbs, and downed trees from wind etc. This stuff is what gets burned on site now, or breaks down sitting there releasing carbon. The fuel supply will be setup by BioResource Management Inc, a Gainesville firm. They think this all will create healthier forests because there will be incentive to thin them.

Paula Stahmer, one of two Gainesville residents who intervened as GREC went before the Florida Public Service Commission, objects to the project on a number of grounds - from the financial makeup of the partially redacted contract between Gainesville Regional Utilities and American Renewables to the need for a 100-megawatt plant, regardless of the fuel source. But the underlying issue is environmental. The operation would be "destroying our most valuable carbon sink: wood," Stahmer said Thursday. Dian Deevey also intervened in the PSC process to no avail. Wednesday, Stahmer and Deevy filed an appeal that will be sent to the state Supreme Court. If their appeal isn't granted, the matter will be left to Gov. Charlie Crist and his Cabinet to decide - and opponents already are getting involved in that process.

On July 26, former Gainesville Mayor Tom Bussing filed to intervene in the state Department of Environmental Protection's review of the site (happens before the Crist/cabinet review), according to a news release about the legal challenge released Thursday. "Dr. Bussing says the site approval should be denied because of the burner's negative health impacts and deforestation of public lands that will be cut for biomass fuel," the release stated

EPA does not think Biomass plants are carbon neutral (duh). They need a permit to based on greenhouse gas emissions.
"If the forest regrows, carbon neutrality is always obtained," Tim Martin for SFRC said. "It just depends on how long it takes." He says trees are part of our current carbon cycle, whereas coal is not, and we are bringing it up and adding it to the mass balance. Uhh... but he forgot about all the trucks that will be bringing it to the plant...? In North Florida, for instance, a forest can regrow in about 20 years, while in Massachusetts, it can take about 90 years.

The plant will use about 1.4 million gallons of water a day, and according to the agreement, about 400,000 of that will be reclaimed water purchased from the city of Alachua. The rest will come from groundwater.

Article about consumptive water use for power plants (2003)

http://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy04osti/33905.pdf
Consumptive water use per kilowatt hour generated by thermoelectric plants? The biomass plant falls into the thermoelectric category... In the United States, approximately 89% of the energy produced in power plants is generated by thermoelectric systems, which evaporate water during the cooling of the condenser water. Average across the US: the final result for typical thermoelectric power plants was 0.47 gal (1.8 L) of fresh water evaporated per kWh of end-use electricity - multiply by 1000 --> 470 gallons (1,800 L) per hour per megawatt * 100 --> 180,000 Liters per hour per day or 47,000 gallons per hour per day --> * 24 --> 4,320,000 liters or 1,128,000 gallons per day.

My own research on water consumption with Water Use data:

The 1.4 million gallons per day proposed pumping by the plant would increase the usage of water in the whole county by 2.5% compared to 2005 numbers (from USGS water use report by Marella). This adds up to 42.7 million gallons a month. I went into my water use database to compare to other users in the SRWMD.

The average groundwater use of all 75 permitted Public Supply and Commercial/Industrial/Power/Mining permittees in SRWMD was 29.7 million gallons per month in 2007.

The average groundwater use of all Public Supply and Commercial/Industrial/Power/Mining permittees in Alachua County that is in SRWMD was 14.8 million gallons per month in 2007.

There were six SRWMD groundwater users that used more than 42.7 million gallons per month out of 75 total permitted users in those 2 categories in 2007:

1. Buckeye Paper Mill in Taylor County used average of 1205 million gallons per month (they recently got a permit to discharge 50-60 million gallons to the Gulf I read somewhere)
2. PCS Phosphate Mine in Hamilton County used average of 276 million gallons per month
3. Lake City in Columbia County used average of 107.3 million gallons per month
4. GRU Deerhaven Plant in Alachua County used average of 55.8 million gallons per month
5. City of Perry in Taylor County used average of 54.6 million gallons per month
6. City of Alachua used 48.0 million gallons per month.

3 of the 7 biggest users would all be in the same place if biomass plant pumps the proposed groundwater.

