I was lucky to get a lie-in til about 10, Gill woke me up saying my 11.30 appointment with Colin, to discuss AVP employment issues, had rung to cancel. He'd been snowed in.
So I didn't need to do anything today, apart from housework, keeping the house warm, and preparing for this evening's talk. Both boys were at home, Gill set them some work which they did quietly.
Gill made a 'cobbler' for tea, basically a hot-pot veg stew with potato, sweet potato, parsnip, tomato, peas and onions, with blobs of scone mix on the top and then baked in the oven. Really delicious.
At about 6.30 I set out for the Physics building at the University of York. I was due to do the talk titled: "Compost John : Britain's Most Sustainable Man. How does he do it?" in room P/L/005, but yesterday, a group of students, following the huge anti-cuts demo in town, decided to hold an occupation in the Physics building, to protest at the proposed increases in fees. So I was contacted by the organiser and asked if I'd do my talk to 'The Great York Sit-In' participants.
So that's what I did: as a guest of the newly-formed University Green Party, I did a talk mainly about carbon footprinting, and how I organise my life to have one considerably smaller than average. First I dispelled the myth that I'm 'Britain's Most Sustainable Man', and explained that this may have come from the Oxfam Carbon Footprint Competition in 2008. So, this led to info about ActOnCO2 and my favourite Carbon Calculator, The Carbon Account, and what makes up someone's footprint. I went through what I do to keep my footprint small, and with a goodly number of tangents, arrived at the other aspects of 'being sustainable' which in my opinion are Fair Trade and Organic consumption, and teaching others about your ethical choices. I also admitted the un-green things I'm responsible for, including my children, and my extensive use of the railways, which isn't recordable in The Carbon Account.
There were some really good questions afterwards, as one would expect from a bunch of intelligent and motivated young people. I feel very lucky to have these connections. I had a cuppa and more chats, and then cycled home, picking up a trailer full of sticks and branches on the way home. The snow wasn't too difficult to get through.
Played lots of Scrabble on facebook, read, watched telly and wrote blog til 3am.
Showing posts with label University of York. Show all posts
Showing posts with label University of York. Show all posts
Well a tough start to the morning, going into school and having another meeting.
This, and another unconnected incident, meant that a 10.30 meeting I was due to have was cancelled. But it wasn't a vital one, just a social, but I was looking forward to it.
So, I did some more prep for tonight's meeting, contacted St John's again but missed the person who would be interested in the Waste Food Feast idea, and spoke with Briony Pete, who assured me that she'd be able to find the place OK.
I cycled round to buy some bread and get a prescription, and only fell off once. Then I went to the other Co-op (we are blessed with two both within 5 minutes walk or cycle) to get goats milk, but there was none.
So, apart from these excursions, a quiet day.
In the evening I got a message to say the Hull Road Planning Panel was cancelled due to the weather, but I was quite glad of this as I was attending the Waste Food Feast planning meeting at 8pm, actually I needed to get there by 7.30, to meet Briony.
I had assumed that G/020 was in G block in James College, which I'd found on the map, but that was a residential block so I went to the info place and the chap in there directed me to the depths of the Mathematics Department. I couldn't find the room but then was accosted by Briony, who had found it!
I dumped my stuff in the room and retraced my steps to put up A4 posters directing people to the room from the car park, as I was expecting someone from City of York Council to turn up, and possibly other non-University people. When I got back to the room, half the People and Planet group had appeared. But no-one from outside the University came... but that didn't matter actually.
Despite not being able to use her laptop presentation, Briony explained about her job, working for Wastewatch, and the Feed the 1000 event in Hull. She explained about the size of the problem: 8.3 million tonnes of good edible food wasted in the UK every year, costing £12 billion in wasted production costs, transportation, storage, and disposal. This works out at an average of £480 per household per year, and if there are children in the house, the average cost of wasted food is £680 a year. When it is explained that this is about £50 a month in wasted food, many families do want to reduce that cost, and save the money. The environmental cost, in terms of unnecessary carbon emissions, wasted resources, other pollution, is enormous.
