That is I thing, because the US got so upset about Mariuana that they forbid allkinds of hemp to be grown (I may be wrong,but I read something likethat recently I think).
Which is a bit absurd.Hemp has been in cultivation for more that 10,000 ys, and became very diversified.Fiber hemp contains no thc worth mentioning and hemp grown for mariuana is useless for fiber, even if they are the same specie of plant.
There wd be no reason to fret.
(ps, I do not think that in Italy they are showing much more sense, mind well... in this region a farmer tried to grow Kenaf, a plant that looks vaguely like Hemp, and was nearly arrested! )

when i was in the grain business, a farmer tried to grow it too. he couldn't find a market for it, and went back to rowcrops.

there is talk of growing hemp for ethanol and using the byproduct in papergoods.

The problem with the hemp movement is its activiists. no one talks a bunch of hippies wearing gunny sacks seriously.. some smart capitalist needs to put on his best suit and sell hemp for what it is, an amazinf renewable cash crop.

DEWD!....have you seen my bong?

no , but if you use your pipe, you might get stoned enough to remember where you hid it last time.

*snikker*
N.

and yet they sell it on the market. hemp handbags hemp shoes hemp seeds in parrot food. help oils and hemp in soaps etc.

where is all the hemp coming from?
N.

i think it's legal to grow hemp in some northern states. i think ND is one....but i can't swear to that.

i know when i was growing up, there was hemp growing wild in locations where it was grown during WWII for making rope.

I used to grow it in my basement.. under a 400 watt Metal Halide bulb.. but that wasn't for industrial/textile uses..

This, from Autoblog Green www.autobloggreen.com
a great source for info on a new generation of automobiles.

Nige.

------------------------
Ford's hemp car closer - a greener choice that produces less smoke

Posted Jul 20th 2007 6:22PM by Xavier Navarro

Yes, yes... A car made from hemp? It's a subject we have discussed a few times: hemp-powered cars and car panels made from hemp fiber, and it looks serious: Ford, teaming with the UK's Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and hemp fiber supplier Hemcore are developing a plant matter used to build auto bodies. The DEFRA is investing half a million pounds (roughly a million dollars) in the matter, because the resulting material can be useful in not using petrochemicals and metals to build cars and is biodegradable. The manufacturing process itself is claimed to save energy (that's what I meant with less smoke).

Hemp fibers (grown from specific varieties, not all hemp is the same) have been traditionally used to make baskets, shoe soles and even paper and physical properties make them potentially suitable for lots of duties.

There was a prototype in 1941 with a plastic body made up from plant material. Our colleagues at Autoblog wonder how much hemp can raise the price if this comes to a successful end, thinking about the effects of E85 had on the market, the so-debated tortilla joint effect. But I guess it gives a complete new meaning of "car smoke".

Ohio does not have a deposit law on cans and bottles so any recycling on that part is personal.

Just bought a "can crusher" a bucket and a gama lid. So I can:

Compact my old cans to 1/5 thier size.
Store them without fear of attracting insects.
I don't have to throw out a plastic bag when I go to the recyling center.

Also this is forcing me to keep track of my soda consumption. I'm trying to get my caffine fix from tea lately.

A University of Michigan research team have found a gene, Sox17, required for the maintenance of blood-forming stem cells in fetal mice but not in adult mice. This provides insight into the mechanisms that distinguish fetal blood-forming stem cells from their adult counterparts.

"One of the next questions in our cross hairs is whether Sox17 gets inappropriately activated in certain childhood leukemias—and that's an idea that nobody had in their mind before this work," says Sean Morrison, Ph.D., team leader and assocaite professor of cell and developmental biology.

The investigators looked for genes required to maintain hematopoietic stem cells in fetal mice but not in adult mice. They found that Sox17 was turned on in fetal and neonatal hematopoietic stem cells but not adult hematopoietic stem cells.

To test whether Sox17 was functionally important for fetal and neonatal blood-forming stem cells, the scientists deleted the gene in laboratory mice. This led to the loss of fetal and neonatal but not adult hematopoietic stem cells.

In follow-up experiments, mice were irradiated to destroy their blood-forming stem cells. Then replacement fetal or neonatal blood-forming cells were transplanted into the mice, some containing the Sox17 gene and others lacking it. The mice that received Sox17-bearing cells were able to regenerate their blood systems. Those that received cells lacking the gene could not.

'End of the UK-US affair'
31/07/2007 12:23 - (SA)

London - British Prime Minister Gordon Brown signalled "the end of the affair" with US President George W Bush in their first talks, putting Anglo-US ties on a more formal basis, commentators said on Tuesday.

British newspapers highlighted Brown's lack of personal praise for Bush at a press conference after the Camp David talks on Monday, in stark contrast to the controversially close relationship between his predecessor Tony Blair and the US leader.