Lake Moon Kayak

A visit to my friend living on Swan Lake to kayak under the full moon was a wonderful Saturday evening. Resulting poems I wrote:

Cumulus Aperitif
Rumps down on grass, all stiff and dry,
wine glasses poised, to watch up high.
An appetizer for our paddle:
cloud-show playing, did us addle!
Mouths dropped open, not for sips
but at flashes, strikes and rips.
Light-cracks went down, and some across,
inner rumblings, gods were cross?
Pink in the folds, dust blue up high,
some purple there, oh me oh my!

Moon Eye
Fish, mouth open, laughing cloud,
porpoise tongue, don't speak aloud.
Moon-eye shine! we want to gaze,
upon your shape-change in the haze.

Ripple Haiku
Kayaks on water
Pushing ripples under moon
Bats flit around us

Fasting with Juice

I have engaged in 3-day juice fasts. I definitely felt better and lost my hunger in the 2nd day… I bought a good juicer (Omega 4000) just for this purpose a few years ago. Historic medicine dudes recommended fasting: Hippocrates, Galen and Paracelsus, who declared fasting "the greatest remedy, the physician within." And fasting is more important these days as we are exposed to so many more toxins in food, air, shampoo, toothpaste, and tap water.

I was cleaning out my old stack of New Yorker magazines, and saw an article by Judith Thurman who did a piece on her visit to a fasting spa, We Care. The spa claims you need 2-3 weeks of a fasting regime for the body to get rid of toxins. Daily intake at the spa is lemon-water and herb teas, dietary supplements taken in precise order, gree-vegetable juice, a fibre drink, and vegetable puree.

In addition to the cynical comments she had about the place, she wrote about the physiology of fasting. Blood glucose is burned first within 24 hours. Then glycogen in the liver gets melted down after 2 days. Then your muscle starts to break down. After 3-4 days, the liver converts fatty acids to fuel, a process called ketosis which releases beta-endorphins (woo hoo!). You get disappearance of hunger and waves of elation!

Online I found this info about long water fasts (which aren’t recommended by most people!) http://www.gaianstudies.org/articles4.htm

"In the first 3 days of a fast, the body switches from using glucose (gotten from food) for energy to glycogen. Usually the body uses glycogen from the liver between meals (this is completely exhausted in the first day of fasting). Then the body shifts to ketosis - the use of fatty acids as fuel – for 2 days. It first converts glycerol, available in the body's fat stores, to glucose but this is still insufficient. So it makes the rest that it needs from catabolizing, or breaking down, the amino acids in muscle tissue, using them in the liver for gluconeogenesis, or the making of glucose. "

From the third day onward the rate of the breakdown of fatty acids from adipose or fat tissue continues to increase, hitting its peak on the tenth day. This seven day period, after the body has shifted completely over to ketosis, is where the maximum breakdown of fat tissue occurs. As part of protein conservation, the body also begins seeking out all non-body-protein sources of fuel: nonessential cellular masses such as fibroid tumors and degenerative tissues, bacteria, viruses, or any other compounds in the body that can be used for fuel. "

This is part of the reason that fasting produces the kind of health effects it does. Also, during this period of heightened ketosis the body is in a similar state as the one that occurs during sleep - a rest and detoxification cycle. It begins to focus on the removal of toxins from the body and the healing and regeneration of damaged tissues and organs."

This Juicing site: http://www.healingdaily.com/juicing-for-health/fasting.htm says that during fasting, your body will "autolyze", or self-digest, its most inferior and impure materials and metabolic wastes, including: fat deposits, abcesses, dead and dying cells, bumps and protuberances, damaged tissue, calluses, furuncles (small skin abscesses, or boils), morbid accumulations, growths, and amazingly, various kinds of neoplasms (abnormal growths of tissue, or tumors). During fasting, large amounts of accumulated metabolic wastes and poisons are, during autolysis, very quickly eliminated through the greatly enhanced cleansing capability of all the organs of elimination - liver, kidneys, skin and lungs. Several common symptoms of detoxification seen during this process could be darker urine, the possibility of catarrhal elimination of excess mucus ("rhinorrhea" - a mucous discharge from the nose), continuous discharge through the colon…

Rudolph Ballentine, M.D., Founder and Director of the Center for Holistic Medicine in New York City, does not recommend "water-fasting," which he says "is more correctly termed starvation," adding the following words of warning: "The destruction of starvation, and the cleansing and repair that happen in a well-managed fast, are polar opposites. … Juices can eliminate much of the trauma of fasting." Freshly-squeezed and extracted vegetable and fruit juices contain a wealth of vitamins and organically-complexed minerals.

