Stupidfool.org

"Why Bother?"

Michael Pollan poses a question that I'd assume a lot of people have about how to fight climate change on an individual basis--"Why bother?". For my part, I was (again) inspired by the thought of planting a garden:

But there are sweeter reasons to plant that garden, to bother. At least in this one corner of your yard and life, you will have begun to heal the split between what you think and what you do, to commingle your identities as consumer and producer and citizen. Chances are, your garden will re-engage you with your neighbors, for you will have produce to give away and the need to borrow their tools. You will have reduced the power of the cheap-energy mind by personally overcoming its most debilitating weakness: its helplessness and the fact that it can’t do much of anything that doesn’t involve division or subtraction.

Now, to actually do it.

David Chang in the New Yorker

The profile of David Chang in the latest New Yorker (not online, sadly) is brilliant & scary all at once--I wonder if Chang is as manically miserable as the profile makes him out to be? He's certainly an incredible chef; our meal at Ssäm Bar last year was one of the more memorable eating experiences I've had.

The article's filled with great quotes, but here's one of my favorites:

"I'm so sick and tired of how awesome it is to work at Google or fucking Apple or one of those tech companies," he says. "Why can't it be awesome to work for a food company? Why can't we create an environment where people are trying to push each other to do great things, and we're not trying to steal from anybody, we're trying to be good to our farmers and run an honorable business, if there is such a thing anymore?"