Organic Farming on the Rise

Billy Allstot has been farming all his life. For the last ten years, however, his 29-acre farm in Okanagon County has yielded organically grown crops exclusively.

Over the last 20 years, the demand for organic produce has increased dramatically--about 20 to 30 percent per year during the 1990s, according to a July 2002 article in Agrichemical and Environmental News written by David Granatstein.

In Washington state, the Organic Food Products Act of 1985 established guidelines for producers. There were 33 certified organic growers in 1988, but the number rose to 142 in 2002. The most popular organic crops are vegetables, tree fruit and herbs.

Allstot grows mostly vegetables: tomatoes, peppers and eggplants. He said they're more ecomical than the apples he used to raise, which can take six to eight years to yield any produce. Vegetables can be harvested in the first year.

A key to the growth of organic farming is the economic benefits of diversifying markets for growers. Instead of selling to one market, organic growers grow more crops and sell in more markets. Allstot sells wholesale to natural foods stores like Whole Foods, directly to restaurants, and in person at the University District and West Seattle farmers' markets.

"Agriculture is really touch and go," he admitted. But the way he markets his produce allows him to be more profitable.

"Doing your own marketing is the only way to survive," he said. "It's all up to me. It's all up to any farmer."

Another benefit of organic farming is that by not using pesticides, farmers reduce their liability for worker exposure or contamination. Allstot said his organic crops are healthier, more prductive and have fewer problems with insects.

Moving into the mainstream has meant "organic farms are no longer primarily small acreage, labor-intensive operations run by people with a particular philosophical view of agricultural," according to the Granatstein article.

But some farms still are, of course. Allstot's is.

The life-long farmer stated he runs an organic farm because "I just feel better about it."

His reasons are also why he feels attached to Seattle markets: the liberal political climate in the city. In the 1970s, when organic farming was a new concept, he considered himself a hippie and North-Central Washington was "the heart of the hippies."

"My generation spoke out," he said. "Nobody really listened."

Now organic produce is popular with consumers and growers alike.

Somebody started listening.

(for News Lab)

Games Excite Students' Learning

Employees and owners of some local stores selling games geared toward helping kids learn have a hard time picking favorites.

"There are so many good games," said Gini Wingard-Phillips, owner of Math 'n' Stuff in Maple Leaf. "I love games."

In a store full of board games, card sets, colorful dice, books, and other fun-looking so-called educational toys, one can't help but match Wingard-Phillips's enthusiasm for the product.

Parents of children heading back to school are eager to encourage learning at home in addition to teachers and textbooks. They might want materials that help kids with difficult subjects like math, or they might want to push a gifted student to take greater pleasure in her studies. Whatever the goal, local stores have the goods to help them do just that.

Math Games

The beautiful Blokus is one Wingard-Phillips touts. It's one of her favorite new games, she said. A non-verbal game, the visual-spatial reasoning puzzle is good for all ages.

At Gary's Games and Hobbies in Greenwood, employee Todd Weaver suggests the ever-popular Yahtzee for math. Math 'n' Things sells several games for math students of all ages. Bump focuses on adding, subtracting and mental math, while Blink is a card-matching game for ages four and older. Both Math 'n' Things and Science Art and More in Roosevelt sell Set, another card-matching game for all ages.

"None of these games sound fun," said Mary Takle, a math tutor who helps out at Math 'n' Things. "But they are."

Walter Lounsbury at Science Art and More insisted games like Set are essential, saying he plays it with his adult friends as much as with his nieces and newphews.

Dice are another common learning tool that have taken on a new role in schools as "random-number generators." Multiple-sided and multi-colored dice are popular at Gary's Games for their place in role-playing games, but At Math 'n' Stuff they sell them as math learning aids.

Moreover, Wingard-Phillips declared: "As soon as kids hear dice roll, they think fun."

Language and Knowledge

Apples to Apples is a critical and crowd favorite. The card game has players creatively match people, places, things or ideas to an adjective. Players take turns as "judge," who pulls the adjective card and decides which noun best suits it. The nouns are sometimes obscure concepts that provide a geography, history or vocabulary lesson, as well as how to play to one person's biases.

