ben zolno

Ellen Page on Ellen Show: Permaculture is Mainstream USA TV

Posted by ben zolno at 12:24 pm permaculture, permaculture.tv 5 Responses » Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,
Oct 082009

Ellen Page on Ellen Degeneres USA day-time TV

Page told Teen Hollywood “It’s about living in a holistic way with the earth and reintegrating our lifestyles with the natural cycles … It was amazing. Anyone at all who has a passion for it can learn about it and use it in their lives in so many different ways … like peeing in a bucket and using it on your compost. Pee is an excellent source of nitrogen.”

Source: What the Heck Is Permaculture? Linda Buzzell, Huffington Post

Also see: Lost Valley Ecovillage Permaculture Experience of Ellen Page, USA Today: Ellen Page Permaculture, EcoRazzi: Ellen Page Permaculture

Wow. Wow. Wow wow wow!!!!

Urine and acting like the training is expensive could be not the best way to promote Permaculture to a homemaker demographic — actually, it’s about the worst thing you can do — but at least now, thanks to Ellen “Small” Page, Permaculture was on ELLEN, the most main-stream show in America. Who can do a search analytics for “Permaculture” since this show?

Transcript and film below.  Start at 1:15 – 2:52, then skip roller derby promo stuff if you want, then Permie stuff picks up again at 3:15.  Watch it all if you want to see the full context.


Source: Whip It – Official Theatrical Trailer, Fox Searchlight, YouTube

Excerpted Transcript of Ellen Degeneres Show, interview with Ellen Page, Oct 7, 2009
ED= Ellen Degeneres, Page= Ellen Page

Degeneres talked to Page about her overwhelming fame from the movie ‘Juno’.

Page- . . . I took a little break from it because it was becoming a lot, you know, a lot at once.  So, I. . .

ED- Well, that’s smart to take a break.

Page- Yeah

ED- What did ya do?

Page- I  went to study permaculture design at an eco-village (Lost Valley Eco-village) in Oregon, outside of Eugene.

ED- What is permaculture? Like getting perms?

Laughter

Page- Yeah it was. . ah. . close.  It’s about living more simply, and about living in a holistic way with the earth, and re-integrating our lifestyles with the natural cycles, you know. So I lived on an eco-village for about a month.

ED- Wow! That’s great.

Page- It was amazing

ED- God, that would be a really great thing for us to all be able to do. Do you think that we could?

Page- I was really lucky because I could afford to take time off work, and to pay to go there, and learn this. But any one at all, who has a passion for it, can learn about it and use it in their lives, in so many different ways. From simple ways, to more elaborate ways- like peeing in a bucket, and using it on your compost.

Laugter

Page- Pee is an excellent source of nitrogen

ED- I pee in a bucket here

Page- Yeah, yeah

Laughter

ED- I do. I try to save money in the budget where ever I can.

Laughter

Page- It’s a recession, it’s nice that your doing that.

ED- That’s what I do. . . We just bought a farm.

Page- Oh, wow!

ED- And we are trying to do the same thing, and live off the land, and do every thing we can to simplify. It’s a goal, it’s hard to do. But it would be so great if we would all start treating the earth a little nicer, and using it what it’s for, instead of abusing it.

Page- Well, you would love this, you should check this out.

ED- I would love to. I would love to

Applause. . .

They chat about Page’s new movie ‘Whip it’. . .

ED- Now you need to find a movie where you can pee in a bucket.

laughter

Page- Yeah, your really on this bucket thing

ED- I’m just sayin’. Then you try to do a movie where your encouraging people to learn all the ways to be kinder. I mean, um. yes we would get away from that, you wouldn’t show that on camera. You would be behind a partition or something. . .

laughter

Page- We would have an apparatus, yes.

ED- Yes, you wouldn’t show that. But we all know from this conversation, when that movie comes out, (whispering) she’s peeing in the bucket.

. . .more discussion about Page’s new movie. .

end.

Global-Disaster-Proof Suits!!!

Posted by ben zolno at 3:30 am permaculture.tv No Responses » Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,
Sep 222009

All you have to do is curl up in a little ball, and everything will be fine! For even better results, curl up in a big ball!

I told you the techno fix was coming…
more details on SurvivaBall here

Ecosystem Restoration, Creek Style

Posted by ben zolno at 7:58 pm permaculture.tv No Responses » Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,
Jul 232009

Good news for fish, and for me.

Goldridge RCD just asked me to make a film about the dismantling of the Camp Meeker dam in Northern California. Since its construction, it has stopped the natural flow of the creek, thus the flow of the ecosystem there.

Here’s a video I made that may relate to this one, not only in content, but in the style as well.

Click on HQ — the regular quality sucks on this vid.

Through much fortitude, it will soon come down.

