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Salad Days for the Internet: Use the Internet to order locally grown produce

tdsollog — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 08:57:56 -0700

Great article in the NY Times:

Salad Days for the Internet
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/05/fashion/05cyber.html?ref=fashion

By MICHELLE SLATALLA
Published: June 5, 2008
THE other afternoon, my husband and I were drinking beer on the front porch and already feeling a little dirty about what we planned to do later - grill a big fat steak brushed with butter. Then a terrible thing happened.

We saw a registered dietitian power-walking down the block. Toward us.

“Nancy Bloom alert,” I hissed, slouching behind the porch rail. “Don’t make eye contact.”

Too late. “Hi, guys,” said Nancy, pink-cheeked from eating whole grains. “What’s up?”

“Nothing,” my husband said, warily.

“What’s for dinner?” she asked. Toying with us.

I couldn’t tell a lie: “We’re getting ready to eat enough red meat to send our cholesterol levels through the roo...”

“What she means,” my husband said, cutting me off, “is that we were just discussing how to add more local, organically grown vegetables to our lives.”

Nancy beamed at him, as if he was just another faithful follower of the Michael Pollan School of Sensible Eating, adhering to the author’s mantra: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”

Mr. Pollan’s philosophy, which he laid out in his book “In Defense of Food,” has turned into a lifestyle in my health-conscious Northern California town. Everywhere I turn, people are eschewing processed groceries in favor of the locally produced foods their grandparents ate.

“I get a box of vegetables online every week,” Nancy said, calling over her shoulder as she headed off at a brisk pace, “from Spud.com.”

Buy food online to eat locally? It sounded unnatural, or at least counterintuitive.

But the phenomenon is growing nationwide. Now a number of sites - including Greenling.com in Texas, Naturaldirect.com in Illinois, Organicstoyou.org in Oregon and Mypersonalfarmers.com in New York State - deliver seasonal products from nearby farms to the doorsteps of customers.

These Web sites differ from the earlier generation of produce-delivery ones for two reasons: they all deliver products from local farms to nearby customers (whereas in the past it was rare to find an online organic produce delivery service that didn’t rely solely on a wholesaler). Second, these new sites all allow users to easily customize their standing-order box weekly.

The peer pressure got to me. After Nancy walked away in a haze of good health, I rushed inside to sign up for Spud.com (whose name stands for Small Potatoes Urban Delivery).

After I registered, Spud.com recommended I buy a $50 basket, based on the number and age of the eaters in my household, and allowed me to choose to limit purchases to items - including green onions, grapefruit and strawberries - grown within 500 miles of my house. (The price included delivery.)

Shopping online to eat locally is not just about the food. With oil prices so high, making an effort to reduce the energy costs associated with transporting food from farm to table can be a political stance.

“When one of our vehicles sets out filled with 80 orders, that’s like emptying a whole parking lot of cars that didn’t drive to the store,” said David Van Seters, the founder of Spud.com, which operates delivery facilities in 12 West Coast regions, including Canada. “A grocery-store chain might need 12 stores to service a whole area and present items in open coolers under warm lights for several days. Over 90 percent of our items leave the warehouse within 24 hours, and everything is kept in coolers in the dark right up until the time it’s packed.”

Some online delivery sites go even further to save energy. In Sarasota, Fla., for instance, the owner of a tiny new company called Harvestcycle.com relies on bicycles alone (pedaled by himself and his sister) to deliver DeSoto Lakes organic produce from a nearby farm to eight customers in a nine-mile radius.

“We’re not business people, we don’t have any money, we don’t have a $30,000 car to take care of or to gas up at a cost of 50 cents a mile,” said Andrew Noune, the founder of Harvestcycle.com, which started in February. “I work in the fields, and one day my friend had this idea I should deliver produce on my way home. My friend said, ‘Dude, you should totally set up a Web site and have people shop online.’ ”

Like many services, Harvestcycle.com also sells a broader selection of products distributed through an organic wholesaler, but allows customers to micro-manage orders to a degree unheard of even a few years ago. Customers can order only what’s local (loosely defined as having been grown or raised within a day’s drive) or only what’s in season or only organic - or a mix adjusted each week.

Linda Abbey, who receives a weekly delivery in the Austin-San Antonio area, is one of 625 customers of Greenling.com, whose customer base has increased 20 percent in the last 3 months. “This week we got a really beautiful goat cheese brie, and half a dozen heritage chicken eggs, blue and brown speckled,” said Ms. Abbey, a marketing manager for the University of Texas Libraries.

“What did you do with it all?” I asked.

“You learn to cook with what you get,” she said. “That night I made a chard frittata.”

A few days after I placed my Spud.com order, I found a blue plastic bin on my doorstep containing 18 kinds of produce - ranging from apples to tomatoes - grown in California.

