The Green Porch

5 Ways to Go Granola Secretly

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Treehuggers InternationalIf you’ve thought about hugging a tree, but were too worried about getting pitch on your Dickies (or explaining the stains to your family) then maybe you can start with hugging something other than a pine tree. (Sheez, slow down Rambo. You can’t just hug a pine without working up to it!) Seriously, until you feel comfortable coming out of the composting closet, there are ways to go granola on the sly. Here are the Green Porch’s top five:

5 Ways to Find Your Inner Redneck

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Toilet seat horse shoesFolk who live the button down life in town (known as the “rat race” until this was seen as discriminatory to vermin) might need a little assistance in letting their mullet down. If that’s the case, here are five great ways to add a little redneck to your white collar world (the Green Porch is always doing its part):

  1. Buy a brick of ammunition from Walmart to keep on top of the fridge (no gun necessary). Then whenever you open the door say the words, “Get some.” (For extra credit you can drink straight from the carton and wipe your mouth with the back of your hand.)

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Company Town: Two Faces of Thurber, TX

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Thurber Texas Coal MiningBy 1915 Thurber, TX existed as the largest producer of coal in Texas. It supplied a dozen railways with coal, paved much of the state with brick, and was the largest city along Interstate 20 between Ft. Worth and El Paso. And every bit of the town (from scratching post to hitching post, from pew to crapper) was company owned by Texas and Pacific Coal Company.

Yet by the 1930’s Thurber was gone, and its success began to unravel during the winter of 1921-22. At their peak, company towns across the nation hosted 3% of the population. But were these towns a blight? or progressive beacons? Was Thurber a bastion of enlightened industrialist Paternalism or a cesspool of oppressive and monopolizing Capitalism?

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