Whoops! I’m a week behind on this one, but apparently September is Eat Local Month, an effort to get people to think about where their food comes from by eating food produced within 100 miles of where you live.
Why eat local? See 10 Reasons to Eat Local Food. “Local” is better than “Organic.”
Waitaminute! No, I’m wrong. The Eat Local Challenge is scheduled for October 3rd. That’s a relief, and it’s only a single day, and this one gives us a 150 mile radius. That’s nowhere near as daunting as foraging in my backyard for grubs for a month.
Hold on… No, the Eat Local Challenge is in May, the Whole Month of May. So that’s two months and a day every year I’ve got to try and eat food produced within 100-150 miles of Elizabeth City, North Carolina??? Sure we’ve got a good deal of farm produce, but eating local seafood here means adding to our problem of collapsing fish stocks. Ever feel damned if you do, damned if you don’t?
I’m not trying to be obtuse here. I think this is an awesome idea, but it has two really big problems:
- It’s disorganized. Pick a date, stick with it, and get corporate sponsorship. Get all the treehugger sites on board.
- It’s too long, which violates the “people are lazy” truism. I’m lazy and I’m intimidated by a month of eating locally. This should be a one-week challenge so it doesn’t scare away those of us who are ecologically mindful, but not devotees to the cause.
- The goal here is to promote a meme. Get people planting gardens in their back yards, fruit trees, stopping in at the farmer’s market, etc. Push Eat Local resources and “how to” guides more than anything.
“I”m a lazy lazy man,” to quote Krusty the Clown from The Simpsons, like most people, and I don’t have time for 24/7 environmentalism. My fellow dirt-worshiping treehuggers are trying to say that we should be mindful of where our food comes from all the time, and that’s great, but package this message consistently, make it inclusive to the point that people who aren’t taking part in the challenge will want to follow it and maybe take an electronic brochure, and dumb it down enough to make everyone care.
Earthday everyday. : )
Right before posting this, I found the Eat Really Local Challenge, 100 yards. Not commenting on that with a 1024-foot pole.
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