You are what you... wear?

I briefly went shopping over Christmas break. Along with getting slightly overwhelmed by the selection process, the amount of choice, and parting with money only recently re-earned, I found myself looking at the labels of almost every garment I tried on. In the past, I often looked to see where my clothes were made after I had purchased them or worn them half a dozen times. This time, I thought of the Bangladeshis and Cambodians and Chinese and Nepalese that made the clothes I tried on. I don't think my tag-checking directly affected my purchases, though. I had little time and money to waste on my already faintly tedious decision-making process. But I am wondering if I should change that...

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I think we used to hear the slogan "Buy made in America" a lot more than we do these days. Maybe that's because it's increasingly more difficult to do so. I think in general Americans (and British from what I can tell) agree that it's good to buy products made in their own countries. They might also agree that the quality of the goods is probably higher. But I remember listening to a man rant about Chinese-made shoes a few years ago and feeling like his tirade bordered on racial discrimination. Josh and I were both present and both left feeling a bit uncomfortable. He was more upset about quality than anything else, but maybe there's more to it. Josh also had people come to him when he worked at EMS asking what they had that wasn't made in China. Apparently, this is more wide-spread than I thought. With all the Chinese product recalls in the USA lately, perhaps I shouldn't be surprised.

There seems to be a new-ish buy local food craze, but what about clothing? Can anyone afford to fill their wardrobe with only American-made clothes? Should we want to? What about the energy it takes to ship all that material from country to country and then to ship those shirts and socks and blue jeans to the other side of the world? What about giving developing countries a much-needed source of income? Or are we just encouraging sweatshops in far-off lands?

On our trip, we encountered huge clothing centers in Phnom Penh, Dhaka, and Kathmandu. They would sell clothes with familiar labels like Gap, H&M, Levis... We had neither time nor money to shop in Cambodia or Bangladesh, but I did pick up two light-weight cotton replacement shirts in Nepal. I think they have Aeropostale labels in them, but obviously they never made it to the actual shops.

Last night, Josh and I listened to a podcast of This American Life that included a segment about the Cambodian garment industry. During the Clinton era, Cambodia was given garment trade privileges in exchange for decent working conditions. The result was a boom in the Cambodian garment industry (explaining the huge clothing centers we encountered), along with 8 hour work days, fresh water, nursing mother breaks, etc. However, with the end of the prioritized agreement came increased pressure to succumb to typical developing nation working conditions in an effort to compete for business. I find myself caring more about the Cambodian plight because I've been there, but I suppose there are dozens of other countries struggling with similar issues. I did find it interesting that Cambodia is losing business to Vietnam and Thailand where the clothing can be made cheaper due to worse working conditions, despite their slightly better-off economies. Also interesting: the Cambodian garment industry representatives are perhaps more familiar with the current presidential candidates than I am simply because the lives of thousands of workers depend on trade agreements I've never heard of. Also, if the current limits on Chinese garment imports expire as they are set to do in the next few years, the Cambodian industry will suffer, losing huge percentages of the trade.

What am I trying to say? I guess I am just asking questions. How can I, as a rich American, seek out cheap clothing knowing what conditions the person who sewed it might be working under? How can I, as the sole earner for a husband who pays very high international tuition, not seek out cheap clothing? And do my clothing choices really make a difference? Should I avoid a "made in China" label? Can I shun an entire country's products over another's? How do I know what to look for anyway?

Unfortunately, I think it comes down to money. And maybe taste. Both Josh and I like the idea of eating more local food, but money has been tight since we spent it all on traveling, and local can mean more money (yes, I know, not always. But it rarely seems cheaper). We also have talked about how we wouldn't be willing to give up things like chocolate or coffee if we couldn't find them locally grown/made. I think the same is true for clothing. I don't know that I have the time and money to investigate all my purchases, and I don't know if I'd find items to suit my tastes if I went only local. Also, I like knowing that I may be supporting an entire Cambodian family by giving work to a young woman who pays her brother's school tuition (another topic...). I suppose one thing I can do is frequent stores and labels who make an effort to buy garments from reputable factories with decent working conditions (although I can't help but point out that even a fairly grown banana takes an awfully lot of petrol to get to your grocery store- what about a cambodian shirt?). Obviously, cottage industries and those small shops are a great (and expensive) way to support growing economies. I guess it's like fair trade for clothing.

