Here’s a bit of plant and region (PA) related inquiry…

Plant related…where are we? What do the growing zones on the back of seed packages mean? We’re in 5a and 6b….
 

Hardiness zone map:

http://www.usna.usda.gov/Hardzone/ushzmap.html

Farmer’s alamanac shizzle which is deliciously in between fact and hear-say:

http://www.farmersalmanac.com/home_garden/gardening

They have a blog you can subscribe to which will tell you the kind of shit I really want to know about, like how far a jackrabbit can jump and which days you should REALLY be chopping wood and baking on ..WTF?

http://www.farmersalmanac.com/best_days/month

Who knew we needed to think more about which days we are castrating animals on? This whole site indulges my interests far too much..if you look on the weather link, there’s a little “game” where you can find out what the weather was like in your area (enter zip code) as far back as 1945…

Here also, is a park I have heard of and finally looked up. Perhaps the destination of future dreamy camping trips? It’s a “dark sky” preserve- good for star gazing…

http://www.dcnr.state.pa.us/stateparks/parks/cherrysprings.aspx

I have been thinking about privialge, wealth, behavior, and reasoning based on these things. I dredged up a little economic overview of Appalachia,  which we are a part of here in the lovely Pittsy-burghy.

http://www.arc.gov/index.do?nodeId=26