Three days seems too short, and 3 weeks seems way too long. Maybe 7 days of juicing would make sense. I keep finding information celebrating the benefits of enemas and colonic hydrotherapy as part of the detoxifying regimen…. “Using an enema during a juice fast will flush the lymphatic system attached to the lower colon with water and help remove hardened fecal matter from the intestinal wall, while giving the digestive tract a chance to rest and heal.” I’ll consider it.

Here’s a 21-day fast that consists of an eight day juice fast, three days to come off the fast, and then ten days on a three-quarters raw food diet. http://www.doctoryourself.com/juicefast.html
I’ll consider that too. For now, I think I’ll go for a 4-day juice fast in the next couple weeks. It will make going to the farmer's market pretty fun.

Ozark Reservoir Collapse

The weekend of Father’s day 2010, my sisters and I visited the East Fork of the Black River near Lesterville, in southeastern Missouri. It’s in the heart of the St. Francois Mountains - a small region of 1.4+ billion year old igneous rocks that are home to some of the most unique natural features in MO (Elephant Rock State Park and Johnson’s Shut-ins). These small mountains contain some of the highest points in the state, and “form the core of the Ozarks.” They are the largest of only three igneous rock exposures in Missouri (bright fuchsia on the map!) Source: http://www.rollanet.org/~conorw/cwome/article6&7.htm

Wow, the pretty purple rhyolite that makes the hard-to-erode rocks of Johnson’s Shut-ins are 1.4 billion years old! The St. Francois Mountains are the exposed geologic core of the Ozarks and used to be taller than the Rockies. Here is a map of what is considered the Ozarks. Most of the light blue is in Missouri, the Ozarks extend into northern Arkansas and some in Oklahoma (source: http://www.answers.com/topic/ozark).

Ameren UE built a reservoir on top of Proffit Mountain as a pumped-storage hydroelectricity facility. The method pumps water from a lower elevation reservoir created in the Black River by a dam, to the upper reservoir at a higher elevation during low-electricity-cost off-peak times. During periods of high electrical demand, the stored water is released through turbines to generate electricity that can be sold at the higher prices. The pumping process makes the plant a net consumer of energy overall but is economical because of energy pricing. In the satellite image you can see where the wall broke on the reservoir and went down the west side of the mountain into the valley that was the popular Johnson's Shut-ins state park.

According to Wikipedia, the electic power operation started in 1963. They thought the upper reservoir was built on pure bedrock. A software glitch on Dec 14 2005 caused the pumps to keep pumping water even though the upper reservoir was full so water flowed over the top lip and eroded the soil/rock underlying the wall which collapsed at 5:14am creating a 700 foot wide breach and releasing 1.3 billion gallons of water down the mountainside. A 20-foot-high wall of water, soil, rocks and trees scoured a path down to the bedrock a mile long until it all flooded into the Johson’s Shut-ins. The rocky shut-ins dammed the water which eventually drained through, but the narrowness and strength of the igneous rocks kept all that debris from going further downstream. The superintendent of the park, his wife and three children were swept away when the wall of water obliterated their home. They survived, suffering from injuries and exposure. The children were transported to a hospital in St. Louis and later released. One child was treated for severe burns from heat packs applied by rescue workers as treatment for hypothermia (!).

The dam of the lower reservoir, which by design is able to hold much of the capacity of the upper reservoir, withstood the onslaught of the flood, but the state park was all but destroyed by rocks, trees and water. Larry’s cabin where we stayed is downstream & south of satellite image, below the lower reservoir...silt/clay is still eroding into the water that goes by the cabin making the stream less crystal clear than it used to be.