So, there were some good questions from the students, and the discussion which followed helped us crystallise what is needed to happen next, a preferred option and a 'plan b'. And a long list of people who want to be involved in the organisation of the event. Briony said she'd sort out a facebook page to help co-ordinate and facilitate communication. So we all left feeling very positive.
I cycled along to Melody to collect the unsold dried fruit from the LETS fair, and left 2 jars in swap for the little bottle of truffle oil that her son had prepared. He did really well selling his chili oil, truffle oil and herb-infused oil.
I collected 2 logs in the snowstorm and came home, and watched the More 4 programme on how the British National Party got trashed at the last election. Very interesting, a good watch.
This, and another unconnected incident, meant that a 10.30 meeting I was due to have was cancelled. But it wasn't a vital one, just a social, but I was looking forward to it.
So, I did some more prep for tonight's meeting, contacted St John's again but missed the person who would be interested in the Waste Food Feast idea, and spoke with Briony Pete, who assured me that she'd be able to find the place OK.
I cycled round to buy some bread and get a prescription, and only fell off once. Then I went to the other Co-op (we are blessed with two both within 5 minutes walk or cycle) to get goats milk, but there was none.
So, apart from these excursions, a quiet day.
In the evening I got a message to say the Hull Road Planning Panel was cancelled due to the weather, but I was quite glad of this as I was attending the Waste Food Feast planning meeting at 8pm, actually I needed to get there by 7.30, to meet Briony.
I had assumed that G/020 was in G block in James College, which I'd found on the map, but that was a residential block so I went to the info place and the chap in there directed me to the depths of the Mathematics Department. I couldn't find the room but then was accosted by Briony, who had found it!
I dumped my stuff in the room and retraced my steps to put up A4 posters directing people to the room from the car park, as I was expecting someone from City of York Council to turn up, and possibly other non-University people. When I got back to the room, half the People and Planet group had appeared. But no-one from outside the University came... but that didn't matter actually.
Despite not being able to use her laptop presentation, Briony explained about her job, working for Wastewatch, and the Feed the 1000 event in Hull. She explained about the size of the problem: 8.3 million tonnes of good edible food wasted in the UK every year, costing £12 billion in wasted production costs, transportation, storage, and disposal. This works out at an average of £480 per household per year, and if there are children in the house, the average cost of wasted food is £680 a year. When it is explained that this is about £50 a month in wasted food, many families do want to reduce that cost, and save the money. The environmental cost, in terms of unnecessary carbon emissions, wasted resources, other pollution, is enormous.
So, there were some good questions from the students, and the discussion which followed helped us crystallise what is needed to happen next, a preferred option and a 'plan b'. And a long list of people who want to be involved in the organisation of the event. Briony said she'd sort out a facebook page to help co-ordinate and facilitate communication. So we all left feeling very positive.
I cycled along to Melody to collect the unsold dried fruit from the LETS fair, and left 2 jars in swap for the little bottle of truffle oil that her son had prepared. He did really well selling his chili oil, truffle oil and herb-infused oil.
I collected 2 logs in the snowstorm and came home, and watched the More 4 programme on how the British National Party got trashed at the last election. Very interesting, a good watch.
A busy day ahead, with 3 meetings scheduled for the afternoon/evening. But Gill and I had a fairly busy morning too, dealing with yet another situation which has arisen. Life does not run smoothly for long.
However, a solution is on the horizon and I was able to spend a happy hour or so bagging up last year's leafmould, which has sat in a chicken-wire cage undisturbed for the past year. After a year of slow mouldering, I put it handful by handful into plastic sacks and leave it for another year. This initial sorting allows me to remove twigs and sticks which I put in the Compostumbler with a job lot of putrescible food waste. I also removed quite a bit of street litter... plastic mainly, and there were absolutely LOADS of pebbles, gravel, and small stones, some of which I was able to remove but the rest will have to be riddled out. I don't know where these came from, but since I collect sacks of leaves from all over the place, it's obvious that someone has swept up leaves from a gravelly area. Bit of a nuisance. I filled 6 sacks before lunch at 1pm.
