Human Lifestyle

I got up early as I wanted to attend the York in Transition Christmas Presents Swap at St Nicks, which started at 10am.  On the way I found a bunch of bright yellow 'Winter Mushroom' or Enokitake, Flammulina velupites.  I picked about a dozen, all quite small.

I was pleased to go as I met some good people and did two 'mini-tours' for people new to St Nicks, and I explained about the old landfill site, the beginnings of the nature reserve, the John Lally Wood, passive solar design, the two types of solar panel, green roof, rainwater harvesting, compost toilets and more.  I really love showing people round! 

I took a bottle of red wine with mulling spices, a Christmas present which we won't use as we don't drink red wine, and my usual bag of dried pea beans which I'm always happy to give out.  I met my friend Linda, who really likes red wine, and gave her the bottle.  She didn't want mulling spices, so those went on the swap table and were snapped up!  I came away with a jigsaw, a wok stand for the stove and a pair of gloves.  I gave two people some pea beans.

I came home at 12.30, Gill had gone to Scarborough on the train with our eldest and a friend, leaving the youngest at home in York.  I had lunch and spent a bit of time on the computer but then suggested to our lad that he come off his Roblox thingy and do something active.  Amazingly, he agreed and came outside and helped me move a lot of recently split logs from the front to a safe store at the rear of the house.  He kept going whilst I did some chainsawing and splitting.

Later, he asked if he could have the stove lit in the front room... and I talked him through how to do it, provided the raw materials and he did an excellent job, got it laid and lit really well.

I cooked tea... a 100% freegan tea, apart from a tablespoon full of EV olive oil.  I fried 2 onions (ones which had manky outside bits but the majority of the bulb was firm and lovely) and chopped up a small butternut squash which had a bit of damage at the stalk end, easy to chop out, a courgette which had one end going soft, a red pepper and most of 5 tomatoes.  All this got fried up on the front room stove.  I marinaded some out of date tofu (but hermetically sealed and absolutely fine) with garlic, balsamic vinegar and soy sauce, and then slow fried them in some free pumpkin oil which dates back to Out Of This World years ago, I think!  I put the mushrooms in with the tofu right at the end, and they just about disappeared.  Enokitake is a very small mushroom!  Then Gill came in and there was a request for pasta, so I boiled that on the stove.  Actually, this pasta was bought too, so not a 100% freegan meal... shame!   But a nice tea, much enjoyed.

I also really enjoyed... to the point of tears, the lovely BBC2 tribute to my favourite and now deceased actor, Pete Postlethwaite. Click here to see this on iPlayer, for the next few days only!

More fruit wrangling this evening, putting pineapple and apple into jars. And washing up, as per bally usual!

The weather was looking dismal and I was feeling tired, but I'd committed to helping with today's event.

So I got up soon after 7 and left the house at 8 to meet with other volunteers at 8.15 at the Postern Gate Hotel on Piccadilly.  I was the first there.  Julia was the second.  She is from Switzerland and is in York to do a PhD on neuro imaging... fascinating stuff!  Then Jenny arrived, and Kaj, from Finland, and Guy, our own FoE stalwart.  Three of us went to Bootham Bar and gave out leaflets about the Car Free Day; the leaflets had information about the extra two traffic-free streets today, Micklegate and Fossgate, and the entertainment that was timetabled, plus the attractions which were admitting car-free travellers at a reduced rate or for free.  It rained constantly, and our leaflets got wet, but lots of people took them.  Quite a few people said they didn't know about the day, but two told me they had noticed less motor traffic on the roads.

Then I went to Millers Yard and picked up the sacks of squashed halved oranges, and came home.  I had just 10 minutes at home, time for a coffee, and I cycled back to go to Micklegate, with my balloons.  I'd been booked to do circus skills, but there was no way I could do that in the rain. But balloons can be modelled in almost any weather.  Trouble was, there were not that many people walking down the road, and only a tiny percentage of them were suitable candidates for balloon animals.  But, I must have given out a dozen or so.  It rained continuously, although mainly drizzle rather than 'proper' rain.  Some good conversations with Kaj, who is a linguist and loves accents and language.  I left at 11.30 and visited Fossgate where I was pleased to find the traders had put stalls out into the street and it was a lot more vibrant, despite being damp.  I came home and had lunch and some quiet time, cracking nuts and doing the washing up.  But soon after 3pm I went back to Fossgate with my bag of balloons and stood with a school sustainable travel person under a gazebo, darting out to give out balloon animals to parents with small children (using the device 'Excuse me, but do you know anyone who likes balloon animals?').  I enjoyed listening to a guitar player called Richard Harrison, and then later a pair of young sisters playing the Sax and Clarinet, the Frankland Sisters, aged 12 and 14. They were very good, and played things like 'Singing in the Rain' and 'Mud, Mud, Glorious Mud'.