Ameren UE took responsibility for the breach and spent $40 million on restoration of the park. More than 15,000 truckloads of debris were removed from the park in the year following the disaster, according to Ameren, including 1,748 truckloads of trees, nearly 4,000 loads of rock and almost 8,500 loads of silt. Wow that is a lot of gasoline.

(Source: http://www.columbiamissourian.com/stories/2007/08/18/rebuilding-reservoir/)

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission fined Ameren UE $15M for the breach – the 2nd largest fine in the FERC history (after a fine on Florida Power and Light for a power outage in 2008). Federal regulators approved Ameren’s plan to rebuild the reservoir, and construction began in late 2007. The rebuilt structure is made entirely of roller-compacted concrete, unlike the rock-fill original. In addition to fill-detection instrumentation it incorporates a spillway to handle any overflow and a video system to monitor the water level. The $450 million cost of rebuilding the reservoir was covered mostly by insurance. The utility is prohibited from billing customers to recoup any of the cost. I saw a wall of concrete on top of the mountain when we were driving to the shut-ins to swim, and it felt like a sci-fi movie suddenly.

The scour-path made by the rushing water and boulders has been a boon for geologists who are now able to study an ancient mountain range. A large bed of rhyolite has been uncovered as well as rocks from several other geologic eras… Some rocks 1.4 million yrs old, others 530 million years old.

"We have 900 million years of the Earth’s history right here," said Cheryl Seeger, geologist for the Missouri Department of Natural Resources. DNR owns the bottom portion of the scour path and plans to make it available for the public and create educational programs with it.

Seeger pointed to a series of tiny ridges on a section of harder rock. "These were created by waves from a huge saltwater sea that lapped the shore," she said. "This was a beach about 530 million years ago." The entire St. Francois Mountain range, once higher than the Rocky Mountains, eventually was covered by sea. That was long before the glaciers melted, fish swam in the sea or dinosaurs roamed the Earth, she explained. Almost 1.5 billion years ago, "caldera" volcanoes spewed forth hot gases and materials from under the Earth, creating mountains. Eruptions left holes underground, which eventually caused the mountains to collapse. This pattern continued for centuries. Unlike Hawaiian volcanoes that spew liquid lava, calderas erupt explosively. "Think Mount St. Helens, only huge," Seeger said. "If you think of St. Helens’ " eruption "as the size of an espresso cup, Yellowstone was a 50-gallon bag and ours was a 30-gallon bag." (Source: Monday, October 20, 2008 in the Columbia Tribune - http://www.missouristateparks.net/johnson)

In Uganda...

After 3 weeks there, I observed that in Uganda...

• they don't eat lunch


• they are very patient and don't need to discuss what is about to happen...


• they love African tea (hot milk, ginger, teabag)


• they say 'ehhhh' or 'heyyy' to acknowledge listening or sympathy and 'mmmm' to mean yes or listening


• women wear long skirts


• they have a soft handshake, and gently point to or grasp their right elbow with their left hand
• they wear fabrics with bright interesting attractive patterns!
• women don't squat and never sit on the ground cross-legged
• they ride boda boda bikes to get a cheap lift
• they eat much bananas (matooke)
• they grow casava, beans, bananas, sweet potatoes
• Stoney and Novida are popular softdrinks
• they don't put screens on windows or doors but give out free mosquito nets
• rural folks get water from borehole wells with hand pumps and yellow jerry cans
• they use bicycles to transport matooke, water, firewood and charcoal
• their bikes are all similar heavy metal bikes
• charcoal is made from acacia and sold in towns, while country folk use firewood
• bugandans kneel to elders
• babies have beads around their waists and seldom any pants or diapers
• there are many babies
• they don't use donkeys, mules or horses for transport or farming and few machines, just human muscle for work
• they live out much of their lives in front of their house
• there are certain fruit reserved for children (jack fruit, tamarind, mango?)
• people speak english
• they sweep the dirt with little small hand-made/held brooms
• children love to see mzungu, say the word and giggle and wave
• cows in towns often look healthier than cows in the countryside
• there are lots of cows
• people are uncynical
• people usually have Christian names: Frank, Grace, Evelyn, Andrew, Gilbert, Isaac, Hilda, Moses, Francis, Lawrence, Elizabeth, Daniel
• women put wraps around their heads to keep dust from the road out of their hair
• women wear lesu wraps around their waists to keep their dresses clean
  
• clay content of soils is 39 to 59% so they turn their land into bricks and homes

Go to Windows 7?