Whereas Ms. Abbey might have looked into the bin and seen, say, a wonderful pesto sauce, I saw only a lot of plants.

My husband broke off a celery stalk. “Tastes good, though,” he said, as we stood there munching and tried to get used to the idea of eating it all before it spoiled.

I spent the next 30 minutes washing greens, rinsing apples and trying to find room in the refrigerator for bunches of chard, cilantro and basil.

“Goll-ly,” said my husband in a Gomer Pyle voice. “We sure have a lot of sprouts.”

I felt panicky. So I phoned Mr. Pollan, figuring that he got me into this mess, so he owed me a pep talk. And sure enough, he made me feel better about buying too much produce online.

“Ideally, you want to look the person who is growing the food in the eye, and then you really know where the food came from and how did the chicken that laid the eggs live,” Mr. Pollan said. “But not everybody wants to meet the chickens. So we need some surrogates to meet the chickens for us, particularly in parts of the country where you might live far away from farmland. We’re inventing different possibilities for that, and the Internet is one of them.”

For sticklers who want to buy directly from a single farmer, Localharvest.org enables users to search by ZIP code for Community Supported Agriculture farms that sell subscriptions, entitling buyers to receive regular delivery of a portion of an entire season’s crops.

This sounded like such a good idea that after I hung up, I also signed up for a Community Supported Agriculture share from Farmfreshtoyou.com.

Then in the interests of self-preservation, I went online to pare back my next Spud order. The last thing I wanted was to end up wasting produce. To avoid that, I intended to make batches of pesto, tomato sauce and steamed broccoli and freeze them.

“Now what?” I asked my husband.

“Salad for dinner,” he said. “And salad for breakfast. And lunch.”

Note to Nancy Bloom: We’ll be leaving a little salad on your doorstep. Just to say thanks.
E-mail: slatalla@nytimes.com

Producer Says He's Helping 'Reinvent' Britney Spears

justingirl1989 — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 05:19:25 -0700

Grammy-winning producer Rodney "Darkchild" Jerkins says he's working with Britney Spears on some "very dancey, really up-tempo, aggressive, catchy, and hook friendly" material for the singer's next album.

"I'm trying some new things [with Spears] … I've always worked with Britney and I love working with her," Jerkins told Rap-Up TV last week at Interscope Geffen A&M's Creme of the Crop dinner in Los Angeles. "I'm try to reinvent her and reinvent myself with her project."

Jerkins, who will produce two tracks on the untitled record, last worked with the pop star seven years ago on her self-titled Britney album, producing the remix for the track "Overprotected" and "I Love Rock 'n' Roll."

Despite the pop stars's rocky year – including an ongoing custody battle with her ex-husband Kevin Federline and two hospitalizations – the producer stresses that one thing has remained the same about Spears: "She's always professional." He adds that while some artists take a long time to record a song, during a recent studio session, "[Britney] walked in at 8:30 and was out by 10:30."

As far as Spears's mind-set, Jerkins says she's, "working on the positive side." Producer Sean Garrett, who has not yet gone into the studio with Spears but is set to work on her new record, also recently told PEOPLE, "I know she's been doing a lot better … You just want to give her the opportunity to get things back together."

And it would seem that Spears is getting back on track. Over the weekend she engaged in some happy mommy time when sons Preston and Jaydenhad a sleep-over at her Studio City home.
http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20209606,00.html

Producers, Broadway stagehands resume talks in strike's 3rd week

justingirl1989 — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 17:06:14 -0800

Negotiations resumed Sunday between striking Broadway stagehands and theater producers struggling to find a solution to their thorny, seemingly intractable labor dispute as theaters faced a third week of dark stages and mounting box-office losses.

Resumption of the talks - after a week of no negotiating - had been announced the day before by Charlotte St. Martin, executive director of the League of American Theatres and Producers, and were confirmed by the stagehands union.

"We are glad they accepted our invitation to negotiate," said Bruce Cohen, a spokesman for Local 1 of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees.

More than two dozen plays and musicals have been closed since Nov. 10, when the stagehands walked off the job.

The walkout was particularly felt during the last week, the lucrative Thanksgiving holiday, when most shows and theater-district restaurants do strong business. Not so this year, when only nine productions, including the newly reopened "Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas," were playing, and 26 others were shut.

A settlement was believed to have been in the works last Sunday after a marathon weekend of negotiating, but the talks ended abruptly with producers walking out.

The complicated contract dispute has focused on how many stagehands are required to open a Broadway show and keep it running. That means moving scenery, lights, sound systems and props into the theater; installing the set and making sure it works; and keeping everything functioning well for the life of the production.

The producers want a flexible number; the union wants a set number and ample compensation for any concessions made.

The negotiations have been protracted. They began last summer, with each side preparing for the worst.

