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We got 6 cubic yards of cedar woodchips for the playground. Megan and I are a little sore today but we got it all installed!

It’s getting cold. You’re working from home. Your toes are cold but turning up the thermostat costs the monies. You wanna treat yo self? You Wanna? This is what you want! I got this 2 years ago and… oooooooooo! It’s like having your own personal foot-elves tending to your toezies. When I went over to my wife a few seconds ago to find out the brand name, Megan said some very “Don’t you touch that!”-like words at me. :-)

Cozy Products CT Cozy Toes Carpeted Foot Warming Heater for Under Desks and More. About $50 on Amazon. Here’s Cozy Products full line of foot warmers.

If the space under your desk is chilly, use this and you’ll be able to lower your house thermostat several degrees and keep your toes happy for about 50 watts.

Our local sanitary district used a photo of construction in front of our house in their 4 page newsletter this past summer. We’re famous!

From page 3 of the Summer 2020 edition of The Endeavor: a publication of the Stege sanitary district of Contra Costa County

What an amazing, fun, and satisfying tribute to the movies!

SUPER-VILLAIN-BOWL! – TOON SANDWICH

And yes, there is more than just one video!

That’s a total of 150 personal letters to Milwaukee.

When it’s windy, the fiber that brings life-giving internets to our neighborhood makes the most annoying thwap-thwap-thwap-thwap-thwap-thwap-thwap sound. I caught a great AT&T serviceman working next door and, two zip-ties later, the world is calm!

Inbox zero. It is so rare and fleeting.

The updates we get from our preschool are so fantastic! My greatest concern is that, at this rate, she’ll be a responsible, capable, joy-filled adult by 4th grade.

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Dear Room 3 Families,

We hope you are off to having a wonderful weekend with your family. This week, the focus of Christina’s circle times and projects have centered around meditation and learning tools to calm our bodies down. On Monday, Christina brought all the kids to our cozy spot to talk about what that area can be used for. She talked about the area being a spot where a child can go when they are feeling sad or just wanting a space to be alone. She showed the kids the books we have in that area that focus on the different feelings we are having.

At another circle she introduced how holding a rock can be used to calm our bodies down. She did a great activity where each child held onto a rock during the mindful minute. After, she had each child add their rock to a collective rock structure.

She also introduced yoga as another tool to center our bodies.

Here is a picture of the kids practicing the turtle pose.

At another circle she used the plants as something that the kids can help take care of and be another thing that can help calm our bodies.

One of the art projects this week was doing string painting.

At the manipulative table this week was a basket of glass jewels and different templates for the kids to carefully place the jewels on.

When we sit at drop off and pick up time, the kids have been aware of how fast people drive on Spruce. We talked about what we can do to get people to slow down and they suggested making signs to hold. Here is a picture of a child making their sign.

Here is a picture of the kids holding their signs.

We have been observing that animal play has been a consistent theme this year. Block structures have been animal houses. The playhouse has been used as a veterinary hospital. There has been lots of observing sign of animals in nature up on the hillside and there has been some days of kids even giving birth to animals.

We feel there is enough interest that we are going to start the process of developing a project. The first step will be surveying the kids about what animal each child wants to learn about and making a graph where we can count up which animal has the most interest.

Here are some important reminders and information:

* School will be open this Monday.
* This year the administration has decided to allow each class to permit kids to wear costumes on the Friday before Halloween. Please refrain from any scary costumes and do not send your child with any costume masks. As per our COVID protocols, we will not be allowing any families to contribute any treats or items from home.
* As the rainy season begins, please have good rain gear for your child, as we do go outside in light rain.
* Here is the schedule for next week.

We hope you have a wonderful weekend and we will see you on Monday.

Peace,

Steve, Christina, and Robyn

I’ve read conflicting reports as to whether municipal recycling actually works or not.

Here’s some musings on that. I have no idea if these numbers are accurate.
I took a look through my city’s budget

I spy that last year…
Disposing of about 7,000 tons of garbage cost $2.6 million (line 46310, chart 8-7)
Disposing of about 4,000 tons of recycling cost $175,000 (line 46320, chart 8-7)
But we also paid 4 “Recycling Maintenance Workers”. I’ll assume they each were paid $50,000.

That means getting rid of recycling costs $94 per ton and garbage costs $371 per ton. So from a money perspective, recycling seems to make sense. But my numbers could be WAAY off. I’m just some guy that spend 1/2 an hour looking up the answer online. I see the average tipping fee for landfills is about $60 per ton. Why does it cost us $371 per ton??

I had a brief email discussion with Will Provost, a Management Analyst for the city and he thinks we recycle. He responded to me:

Thanks for your interest in this important topic. Yes, with the global recycling markets collapsing a couple years ago, a lot of jurisdictions are having trouble finding processors to accept their recycled plastic. In El Cerrito, we were able to switch contracts and find a new processor (Napa Recycling & Waste Services) that still accepts and recycles the plastics from our curbside program, including products like TetraPaks. However, whereas in the past the commingled recycling stream would have generated some revenue for the City, now the City is instead paying for these materials to be sorted and properly recycled. We’ve also had to limit what’s accepted in some cases. For example, we no longer accept plastic bags or plastic film. So in short, the plastics in El Cerrito are getting recycled, but the economics of recycling has drastically changed and the community is effectively subsidizing the recycling. Unfortunately, other communities around the country that are facing the same markets are choosing instead to send the plastics to the landfill or end their recycling programs.

Hope that helps. Longer term, the City is interested in moving forward with an Expanded Food Ware Ordinance to reduce the amount of single-use plastics generated in El Cerrito and ending up in our waste stream.