Gary's Games, Math 'n' Stuff, and Science Art and More all sold the basic set, but Math 'n' Stuff also carries multiple expansion sets and printable cards so players can add their own nouns to the game.

History-focused games from the Civil War to World War II are found at Gary's Games. Weaver was particularly fond of History of the World, which takes players through seven epochs, from Egyptian civilization to the British Empire, learning historical facts all the while.

A series of games from Germany including the popular Settlers of Catan teach players about resources, building and trading.

Weaver, who admitted he's played the game with friends, said it sounds simple but "it takes some thinking."

Bioviva takes an environmental slant to Trivial Pursuit. Players aged 8 and older make moves on a world map. Science Art and More carries Bioviva.

Not Your Father's Chemistry Set

Science Art and More caters to the niche market of science learning sets. Even TV's Bill Nye (the Science Guy) has borrowed items from the store for his new series, said Lounsbury.

Lounsbury called the Microchem XM 5000 the "best classic chemistry set on the market," but noted that it's not as dangerous as sets used to be. None of its 1,500 experiments involve open flame or poisonous mercury, and the kit includes safety equipment.

Several Wizard kits--ElectroWiz, Chemistry Wizard, Newton's Wizard, and others--include a book describing and explaining several activities. They start simple and get more advanced. The kits include equipment to do projects like building a hovercraft or water-powered rocket.

Smaller toys can still contain great scientific lessons, however. Lounsbury pointed out the Putt-Putt toys that allow children to build a steam engine-powered boat, Insta-Sno that teaches about polymers and the ever-popular ant farms and butterfly gardens.

Bugs appeared to be a favorite subject of Lounsbury's. He recommended the "Eat-A-Bug Cookbook," by David George Gordon, stating that 70 percent of the world's population eats insects willingly. The store also sells such creepy treats as chocolate-covered ants, grasshopper lollipops, and the crunchy, baked, and flavored Larvets.

"Bugs are only gross to us because we say they're gross," he said. Perhaps insect-eating counts as a lesson in cultural acceptance, he agreed as he chomped on a cheddar cheese-flavored Larvet.

Strategy, Competition and Teamwork

Some of the classic games of strategy have taken new forms and, say some game experts, become better. Risk 2210 is an update of the original Risk board game that features a post-apocalyptic world with moon bases and underwater cities, available at Gary's Games. Diplomacy is similar to Risk.

"It's a cutthroat, kill-or-be-killed game," Weaver enthused. "Half cooperation, half stab your friend in the back."

Lord of the Rings is one of Gary's Games most popular board games. It's one of the few Weaver said truly enforces the value of teamwork.

"If you don't play together, you all lose," he explained.

Kuba is a bestseller for Math 'n' Things. It's a dynamic two-player game that game enthusiast Takle described as different every time it's played.

Takle said Checkers 2000 adds "chess strategy to regular checkers." It uses numbers and helps with math, too. Gobblet is another two-player game that is similar to tic-tac-toe, only "bigger pieces can gobble up smaller pieces," she explained.

Wingard-Phillips travels to New York every year for Toy Fair, where she discovers prototypes of new games. Twice she went to Nuremberg, Germany to find the latest great European games.

"I can see a game in New York," she said, "and hanker for a year before it's out."

Gary's Games and Hobbies is located at 8539 Greenwood Ave. North. Math 'n' Stuff is located at 8926 Roosevelt Way Northeast. Science Art and More is located at 6417 Roosevelt Way Northeast.

(for News Lab/The North Seattle Herald-Outlook [registration required])

Sunburn can be severe

It seemed absurd.

A week after spending three hours on the beach, reading a book in the summer sun, the skin on my lower legs was burnt, untouchable and showing no signs of improvement.

Worse, my ankles were swollen and feeling bruised. The blisters that didn't appear until three days after the initial burn had grown in size and area. I could only wear skirts that fell to my knee. Nothing could touch it but cold water and it hurt to walk and stand.