I had the usual pile of sandwiches and headed out for my 2pm appointment, hopefully a conclusion to my year of not being an active York Rotter. John at St Nicks had drawn up a document which he emailed me this morning, Basically this is a set of rules I have to abide by if I'm to continue as a Rotter, including only wearing my York Rotters teeshirt at official engagements, and whilst representing the organisation, I'm not allowed to discuss the composting of dead bodies (including roadkill) or composting condoms (which are biodegradable if made from natural latex) or to talk about or make jokes about sex. But the really good thing is that Pat, one of the St Nicks management team, is going to be my 'buddy' whilst I'm working on stalls as a Rotter. I'm happy with this. I signed the document as I really want to get back to doing what I love, and working with members of the public, engaging them with home composting education. The other good thing which has happened because of the complaints from some oversensitive volunteers is that there has been some diversity training, so, hopefully, Aspergery people like me, ADHD-ers (we have one undiagnosed ADHD-er on the team) and other 'neuro-diverse' people may be better understood and perhaps tolerated.
Neuro-typical people (that's about 80 to 90% of the population) do find it difficult to understand what it is like to be neuro-diverse, ie autistic, depressive, Tourettes syndrome, Dyslexic, etc etc. It is difficult to understand ourselves sometimes. I can't explain why I am happy to have the same sandwich every day, at the same time every day, or why I find it difficult to 'read between the lines' of a conversation, or why I tend to be direct and very honest. So if I don't understand, it must be almost impossible for anyone else to get it. But learning about some of these traits is a start, and I think that more organisations ought to offer this sort of training.
So, by 3pm, John and Edward and I had talked around the subject enough and we'd all signed the document, and we'll review things in 3 months. I cycled home, picked up a beautiful but road-murdered male Mallard duck, had a coffee and at 3.40, headed into town to go to the Environment Forum at the Guildhall. We discussed a range of subjects, including the York New City Vision written by Professor Alan Simpson (59 page pdf document here) and the Forum response to the Allerton Waste Recovery/Incinerator plans. Perhaps the most important thing we did was to choose our new Chair, due to the resignation of Jonathan Tyler, who held the reins for several years very successfully. We accepted Kate Lock as our new Chair. She is ideal for this post, as she's passionate about sustainability, and York, is a good communicator, both verbally and in writing, and is not aligned to any political party or connected centrally to any one organisation. So, independent, able and keen.
We finished at 5.55 and I zoomed off to my third meeting, at Langwith College up at the University. I got there before 6.15, and soon found the People and Planet group, who had asked me to go and help them with one of their campaigns to get more composting happening at the University. When we split up into groups, I was able to present a short analysis of the issues: first looking at promoting composting off campus, to students living in rented and shared homes. Then the possibilities of recycling on-campus biodegradable waste: composting on site with bespoke composting machines such as the Big Hanna, Rocket or Ridan, (there are other solutions too) or composting/anaerobic digestion off site, such as the Future Energy Yorkshire site near Selby (which has some collaboration with the University) or indeed, the Allerton plant, if and when it is built. Obviously, I favour on-site solutions, as there's no driving tonnes of stuff around, and the material doesn't even become waste. I also explored, briefly, the reasons that the University should be recycling it's biodegradables. These include the People and Planet University Green League, reduced landfill/transport costs, reduced carbon emissions and setting a good example to students!
We finished at 7.30 and I picked up 2 logs on the way back, and enjoyed a pile of rice and veg with chutneys for tea. The evening was full of fruit prep, writing, a bit of Scrabble, lots of washing up... bed after 2am.
