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Have Jesus’ disciples been overeating?
Leonardo da Vinci’s 1498 painting of The Last Supper.Photo: Drewwiki via Wikimedia Commons In a strange study published this week by the International Journal of Obesity, professors found that portion sizes in artistic renditions of The Last Supper increased dramatically in the past 1,000 years, the L.A. Times reports. The study, conducted by brothers Brian […]
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Friday music blogging: She & Him, again
She & Him — the indie It band composed of musician/producer/genius M. Ward and actress Zooey Deschanel — have released a follow-up to their 2008 debut, Volume One. They’re calling it … wait for it … Volume Two. When I first FMB’d She & Him, I went on at length about my unseemly crush on […]
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Watching the green screens at the Environmental Film Festival in D.C.
HomegrownSpring and the Environmental Film Festival both burst into full bloom at the festival’s start in the Nation’s Capital last weekend. Eco-movie buffs, many having withstood record snowfalls in Washington, D.C., this winter, eschewed the beauty of the outdoors to watch the beauty of the outdoors indoors in the form of a wellspring of eco-conscious […]
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What’s that funny-talking TV chef doing in my West Virginia hometown?
It’s about 8:45 a.m. and I’m sitting in an audio booth, waiting to talk to Brit celebrity chef Jaime Oliver on the other end of a high-quality line. I’m his third, set-‘em-up-and-knock-‘em-down “interview” of the morning. The night before he was on Letterman. He’s 15 minutes late, and I have an uneasy feeling. Not about […]
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The Nuclear Fig Leaf is Falling
Raise your hand if US taxpayers are responsible to pay for the most expensive mistakes you make in your business. Chances are, the only hands that just went up are attached to nuclear power executives and, if that unfair advantage were removed we would see the end of nuclear power in this country. The five […]
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A fast-and-furious weeknight skillet dinner
In Tom’s Kitchen, Grist’s food editor discusses some of the quick-and-easy things he gets up to in, well, his kitchen. Forgive him for the lame iPhone photography. —————— Last night, I wanted something fast and simple for dinner–that also tasted really good. I hadn’t been grocery shopping for a while, and nothing much is coming […]
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Silicon Valley investors place bets on sustainable ag
I attended an agriculture conference this week at the Four Seasons in Palo Alto. There were no pickup trucks in the BMW-packed parking lot, and few farmers with dirt under their fingernails could be found milling about the sleek hotel lobby. But the place was swarming with venture capitalists from some of Silicon Valley’s marquee […]
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Whoops: Energy Star approves gas-powered alarm clock
This (ahem) “space heater” earned a government Energy Star rating.Photo: Government Accountability OfficeWell this is embarrassing: Federal monitors granted the Energy Star stamp of approval to a number of bogus appliances, including a gas-powered alarm clock and an electric space heater with a feather duster taped to it. The Government Accountability Office submitted the fake […]
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Reminder: the U.S. already has cap-and-trade–in the Northeast
Update below The Center for American Progress offers a reminder that we already have a cap-and-trade system for carbon emissions up and running in the U.S.— it’s called the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, it operates in 10 northeastern states, and it works fairly well, according to CAP’s new review. Bradford Plumer rounded up the details […]
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Blanche Lincoln’s dismal school lunch bill passes committee
What will 6 cents change in this picture?“‘No machines until you get your lunch!’ an aide yells, trying to keep students from the bank of vending machines at the back of the cafeteria ringing with the siren call of Pop-Tarts and Cool Ranch Doritos.–From “Schools’ Toughest Test: Cooking,” by Kim Severson, The New York Times, […]
