Human Lifestyle

I took our youngest to school and came back in good time to get myself ready to go to work in Harrogate, for their CarFreeDay activities.

I got the 10.11 train and was met in Harrogate by a camera operator from BBC Look North who wanted to get some footage of me advertising the event. So we walked to the St Peter's Church and I got changed into Professor Fiddlesticks and went outside to unicycle around and invite people into St Peter's to see the exhibition materials from Sustrans, the Christian Ecology Network , FoE and others.

As I finished doing the unicycling around, the group toddle arrived... actually a group of about 10 mums with pre-school kids in push chairs and buggies. I don't know where they'd walked from, but they were the sort of 'customer' who might usually go places by car. I was expecting a school group to entertain but it turned out that the youngsters were these pre-schoolers! So I did a half-hour show aimed at the mums, Vicar and his helpers, and the CarFreeDay volunteers... which seemed to go well.

Then Yvonne invited me to come to lunch... which I wasn't expecting. We went to a mock-French place and the service was slow and several people didn't get what they asked for. I had a tomato soup and baguette 'pizza'. Thanks to Malcolm Margolis for this. At least the long wait allowed us to chat!

Back to St Peters where the displays were starting to be taken down, and I chatted to a nice couple called Rachel and Dan, with a cute baby, and an enthusiastic chap called Lee and his friend Adrian...

I went to get the 3.05 train but missed it by 3 minutes so read my NewScientist and got home before 5. On the Leeds 'Look North' there was a brief mention of Professor Fiddlesticks, see
http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediaselector/ondemand/england/realmedia/looknorthyorkslincs/looknorth?bgc=C0C0C0&nbram=1&lang=en&nbwm=1&bbram=1&ms3=6&ms_javascript=true&bbcws=1&size=16x9&bbwm=1#
It's about 3 minutes 20 seconds in...

Later in the evening I got a call from a friend/neighbour who had a bust-up with her 17 yr old daughter and she'd locked her out of the house, partly as the daughter had some large chaps with her and Mum was not feeling safe. I negotiated that the daughter came in, got her overnight stuff and rang one of her brothers who said he'd let her sleep over for a night. I stayed in the house whilst the daughter got her stuff together and left. Happy families eh?

Nearly finished my column on Electrics and Gadgets, but it's too long so will edit it down tomorrow.

I took our youngest to school. I came back to have an interesting discussion with Gill about blogging, and then we were both invited to have a coffee with our friend and neighbour Maria, and some of the conversation continued there and Maria was able to put some of the issues into perspective which was good, and the chat helped us both.

Lunch with Gill and then down to the station to pick up a visitor from London who is up in this area because of business, but had booked to see YorkLETS members to offer us some software which should help us run the system quite a lot better. We walked through York, stopping for a coffee at El Piano, and then walked on to St Nicks as I had to have a chat to John about tomorrow's work I have there, with a bunch of school children who are visiting on an 'Eco Day'. I'm working 10 til 2 and we had to talk through what was needed re times and activities.

Then back home for a few minutes before walking round to Ben's to have a look through the software. We were impressed and will be debating the situation at the next Core Group meeting.
Our visitor had a bite to eat with me and Gill and then headed back down south, getting a lift to the station with Ben who drove down to collect his partner Jill.

Got a lovely email from a supportive friend regarding the turbulent times we've had this weekend. How good it is to have friends like we've got. Life would be much tougher without them.

Enjoyed watching Bruce Parry in the Amazon, despite all the puking. Started writing column on electrical stuff and gadgets but got distracted looking at energy websites and similar.

A good start to the day as was woken by noise from boys, but HAPPY noise which was good, not fighting but playing!!! As the weather was good, went into the garden and did the inevitable compost heap management!

After lunch went to the York Rotters 'end of year party' at St Nicks. Catherine had compiled a quiz (I wonder if this was in work time???) and after a 'go round', which was a bit like a 'composters anonymous' meeting, we were asked to pick a coin out of a bag and look at the date on it and tell the group something from that year which we remember. I got a 1985 two pence and told people about my time at college when I was 19 and had an experience which resulted in me turning 'green'. Then we got into teams and our team won! We could choose a prize and I chose a little packet of chocolates over a ceramic compost caddy or an insect hotel... I particularly enjoyed this meeting as my competitively-green CRAG friend Robin was there with his little boy and his dog, also my mad-keen-on-composting friend Jo, over-enthusiastic-about-everything-green friend Chris and even our lovely Lib-Dem (shortly to defect to the Green Party?) Councillor Andrew. I also met some new Rotters, two of which I teamed up with to win the quiz. A good accumulation of Rotters, very jolly. Thank you Catherine for organising this.

I picked up a log on the way home and delivered this to home before cycling down to Country Fresh and picking up a sack of manky lettuce and a big box of other compostables... and bought some cranberries and potatoes, plus some kiwi and oranges for my friend Debbie. I popped in to Debs on the way home and had a 10 minute chat with her and her daughter, always a friendly welcome here.

I do feel lucky with my social life. This is a real benefit about living in a city, there's lots of opportunities to visit people and socialise.

A late tea... quiche and potatoes... and during the evening I started to compile a log of all the composting outreach work I've done in the past year, going through my blog, day by day, and noting all the stuff other than doing my own garden compost into a file, which when finished, I'll send to Catherine for her records. A very slow and tedious job... but interesting too!