The producers set up a $20 million strike emergency fund, taking a couple of cents out of each ticket sold over the past several years to pay for it. The money was to help struck shows struggling with the costs of a shutdown.

The union, too, has its own fund - benefits of more than $4.1 million for its members, as well as another $1 million allotted for members of other unions affected by the walkout.

"Grinch" came back to life Friday after its reopening was ordered by state Supreme Court Justice Helen Freedman.

The judge said she believed the show's production company would be irreparably harmed if the $6 million holiday musical wasn't permitted to resume its limited run, which ends Jan. 6.

Eight other shows, whose theaters have separate contracts with the league, remain unaffected by the walkout: "Pygmalion," "The Ritz," "Cymbeline," "Young Frankenstein," "Mary Poppins," "Xanadu," "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" and "Mauritius."

But "Mauritius" ends Sunday, while "The Ritz" closes Dec. 9 and "Pygmalion" finishes Dec. 16. All three shows had regularly scheduled limited engagements

thats good

source: yahoo.com and the associated press

Christian Bale is to play rebel leader John Connor in three sequels to the Terminator franchise, its producers have revealed.

justingirl1989 — Tue, 20 May 2008 11:55:02 -0700

The Welsh-born star, who is soon to be seen in Batman Begins sequel The Dark Knight, has already started shooting the first of those films, Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins.

“He’s really an actor’s actor, so we’re very proud,” said Victor Kubicek of film company Halcyon. Charlie’s Angels director McG is directing the new film, which is due to be released on 22 May 2009.

“Christian was our first choice and he’s a big fan of The Terminator, so we’re very lucky,” Kubicek told the BBC at the Cannes Film Festival.

“But with Batman he’s already done the whole franchise thing, so we weren’t sure he’d respond.”

Luckily, said Kubicek’s business partner Derek Anderson, “he read the script and he loved it, so he’s signed on for all three.”

US rap star Common will also have a lead role in the film, as will Australian actor Sam Worthington, who will soon be seen in Titanic director James Cameron’s science-fiction epic Avatar.

The producers would not reveal whether Arnold Schwarzenegger would reprise his role as the Terminator. Nor would they discuss character names or plot details.

“We can’t talk about the story points at all,” said Kubicek, adding the project was being kept strictly under wraps.

“Not everyone gets to see the script. They only see the part of the script that’s relevant to the job they’re doing.”

But the producers promised not to disappoint fans of the time-travelling franchise, which has also spawned TV series The Sarah Connor Chronicles.
“We’re both huge Terminator fans and we’re just approaching it from the point of view of what we’d like to see,” said Anderson.

“Any time we’re feeling pressure we just take a step back and say, as fans, ‘what would we like to see?’”

http://icydk.com/2008/05/20/christian-bale-is-to-play-rebel-leader-john-...

Small Wine Producers Can Be Great Artists

WineUnleashed — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 15:57:52 -0700

Florence, the home of many of the world’s greatest art, is where I was inspired by the philosophy of Michelangelo. He saw a soul in the block of marble, and felt that it was his duty to liberate it for the world to see. My 11-year-old daughter, Alex, a gifted artist in her own right, understood this artistic sense of duty. She said, “Sometimes when I look at a blank canvas, I can see what it will become.” As with almost everything, I started to think about how to apply this philosophy to food and wine. The truly artistic chef, like a sculptor, can see the essence of a simple tomato, plum, or chicken and coax out the best flavors. And the same holds true for the truly gifted winemaker-their passion and essential knowledge of the grape is evident in each sip.

One of the reasons I try to focus my wine selections on the small producers from around the world is that I want to taste that passion. The artistry in winemaking exists in the winemaker’s skills and their ability to interpret what the terroir brings them. The wine starts in the vineyard and finishes in the cellar. Michelangelo worked with the simplest of tools: his eyes and hands, a chisel and a hammer. The small winemaker usually has to rely on a similar set of basic tools: a few choice implements and his nose, since they usually can’t afford the state-of-the-art technology that makes everything easier. In the end, they tend to use less process, which, in my humble opinion, leads to unique wines with personality. As in great art, the wine can be extremely reflective of the artist’s skills and thoughts.

Though to be fair, this is not to say that large producers can’t impart passion. There are many that can, Ridge Vineyards, for example. I like to track down and find these unique wines, large or small. And I should also say that not all small winemakers have something that should be imparted. Like in art, nothing is cut and dried.

There are many winemakers that are following the lead of a great artist: Elisabetta of Montenidoli, Cyril Marès of Mas des Bressades, Bob and Jim Varner of Varner Wine, just to name a few. For my part, I will continue on this quest to present these wines of personality to you.

Ryan Seacrest gets bitten by a shark, survives to produce more crappy shows

justingirl1989 — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 12:20:35 -0700

“American Idol” host and executive producer of the abominations that are the Denise Richards and Dina Lohan reality shows, Ryan Seacrest, suffered a minor shark bite over the weekend. The uber-annoying Seacrest discussed the incident on his radio show. It was a minor bite and Ryan will live to carry on his world tour of aggravation and bad taste.