It began to rain very heavily and at about 5pm I came home.  Very wet, very exhausted, feeling deflated and in need of bed rest.  However I didn't manage to get the early night that I would have liked.  I made my own tea... 3 slices of the huge Tromboncino squash, half an onion, some nuts all fried up on the stove top, then I added a sliced huge 'beef' tomato straight off the plant, and some pasta left over from yesterday, and some old Edam cheese which the children now claim not to like.  I spent some time on facebook, and got a message from a friend who told me that a scan had found a tumour on their liver, which kind of put my low mood and tiredness into perspective.  I went to bed at 9ish, intending to get up a bit later and do stuff, but I slept right through.

I slept in and when I got up, my top dressing had come off revealing a neat pair of 'butterfly sutures'.  It isn't clear whether I have normal stitches as well.  Gill replaced the gauze and attached it with tape.

So I had a sedentary day, mostly.  Wrote my piece for the Ward Election newsletter, and dealt with more fruit.

Later, I installed a dalek compost bin which came home from Lord Deramore's minus it's lid and basal door.  I used a load of bits of rock and concrete to block the door hole and I'll use something to put on the top.  I half-filled it with the contents of the medium Compostumbler, and started refilling the tumbler with shredded shrubs, shredded rotten wood and a couple of sacks of greengrocers stuff. 

I picked some beans for tea. I picked a lovely looking bright orange winter squash, which should keep for quite a few months.

In fact, tea was excellent.  Someone (err, was it Loony?) had suggested making a bread and butter pudding but make it savoury with layers of veg instead of fruit.  I had a thrown away wholemeal loaf, so Gill and I made an experimental meal.  The beans were chopped up and put in a dish with onion, mushroom, tomato and courgette, with herbs and a bit of bouillon, and microwaved for a few minutes to soften them.  The bread was dipped in a mix of goats milk and egg, and some put in the bottom of a greased pyrex dish.  Then a layer of veg mix, and another layer of bread, and so on, finishing with a layer of eggy bread, and some goats cheese grated on top.  This was microwaved to heat it through, and then put in the oven to crisp the top and make sure it was really well cooked.

It was delicious, a really nice meal.  We'll be doing a version of this again!

A quiet evening, wrote the minutes out for the YiT meeting last week as I had a gentle prompt from Peter that I hadn't done it yet.

Up far too early and could have done with a lie-in.  But with kids to deal with, no chance of that today.

I spent some of the day attempting to write something for the election leaflet but got some sort of block.  At 10.30 I set off to see my friend Kate, who'd requested my expertise in a couple of areas of my degree training, Environmental Health.  We had a nice 90 minutes together, talking about vermin, and how to remove and prevent, about heat loss from homes, chimneys and door frames, architectural salvage and woodstoves.  I was happy to consume a scone with jam and a coffee... and as always, enjoyed her company.  On the way home I stopped off at a chemist for Gill and then Cycle Heaven for a couple of replacement bits, and then called in on Alligator for some recyclable resources.

Home for a late lunch, after which I did some pruning of shrubs in the front.  Once the children were home, I had 2 hours nap, which was nice but I got up just before 7 so I could go to the Green Party meeting at 7.30 in town.  I didn't have time to eat.

The meeting was good, met an energy expert who is keen to stand in the 2011 elections, and we discussed some sections of the manifesto, a lively debate.  I signed a document to allow the use of the Green Party logo against my name in the forthcoming local By-Election.

I made a meal when I got home.  I had a Freecycled sachet of ready-cooked rice, home grown courgette, tomato and hazelnut, all done in a stir fry on the woodstove.  Lovely.  My sister invited me to help her run a Ceilidh in Sheffield on Sunday night, so I spent some time trying to work out the logistics of that, as I'm working til 4pm that day in York, so it's do-able!  Still didn't manage to write the election leaflet...

Not a bad day, on the whole.  I didn't get up that late but had a slow start to the day, and watched a bit of Politics Show and started doing the hazelnuts which have sat in a bucket long enough, and needed to be processed.

After lunch, I got a phone call from Freshways who had a bag of wilted herbs for me, so I collected them.  When I got back I noticed that the sacks and bags of aluminium cans I'd put at the front ready to take to the metal merchant had gone.  I asked Gill if she'd moved them but she hadn't.  So, they'd been taken, stolen, and someone else had got about £20 worth of aluminium.  The only consolation was that I know that they will be recycled, and won't be going to landfill.

Then I decided to go down to the Get Cycling show in Rowntree Park, and I called in on Country Fresh on the way there.  The Festival of Cycling was excellent.  I first looked in at the fixed stage area, where there were a lot of different unusual bikes available, and a queue of mainly families with children waiting to ride them round and round.  It looked like a lot of fun.