I'm staying in on a Friday night investigating Windows 7. Am I sure this is the best idea? Why am I upgrading?
a. I keep hearing how Vista is so buggy
b. My computer runs slowly and hesitates at wierd times
c. None of my Windows or McAffee updates will install!

Here are some PRO pages that say do it:

1. Beta News. Windows 7: Vista without the Crap by Scott M. Fulton, III - he says he could save 6 weeks of time per year with Windows 7 compared to Vista sp2. "Betanews tests on all the major brands of stable and developmental Web browsers, running on the three most recent versions of Windows, installed on the same machine with the same hardware, show that programs tend to run 17% faster on average in Windows 7 RTM than in Windows Vista SP2. That doesn't make Win7 the fastest Windows ever made -- XP Service Pack 3 is faster still, by another 16% over Win7, at least at running Web browsers."

Maybe I should go find an old set of XP disks? they will stop supporting XP in July 2010. Wierder, they wont support Vista whatever version after April 13, 2010!

2. EWeek. 10 Reasons Why you Shouldn't Wait for Windows 7 Service Pack by Don Reisinger - he explains how the first Windows 7 service pack has leaked to the internet and it's not enough to wait for before installing the first release of Windows 7. That is heartening... Also "Vista was also rife with compatibility and security issues just don’t apply to Windows 7." That's good, I want to hear more about better security!

3. PCWorld. The State of Windows 7 Satisfaction by Harry McCracken (Dec 2, 2009)
"The 550+ Windows 7 early adopters who took our survey -- a sizable majority say they're extremely satisfied with the OS and rate it as a clear improvement on both the beloved Windows XP and the widely-panned Windows Vista. Crippling installation problems -- the bane of every upgrader's existence, and always a legitimate reason to postpone switching OSes -- were rare."

I am going to download the Windows 7 Upgrade advisor to make sure everything will still work.

I figured out a way to get free Windows 7 upgrade by being a UF staff... So will have to wait til Monday when they are open to get my new Gator1 and then bring that with my paystub to the bookstore to get my upgrade CD. But Josan says to do a clean install! Now I should research this?

Chua Ka

Not related to La Chua trail here in Alachua county... It is body-centered therapy that combines mental health counseling with massage therapy. "Our life experiences create networks of muscular tension (pain) that we remember as fears. Working the tissues with precise hand and finger positions and a stick called a ka, we transmit energy (Chi) to the bone, removing the tension. When we release physical tension, we release psychic tension" from the Arica school.

Some belief systems say that emotional traumas that caused pain can be stored in the physical body and either cause physical pain, no pain, or lead to disease (Myss 2008). Today during my first session, Paul did my feet. The feet reflect the fear of being oneself. In the calves; fear of action, in the knees; fear of death ('weak in the knees').

I didn't feel much sensation during the gentle massage and point pressure but I experienced some real grief a few hours later. Unusual opening was experienced with strong longing memories of my grandfather who was the most loving person in my childhood. All grasping must-do, be-busy layers were gone to reveal tender low energy. I just needed to lie in that...

Sweat Lodge

"The sweat lodge is one of the gifts that Creator gave to the Blackfeet. Just like our physical body becomes unclean and needs a bath, the body's spirit also needs a cleansing. Everything used in the sweat lodge has to be gathered in a ceremonial manner, the rocks for the fire, the sage for the floor, and the willows that form the frame. The sweat lodge is ideally built along the bank of a river.

"Crawling out of the lodge the sweaty and red with life people, are now rejuvenated. Their spirits and bodies have been cleansed. Time has begun to start a new walk, free from previous negative energies —just like a baby leaving its mother's womb.