So much for a relaxing trip to the beach.

On his KIIS-FM radio show Monday, Ryan Seacrest said he decided to take a dip in the ocean over the weekend when, he said, “I was bit by a shark!”

See more photos of stars at the beach.

He said he was “about eight feet out” when he felt something swim by him.

“I thought it was a stick,” he said. “I wasn’t sure what had happened.”

Then, he said, “I saw it swim! He took a bite, and he left.”

Seacrest, 33, said the shark’s tooth “wasn’t a great thing to find. It was like finding a splinter!”

Although he said he was “in pain,” the American Idol co-host wasn’t hurt too badly, as he still went on the air to blab about it. (”I need to take an Advil!” he yelped.)

But he’s bitter.

Asked by his radio co-host if anyone else got bit, Seacrest lamented: “No, just me, of course! There were like 1,000 people in the ocean, and I get bit by the shark!”

[From Us Weekly]

Maybe it was hard to find that shark tooth lodged in his little toothpick leg due to all that self-tanning cream and spray-on glitter. I like to think that the shark was trying to do us all a public service by eating the tiny tanorexic host. Or, maybe the shark was part of an elaborate hit put out by Simon Cowell.
http://www.celeb*tchy.com/13234/ryan_seacrest_gets_bitten_by_a_shark_sur...

Producer: 'So Far, So Good' for Lindsay Lohan on Set

justingirl1989 — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 05:13:19 -0700

Lindsay Lohan has only been the set of her new movie Labor Pains for a week, but so far she's earned high marks for professionalism as she gets her film career back on track.

"We were a little bit reluctant to work with her," Lati Grobman, one of the producers, tells PEOPLE. "But she's been amazing."

Lohan, 21, whose movie career has been stalled by several stints in rehab, showed up for work June 9 on the L.A. location and has consistently been early and well-prepared for the grueling 12-hour shooting days, says Grobman.

In her return to comedy, Lohan plays a publishing house employee who escapes getting fired by pretending to be pregnant.

"She's so natural at what she does. I've never seen one take where she's off," says Grobman. "The difference between her and the other girls that are naughty in the business is that she's actually talented. It's not [like] Paris Hilton and the rest of them. We took the chance. It's good that we did. So far, so good."

The only problem is the horde of photographers who have infiltrated the Los Angeles-area locations.

"Paparazzi are ruining my life," says Grobman. "This is the most insane thing I've ever seen in my life. They do things that are very, very aggressive. I'm not a producer anymore, I'm a police woman."

http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20207032,00.html

Producers Want Britney Spears To Play Sandy On Broadway's Grease

justingirl1989 — Thu, 29 May 2008 06:56:32 -0700

It's just a request at this moment. No one has confirmed that Britney Spears would even consider the role, but producers of Grease are putting it out there. They want Britney to play Miss Sandra D in their Broadway play. The team is recasting in July and thinks Brit Brit would be the perfect fit.

They’re recasting the roles in July and they thought that Britney looked like a Sandy. She would be terrific."

What do you think? Can Britney do Sandy justice?

http://imnotobsessed.com/2008/05/29/producers-want-britney-spears-to-pla...

Kristin Davis Turns to Producing

justingirl1989 — Mon, 26 May 2008 10:57:15 -0700

From the big screen to behind the scenes. 'Sex and the City' actress Kristin Davis is moving behind the camera for her next big project.

Davis will take on the role of producer when she begins work on an unnamed romantic comedy.

According to British tabloid reports, Davis will also star in the film. A source says, "Kristin is just getting the final budgets in place. And she's chosen her leading man."

Wonder who her leading man will be? Hmmm....
http://movies.hollyscoop.com/kristin-davis/kristin-davis-turns-to-produc...

Justin Timberlake to Produce Reality Show

justingirl1989 — Fri, 09 May 2008 09:29:49 -0700

Justin Timberlake: singer, actor and now - executive producer!

The “SexyBack” crooner is helming a reality series for MTV billed as a "real life Bourne Identity” called The Phone, the network announced Friday.

Each episode beings with two hidden cell phones ringing on opposite ends of a major city. Once picked up, a "mysterious guide gives contestants five seconds to concede whether or not they wish to play the game for a chance of winning a huge cash prize," MTV said in a statement.

Afterwards, the players work against each other on various missions while keeping in touch with the guide via cell phone, and being followed by a helicopter hovering above.

The show, which is based off a Dutch series of the same name, is slated to premiere this fall.

Look back on Justin through the years here.

Tell Us: Will you watch Justin's show?
http://www.usmagazine.com/Justin-Timberlake-to-Produce-MTV-Reality-Show