Appalachian Mountain Dreams

Even over here in Texas the word is getting out and people are noticing the policies of the Bush gang in Washington. Mountaintop Removal Mining has to be stopped and it will take the efforts of all of us to do it. I have made the point to switch my electric supplier to a company that only supplies green power…No

Today’s email brought the Watauga Farmers’ Market News for tomorrow…Wish I were on the mountain, it looks like Labor Day will call for corn roasting on the grill. Here is the news…. This Saturday, professional cooking instructor Sheri Castle http://www.sheri-inc.com/ will be at Watauga County Farmers’ Market to demonstrate recipes using foods available that day from market vendors. Sheri will

I wish I was. While I can’t make it for tomorrows Farmers Market, if you are in the Watauga County area in the morning, check it out. Here the teaser for this week… Shoppers at Watauga County Farmers’ Market will find many good things not available in stores. Katinka Day will have some great tasting but impossible to ship heirloom

It’s not straight from the VP’s mouth, but it’s straight from his policy book. Energy companies rule and all you folks living in the neighborhood can “just go f— yourselves” to quote on Administration Official. The one thing that has been consistent about the Bush Presidency is that never have so many environmental laws been gutted, overwritten, or just plain

One of the things I miss now that I’ve returned from my virtual Valle Crucis vacation was spending time at the Watauga County Farmers’ Market. The virtual meals I ate on this summer’s trip were delightful if only because of the ingredients supplied at the Market (OK, in all honesty, every meal eaten with a view from the mountain is

I ran into a link to this site over at Hillbilly Savants…Go check them out. Maybe they can keep the North Carolina Mountain Dream alive until I get there. Land for Tomorrow is a statewide partnership of conservationists, farmers, business leaders, local governments, health professionals, and community groups urging the General Assembly to provide $1 billion over five years to

It’s been a while since Fred First came up with this idea…contest? So I thought I’d throw out another mention just to see if I could push it about a bit… It would be neat for contributors from all over the country to offer their images to an aggregate gallery called Unplanted Gardens: America’s Roadside Bloomery, I thought. And here

Todd, North Carolina is one of the few places I haven’t managed to trek through in my western North Carolina mountain stomping grounds to be. I read about Todd before our first trip and it’s been on the short list of places to visit ever since. But for some reason, we just haven’t made the trip yet. A link on

Yesterday I began reading “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle” by Barbara Kingsolver. It is seldom that I am captured on the preface by the writing style of an author the way this book captured me… We wanted to live in a place that could feed us: where rain falls, crops grow, and drinking water bubbles right up from the ground. That is

Have you ever watched a Bluejay eat an acorn? Around my home in Texas we have Bluejays year round. Actually, we have more Bluejays in winter than in summer but that’s neither here nor there. The Bluejays in my yard tend to eat acorns they find on the ground. Watching them find an acorn to try is fun but the