However, a solution is on the horizon and I was able to spend a happy hour or so bagging up last year's leafmould, which has sat in a chicken-wire cage undisturbed for the past year. After a year of slow mouldering, I put it handful by handful into plastic sacks and leave it for another year. This initial sorting allows me to remove twigs and sticks which I put in the Compostumbler with a job lot of putrescible food waste. I also removed quite a bit of street litter... plastic mainly, and there were absolutely LOADS of pebbles, gravel, and small stones, some of which I was able to remove but the rest will have to be riddled out. I don't know where these came from, but since I collect sacks of leaves from all over the place, it's obvious that someone has swept up leaves from a gravelly area. Bit of a nuisance. I filled 6 sacks before lunch at 1pm.
I had the usual pile of sandwiches and headed out for my 2pm appointment, hopefully a conclusion to my year of not being an active York Rotter. John at St Nicks had drawn up a document which he emailed me this morning, Basically this is a set of rules I have to abide by if I'm to continue as a Rotter, including only wearing my York Rotters teeshirt at official engagements, and whilst representing the organisation, I'm not allowed to discuss the composting of dead bodies (including roadkill) or composting condoms (which are biodegradable if made from natural latex) or to talk about or make jokes about sex. But the really good thing is that Pat, one of the St Nicks management team, is going to be my 'buddy' whilst I'm working on stalls as a Rotter. I'm happy with this. I signed the document as I really want to get back to doing what I love, and working with members of the public, engaging them with home composting education. The other good thing which has happened because of the complaints from some oversensitive volunteers is that there has been some diversity training, so, hopefully, Aspergery people like me, ADHD-ers (we have one undiagnosed ADHD-er on the team) and other 'neuro-diverse' people may be better understood and perhaps tolerated.
Neuro-typical people (that's about 80 to 90% of the population) do find it difficult to understand what it is like to be neuro-diverse, ie autistic, depressive, Tourettes syndrome, Dyslexic, etc etc. It is difficult to understand ourselves sometimes. I can't explain why I am happy to have the same sandwich every day, at the same time every day, or why I find it difficult to 'read between the lines' of a conversation, or why I tend to be direct and very honest. So if I don't understand, it must be almost impossible for anyone else to get it. But learning about some of these traits is a start, and I think that more organisations ought to offer this sort of training.
So, by 3pm, John and Edward and I had talked around the subject enough and we'd all signed the document, and we'll review things in 3 months. I cycled home, picked up a beautiful but road-murdered male Mallard duck, had a coffee and at 3.40, headed into town to go to the Environment Forum at the Guildhall. We discussed a range of subjects, including the York New City Vision written by Professor Alan Simpson (59 page pdf document here) and the Forum response to the Allerton Waste Recovery/Incinerator plans. Perhaps the most important thing we did was to choose our new Chair, due to the resignation of Jonathan Tyler, who held the reins for several years very successfully. We accepted Kate Lock as our new Chair. She is ideal for this post, as she's passionate about sustainability, and York, is a good communicator, both verbally and in writing, and is not aligned to any political party or connected centrally to any one organisation. So, independent, able and keen.
We finished at 5.55 and I zoomed off to my third meeting, at Langwith College up at the University. I got there before 6.15, and soon found the People and Planet group, who had asked me to go and help them with one of their campaigns to get more composting happening at the University. When we split up into groups, I was able to present a short analysis of the issues: first looking at promoting composting off campus, to students living in rented and shared homes. Then the possibilities of recycling on-campus biodegradable waste: composting on site with bespoke composting machines such as the Big Hanna, Rocket or Ridan, (there are other solutions too) or composting/anaerobic digestion off site, such as the Future Energy Yorkshire site near Selby (which has some collaboration with the University) or indeed, the Allerton plant, if and when it is built. Obviously, I favour on-site solutions, as there's no driving tonnes of stuff around, and the material doesn't even become waste. I also explored, briefly, the reasons that the University should be recycling it's biodegradables. These include the People and Planet University Green League, reduced landfill/transport costs, reduced carbon emissions and setting a good example to students!