"The oval shape of the sweat lodge is like that of a pregnant woman lying on her back, gazing up into the heavens. That is one way to say that the womb of Mother Earth is the sweat lodge. When entering the lodge from the east it is as though you are entering Mother Earth's womb.

illustration from here.

"Once inside, it is dark, but safe. The head lodgeman sits in the west direction and splashes the hot rocks in the center of the lodge with medicine water. After four rounds of singing and being purified from Creator's breath with the steam from the holy rocks, all negative toxins from the person's body and spirit have been taken by Mother Earth. The lodgeman utters, "It is time to leave." Crawling out of the lodge the sweaty and red with life people, are now rejuvenated. Their spirits and bodies have been cleansed. Time has begun to start a new walk, free from previous negative energies —just like a baby leaving its mother's womb." from trailtribes.org

Our sweat lodge was made of bamboo branches tethered together with strips of old corn sacks. That was covered with holey blankets and old hotel bedspreads from thrift stores and sleeping bags probably left behind by bygone hostelers. The little lodge was nestled in the saw palmetto bushes and a small altar of a circle of stones in a dirt ledge was near the entrance. Jess and I got tasked to clean that up and decorate or prepare it in whatever way. I picked up all the acorns, cleaned them and put them in a little pile there. Then tore saw palmetto leaves and stuck them in the sand at the front and bent them down across the middle of the sand. We placed circlesof dead grass on the remaining exposed sand.

Each person chose a rock from those laying around and put our intentions on it. One woman, native american heritage, invited me to place my hands on her sandstone from Arizona and to store the memory of the rock so I could remember the coolness of it later. We then placed our rocks on the logs in the fire pit. We added wood and many dead palmetto leaves. Here is the fire pile about to burn with all of our rocks inside:

We lit the fire and watched. Our rocks were in there. We gathered in a circle and shared our thoughts and sweat lodge questions in turn. Expectations were explained and we dispersed to hydrate and prepare. On our return, a few of us spent 20 min doing yoga stretches in the ante-circle that preceded the main fire pit. MikeJoe and Chuck were feeding the fire with the very big pile of firewood.

I re-raked the circle. First an arc toward the middle, then 4 more concentric arc raked clean of leaves and yoga posture divots. Our fellow sweaters were arriving. Some in shorts, some in towels. Before entering, we each were smudged. Mike Joe smudged Chuck who would be tending the fire and delivering rocks to the sweat lodge. Using a hawk tail to waft the burning sage that was on a clam or large mussel shell. Down the front slowly back and forth, wafting the tail toward the smudgee, down each leg and under each foot. On the other side too. Coming back up the second side, the smudger *puff* blows at the person's neck. Then big hug "namaste." Chuck then smudged Mike Joe who then undressed and went into the lodge. Then we filed forward one at a time to be smudged by Chuck. I was glad it was him. He's one of those people you can instantly love.

We all were in there, 10 women and 3 men. Our first rock came in on the pitchfork glowing red. Little live red sparks of metal filings burning bright for 2 seconds. Welcome grandmother. After 4 rocks or so, the blankets closed the door and we had total darkness. Mike Joe facilitated our sweat. Four rounds of 30-40 minues. 3 or 4 left after the second round, and 3 more after the third. I left in the middle of the 4th with Mike Joe and others leaving 4 or 5 inside.

Round 1 - The East. Direction from which we entered the lodge. A song, then a round of each of our personal intentions. Emotions poured out and traveled among the circle. we were back in the womb of mother earth, reconnecting with the our inner children, feeling the fears and griefs and desires and love. In the blackness we were free to say it out loud and cry. I was amazed by all this trust.

Round 2 - The West. More songs, then a round of each person's reason for thankfulness. More emotions pored out, and the one who was thankful for his newfound grief got us all going grieving with him. The emotion traveled in the circle to each of us.

Round 3 - The South. songs and hollers and whoops and a round of each person's object of nature they were thankful for. Then a round of laughing. A few spontaneous spiritual comments.

Round 4 - The North. my teeth got hot and I couldn't breath without coughing. no rounds of anything, just a round of laughing. That was hard to do. A few of us asked to come out before it ended.