Then I cycled round to the main field, which had stalls round a couple of the edges and a big jump-landing bag on another, with a ramp and stunt riders demonstrating different types of jump.  On the concreted area in front of the toilet block was a toddlers cycling circuit.  Then there was a the cycle powered Scalextrix and in the basketball court, a tricycle recumbent racing circuit. 

There were the usual burger vans, ice cream vans and inflatable slide and bouncy thing.  The whole park was full of children with their parents. It had rained briefly earlier but whilst I was there it was sunny.  I met quite a few people I knew, including someone who gave me feedback about their experience of last weekend's Peace Festival.  They told a story of a particular Council Officer who had attended the event and made themselves a real nuisance, behaving in a completely unacceptable and unprofessional manner.  Amazingly, this person was not even supposed to be there in any official capacity.  However, the good news is that this person, who made life difficult for me whilst doing the Green Festival, may be retiring next year.  Maybe I should organise a festival to celebrate their going? 

As I cycled home, over Millennium Bridge and through the Stray, it rained briefly again, but not enough to make me want to cycle any faster.  I found a dead fallen tree, about 6 or 7 metres long, and it found itself attached to the back of my trailer, and I dragged it home.

I didn't do much more work outside after this, just picking up windfalls and putting a bit of shop waste  resources in a tumbler.  I helped Gill in the kitchen too, cooking some courgette and some slices of tromboncino squash, and mushrooms, to go with her pasta dish.

During the evening I finished the hazelnut job part one... removing the nuts from their frilly leaf-like sheaths.  This resulted in 5 envelopes of hazelnuts, which are now ready for cracking and rendering edible.  What a job!  I fully understand automation, but in the spirit of self sufficiency and low carbon living, I'm doing it by hand.  And anyway, it's only a couple of kilos!  Took me an hour or so.

Awake early again as the curtains are far too thin, and I got up and after breakfast went to explore the footpath behind the house, and I found some nice lumps of dry wood which I brought back in case we light the stove on Tuesday evening when it could be cold and wet.

Then Gill and I walked into Mumbles together and had a wander around and did some shopping, and found two greengrocers and a health food shop, a love spoon shop and two charity shops. We spent more than an hour out of the house... and when we got back we thought the boys hadn't noticed that we'd gone, as they were so totally immersed in their DS games. So we had lunch and then had a family conference about what to do with the afternoon. Both the boys wanted to go and play Crazy Golf, as there is a place just at the bottom of Village Lane. So we all walked down and on the way we met a friendly Australian-sounding chap called Karl, who's currently teaching physics but is interested in working in a more creative way, and we immediately hit it off, and chatted for a short while.

I'd never played Crazy Golf before, but the idea is to knock the golf ball along the concrete playing area, past or through the obstacle, and into the hole at the end. This course had about 12 playing areas, all with different shaped obstacles. We all had our own club and different coloured ball, and four score sheets and a pencil. We just totted up the number of putts we each needed to get the ball in the hole, and at the end of the round, we totted up the number of points... and the person with the least had won, and, amazingly, that person was me. Beginners luck!

This was enough activity for most of the family so we came back home. Gill had prepared some tea earlier, a mix of Bulgar wheat, finely chopped onion, mixed seeds and grated carrot, and the middles of the hollowed-out mini-marrows, brought from home. The marrows/large courgettes were stuffed with this and baked with some grated cheese on top. We had this at about 6pm and it was really nice.

Before dark I went to a hedgerow where I'd seen a lot of dead wood and came back with a bag full of lengths of stick, which I may use if we have the stove going sometime.

In the evening I added chopped cooking apple to the de-stoned York cherry plums, and Gill's going to make a crumble with it to take to George and Rhona's.

A lazy start to the day and a nice morning with Gill. We both worked inside the house for most of the day... I had assorted paperwork and admin to do and Gill did a bit more work on my accounts. I got a booking in Malton next week and to the Beverley Food Festival in the Autumn. I enjoyed reading this NewScientist article about the value of friends on social networks.

A bit later I did some work outside but really this was a comparatively uninteresting day. I harvested some ground elder for tea and rescued some broad beans from the unsold 'resources'; Gill made a nutloaf with yesterday's rice plus breadcrumbs and cashew nuts, grated carrot and chopped onion. This was lovely, a delicious tea.

The highlight of the evening was getting 74 points in Scrabble for TOILETS. Oh, and a nice chat with Kerry whom I met at the Northern Green Gathering a couple of years ago. She is currently what NewScientist would call a 'weak tie' but I think she'll get on well with another of my friends and my prediction is that we'll all meet up in the next few months. Then it will be a stronger tie. My friends are some of the most important parts of my life, and my life is considerably richer because of the assorted social networks I'm part of.

Had quite a busy morning, up just after 9 and dealt with a slight hangover by having a large coffee and 2 paracetamol, and a shower.

