stevia

We are powerfull beyond our imagination. To me this is just an other example they humans are truly capable of great things. If we only chose to do so. We have a choice. We found out that the hight amounts of sugar that we consume are harmless to our health. That was a great insight! There is a plant of which the "extracts, steviol glycosides, having up to 300 times the sweetness of sugar without any calories". We found a great solution to a severe problem.

Tell me why do we have to expose this great solution to endless scientific scrutiny while we in the meanwhile use artificial sweeteners that are not scientifically proven to be safe?! It is a matter of choice. Is it again the economic interests of a few and a 'blessed herd of scientists' that restrain us from growing to our fullest potential?

http://www.eustas.org/

ylläs

I managed to get away from work for a few days. Inari Ylläsjärvi from Ylläsjärvi (her very own father was born in a cabin in the wilderness and named after the lake) took us on a three-day trip in Finnish Lapland. That was pretty cool of course. The night train alone was already awsome. Reminded me of that first trip up north to Umeå. Those overwelming stretches of forest that pass by, on and on. There was a shower on the train which brought about an interesting new experience. : )

vesihiisi

A new record! The northern-most swimming pool I visited so far! In Rovaniemi to be precise. It was nice and cozy with all the good stuff: diving tower, diving boards, jacuzzi, sauna. They even had a water slide. Perfect swimming pool to have next door. But Vandkulturhuset in Copenhagen is still on top. ...of course. Will be hard for any swimming pool to beat a 100-meter circular salt water pool and monkeyhouse diving pool.... Too bad for all the suckers that build less-cool swimming pools. Suckurzzzzzz!!! : P

carl philip

Prince Carl Philip of Sweden is going to study forestry at SLU. Wonderful.

mushroom course

Took part in this years mushroom course again. Hoped to rehearse the very few I remember from last year, but I only got more confused. They all look the same to me. :-) I still think they're weird, mushrooms. They belong to some other world or something. Besides, it's a weird idea that you can actually die eating certain bastards....


Anyway: Mushroom-picking rocks!

plan b 3.0

Read some interesting stuff in today's newspaper. About Lester Brown and Rajendra Pachauri.

Lester Brown wrote about how we can 'save civilization'. It is basically a handbook, it sums up concrete measures that we (humanity) right now can start using. For example, we can save up to 25% of our electricity consumption by replacing the light bulbs in our homes with energy-saving ones. (Not that hard!) The book comprizes four goals: stabalizing the climate, stop population growth, eliminate poverty, and repare the worlds damaged ecosystem. If we fail to meet one of the goals we fail to meet the others as well. The result: ECONOMIC chaos.

What I found striking was that the cost of implementing this plan would be 1/6 of the worldwide military expenditure.... Saving the world for an amount of money 1/6 of the money we spend on weapons, fighting wars, killing each other, . . . Almost cynical....

http://www.earth-policy.org/

Mr. Pachauri suggests us all to eat less meat one measure to stop climate change. Nothing new of course, we all knew that already, right?! Right?! The thing is that Mr. Pachauri is chairman of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Maybe we'll have to start taking these things serious soon.

tusby

Arvid was in the exchange-student committee of SLU. He has been a trainee at Stora Enso here in Finland for six weeks. On Sunday he joined us to Tuusula / Tusby. We checked some painter dudes house (which was a pretty impressive, huge bastard of a log house), walked around a bit along the lake and had coffee at some Lotta Svärd driven café. Swastikas all over the place... (Guess Herr Adolph stole it from the Lottas, so at the time of the Winterwar swastikas still were pretty pc.) Jummie örfilar (cinnamon buns)!