(what a confusing world.)

So. Anyone have any recommendations? Shops? Websites? Thoughts?

Recent Musings (from December)

Meg: We’ve been in Durham a few months now. That’s a long time. Let’s go somewhere.
Josh: Where?
Meg: Somewhere warm. Laos was nice.
Josh: We can’t afford to fly to Laos right now.
Meg: Right. What can we afford?
Josh: Ryan Air has cheap flights from the UK. They even fly from Newcastle, although only to four places from there.
Meg: Alright, what’s the cheapest?
Josh: Barcelona, Spain.
Meg: Spain is warm. Perfect. Plus I’m an architect, and architects are supposed to see Barcelona.
Josh: I have a full month off from school in April, but we can't spend a month in just one city.
Meg: Oh yeah. And we can’t spend a whole month in one country. That would go against Wall-stra principles; we’d see too much and maybe start to understand the culture or something.
Josh: Well let’s keep moving then. We could go around the Mediterranean.
Meg: That sounds like great fun. Except I don’t think we can make it in one month.
Josh: True. Let’s just do the part that won’t make our mothers worry then. We can stop in Greece.
Meg: Nice.
Josh: Although I’ve always thought Turkey sounded interesting.
Meg: The Hagia Sophia is in Istanbul. I should probably see that in my architect’s lifetime, too.
Josh: Alright, we drive from Barcelona to Istanbul this April.
Meg: That means we need a car.
Josh: We can’t afford a car. How about a bike?
Meg: Bikes aren’t very safe. But fun. They are fun.
Josh: I suppose it would make our mothers worry.
Meg: Nah, your dad owns a bike and as for my mom, well, she'll live.
Josh: Are you sure this is how the conversation goes? Not caring what other people think? That doesn’t sound like the Megan I know.
Meg: Shhhh. This is a post, keep it moving.
Josh: So we buy a cheap bike in Spain.
Meg: Do you think we’d run into legal issues purchasing as foreigners? And what about getting through borders? Wouldn’t we have some vehicle registration and insurance problems?
Josh: It’s all the EU now. I don’t think it would be a problem.
Meg: Montenegro and Albania are not part of the EU.
Josh: Where are they?
Meg: Somewhere between Croatia and Greece.
Josh: Wait. You’ve been doing research on this already?
Meg: Maybe a little.
Josh: (silence)
Meg: So can we afford this? We’d have to buy a car or bike; a camper van would be ideal. Maybe we take camping stuff back from the USA at Christmas and find a method to attach it to a bike. We’d have food and lodging and entrance fees. Plus petrol. Can we really afford this?
Josh: Probably not.
Meg: Perfect. Let’s do it.

Fairies, revisited

I've gained new insight into the fairy/angel Christmas curiosity on which I posted before Christmas. I was surprised at both the prevalence of tree-topping fairies and the confusion of how these fairies were different from angels. A few weeks ago, I took these photos of "angels" during the after-Christmas sales around here. Who knew angels, as the packages are labeled, wore pink, carried wands, and had little sparkly wings? (Sorry, Beth, I didn't find any left-over fairy Christmas tree-toppers besides the one below and I didn't know if pink would go with your decor...)

Funny Photo Friday

Here's one of our drink post-football game a few weeks ago. Isn't that little one cute? I still can't get over that it's acceptable to order a half pint at an English pub (if you are female or over 65...). The English may not find this funny but for foreigners we were greatly amuzed to have a half pint that was the exact same shape as a pint glass.... just smaller.

Matchmaker (or "The Voices in my Head")

I like public transportation, have since NYC, I suppose. Although I often find myself standing on my train these days, I do enjoy the new voice I get to hear each morning. A lovely and pleasant feminine voice informs me in the most delightful English accent that we are approaching Chester-le-Street (the one stop between Durham and Newcastle) and that I should alight carefully. Neither of those items would sound as tempting from an American voice. If her actual self is anything like her voice, she must be appealing. I like her. And I think Howard would like her, too.