I needed to be in tip top condition for work... Professor Fiddlesticks had been booked by Anna, the organiser of today's 'Multi Sports Day' near the Fulford end of the Millennium Bridge, which was due to run from 2 til 4pm. So I had an early lunch and got going with my bike trailer full of the usual gear at just after 1pm. I also took a couple of bags of dried apple rings for the LETS stall, and the York World Naked Bike Ride leaflets.

Stuff was already happening when I got there, and I secured a place on the path with my bike propped up against a lamp-post and immediately there were youngsters wanting to have goes on the unicycles. So I was busy for over 2 hours, unicycling and helping people with the 4 wheel unicycle, 2 wheel unicycle and occasionally the one wheeler. Oh, and rewarding people with balloons and doing some unicycle and devilsticking demos.

But it wasn't a perfect day... we had gusts of wind, strong enough to lift up some of the gazebos, rain showers and even a hailstorm, but several nice patches of sunshine. There were at least 100 people there, possibly up to double that, and it seemed that everybody had a good time. I was pleased to see quite a few of my friends, including Tony my WNBR friend who had collected the Yorkshire WNBR leaflet, half of them for Sheffield, half for York, and he'd also got some flags. These will be available on the York Ride, at a slightly discounted rate.

I packed up soon after 4pm as I'd had a phone call just before I'd set out from Randall, who wanted me to help fill in a Risk Assessment for the forthcoming CarFree Network Street Party, and he was due to come round at 5pm. I got in at 4.50, and then got a phone call from Rand saying he'd been moving paving slabs around with his bike trailer and would prefer not to have to cycle from Acomb to Hull Road... so could we do the meeting by Skype?

So we had a 1 hour 45 minute Skype call, filling in the documentation and raising several important questions. At the end of it Gill gave me a bowl of home-made celery soup which was delicious, and then home-made 'stuffed crust' pizza with salads, also delicious. Gill is an awesome cook, and knows it, and loves it. She's always saying how much she likes being a mother and looking after us. We are all damn lucky.

I visited Ben as he had offered a CFL bulb on freecycle which would fit our ceiling light socket in the front room (downlighters) and he also might have a solution to my shaver conundrum. He'd found a large heavy transformer, a box with knobs on which changes mains power to whatever voltage you set the dial at, and analyses whether things are shorting, etc. In return, I'm taking a box of waste metal to the recycling site for him.

Later I did the washing up and sorted through the bananas and set about 30 of them to dry, and left my shaver charging on Ben's machine.

Upbeat day, although spent the morning on the computer catching up on yesterday's conference.

Then after lunch I took two medium sacks of seed compost down to St Nicks as Ivana had asked for some more. She also gave me the cheque for doing the Extreme Composting talk last week.

I cycled out of the back of the nature reserve to the Council depot, Hazel Court, with two broken toasters for their WEEE recycling. No hassles here this time.

Then down to my building society, to put that cheque in and transfer some money into out Co-op Suma account, as we're doing another order. And then to the bank to put that cheque in and one from a friend who participates in our food Co-op. I met my friend Jenny H and discussed a possible mediation session, but she might not be the best person for the situation which needs mediating.

From here I went to Country Fresh and got two carrier bags of fruit and veg, plus one sack and 4 boxes of lovely compostables. I got home just after our eldest son did, and he helped me unload the groceries. I then got busy in the garden... I pruned two of the small pear trees, removed honeysuckle from the James Grieve apple tree, pruned a shrub (can't remember it's name), cut down some brambles and dug out a compost heap into plastic sacks, to make space for turning another. I expect I'll do that on Sunday evening.

Gill created a noodles-based tea, with mushrooms, cashew nuts and asparagus. It was delicious. She'd made a microwaved cake for pudding which wasn't her best, according to her, but I enjoyed it...

Later I rang my Auntie in Norfolk and we chatted for nearly an hour. I also enjoyed watching Professor Brian Cox on the Jonathan Ross show, quite entertaining...

A reasonable day, certainly the first part was. Our young visitor went to see one of his other York friends and our two played reasonably happily on the computer all day.

I spent the morning inside but just before lunchtime did a short stint in the garden, coming in at 1pm for lunch. I was just sorting out some potato sacks which were not worth keeping for re-use, and was taking out the nylon thread which I'd rather not put on the stove (nylon is a type of plastic) and there was a knock on the door.

I'd had a message yesterday from the wife of an old friend saying they were passing through York today, and might pop in. I replied saying great, what time, and if they could ring me first and warn me that they were on their way, I would be ready for them.

But they arrived unexpectedly and yes my hands were covered in slimy potato sack. But it was good to see them; I've known Glenn since I was 18 at Nene College, and Joanne is his wife and has recently booked me to do a Fiddlesticks appearance at her school where she is head of science. So, despite composty hands, it was lovely to see them. I cleaned myself up and made hot drinks and for over an hour and a half we chatted, covering a lot of ground.