My heart was beating so hard but my breathing was normal and I was relaxed. Wierd. I felt open and clean. Relieved to visit my fears, hopes and loves - and to express them to strangers. But not strangers anymore. Several spoke of our new status as family. The rock-lady's mom said souls travel in blocks, and all of us were traveling together.

I jumped in the lake! It was definitely below 70 F. I aimed to swim to the platform, but halfway there thought better and turned around. My feet were pained from the cold. I got back out and lay supine on the grass. I was happy and grateful and worry-free.

Dark clouds were rolling in. Hollie and I really wanted to hug Leo. We found him at the fire dressed for the rain like us. We could embrace him and talk of his success to find and express his inner child and to have shed some layers that were over his grief. All of us shed stuff that day and felt open hearts.


some sweat lodge info: http://www.barefootsworld.net/sweatlodge.html

The Buganda Kabaka

The Baganda make up largest tribe in Uganda (map on right). The Bonyoro tribe is their biggest rival (map on left).

"At its founding, the Kingdom of Buganda had only a small territory consisting of the counties of Busiro, Busujju, Kyaddondo and Mawokota; as well as small portions of Ssingo and Bulemeezi counties. Most of the surrounding territory was the dominion of the kings of Bunyoro. There was considerable rivalry between Bunyoro and Buganda, and constant fighting over territory. Gradually, Buganda was able to expand its territory at the expense of Bunyoro until it grew to the twenty counties that constituted Buganda at its pinnacle. The islands of Ssese [in Lake Victoria] were autonomous within Buganda right from its founding, being reserved as the islands of the gods. They were not directly governed by the kings of Buganda until after the 1900 agreement." Quoted from this site that has the list of Buganda counties, the chiefs and how acquired the counties.

The Baganda honored a king, the Kabaka. The last Kabaka was Mutesa II. His full name was Major General Sir Edward Frederick William David Walugembe Mutebi Luwangula Mutesa II aka "King Freddie." He died in 1969 in exile in London from alchohol poisoning, unable to return to his homeland where Obote was ruler.

Mutesa II became the King of Buganda in 1939 upon the death of his father. He attended Magdalene College in Cambridge England where he joined an officer training corps and was commissioned as a captain in the Grenadier Guards. At that time, Buganda was part of the British protectorate of Uganda.

In the early 50s the Brits wanted to unite their colonies (Uganda, Kenya and Tanganyika) into a federation but people feared they would come under the control of Kenya's white settler community, as had happened in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). The Baganda had some limited autonomy under British rule so were particularly opposed. Mutesa confronted the British Governor, saying "no way!" The latter exiled the former in 1953, creating massive protest among the Baganda which pressured Brits to let him return in 1955. After a settlement was reached, he became constitutional monarch and gave the Baganda the right to elect representatives to the kingdom's parliament, the Lukiiko. Mutesa's standing up to the Brits sure made him popular!

Mutesa II's monarchist party was called the Kabaka Yekka party and was now quite powerful. Milton Obote was leader of the Uganda People's Congress and created a coalition with the Kabaka Yekka. In 1962 Uganda became independent from Britain under the leadership of Milton Obote. Through parliamentary elections, Obote became Prime minister and Mutesa II became the first president.

The coalition between Mutesa and Obote's parties collapsed in 1964 when two counties from Buganda were transferred to Bunyoro. Things got even worse, so in 1966 Obote sent the Kabaka into exile (a dingy little London flat) and declared himself president.

Mutesa II wrote an autobiography in London called "The Desecration of my Kingdom." I bet it is a very sad book. The Buganda people loved their king very much.

Idi Amin was ruler after Obote and he arranged for Mutesa II's body to be returned to Uganda two years after his death to have a state funeral in order to win favor with the Baganda people in preparation for the next election. I think it worked.

Kabaka kings are still crowned in Buganda, in a place just 20 minutes from Kampala called Naggalabi Buddo. Oh boy, it's now a tourist spot - costs $2 to get a look. But apparently there was an interegnum, where they had no king between Mutessa II and his eldest son Muwendi Mutebi II being crowned in 1993.