Howard is the Metro-North Man...
Howard is the Metro-North Man. For about 19 months I took the Hudson Line Metro-North commuter train (after the NYC subway) to work. As I was generally quite pleased with the trains and the train service, I also tended towards fondness for the announcer. I don't know if I actually learned his name or if I named him myself, although I remember considering on multiple occasions what his name might be (I had a long commute). Howard seems to stick in my head, though, and I really think that Howard and the TransPennine Express voice would get along. Howard had a very nice, low to mid-range masculine voice, pleasant and polite, yet firm. When he said, "The next station is Hastings-on-Hudson," you knew he meant it, and you might even consider getting off if it didn't mean having to leave him. If only these two recorded voices' actual emitters could join forces! Imagine the phone conversations! Like lullabies next to a waterfall, I would think! They might tend towards the overly polite, but that is a risk I think they should be willing to take for the sake of life-long audial bliss.

On the other hand, I do not think that Howard would get along with the English Shop Queue Woman. It seems that many convenience shops like Woolworths or pharmacies and even a number of banks all had the unfortunate occurrence of buying the same recorded voice calling customers to the next available counter. "Cashieh numbeh Foh, please" is spoken by an irritating female voice that continues to rise higher and higher with each hurried syllable triumphing in a drawn out and falling numerical digit and ending with a mid-range "please." It's difficult to explain it in words, but if rhythmic counting works (think back to piano lessons), it's:
1(ca) 2&(shieh) 3(num)&(beh) 4(foah)-5-6 7(please)
(pitch- start high, then up, up, up, up, up-fall-fall-fall, "please")

There is one other voice I am fond of, though she would also not do for Metro-North Man. Those of us at the architecture school at Columbia grew quite familiar with Rhonda, the Avery Hall elevator parrot (I should point out that I don't remember who knew Rhonda was a parrot. It is very likely not wide-spread knowledge). I read somewhere in research for a project that the average person will get impatient at any elevator wait over 11 seconds. Well, Rhonda was slow. Very slow. A lot slower than 11 seconds. Yet for some reason we waited for her to take us down 3 short flights of stairs (I think having something to do with stress and lack of sleep). Rhonda dutifully announced each floor, but I don't recall when she was officially dubbed Rhonda. She also became a parrot, perhaps after a late night of computer modeling. Whatever the reason, the female voice in the elevator that rose with "third floor" and fell with "fourth" and second" became Rhonda the Parrot. As much as I liked her, I don't miss hearing her voice...

Have you ever considered how many pre-recorded voices you hear on any given day?

Weather

Since moving here, we've told a variety of people that it is substantially colder where we grew up than Northern England and often (though not always) get a puzzled look, as if to say, "really?" So just to give any UK readers some context it is presently -6 F in the town where my parents live which works out to -21 C and in Michigan where Meg's folks live it is a high of 12 F, which works out to -11 C. Just for context.

Pardon me... you call this WHAT?

A few weeks ago, our friend Steve posted about a great, map-filled website called Worldmapper. Well, Wordmap isn't quite as visually interesting or far-reaching, but it is fascinating! Wordmap is an interactive mapping of various word usages in spoken English made as part of BBC's Voices project. Also part of the project is a large compilation of voice recordings from around the country. From the thousands of audio clips, you can choose which ones to listen to based on speaker, location, topic...

It's great fun to explore, especially if you've been trying to put your finger on what makes that Geordie accent so Geordie (and amusing to see how many of the words show up red only in the Newcastle area)! Some English we've met complain that Americans always use the same "posh" accent when trying to imitate British English. So here's your chance- listen, copy, and then impress your friends with your Yorkshire Tyke or Liverpool Scouse!

Funny Photo Friday

This is the first in what shall, hopefully, be an ongoing series. We'll see how long we'll be able to maintain this, but it should be fun.

This photo is from our time back in Colorado. Please note that we have an SUV being towed by a small tow truck, being towed by a flat bed tow truck down a windy mountain pass. What fun!

Last Night

In his sleep Josh said, as clear as day, "Come along Santa Clause!"

If only he could remember what he was dreaming about.

On Cooking:

This post originally began just to tell people (ok my mom really) about the foods I've started to make from scratch as of late. But thinking about food got me thinking about a growing interest I've had in local food and how I've found spending 9 months living and eating abroad. Consequently, I think this post rambles more than it should and is longer than it should be, but I want to post it really just to, once again, tell my mom about what foods I've been making from scratch. So if the rest of you can bear with me here that would be great.

