Chris Hardie's Weblog

The Story of Stuff - "From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view. The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns."
The Official Blog of [...]

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Are you brave enough to say no to a high-stress holiday? "The problem with Christmas is not the batteries. The problem isn't even really the stuff. The problem with Christmas is that no one much likes it anymore."
Richmond News Review podcast episode #23: Debate bid followup, buying local, media coverage gaps from last weekend.
And don't [...]

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I've generally been content not having a physical phone line at home and using my cell phone instead. I'm not much of a phone person anyway, my back yard looked a lot nicer when Verizon cut down the unsightly cable, and it's certainly a cost savings. But sometimes, I still long to have [...]

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Recently, the Summersault staff was eating together at the Golden Corral here in Richmond. They were out of the feed buckets that you just strap onto your head and tilt up, so we ended up having a conversation. We noted that they have pine nuts on their all-you-can-eat salad bar in large quantities.
Pine [...]

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I thoroughly enjoyed this post by Dave Pollard: Need Less.
The essence of radical simplicity, of the gift/generosity economy, of natural community, and of natural entrepreneurship, I think, is needing less. Needing less makes us, as individuals, members of enterprises, communities and societies, more self-sufficient, and more resilient, and allows us to give more with [...]

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When I grow up, I want to get a job (or an internship, or just a stint in the mail room) with Corporate Accountability International, the folks who are behind the recent announcement by PepsiCo that they will label their Aquafina bottled water for what it is - tap water that's been filtered a few [...]

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Presenting: another epic saga of wireless phone company incompetence...bear with me.
I'd had my Sprint cell phone and plan since 2001 - six years of relatively problem free operation (minor billing annoyances aside). And they recognized that I was a loyal customer who always paid my bill on time - in recent years they regularly [...]

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I called the sales team at Linksys today to ask for help in picking which one of their products Summersault wanted to purchase. I saw this notice on their "contact us" web page:
Due to a major earthquake in the South-Pacific area, telephone, internet circuits, and services from the United States have interrupted our call [...]

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This is an ad for a really great Frontline episode called "The Persauders" - a thoughtful and thorough journalistic look at the world of advertising and how it affects us at all levels. It covered a wide variety of perspectives, from advertising executives to media experts to sociologists to counter-cultural ad-busters. Quote from [...]

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I opened up today's Sunday newspaper bundle to find a brown paper grocery bag from Menards that said "Merry Christmas! 15% OFF ANYTHING YOU CAN FIT INSIDE THIS BAG!" The fine print - inscribed on both sides of the bag, mind you - was my favorite:
All merchandise must fit inside the bag, all [...]

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