CROZET gazette Venable Elementary School. Volunteers work throughout the year to process donated items and also to serve as staff for the sale. The Friends have donated the proceeds of their last two years’ sales to the Build Crozet Library fund.
NOVEMBER 16 & 17
WAHS Presents As You Like It
Western Albemarle High School’s Theater Ensemble will present Shakespeare’s As You Like It, a romantic comedy, which includes the playwright’s well-known “All the world’s a stage” speech, November 16 and 17 at 7:30 p.m. in the school auditorium. Advance tickets are $5 for stu-
NOVEMBER 2012 dents and $7 for adults, and $6 and $8 at the door. Live music and dessert will be available during intermission. Tickets can be purchased at the high school’s front office and in Crozet at Over the Moon bookstore or Mudhouse coffee shop. All money raised will support future student productions at Western. The Crozet Gazette Upcoming Community Events listing is intended for free, not-for-profit or fundraiser events that are open to and/or serve the broader community. Events are included at the editor’s discretion. Priority is given to special events. Space is limited. Submit event press releases for consideration to news@ crozetgazette.com. Thank you!
Numerous Local Artisans Participate in Annual Studio Tour The 18th Annual Artisans Studio Tour will be held November 10 and 11, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. This year there are 11 locations in the Western Albemarle and Northern Nelson area featuring potters, jewelers, leather craftsman, furniture makers, wood turners, hand-forged iron by a blacksmith and flintlock makers. Just outside Crozet, Janice Arone with her one-of-a-kind clay pieces and Mary Ann Burk’s sculptured and altered porcelain can be found at The Barn Swallow (796 Gillums Ridge Road). Greenwood Studios at 5289 Three Notched Road in Crozet will host Dan Hunt’s distinctive, one-of-a-kind furniture and Nancy Ross’s functional and sculptural pottery. Just outside of White Hall, Fred Williamson returns to the tour with his turned bowls. Tom Clarkson and Cindy Hammond of Jumping Branch Studio will join him to show their stoneware and porcelain vessels. Williamson’s studio is located at 5623 Sugar Ridge Road. In Afton, visitors can admire museum-quality colonial-period long rifles made at Allan Sandy Flintlocks at 8801 Dick Woods Road. At nearby Wayfarer Forge, Gerald Boggs will show his functional and beautiful ironworks at 3261 Afton Mountain Road. Just down the road at Forma Woodworking (1287 Afton Mountain Road), Christopher
Harrison will show his finely constructed contemporary furniture and whimsical art. The Judd Jarvis Studio at 1203 Afton Mountain Road will present Jarvis’s functional salt-fired stoneware pottery. Down Route 151, a quick turn on to Avon Road will lead visitors to 2 Art Studios – Gallery 161. Tanya Tyree is known for her abstract raku-fired clay sculptures and jewelry. Sharing that space, Gary Dalton designs and builds custom furniture and Greg Sandage creates jewelry from precious metals and unique gemstones. At the Rockfish Valley Community Center (RVCC), K. Robins will be showing off her symbolic pendants, amulets and talismans. These unique pieces of jewelry are done first in wax and then cast in sterling silver. Patricia Yoder creates wheel-thrown stoneware and can be found at Rockfish River Pottery just beyond RVCC at 80 Tuckahoe Lane, behind the Tuckahoe Antique Mall. Not far away is the Nan Rothwell Studio at 221 Pottery Lane in Faber. Rothwell is known for her functional salt-glazed and stoneware pottery. At that same location, Penny J. Sipple will be showing her handcrafted leather handbags and accessories. The tour is free. For more information, call 434-295-5057 or visit www.artisanstudiotour.com.
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© J. Dirk Nies, Ph.D.
Energy Part Three: Food Choices Fall is in the air. Days are shortening and the nights oftentimes are cold. Nature is responding to this diminishing inflow of solar energy in myriad ways. Trees are tossing their leaves to the ground. Squirrels are rebuilding their leaf-lined nests and hoarding nuts. Migratory birds and Monarch butterflies are flying south to warmer climes. White-tailed deer, sheep and goats are rutting. Bears and bats are hunkering down and preparing to hibernate for the winter. Bees are clustering (when temperatures drop below 55 degrees), forming a dense ball around the queen and conserving precious energy within the hive. And as November draws to a close, many of us will gather with family and friends to share a feast around the Thanksgiving table. Especially during this season of the year when fields are fallow, orchards bare, and the weather sometimes chilly and damp, we more deeply appreciate nourishing food and warm, dry shelter: the most fundamental necessities of life. To provide these necessities, we must expend energy. Picking up where we left off last month, let’s look at our energy expenditures in the food and household sectors of our economy and where and how we expend energy
through the choices we make (perhaps unwittingly). Three governmental reviews and surveys are helpful in this regard: Energy Use in the U.S. Food System published in 2010 by the Economic Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA); and the Residential Energy Consumption Survey along with the Annual Energy Review both published and updated in 2012 by the Energy Information Administration of the Department of Energy (DOE). These resources are available free of charge and may be accessed via the internet. There are upwards of 45,000 distinct items for sale in a typical US supermarket. Each one of these has its own history of energy expenditures. To illustrate the scope of this energy history, consider the following representative scenario for freshcut salad greens. A farmer sowed seeds of lettuce and other salad greens using a planter attachment on a tractor powered by fossil fuels. Between planting and harvest, a broadcast spreader applied fertilizer, and possibly pesticides and herbicides. These farm products were manufactured using natural gas and electricity and transported to wholesalers, retailers and farms. During times of inadequate rainfall, electric-powered water pumps irrigated the fields. At harvest, field workers continued on page 35
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