They left after half two and I had my lunch. At 3pm our guest came back and there was a lot of excitement before it was time for him to be taken back to the station to get his 5.30 train back to Leamington Spa.

I did some stacking... logs I cut yesterday got stacked on pallets down the garden where they will dry for a year or two before being transferred to the stacking area outside the front door for a final drying, under cover, before converting into heat.

I had spotted that my prize-winning pumpkin which has sat on a kitchen work surface since harvesting (with a brief trip to Pumpkin Day at St Nicks, where its large size won me a 'Worm Cafe') had just started to go mouldy near the stem. So I gave it a wash and chopped it up, taking the seeds out to dry them (and to eventually remove the succulent kernel for eating), and made a soup on the woodstove with about a third of it. Fortunately only a very small amount of pumpkin was rotten, and I now have lots of onion/pumpkin and red pepper soup, and 2/3 of a big pumpkin left to do something with.

Our youngest didn't go to town, and luckily his friend from up the road rang and came round, and they spent time together playing computer games. I went out, leaving the soup cooking and kids playing, and visited Ros up the road who has some sticks and branches to dispose of. I offered to take my shredder up to her house in the next couple of weeks to render the pile into a useful material... shredded stuff for her, fuel for me.

Gill and our eldest came back and we served tea. My soup wasn't very well received. Gill thinks she can improve it for tomorrow. I liked it. I had a mushroom toastie with it.

The evening after this was best forgotten. I washed up and kept myself out of the way as much as possible. When I was needed, I tried to achieve the right mix of setting a good example as a role model whilst being a 'normal' parent/father and ensuring that boundaries are observed and that other family members are protected from violence, the right mix of hands-on involvement and rising above the provocation and threats. Life is tough at the moment.

A good day... up in time to cycle into town to go and see my dental hygienist who is very nice. I went via Morrison's where they have cash machines, as I need to pay for every other visit to the dentist.

So, a good scale and polish, and a chat... as always! Then back to Goodramgate to the newly refurbished Oxfam where I bought a big can of coffee, which has increased in price to £17. Then on to Sainsburys to get one of their delicious loaves and some mayonnaise. Home via Country Fresh where Shirley let me have two sack's worth, and to home, where I did a bit of splitting and stacking.

Lunch was good.. and an active afternoon, preparing some waste nectarines and peaches for stewing, some pears and kiwi fruit for drying, and a butternut to add to tonight's tea.

Later, did more website prep, getting ready to send stuff off to Jamie at Semlyen.net, whilst watching the Winter Olympics. I watched Panorama and was very moved by the stories of abuse directed at disabled people... this needs to be made a criminal offence the same as racist abuse. Currently, it is just 'breach of the peace' or something like that, and not much of what goes on is reported, and there have been very few prosecutions. I'll be writing to my MP about this.

Later still, more exciting snowboarding etc. Part of me wishes I'd given something like this a go when I was younger... but as a child I apparently had 'no stickability' and couldn't focus on anything. Classic ADHD, combined with my fidgeting, talkative nature, ability to annoy people and the rest. Glad I'm normal now... hahahaha!

Up at a reasonable time so that I could get to St Nicks for soon after 10am, as I'd promised to dig out the compost bay which is over-full, and it needed turning into the next bay.

I took my fork and spade down in the trailer and fully expected to have a couple of hours work by myself... peace and quiet, with the birds singing around me and an occasional dog walker passing by.

There was a lot of work to do; the composting area is a concrete base with 4 walls of breeze blocks, about 6 metres long, a metre high and about a metre between each wall. Each bay therefore is about 6 cubic metres of space. A pet shop regularly drops off sacks of sawdust and pet bedding, and this makes up the majority of the material, but I have on occasion added stuff and other people probably do too. But no-one is completely in charge or responsible.

So, I started getting the second bay ready for the contents of the first, and did about half an hour, with a short chat to Sue the Priest, out walking her dog, and anticipating the service in Doncaster this afternoon. Then I was joined by a 20 year old student, who offered to help and I let her have the fork, which is easier to use, and she worked at one end of the pile and I started towards the other, but in the middle whilst standing in the empty bay and adding to the pile that she was also adding to. We talked about all sorts of things, her history degree, her half Chinese ancestry and peoples' attitudes to race, lots of other subjects. We worked together for well over an hour. I think we shifted about a quarter or a fifth of the compost. Lots more needs doing!

I went into the Environment Centre at about 12.30 and the Eco-Active volunteers were all having lunch, and John invited me to have lunch too. I did, and chatted to a nice Chilean guy and a female student from Minnesota.