We finished at 7.30 and I picked up 2 logs on the way back, and enjoyed a pile of rice and veg with chutneys for tea. The evening was full of fruit prep, writing, a bit of Scrabble, lots of washing up... bed after 2am.
Another reasonably productive day, and a definite highlight at the end.
So, a slow start to the day... bits of washing up and stuff around the house, Gill went out to get a pre-birthday hair do, and came back looking even more lovely than she usually does.
In the afternoon, I took a shopping list to Country Fresh, picked up a couple of sacks of goodies, then went to Alligator and did the same. Round to Cycle Heaven to find out if the saddle I'd ordered was in yet, and weirdly the order had been cancelled. When I got in, I think I found out why... they did have one in. I'll pop in sometime and have it fitted.
From here I cycled along the West bank of the river and then crossed at Lendal Bridge to go and visit my dentist, as I was wondering when my next appointment was. I got a date in August.
Then on to see Sarah who used to run Kyi Po on Goodramgate. She found that the 'vegan only' fare wasn't attracting enough custom, so she started selling alcoholic drinks (vegan ones) and has now completely changed to being Gluggles, an off licence. Sarah had invited me to go there and pick up a few bags of flour which were left over from the old shop, and I was pleased to see Matt there. We chatted for a few minutes and he showed me the selection of local wines, including a range from Ryedale Vinyeards, and several from a little further away. We discussed carbon footprints and carbon rationing.
Then I went to Sainsburys to get cereal, bread, vegan ice cream (for Gill), asparagus (ditto) and cheese. And then home.
We had an early 'toastie' tea, as my eldest had agreed to come with me to a lecture at the University, as part of Insect Week. We set off cycling soon after 6pm and got to the Physics block in good time for the 3-part event. It was entitled 'The Wet, Weird and Wonderful World of Garden Insects'. First up was Duncan Sivell, who is the Biodiversity Acton Manager for Buglife, the only charity in Europe working to conserve all invertebrates. He talked us through the various insects found in ponds, such as diving beetles, scavenging beetles, Reed beetles, assorted sucking bugs including skaters, water scorpions and two sorts of 'skimmer', which I know as water boatmen, the dragonflies and damselflies, 'riverflies' including Caddis, May and Stone flies, and the true flies including one of my favourites, the drone fly, a hover fly which has a larva known as a Rat Tailed Maggot. He also talked a bit about ponds and the Million Ponds Project, which I think I'll register with, as I'm in the process of building one.
The next presentation was by Dr David Chesmore, who is very keen on moths and butterflies, but researches invertebrate noise in the physics/electronics department. He described his work as the 'Weird' bit of the lecture, and described how invertebrates make noises, and why, and then played some sound files for us, things like woodboring beetle noises, plant hoppers, grasshoppers, cicadas and more. I never knew that the Tiger Moth responded to bat noises by emitting it's own bat-like noise to confuse them. Or that some web-building caterpillars have sound battles to win access to each other's tent-like homes.
The final presenter was my friend Anneliese Emmans Dean, who is a brilliant poet and performer, and she presented some of her insect photos, stories and poems. I always enjoy what she does. I think she was definitely the 'Wonderful' part of the presentation.
My son enjoyed it lots, and we chatted to some of the other people for a while afterwards before cycling home. I was extremely happy to have had an evening out with him, really glad he said yes, and I think he was too.
So, a slow start to the day... bits of washing up and stuff around the house, Gill went out to get a pre-birthday hair do, and came back looking even more lovely than she usually does.
In the afternoon, I took a shopping list to Country Fresh, picked up a couple of sacks of goodies, then went to Alligator and did the same. Round to Cycle Heaven to find out if the saddle I'd ordered was in yet, and weirdly the order had been cancelled. When I got in, I think I found out why... they did have one in. I'll pop in sometime and have it fitted.
From here I cycled along the West bank of the river and then crossed at Lendal Bridge to go and visit my dentist, as I was wondering when my next appointment was. I got a date in August.