They also highlighted Brown's use of the phrase "full and frank" - usually diplomatic code for cool - to describe the meeting.

"The love-in is over. Everything about Gordon Brown's demeanour at Camp David yesterday proclaimed that a new chapter is opening in Britain's relations with the United States," said the mass-market Daily Mail in an editorial.

"Indeed, Brown was businesslike almost to the point of coolness," the conservative daily noted, while headlining its main news piece on Monday's talks the "End of the Affair".

The traditionally left-leaning Daily Mirror also contrasted Brown's stance with Blair's.

Yankee poodle

"Our special relationship with the US has thankfully entered a new phase," it said. "The prime minister is determined to avoid the error of his predecessor Tony Blair."

"Mr Brown's admission of a 'full and frank' conversation and his failure to reciprocate personal praise showered on him by Mr Bush opened a new international era.

"And Britain will be stronger if our leader is not a Yankee poodle," it added, in a reference to widespread criticism that Blair was subservient to Bush.

The conservative Daily Telegraph also used a marital metaphor to underline the new transatlantic relationship.

"We seemed to be witnessing the celebration of an arranged marriage between two grown ups who do not pretend there is much romance in their relationship, but are hard headed enough not to allow any cracks to show in public," it said.

The left-leaning Independent meanwhile said Brown "achieved what he came for. He looked statesmanlike and eloquent (especially next to the inarticulate, and at times irritable, President Bush).

No diplomatic rupture

"At the same time he managed to signal a subtle change of tone in transatlantic relations, although nothing that is going to cause diplomatic rupture," it said.

The Times, under the headline "Brown keeps it formal as two leaders find common challenges", noted that the Anglo-US "special relationship" has been renamed "our single most important bilateral relationship".

And it warned: "What broad agreement the two men were able to point to yesterday .. masks potential divergences that may yet widen.

Yankee Poodle? is that like
"Imperialist Running Dog"?

sad. very sad.


N.

" Who wrote this? ............"Somehow we were sent to invade a nation because it was a direct threat to the American people, or to the world, or harbored terrorists, or was involved in the September 11 attacks, or received weapons-grade uranium from Niger, or had mobile weapons labs, or WMD, or had a need to be liberated, or we needed to establish a democracy, or stop an insurgency, or stop a civil war we created that can’t be called a civil war even though it is. Something like that. Somehow America has become a country that projects everything that it is not and condemns everything that it is. Somehow our elected leaders were subverting international law and humanity by setting up secret prisons around the world, secretly kidnapping people, secretly holding them indefinitely, secretly not charging them with anything, secretly torturing them. Somehow that overt policy of torture became the fault of a few “bad apples” in the military. Somehow back at home, support for the soldiers meant having a five-year-old kindergartener scribble a picture with crayons and send it overseas, or slapping stickers on cars, or lobbying Congress for an extra pad in a helmet. It’s interesting that a soldier on his third or fourth tour should care about a drawing from a five-year-old; or a faded sticker on a car as his friends die around him; or an extra pad in a helmet, as if it will protect him when an IED throws his vehicle 50 feet into the air as his body comes apart and his skin melts to the seat. Somehow the more soldiers that die, the more legitimate the illegal invasion becomes. Somehow American leadership, whose only credit is lying to its people and illegally invading a nation, has been allowed to steal the courage, virtue and honor of its soldiers on the ground. Somehow those afraid to fight an illegal invasion decades ago are allowed to send soldiers to die for an illegal invasion they started. Who wrote all that? Pat Tillman's brother, Kevin. "

In holiday in the German Eifel I came close for the first time in my life to the wind turbines (Italy is somewhat behind schedule in matters of alternative energy).

Wow, I am in love.

There are lots there, some smaller, some larger. They tower over the soft landscape, sometimes in thick groups, crowding a ridge of distant hills, sometimes alone, or in twos or threes. Theese loners are larger, taller and handsomer. A more recent design I guess, because they are sleek and beautiful beyond words.

They look slender like straight white flowers from afar, but driving close to them (I HAD to see them close) they turn out to be huge powerful giants, the delicate stems are mighty towers tapering away into the blue high far away over you, topped by the areodinamic ovoid shell of the turbine and the somewhat martial sweeping blades.

Their sound is awesome. A stately, majestic swoosh-swoosh-swoosh, powerful and yet soothing like waves breaking on a far away shore.

We spent the night with our camper at the foot of one of the towers. During the night the breeze turned into a steady fresh wind, and the blades picked up speed, softly chanting the change in the wind like the rigging on a windjammer of old cutting through the dream of a cloudy blue fantastic sea.

After leaving the Eifel we found out that some of the wind towers can be visited. I can't wait to go and see, next time we are there. Think of the bearings on those mighty turbines!!

I am in love!

A pic of one of the companions of "my" wind tower. Original Eifel sky.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Snowflake,