Home to a peaceful house... our youngest had gone to a birthday party and wasn't due back til 7pm. I busied myself in the front, trying to tidy up after the unwanted planks and packing wood had been almost tossed everywhere after yesterday's sorting of good from bad. I chainsawed up quite a bit more and built a good stack on the right of the door.

When I came in for a coffee I chopped up two huge onions, rejects because of surface blemishes, and slow-fried them on the stove, hoping that they would come in useful for tonight's meal.

Later, Gill decided to treat our eldest to a DVD from Blockbusters and a bag of chips from the Chinese takeaway just beyond it. So they ate together and I made myself a meal based on the onions. I had couscous (free as the bag had split), sweet red pepper paprika (made from thrown-away peppers) cooked in marmite water (to clean out the nearly empty jar) and a couple of, shock horror, bought mushrooms. Oh, and there was a 'crust' of Edam cheese left in the fridge because Gill cuts this cheese parallel to the rind, leaving a half centimetre of wasted cheese..... but not if I can help it, so I chopped that into small cubes and mixed them in just before I plonked it on my plate. Delicious! And 90% free materials... only the olive oil, mushrooms and cheese was paid-for. Even the heat to cook it was free. I really like meals like this!

A nothingy evening followed... bit of telly, kept the stove going as it's another cold night, played on the laptop for ages.

A really difficult start to the day, but I eventually took our youngest down to school and was pleased to have a chat with the head, who invited me to meet with her next Monday. No doubt she will tell me that the school is doing everything it can to become greener.

Anyway, picked up a few bottles and cans from verges on the way back. For me, 'green' is all day, every day. I felt pretty low today due to the shenanigans this morning, but did quite a bit of stuff around the house before cycling into town to pay the gas bill, our first gas bill with Good Energy. I pay Good Energy for our electricity and now gas annually in advance, a deal I've negotiated with them and may not be available for new customers. Although gas is not renewable or green, our annual bill with them is likely to be about £100, slightly more than with British Gas, but the extra money that Good Energy get is given back to customers who have renewable generation (including solar hot water) through their 'Hot ROCs' scheme. This is what we have to sign up for next. We have the forms already... next week I'll fill them in. I'm looking forward to seeing how much we get back! These case studies make it look promising!

I came home via Sainsburys as nowhere else does big jars of Marmite and I got one of their big loaves too, at a slightly reduced price as the label and barcode had been torn off. I popped into Freshways and picked up one bag of compostables from them, and on my way into town I'd visited Country Fresh and had two medium sacks from them.

Home to a peaceful house... our youngest had got a special mention in school assembly for his pivotal role in yesterday's class assembly. That would have made him feel good. He really deserves it.

I did a bit of ringing round to see if I could help a voluntary group I've got involved with, they need to get some insurance quotes for a site visit they want to do. So I found potential insurers on the web, and then rang to explain the situation. It took about 8 phone calls before I got to the right place. But the person in charge of the voluntary group was pleased and I hope this facilitates the site visit.

I helped a bit with tea... mushroom sauce in funny wrap things (reduced in Sainsburys!) with butternut rounds and halved pickling onions (both thrown away!) gently sauteed on the woodstove, and baked beans and a bit of salad.

A quiet evening. Played Scrabble and chatted to two friends on facebook. And washed up.

Oh, and today I did quite a bit of composting help too... a woman I know who works in a school wants me to come in and give some composting advice, and someone I know well who works in the Environment Agency also emailed me for some composting advice. How cool is that? Helping the EA with their tea-bag problem!!!

Spent the morning filling in forms and writing letters.

The rest of the day was similarly an indoor thing... I processed some 'seconds' tomatoes (OK, I lie, they were 3rds) and carefully removed anything I wouldn't eat, and made a large saucepan of soup. Gill made a pizza which was tasty. The soup will be good for tomorrow.

The highlight of the day was that my favourite musician of all time, ever, my ultimate musical hero, Brian Eno, was on TV with a series of programmes about him and his work. I don't know what it is about Eno's music, but nearly all of it transports me to a different mental state.

But, the best bit of this evening's programme was when the bit came on about his collaboration with the computer game Spore, which my children love. Gill called them to come in, and both of them were amazed... they both think the music is excellent on Spore and really adds to it. This was the first time my children have ever taken any interest in the music I like, and it was a really nice moment.

Quite a frustrating day in some ways.

Some interesting email feedback following the WeLoveTheEarthCentre meeting yesterday, some very positive, others less so. But nothing horrible, just stuff which took time to read, and as is my wont, I reply to everything, politely and carefully. Sometimes composing an appropriate reply takes a long time, but my view is that every individual is worthwhile, has a right to their views, and deserves a hearing and a polite but honest response.

Hey ho... was on the computer til midday.

