Memphis Democrat July 4, 2001

Day to Day Life
Memphis Democrat Column -- Jacob's Travel Logs

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This week we had a changing of the guard, when it comes to interns. Interns Megan and Emily left and Kit's departure is imminent. Our resident Brad returned to his home in CA, too. But three new interns arrived to fill their places. We have a new garden intern, also named Megan. The new construction intern Tom comes to us from Pittsburgh, where he worked in a molecular biology lab studying amoeba flagellates. And we have a new type of intern. Ted is joining us to do an eco-audit of Dancing Rabbit, to determine what our ecological impact is and see if there are areas we'd like to change.

We are having some exciting visitors as well. John and Angelina are visiting from OR to determine if they would like to move to Dancing Rabbit in the spring, after they have their baby. Our ex-member Jacob visited from Detroit and brought a friend, Jessica, to learn some natural building skills. Also, former intern Scott and Laurel returned as residents, to continue to polish their plastering skills.

Don's sister got married in Bloomfield, IA. They were so close, Don's brother and mother couldn't resist the opportunity to come by for a visit. For the wedding reception, Don, Cecil and Tamar played music and Bekka from Sandhill called, as they led contradances for the party.

There was no regular bridge night in Kirksville this week because of a tournament, so Laird from Sandhill and Leon from the bridge group came over to play with Jeffrey and Cecil and keep their skills sharp.

I used to teach self defense for women when I lived in California. With so many interns and visitors here, there was demand for a class. Tamar and Emily learned to assist and we taught a fun class. Now that they are trained to help, I am able to teach other groups in the area.

Cecil has been very busy. He ventured to Judy's Pony Farm in Sperry, with Lu and Anna from Gorin, to the regular Jam Session there. His trombone skills are always well appreciated. He also taught interns and visitors about solar electricity. And he organized a canoe trip for his birthday. Thirty one of us caravanned to Keosoqua and then put in canoes in Selma, IA. We enjoyed an all day float down the Des Moines River. Cecil's birthday happens to also be Canada Day and we couldn't help break out in a few rousing rounds of "Oh Canada," the national anthem.

Plenty of work got done too. Finally all the tin was installed on the roof of Skyhouse. Now the construction crew can work in the shade. Some Sandhillers came over and joined folks here in plastering the east wall of the timberframe. Erik and Rainbow have been hard at work fixing up the biodiesel lab and preparing to make biodiesel.

Biodiesel is a fuel made from a chemical reaction between vegetable oil, methanol and lye. We use it in our unmodified diesel engines. We have been buying it because we haven't been able to produce as much as we need. But we hope that Erik and Rainbow might be able to make enough for us from used vegetable oil from deep fat fryers. We started using biodiesel about four years ago when few folks knew about it. Now the Missouri legislature has taken an interest in it and is working to use it in a blend with petrodiesel in public buses.

We were planning to slip in at the last minute and plant a few more native grass seeds in areas where we're trying to recreate the native prairie ecosystem. But our tractor has not been very cooperative. Erik has been hard at work trying to keep it going smoothly. But just before we were going to try and plants the seeds with a seed drill, the hydraulics quit. Luckily, Curvin Weiler yet again came to our rescue.

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