Was woken early.. well earlier than I would have liked as Gill wanted me to take the boys into school, so we set off at 8.30 and I got them to school and got back at 8.50, but as was so tired, went back to bed and tried to go to sleep. I'm not very good at going back to sleep once up (infact I don't get to sleep well unless absolutely exhausted) but I lay there after reading NewScientist and drifted off... and had what I now know of as a 'lucid dream', where the dreamer is partly in control of the dream, and aware of it after waking. I read about different states of consciousness in NewScientist a few weeks ago and it was then that I realised about lucid dreaming. This one was about learning to water ski, using my feet not skis, and then going up a ramp and having to jump but worrying about banging my head as the ramp was under a bridge. I went up the ramp and went so high I flew up in the air. In the dream I cannot remember landing so I don't know if I survived or died... it was a pleasant experience, and when it ended I got up refreshed and very aware I had been partly directing the dream. Weird!

I then went down the garden to try to finish off the hedge processing... and I did get one stage of it done... there are now no more huge lumps of hedge waiting for initial cutting up. Now I just have a pile of cut hedge pieces and a big pile needing shredding and an enormous pile of sticks needing to be cut up so that they can be bagged up for drying.

Came in at 12.30 and downloaded my emails. Got another from 'Dr Evil' who obviously thinks that there is some type of competition going on, as she posted 'Dr. E:1, The Prof:0... and I just don't understand quite what her problem is. If I don't like reading something, or watching something on telly, I don't read or watch it. So I don't watch horror movies or stuff with violence, nor do I read blogs about cars or cooking meat... it just wouldn't interest me, and I certainly wouldn't complain, as I firmly believe that it is an individual's right to watch scary films or get thrills from cars, regardless of my opinions which are just one person's opinions. 'Dr. Evil' thinks that her opinions are important; I agree they are to her, but not much to me, and I suggest she stops upsetting herself by looking at blogs with content which disagrees with her. I still wish her no harm or hurt, and believe that she has been damaged by society or some event in her past. However she does have responsibility for her actions today and I would respect her more if she would not post anonymously.

However her comment yesterday did make me think about why I post this blog. I started because I wanted people to know how someone lives with a low carbon lifestyle, growing some food, using renewable fuels, participating in community and having lots of supportive friendships, but now it is less that and more a way for people I know to keep in touch with what is happening in this household.. and it is read by friends in the UK and US, relatives in New Zealand and family members... as well as anyone else who wants to read it. And I really enjoy writing it... I wrote a daily diary for 20 years and this has now taken it's place.

I got the kids from school and then spent some time oiling their bikes and pumping up tyres, as they seem to be slow... well the youngest anyway. Then split logs for a few minutes, and came in and cooked a quite inventive meal of vegetable spaghetti (a squash which when cooked kind of fluffs up into fibrous 'spaghetti' like threads, with a beans and cheese covering and small potatoes, boiled yesterday and put on the woodstove tonight and crisped up in a frying pan. Was very interesting!

During the evening I prepared some free pineapple for drying and did some preparation for another column subject which has to be in by the first few days of Feb.

I got another anonymous comment on the blog from the same person, who's decided to drop the Dr. Evil moniker this time, who assumes that Gill works and does most of the childcare, and that having a blog is just an ego trip. Well she ought to know that I earn the money and do quite a bit of the childcare... perhaps not as much as half, but plenty more than some Dads do. And I'm very happy that my low-income and part-time work means that I have time to prepare renewable fuels and not have to pay loads for electricity and gas. She may know the phrase 'downsizing' which I have not had to do as I have never been up there with the high earners and highly stressed folks! I feel I have a very high quality of life and can therefore cope with any criticism from folks who probably don't understand how satisfying it is to live a 'green' life.

Oh, and I have worked out who the anonymous Dr. Evil is, too, as this latest message, which I won't publish as it's rude, gives me another clue. I am suprised though as she is friendly to my face. A pity really that she's reduced to posting anonymous defamitory comments! She won't get another mention on this blog and I hope she continues reading and perhaps gets inspiration to green-up her life, which is one of the aims of having a blog. Maybe she should write one, and I could write kind comments about her talents!

Had a lovely happy evening with the stove and Gill who was feeling a bit better than earlier as she'd managed to have a sleep.

Not a bad day... spent some of it in the garden... had meant to go to the lottie but the garden beckoned and I did more clearing up and some hedge removal, shredding etc.

After lunch went with boys to Heslington to first see Melody and Simon for an hour. Gill arrived with the Bakewell Tart she's just made and we then went to visit our German friends who are moving to Leamington Spa in a few days. Our boys are friends with theirs, and Katrina and Ulrich are both 'Green', he works for HDRA/Garden Organic and she's a researcher currently looking at invasive plants. Several other people came to the afternoon's soiree, it was very jolly.

Left at about 6pm and zoomed home to light the stove and do a bit of tea for the boyos.

A quiet evening, good film 'The Queen' which was good, then a film/documentary about Greenpeace on C4+1.

Not such a hugely busy day, but got lots done, including a lie-in til 9am!

Then at 11 we had visitors who stayed a couple of hours and then after lunch Gill went out with the boys and one of their friends to the Castle Museum, as I had a few visits round town to do, including a couple of compost pick ups, signing a couple of YorkLETS sterling cheques at Liz's and a pop in to Cycle Heaven to see if they've got my new bike priced up yet...they hadn't.

Then onto see my friend Anita who's got a stiff neck and had requested a massage, which I'm always happy to supply, although we have a strictly professional relationship and good friendship, we've known each other for years.

Home for tea which was pasta, and did some composting, rebuilt a pallet bin and put a load of woodchips in the base.

Various email stuff and some last minute YGF sorting out.