But then I had a couple of Freecycle things to do, one person asking for cacti accepted my offer of a few Bryophyllum plantlets, which grow on the leaves of the parent plant. So I put some into a film canister and got my bike and set off to Burton Stone Lane, which is about 20 minutes cycle away. On the way I met John from St Nicks and had a nice chat, and then went on my way. I got to my destination... and realised I'd left the film canister at home! Duh! So, I cycled all the way back, collecting some logs on the way, so this journey wasn't completely wasted. But halfway back, my chain broke. Oh no! I had to walk the rest of the way home. Grrrr...

So, got home, admitted my error and bad luckto Gill, and borrowed her bike and did the whole journey again. I love cycling but I'd have preferred to do this 40 minute trip once, not twice, and not to have used Gill's bike as it isn't good for my knees.

When I eventually got home, after dark now, I went to pick up a broken colander which was offered on freecycle, which I'll use to do the University of Plymouth and Garden Organic 'compost beasties' survey. The idea is to put some compost in a colander, in a funnel, with the funnel in a jar of vodka. The compost is then subjected to several days of shining a warm light onto the top surface, which drives the beasties downwards, to their alcoholic death and then being sent through the post to be identified. This has never been done before, so I'm happy to be contributing (well, about to contribute to) this scientific research.

When I got in from this, we'd had a visit from the friendly Environmental Health Officer. Before Christmas, someone had complained they'd seen smoke coming out of our chimney, and complained. We live in a Clean Air Act zone so homes may not emit smoke except for the first 10 to 20 minutes of lighting the fire, and householders may only burn 'authorised fuel' or have an 'exempt appliance', which is what both of our stoves are. We hadn't responded to this letter... I had been busy and then the letter had got buried in a pile of stuff, and anyway, we knew we were ok, so we just let it go. The complainant had complained again, so she visited. She was happy to see which models of stove we had and my method of drying the wood, and she said that the occasional aroma of woodsmoke was not a problem, only actual smoke coming from the chimney. She also said that she had a woodstove, and understood why we had them. A good visit!
City of York Council have a leaflet explaining this here (pdf), on their webpage, and there's a list of exempt appliances here. If you want to see what other people think about your stove, or a make of stove you are considering getting, check out WhatStove which is an excellent resource.

Gill was experimenting with making pasta. We had her home-made tagliatelle for tea, with broccoli. It was very good.

I had a quiet evening in, more Earth Centre stuff, and other things including a Fiddlesticks booking in Malton at Easter and confirmation of another couple of bookings in the Summer in Leeds. Good, need the work! However cheaply we live, we do need some money to keep things going...

A good day, relaxed but seemed to get a lot done. Gill rang me from town and woke me up (!) so I got up and made up the stove and did some woodpile building out at the front.. keeping warm is the priority at the moment!

But when Gill came home, she realised that our eldest had left something at home that he should have had at school, so I cycled it in... only to be told that they were finishing at 1.25 and he wouldn't need it.

So I went down to Country Fresh and then Freshways, and came back with an ENORMOUS load of compostables... just as soon as the snow goes, I'll have to make a new pallet heap for all these sacks and boxes of stuff, which are currently just frozen solid awaiting 'disposal'.

The boys were very excited and hyper as Gill has bought tickets for Avatar tomorrow.

I helped Gill make tea, roast potatoes and nutloaf and broccoli/cauliflower... simple and delicious.

I jarred up more bananas and later put 61 fresh ones on the stove drying racks.

A good day.

A late start... it is still the holidays!

And a peaceful day... the boys had been invited to a birthday party at 2pm, so I got the sledge out of the garage after lunch and Gill walked down to Heslington with them, and she stayed there til the party finished at 6.30. Simon and Melody took their son and the three invited partygoers sledging on the hill on Low Moor near the allotments whilst Gill chatted to Natalie.

I prepared a meal for myself and Gill (couscous, onion and leek, stove-fried chunks of sweet potato, broccoli, and cranberry sauce for Gill, pesto for me) and took a Fiddlesticks booking, did some emailing and Scrabble on facebook, phoned a couple of friends and did a small amount of work outside. It was very cold outside, and lovely and warm inside, so I soon came back in!

The family came back at 7, children exhausted, Gill hungry, and all was well in the Cossham household.

Another late morning but a peaceful one.

