…just as I popped a couple of slices of bread in the toaster. Neighbors out, neighborhood out, much of town out, apparently. But, about an hour later, as I was thinking of Manitoulin hydro, and then of the cold snap in Texas, my toast resumed toasting. Interesting to note that even without electricity we always have heat in the house; our little gas-fired fake wood stove in the breezeway, though controlled by a thermostat, uses only micro-volts generated by a thermocouple, and thus functions whatever the state of the grid.

And then there are the “Tree Posts” I do every Sunday for members of the Starin Park Arboretum Committee. So far, twenty-eight of them. Thinking it might be worthwhile to keep track, I’ve uploaded them all to the IntoNaturalWorld website, under the “Ecological Empathy” tab (down a ways).