I never really contemplated my eating patterns until rather recently but between reading some books, spending time abroad, and starting to cook more for myself, my perception of food has been changing as of late. What has happened is this, when we first got here, I found things that I wanted to eat but couldn't find or couldn't find at a price I wanted to pay (OK, so it was really just tortillas), so I started to make them from scratch. And then I started to make other things from scratch. And then I found I enjoyed this whole making-things-from-scratch business. I've known for a while now that I enjoyed cooking, but I can't say that I ever made that much stuff, and we still relied heavily on prepackaged foods for a decent amount of daily caloric intake. However since being here and wanting things that I had to make if I wanted to eat them (at least on our budget), I've found that many things are suddenly more accessible, easier, and better than I had originally thought.

How many people can own cookie cutters in the shape of the state they are from? Not many me thinks...

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Anyway this post isn't an attempt to amaze anyone with my razzle dazzle in the kitchen (which in our case is really just an oversized closet at present), but simply to say, I'm surprised at how much fun I've had cooking things from base ingredients and how freeing I've found it. For example, before moving to the UK, the only time I used flour was in making cookies, and a 3 lb. bag of the white stuff lasted most of a year. Now we go through three pounds of it in about a month and a half. I've also been getting more and more interested in food... local food, real food (as it often gets called, in contrast to processed food), which I didn't ever think I'd get interested in. Maybe I've been listening to and reading Barbara Kingsolver a bit too much as of late. But despite these growing interests, I (we) feel limited based on space and social location. Our budget is rather tight, we are only here for about six more months, and it just seems mildly silly to get involved in local food (at least the joining a co-op version) only to leave the location.

This is the point where I am now supposed to either exposit on the glories of food (of which there are many) or proclaim a specific approach to food (only eat local! Only eat processed! Only eat Vegan, the way God intended!), but I don't really want to do that. I think I really just wanted to say that I miss the food of home, and I miss having access to things that I could find in the states. There are some good foods over here that I can't find at home (the Cheddar part of the cheese section is MASSIVE), but I miss having a choice of salsas... rather than just one (way overpriced) option or being able to buy ice cream that tastes right or Hersey's chocolate syrup. And I wanted to tell someone about what I've started to cook since coming here. Ok, so this last part is really to try and impress my Mom and show her that those times she showed me how to cook some things before I went off to college weren't wasted.

Anyway, as of late I've been making...

- Chapati: I love chapati, didn't know what they were till Bangladesh... but I love them and have enjoyed making them as of late. Who knew flour and water could taste so good. I think I started making these because Naan costs money, but water is free and flour is 34p for a lb. So why not?

- Flour Tortillas, which I like more than any store tortillas I've ever bought. I'm supposed to use "shortening" in the recepie I have... but I couldn't find it and so I use lard (same stuff right?) and Megan swears THAT is reason why they taste so good... I think it's my culinary genius. But they do taste abnormally good... too good to really be healthy.

- Corned beef with diced potatoes: For when I want to start the day with clogged arteries and remember fondly all those small town diners.

- Bagel with egg, cheese, and salsa: This, I think, is a remnant of living in New York. Oddly enough I never had one there, but I've grown to like them here.

- Pumpkin Cheesecake: This is mostly because of Thanksgiving but still...

- Pizza Sauce: We eventually found some but for the first bit I was reducing tomato puree and adding some spices...

- Scones: Didn't know I liked these so much until the first batch came out of the oven, but now I know I do. Also thanks to Beth we can make Michigan shaped scones! Which, while this doesn't change the taste of them, is kind of fun.

- Beer: This is forth coming. We are currently collecting enough bottles to put the stuff in... and a kiddy pool to mix it in. (Thanks, Meg, good Christmas gift)

P.S. This isn't meant to be a negative post about the lack of food choices here (which are abounding) but I think its more about just me thinking about cooking and food. Also, in case anyone needs to know, there is already a sizeable selection of food that I will desperately miss when we leave, digestives and nutella, the cheddar section at the grocer, and cadbury just to name a few.

Wanderers

So there were the little snowballs that fell the other morning and the milk bottles delivered to our door, the giant paper clips and the deciphering of double versus single cream... but here is one more Unexpected England thing: gypsies.

About a month ago, I was carefully inspecting an aerial photograph of a large master plan site I am working on digitally modeling at work when I spotted an area that I couldn't figure out. It looked like a parking lot but full of large items. Maybe a lumber yard? A market? Or a... ummm... what is that? I asked a coworker, and he said it was an established travelers' site. It's even officially listed as such on the city council planning proposals map. Travelers! Gypsies! Those still exist? Perhaps this is culturally insensitive of me, but I thought that most gypsies/travelers had settled down permanently or lived in Romania. Is "gypsies" even a PC term? These are things that Americans just don't tend to know.