Then on to see Sarah who used to run Kyi Po on Goodramgate. She found that the 'vegan only' fare wasn't attracting enough custom, so she started selling alcoholic drinks (vegan ones) and has now completely changed to being Gluggles, an off licence. Sarah had invited me to go there and pick up a few bags of flour which were left over from the old shop, and I was pleased to see Matt there. We chatted for a few minutes and he showed me the selection of local wines, including a range from Ryedale Vinyeards, and several from a little further away. We discussed carbon footprints and carbon rationing.
Then I went to Sainsburys to get cereal, bread, vegan ice cream (for Gill), asparagus (ditto) and cheese. And then home.
We had an early 'toastie' tea, as my eldest had agreed to come with me to a lecture at the University, as part of Insect Week. We set off cycling soon after 6pm and got to the Physics block in good time for the 3-part event. It was entitled 'The Wet, Weird and Wonderful World of Garden Insects'. First up was Duncan Sivell, who is the Biodiversity Acton Manager for Buglife, the only charity in Europe working to conserve all invertebrates. He talked us through the various insects found in ponds, such as diving beetles, scavenging beetles, Reed beetles, assorted sucking bugs including skaters, water scorpions and two sorts of 'skimmer', which I know as water boatmen, the dragonflies and damselflies, 'riverflies' including Caddis, May and Stone flies, and the true flies including one of my favourites, the drone fly, a hover fly which has a larva known as a Rat Tailed Maggot. He also talked a bit about ponds and the Million Ponds Project, which I think I'll register with, as I'm in the process of building one.
The next presentation was by Dr David Chesmore, who is very keen on moths and butterflies, but researches invertebrate noise in the physics/electronics department. He described his work as the 'Weird' bit of the lecture, and described how invertebrates make noises, and why, and then played some sound files for us, things like woodboring beetle noises, plant hoppers, grasshoppers, cicadas and more. I never knew that the Tiger Moth responded to bat noises by emitting it's own bat-like noise to confuse them. Or that some web-building caterpillars have sound battles to win access to each other's tent-like homes.
The final presenter was my friend Anneliese Emmans Dean, who is a brilliant poet and performer, and she presented some of her insect photos, stories and poems. I always enjoy what she does. I think she was definitely the 'Wonderful' part of the presentation.
My son enjoyed it lots, and we chatted to some of the other people for a while afterwards before cycling home. I was extremely happy to have had an evening out with him, really glad he said yes, and I think he was too.
I had a nice morning with the family and dealt with various phone calls and things around the house. Late morning our eldest made a cake with Mum and youngest helped me with some hedge processing in the garden.
In the afternoon, Gill took the boys into town and I went to the University to attend a lecture by Professor Uta Frith about how autism helps us understand how our brians work. I had got the room number BO20 in my memory, and hadn't sussed that it was in the Psychology block. I asked someone if they knew where BO20 was and they told me it was in Biology, where all the room numbers start with BO, apparently. I went looking round Biology but didn't find the room. I eventually found someone in a 'help' office and after another 10 minutes looking through the University website, they found the lecture... in BO20 in Psychology. But by this time I would have been at least 15 minutes late so I cycled home.
But I made good use of the time, I popped into the old chap on Windmill Lane who wanted help removing a cherry tree trunk and asked him if he'd like me to do it in ten minutes... he was delighted so I cycled home, picked up my chainsaw and went back to him. The job was actually much easier than I thought it would be. The difficult job was getting the log to the front of the house, but I walked it end over end. He offered to drive the thing round to mine, I accepted as I don't think my trailer would have coped with such a heavy and long load. I don't do that very often.
I cycled home and cooked some pasta and had the remains of the tomato and trombone squash thing, and Gill and the boys arrived home, having eaten something in town.
At 7pm I set off for a long-arranged meeting with Di, a new Transitioneer, who wants to start a Huntington and New Earswick Transition group. I popped in on my friend Keith on the way, to pass on a message from two of my friends from long ago who want to be in touch with my old partner, and Keith said he'd pass on the message. The meeting at Di's was good, her neighbour Angelica came too and we had a good talk through what would be a good way of starting a local Transition group.