My legs felt stiff and painful in the morning, resulting in what must have been a comical sight for my housemates. I staggered down the hall to the bathroom, yelping all the way.
"How could all this be only a little sunburn?" I wondered.

Upon seeing the blisters, my horrified boss suggested I make a visit to the doctor.

I spent a lot of time scouring Google for sunburn treatment suggestions during my week of pain, but none of the descriptions convinced me of the trouble I was in. Everything I read lead me to believe things should improve shortly: Just keep up the liquid intake, cool water baths, and aloe vera gel application, and it'll turn into a tan and peel in a day or two. It didn't, and the pain got worse.

So I went to the urgent care at the University of Washington Medical Center.

A nurse practioner marvelled at the protective powers of sunblock--my otherwise exposed face and arms had been slathered in the stuff and survived the ordeal unscathed--and told me, yes, it was a pretty nasty burn and it probably had a secondary infection to boot.

"It's a good thing you came in," she told me. "This wouldn't get better on its own."

The medical assistant cleaned and dressed the wounds with non-adhesive pads and rolls of gauze and showed me how to apply Silvadene, the heavy-duty burn cream known to some as a "miracle." She laughed when I told her I'd been trying to use aloe.

The nurse practioner prescribed antibiotics for the infection and sent me home.

A few days later, the blisters were gone, the burn was healing and the pain was comparatively undetectable. At last, I could shower again.

Medical treatment for sunburns is not uncommon, though to patients it seems like it would be. Many who suffer even second-degree burns that penetrate beneath the top layer of skin and bubble up with ugly blisters do not seek treatment under the assumption it should go away sooner or later.

But sometimes it's worse than that.

Kellie Tinnin, a 22-year-old from Yuma, Ariz. visited San Diego a few weeks ago with a girlfriend. They spent time on a sunny beach. She relied on the 15 spf in her makeup instead of applying another sunblock to her face.

"Careless sunblock application left me with first and second degree [burns] on my face," she explained.

In the time many sunburns should begin to heal, Tinnin's worsened.

She recalled: "My face was as red as a tomato, and after about a day and a half my forehead, cheeks, lips, etc. swelled. I could barely talk for two days and my face basically felt like it was going to fall off."

Several concerned people hold her she should see a doctor. She went to the local urgent care facility, where she was told she should "know better" and sent home.

Her own physician saw her the next day and diagnosed her first and second degree burns.

"[He] gave me burn cream, which helped so much."

Many of the websites that came up in my Google searches listed common symptoms associated with mild first and second-degree burns: redness, pain, itching, blisters, fever, moisture. The experience of a mild sunburn is common among those with light skin.

What was tricky on the Web sites was their insistentence that people exhibiting symptoms of a "severe" burn seek professional care. What did they mean by "severe?" I knew, for example, that my burn was far and away worse than any sunburn I'd ever had before, but was it "severe?"

My visit to urgent care made it clear that it was. And it took me a week to figure that out.

Tinnin had a similar experience. She admitted feeling embarrassed that she resembled a "tomato with legs and arms" for a week, but less for her appearance than carelessness.

"I was like, 'Ah, it won't happen to me,'" the beachgoer said, "[but] boy did it ever!"

Normal sunburns are unpleasant, but should not feel worse a week later than the day after. Usually a burn will appear one to six hours after sun exposure and peak in 24 hours.

Sources disagreed on whether or not the presence of blisters alone was enough to warrant medical care. Signs of infection, however, signal the need for a doctor's intervention.

Only one website I saw mentioned the "red and white streaks" of which to beware in this regard. I couldn't see mine, because they weren't part of the burn itself. The subtle marks appeared on healthy skin above the burn. I wouldn't have been able to identify them as such until the nurse practitioner pointed them out to me as evidence of infection.

Within five days, the cream had healed up my burns, the antibiotics removed those easy-to-miss red and white streaks and I could wear jeans again.

(for News Lab)