A week after that, Josh walked to a nearby village to collect some lamps we'd found through the ever-amazing Free-cycle website and encountered a grassy area surrounded by boulders. The friendly lamp-giver told him that was a popular Traveler site. The boulders were to prevent driving onto the lawn because once settled it was legally difficult to remove the travelers.

Like that milk bottles post a few months ago, who knew??

Strongly Bitter like English Noble People

So when we were home for Christmas I was rummaging though the backpack I took to Asia when I ran across something that we thought was funny at the time and still feels funny six months later. Scrawled on the classified section of the Myanmar Times are the coffee descriptions from Black Canyon Coffee (the only chain restaurant we found in Myanmar). I can still vividly remember sitting in an air conditioned coffee shop on plush chairs and drinking coffee drinks that cost more that I paid for all of my food from the day before. But it was a humid and incredibly sticky day, so it was a great luxury to spend three hours sitting in Black Canyon laughing at the descriptions and milking our drinks for all they were worth. With that as background, enjoy.

Black Canyon Iced Coffee:
Milk mixed with that old "Black Devil" poured into glasses... This is a two-straw drink, something to be shared with your sweet heart or with your favorite group of yuppies.

Mexican Iced Coffee:
Nutty soft taste, moisten, refresh, return to flourishing passing from cool ice, Kahlua liqueur inside, cowboy have energy, surface with mild. An excellent after-dinner habit is to take Mexican iced coffee with a liqueur but also equally good at other times of the day to aid digestion.

Black Canyon Coffee:
Black like a devil... fully concentrated, ardent like "Black Canyon" type, talking in Latin after a sip.

Hot Espresso Coffee with Honey:
The coffee of nobility, special formula for good people, strongly bitter like English noble people but sweet like "honey" a little bit like charming Thai ladies from Northern Thailand."

Ice Cream:
Improved, cheaper refrigeration techniques in the16th century brought ice cream to the masses, probably the most important point on the timeline of history until the discover of antibiotics 400 years later.

P.S. Black Canyon has a website if you want to find some more fun descriptions of their drinks.

Two things...

1) I'm starting a new job today and am rather excited and a little nervous...

2) I have a new favorite state law. In Louisiana it is illegal to tie an alligator to a fire hydrant. Good to know that one...

3) Ok I've done a bit more digging and there are tons of these stupid laws, but I'll still call that one my favorite (even though it may not be anymore, ex. in Michigan a wife isn't allowed to get her hair cut without her husband's permission) for the sake of brevity.

My night at the Football Match: By Joshua (Feenstra) Wall

I grew up playing soccer (football for those of you on this side of the pond), always interesting in a country that tends to overlook the sport. This feeling is expressed moreso when you understand my bucolic small town which holds football (at times) next to godliness, not on the Texas level but it is most certainly the preferred sport. Thus growing up my sport was never held in high esteem, so my teamates and I would often talk about wanting to have culturally dominate soccer teams to watch and follow just as our cohorts in other sports did (mind you at the time you couldn't really watch any matches on TV, even most of the world cup wasn't shown in the states), and we would talk, in jest, about coming and watching professional teams play in Europe where the sport was actually esteemed. So before we left to come here, I had mentioned that, if possible, I'd really like to go see a Premier League match, knowing that tickets are hard to get but thinking that it would be fun to go and experience. Not too long ago that finally happened, thanks to a Christmas present from my folks and some digging on the part of my wife.
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Right after getting back to the UK, we went to see Newcastle United and Manchester City play at Newcastle. I'm not really sure what my expectations were before going to the game but I was definately excited to go. It was my second professional sporting event ever. We went to a Yankee's game once in New York, and I have to say that of the two this match was much more entertaining, even while I'm sure it wasn't nearly as good as it could have been. What I found most interesting was the amount of crowd participation that existed. There were songs, cheers, chants, applause, and precisely directed verbal abuse, all of which added some sizable flavour to the event. The visiting crowd, bordered entirely by stadium staff (safety??), was incredibly loud for such a small group, singing away and cheering.