Here’s how (from an e-mail):
If this is the first time you are hearing about the project, it has two primary objectives:

1. To eliminate all known fish barriers along the mainstem of Dutch Bill Creek, and
2. To provide the community with a new and hopefully well-utilized pedestrian walkway that spans the creek.

These objectives will be accomplished in the following ways:

1. Remove the instream summer dam below the Post Office;

Retrofit the culvert under Market Street with baffles;
Install a series of boulder weirs downstream of the Market Street culvert; and
Replace an important community connector (footbridge) between Camp Meeker proper and the community recreation site.

Also, check out the work of Derek Jensen. This guy does not mince much, especially when it comes to his thoughts about our illegal responsibilities we have as the crash approaches.

Flying-Car Drive-Thru or...? The Future of City

Posted by ben zolno at 8:21 pm permaculture.tv No Responses » Tagged with: , , , , ,
Jul 072009

WATCH VIDEO HERE –> “City Slicker Farms” for Urban Yards

People are always saying the tragedy of climate change is that those who contribute the least to the problem — the poor — are punished the hardest.  There is truth to this; third-world, small-scale farmers whose fields experience climate changes too strong to adapt to don’t have industrial agriculture’s luxury of abundant surplus to cover their margin of error, or mass pesticide correction (fossil fuel use) to control the infestation of new pests that thrive in the new weather, or abundant water supplies that can be taken from the nearest neighborhood in short periods of dryness.

But with just one of these advantages taken away — through peak oil, erosion, severe drought or the like — the playing field will be evened.  Those who educate themselves to adapt to a lifestyle of lower-energy inputs for higher gains are those who will thrive.  Backyard farmers will benefit, while Food For Less and Wal-Mart devotees may be scratching their heads and rubbing their bellies.

Last week, I drove into West Oakland, California to meet with Patrick O’Connor of City Slicker Farms, an organization that works mainly with low-income families to increase “food self-sufficiency in West Oakland by creating organic, sustainable, high-yield urban farms and back-yard gardens.” CitySlickerFarms.org With curly hair, humility and heart, Patrick told me the vision he sees unfolding.  Lower-income families taking responsibility for their own food.  Unlike other programs he’s seen, he notes that the tendency of residents to maintain their gardens is high.  Of course, all the cliches of the confidence building, community bonding, consciousness breakthroughs and other cb’s ring true.

They’re not doing this because their clients can’t afford food — they’re doing this because everyone should be eating local and learning to garden on some scale; their clients just happen to be unable to afford it.

We need more City Slicker Farms.  Start slicking, or help someone else slick by getting in their yard and showing them this here video.

- Ben Zolno

Introducing the New Director of Production

Posted by ben zolno at 6:11 pm permaculture.tv No Responses » Tagged with: , , , , ,
Jun 182009

…that’s me, Ben Zolno, aka ben@permaculture.tv

As a filmmaker, organizer and fellow citizen of Earth, I am thrilled to be a part of Permaculture TV.

Not only is it a chance to help educate all the Permies out there, but more importantly, we will bring Permaculture to those outside “Permie culture”.

While I am proud to be part of the Permaculture community involved in the sustainability movement, I’d be lying if I said I originally came to it from the honorable yearning to respect my role in the ecological system in the holy land of Gaia.

No.  I came to it because, after seeing videos like these that freaked me out about peak oil, I sought answers.

While crass to some, it’s undeniable that there are billions more people who want to watch a video with a scantily-clad woman gyrating than people who want to watch a video about respecting the Mother Earth. Considering these same viewers are the same people who are contributing to the destruction of our ecosystem(s), we need to find ways to wake them up, then get them started on the healing path asap. Call it cynical, call it Zen… we believe it’s critical.

This is not to say it’s time to compromise the efforts we need to make to thrive in this new world; the Earth can’t afford that compromise. We are simply saying that a Permaculturalist has a responsibility to recognize that his/her ecosystem is not in a bubble. Water, soil, air and climate are affected by actions of everyone… far outside your watershed.

The current Permaculture subculture can’t do it alone. If the sustainability subculture doesn’t reach 6.8 billion members soon, or at least access the real “deciders” who can mandate the change we need, much of Permaculturalists’ efforts may be for naught.

  • We need videos with Muppets to draw in the under-8 crowd.
  • We need videos about new flying cars to draw in the overly-optimistic yuppie demo.
  • We need videos with screaming, blood and beer to draw in the Metalheads that party in the apartment below me.

Here’s one from Green Ambassadors, that preaches outside the choir.

And we’re looking for even bolder.

So we need you — yes, literally you — to think about sub-groups you know of and get some videos made that are geared to reach those people.

Thanks for joining us. I look forward to learning and sharing with you.

- Ben Zolno

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