Bananas to Arizona

"It's difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it." - Upton Sinclair
I've decided to start an entirely new blog entry. Despite the suggestions and what Mahoney said about being able to relate the subject of bananas to things we've talked about in class, I just don't really see it going anywhere. Fair trade is certainly a big issue, but one which has never really struck my fancy. The subject of organic gardening, however, did seem like it might be fun to pursue, but in the end I decided against this as well. I wanted a topic that would not only be interesting, but one which would also be beneficial for me to be knowledgeable about. Environmental issues have always interested me, and since I'm an environmental engineering major, I decided this would be a good subject for me to learn more about. Instead of choosing one issue to research thoroughly, I decided to research many issues in one place: Arizona. Next year I will most likely be transferring to Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, and I figured I should know about the environmental issues going on there. I found one article about global warming and how it was affecting many national parks in the United States including Glen Canyon National Recreation Area in Arizona. I also found an article from the Sierra Club about the use of snow making in the Arizona Snowbowl. (I took the picture on the top when I was in Flagstaff a month ago - I was up 12,000 feet on Mt Humphrey, part of the San Francisco Peaks, in the Arizona Snowbowl.) Other issues of great concern in Arizona are fire management and air quality especially in the Grand Canyon. (The lower picture was taken by my parents when they visited the Grand Canyon last April.) Also, I recently read an article in National Geographic Adventure entitled "Along the Devil's Highway: A Border Odyssey", directly linking environmental issues to our discussion of illegal immigration in class (I also talked about the effect the 700-mile fence will have on the environment in my paper). I think this is a good start, but I'll keep looking for additional information that I think will be interesting.