I had heard about this atmosphere, and I was actually looking forward to experiencing it, specifically the more organized crowd aspects (for example singing... I found it funny to hear mobs of grown men singing... that doesn't really happen back home and after experiencing it here, well, that's too bad) given America's tendency towards more individualized insults and attacks (Pistons and Pacers game a few years back for example). This isn't to say soccer doesn't have it's issues, but it seems more individual than communal in the States (say organized mobs vs. groups of individual thugs).

A massive flag that is passed through part of the stands right before the match starts

The match itself was quite fun, and it was a good game until about the 65th minute, when Newcastle fell apart. But up until then it was a fun game to watch and a great experience over all. I have to say I wanted to go partially because I felt obligated to, seeing as how I grew up playing the sport, but I really enjoyed myself! Megan also had a great time, and it was enough fun that we decided we'd like to go again if we can get our hands on some tickets. For those not familiar with the Premier League games, most tickets are held by season pass holders. Newcastle isn't entirely pre-sold (a 53,000 person stadium), though it's close. However the 73,000-seat Arsenal stadium, near our friends Emma and Gerard's place, is entirely sold out just to season ticket holders! By way of comparison Yankee stadium holds 57,000 and the Silverdome holds 80,000. I find that idea simply amazing, that teams with large stadiums have such a strong set of followers that tickets, in general, are so hard to come by.

Let me conclude with some interesting, chuckle-worthy phrases overheard as we sat in the stands, though it helps if you can picture them being said in a 'geordie' accent. Picture a dirty English/Scotch dialect, the kind that only sounds like English after a pint or two. (It is really that thick. I'll walk behind people on the street and think "That's not really English, is it?" Someone even made a website about it.) Also note that Manchester City won the match, so our Newcastle-ite neighbors had plenty to say about that...

Smash 'is legs!
Such Shite!
Dat cheeky buggeh...
Git down da line lam!
They've lust ther fluff!

And they sang the tune "Be kind to your fair feathered friends..." (or at least that's what we'd call it in the states) to the words "Newcastle, Newcastle, Newcast-le, Newcastle, Newcastle,Newcastle-e... " getting faster and louder and faster and louder...

The match didn't go well as you can tell, but it was great fun to be surrounded by such colourful phrases. What fun.

And of course someone else had to tag along in Megan's purse to the match...

My hair (and a few other things)

Alright, here it is: a long-awaited photo of my short hair! It may not be as short as you expected- I hadn't had a decent hair cut since last year about this time, as a ponytail was quite helpful in both hat-filled Colorado and heat-filled Asia. I did have TEN INCHES cut off, though, as you can see in that photo I posted last week of the sadly shorn ponytail. Those ten inches were a minimum for a Locks of Love donation, which helped push my indecision towards a shorter style. While I am pleased I can wear it both straight and curly, the whole having to actually pay attention to it is a bit annoying! (And, no, Josh did not cut it. Are you kidding?!)

This photo also shows some of the group from our New Year's eve spent with friends Emma and Gerard in London. We had a wonderful evening filled with large amounts of food, alcohol, Uno, Big Ben's dozen chimes (much more appropriate than a crystal ball dropping, wouldn't you say?), and the wee hours of the morning (not helping our jetlag AT ALL). We also spent a few days with Emma and Gerard before our Christmas trip to the States, and, as I don't know where else to put them, I've included a few photos from that below.


We hadn't seen our friends since Nate and Milli's wedding in April, so we had a wonderful time catching up and talking about being "foreign" (we met Gerard and Emma, both English, while they were living in NYC). Along with a long walk about London, we climbed up to the top of St Pauls...... for some great views:

Oh, and just because I don't know where else to put this, here are a few of those 65 cars we saw that had slid off the road the night before our drive from Iowa to Michigan...

A view from our window this morning, μέρος τρία (part three)

It's finally snowed here and it adds a nice feel to Durham (in my opinion). Just a white dusting on top of the stone, brick, and the cathedral. Its quite lovely.

Leaving on a jet plane. And coming back again. And then leaving again...

In 2007, we flew a total of 39,686 miles on 11 different airlines. That is 1.6 times around the earth at the equator or driving from NYC to LA and back eight times. And that doesn’t include the drive from New York to Colorado via Michigan and Iowa, roughly the distance from our place in England to Istanbul, Turkey. Talk about a carbon footprint.

Happy New Year!