I left soon after 9.30 and got home at 10ish. A bit of a fraught evening as I have a dilemma about what I'm doing this next weekend. I have arranged to do one thing and now there's a chance to do something else... decisions decisions...
In the afternoon, Gill took the boys into town and I went to the University to attend a lecture by Professor Uta Frith about how autism helps us understand how our brians work. I had got the room number BO20 in my memory, and hadn't sussed that it was in the Psychology block. I asked someone if they knew where BO20 was and they told me it was in Biology, where all the room numbers start with BO, apparently. I went looking round Biology but didn't find the room. I eventually found someone in a 'help' office and after another 10 minutes looking through the University website, they found the lecture... in BO20 in Psychology. But by this time I would have been at least 15 minutes late so I cycled home.
But I made good use of the time, I popped into the old chap on Windmill Lane who wanted help removing a cherry tree trunk and asked him if he'd like me to do it in ten minutes... he was delighted so I cycled home, picked up my chainsaw and went back to him. The job was actually much easier than I thought it would be. The difficult job was getting the log to the front of the house, but I walked it end over end. He offered to drive the thing round to mine, I accepted as I don't think my trailer would have coped with such a heavy and long load. I don't do that very often.
I cycled home and cooked some pasta and had the remains of the tomato and trombone squash thing, and Gill and the boys arrived home, having eaten something in town.
At 7pm I set off for a long-arranged meeting with Di, a new Transitioneer, who wants to start a Huntington and New Earswick Transition group. I popped in on my friend Keith on the way, to pass on a message from two of my friends from long ago who want to be in touch with my old partner, and Keith said he'd pass on the message. The meeting at Di's was good, her neighbour Angelica came too and we had a good talk through what would be a good way of starting a local Transition group.
I left soon after 9.30 and got home at 10ish. A bit of a fraught evening as I have a dilemma about what I'm doing this next weekend. I have arranged to do one thing and now there's a chance to do something else... decisions decisions...
Spent most of the morning doing York Green Festival stuff on the computer, but got up and out and about before midday. Also got an email from the Press with Martin Burton's phone number, from Zippo's Circus, following my letter being published yesterday and a reply due to be published today... I rang Martin Burton and thanked him for his offer of showing me round the circus animals, and he said that my letter didn't have any of the usual rhetoric some of his opponents came out with, and that I had obviously thought about the issues. He invited me to come with a friend or my wife, and to ring him back when I have decided which performance to go and see.
Gill came back from Art with a partly done copy of a Klee, who she described as being not nearly as good as our youngest, who continually draws and doodles, all brilliant stuff.
After lunch I did some more work in the garden... shredding some greenery which Gill had pruned out, putting a load of shredded paper which Ben had brought from work onto various heaps, going to Country Fresh to buy eggs, potatoes and tomatoes, and pick up two boxes of compostables, Freshways for one bag of similar, and then came back to help Gill in the kitchen... peeling potatoes.
Gill watched a trailer for the film Garbage Warrior on my computer and told me I must go and see it, so I headed to Derwent College to the Archetecture Society meeting which was a showing of the film, about Michael Reynolds, the designer of the 'Earthship' concept, homes built with waste materials such as rammed-earth tyres, beer bottles, plastic bottles. It was an excellent film, very inspiring. I had seen various bits of the New Mexico homesteads on other films and programmes, but this film was his story, told by him, including lengthy battles with the authorities to allow the continued building of his projects. The bit I most enjoyed was his discussion of the importance of experimentation and the value of making mistakes.
After the film, I said a little about York in Transition and invited people to take a card and sign up to our newsletter. I also went to the bar with a group of about 6 of them, and had some intense conversation there too.
I got back soon after 10 and later Gill showed me the film she'd got in her camera of the boys and their friend feeding the fish over in Pocklington, and our youngest pretending to be Bill Oddie tracking the 'wild humans'. Very funny!
Gill came back from Art with a partly done copy of a Klee, who she described as being not nearly as good as our youngest, who continually draws and doodles, all brilliant stuff.
After lunch I did some more work in the garden... shredding some greenery which Gill had pruned out, putting a load of shredded paper which Ben had brought from work onto various heaps, going to Country Fresh to buy eggs, potatoes and tomatoes, and pick up two boxes of compostables, Freshways for one bag of similar, and then came back to help Gill in the kitchen... peeling potatoes.
Gill watched a trailer for the film Garbage Warrior on my computer and told me I must go and see it, so I headed to Derwent College to the Archetecture Society meeting which was a showing of the film, about Michael Reynolds, the designer of the 'Earthship' concept, homes built with waste materials such as rammed-earth tyres, beer bottles, plastic bottles. It was an excellent film, very inspiring. I had seen various bits of the New Mexico homesteads on other films and programmes, but this film was his story, told by him, including lengthy battles with the authorities to allow the continued building of his projects. The bit I most enjoyed was his discussion of the importance of experimentation and the value of making mistakes.
After the film, I said a little about York in Transition and invited people to take a card and sign up to our newsletter. I also went to the bar with a group of about 6 of them, and had some intense conversation there too.
I got back soon after 10 and later Gill showed me the film she'd got in her camera of the boys and their friend feeding the fish over in Pocklington, and our youngest pretending to be Bill Oddie tracking the 'wild humans'. Very funny!
I got up early but not as early as Gill who had got up and fixed the flat tyre which happened last night, and I cycled the boys to school.
When I got back I went into the garden to construct another pallet compost bin, or rather re-construct it in a different place, and refill it with fresh stuff (fresh is the wrong word of course).
At 11, as pre-arranged, Toby an English Student from University of York came round and we talked about my 'green' lifestyle and then had a walk down the garden to see the fruit trees and composting systems. He's having a 'green week' and writing about it for the student newspaper.
After lunch bombed into town and got a trailer load of compostables and visited the Building Society to get several cheques out, and got back in time for picking up the kids.
Several people are leaving York whom I will miss, including a lovely Oriental Brazillian lady who I chat with who picks up a child, not her own, and she gave me her and her husband's contact details back in Sao Paulo, also an Oriental family from Austraila are leaving, and we will miss them too.
Back at home I refilled the newly constructed compost bin and gratefully accepted Gill's offer of home-made Pizza and potato salad for tea, and then got ready for the York Green Festival meeting.
I picked up the Space 109 keys from the Blue Bell and let myself in, a good meeting was had, very fruitful. Afterwards, after giving the keys back, found a load of cardboard tubes which I thought shouldn't be landfilled, so brought them home to put on Freecycle. Re-Use is so much better!
When I got back I went into the garden to construct another pallet compost bin, or rather re-construct it in a different place, and refill it with fresh stuff (fresh is the wrong word of course).
At 11, as pre-arranged, Toby an English Student from University of York came round and we talked about my 'green' lifestyle and then had a walk down the garden to see the fruit trees and composting systems. He's having a 'green week' and writing about it for the student newspaper.
After lunch bombed into town and got a trailer load of compostables and visited the Building Society to get several cheques out, and got back in time for picking up the kids.
Several people are leaving York whom I will miss, including a lovely Oriental Brazillian lady who I chat with who picks up a child, not her own, and she gave me her and her husband's contact details back in Sao Paulo, also an Oriental family from Austraila are leaving, and we will miss them too.
Back at home I refilled the newly constructed compost bin and gratefully accepted Gill's offer of home-made Pizza and potato salad for tea, and then got ready for the York Green Festival meeting.
I picked up the Space 109 keys from the Blue Bell and let myself in, a good meeting was had, very fruitful. Afterwards, after giving the keys back, found a load of cardboard tubes which I thought shouldn't be landfilled, so brought them home to put on Freecycle. Re-Use is so much better!