I spent time on LinkedIn, replying to a topic posted on 'The-Green-Group.com' by a guy who's developed a technology which converts 'waste' (his terminology) to 'SynGas', a type of pyrolysis or gasification, a way of heating materials and getting a fuel off them. I am a proponent of materials recycling, keeping plastic as plastic, agricultural wastes as solid carbon (and sequestering it in soil as compost), rather than converting it to something which will power cars or electricity generation... and releasing that carbon into the air. I also feel that having a constant market for these materials, to feed incinerators, will skew the economics for recyclable materials. For instance, (purely hypothetically) if it costs £100 per tonne to take plastic bottles to a recycling plant and render them into a new product, and a 'waste to energy' plant pays £10 a tonne for the same material, which is the local authority more likely to do? I don't have a problem with renewable materials (like agricultural wastes) being used for power generation, and I'm particularly interested in anaerobic digestion, which gives methane or natural gas, plus a digestate which can be composted and added to soils. BUT this can only replace our fossil fuel addiction if we rapidly cut the amount of energy and resources we are consuming. The 'Energy from Waste' proponents just want to replace coal power stations with rubbish powered ones. They are not in the game of radical reduction in energy use, per se. However, many of the people involved are in fact keen greens and support concepts such as permaculture and low carbon technologies.

Interesting discussions and hopefully some mutual awareness raising.

During the afternoon I finally got outside to bring logs from the back up to the front to rebuild the logpile on the left of the door... and we've nearly used all the pile on the right, so hardly any really dry logs left. We've plenty of old dry wood, but it's been outside on pallets and has had a wet winter's worth of rain and snow on it. It will burn, but best if it has a few weeks in the dry first. I'm stacking some round the stoves to flash-dry them... although this process reduces the warmth coming into the room somewhat, as the heat on the damp logs is used to evaporate moisture, not left as 'free' heat.

I had rescued a tray of slightly shriveled kiwi fruit from one of the shops before Christmas and today I managed to peel and slice quite a few of them to dry. I did 5 for a fruit salad and about 20 on racks on the stove. I helped Gill prepare the meal... rice and assorted veg, roast Turk's turban squash, and some felafel.

I watched a very interesting programme about how people who were affected by the tsunami felt about their faith. Despite my being an agnostic, I'm really interested in what people believe and why. This programme was good as some had come through the event without questioning God, some had questioned their faith, one person who had lost their entire family said she hated God for doing it. There were some who blamed 'Karma' for the loss of innocent lives... it was fascinating.

I got a phone call from my sister which was most welcome. I am so lucky to have the support of my siblings. They both have very different qualities and attributes, and I'm grateful for them both being in my life, and supportive and loving.

I had a long facebook instant messaging chat with a friend in Germany who is going through some difficult times. It feels good to be able to offer some support there.

A good day!

Did quite a bit in the garden and building a logpile on the left of the front door, looking out, visited Richard at Country Fresh and met a nice law student called Gita, who knew of me as 'Compost John' from discussions at the Students' allotment.

Spent quite a bit of time sorting out the stuff from there, loading up the big Compostumbler with shredded hedge and greengrocers' unsold goodies.

I had an early tea... an aubergine thrown out for no good reason, and some slices of 'nutolene' that Gill found in the loft, in tins from a Suma order years ago. They are dated best before sometime in 2008 but as far as I'm concerned, it's OK, and 5 hours later, I'm not dead. I sliced this and fried it on the stove, and made two 'burger' things with Foccacia rolls that Gilly bought, with broccoli, baked beans and some home-made coleslaw.

Then I went out to 'The Climate Connection' meeting organised by York and Ryedale Friends of the Earth at the Friends Meeting House in town. This was a meeting to give information about the path towards the vital Copenhagen talks next week, and a chance for York people to hear what some local decision makers think about it, and ask them questions.

My friend Kate Lock chaired, and the panel were Andreas Heinemeyer from the Stockholm Environment Institute, Andrew Waller who is the leader of the City of York Council, Hugh Bayley our MP, and Mike Childs from FoE. The format was that they each had a chance to say what they wanted and then faced a couple of questions before the next panellist came on. Then all four of them faced a 'Question Time' type situation.

Andreas presented his take on climate change, which as a scientist had plenty of facts and figures, but as a father, had a soft side too. I've seen him present this before and he's one of the best, very accessible and easy to listen to.

Andrew Waller had a slide show showing some of the ways which York is responding to the issues. He had just come back from the Leeds City Region Housing Strategy and learning that York is to have it's own 'Urban Eco Settlement' where the British Sugar site was. He had slides of the Eco Depot, built with straw and with an innovative automatic ventilation system, and the Clifton Moor Eco Business Centre built by The Helmsley Group. I didn't know that York has a Passivhaus, (here's a good pdf from Leeds Metropolitan University on the development) but I did know about Elm Tree Mews in New Earswick, six homes heated by one ground source heat pump and with other built-in innovations. He mentioned the Joseph Rowntree Housing Association's other eco-experiment (to-be) at Derwenthorpe, near Osbaldwick and a 1930's semi they've bought and are retrofitting to high ecological standards. Andrew then turned to the carbon emissions from Council activities and property, which they have promised to reduce by 25% by 2013 using a carbon management system. This includes a new school which is heated with wood pellets, and a campaign to get shops to keep their doors shut in cold weather, keeping the warmth in (but hopefully not the customers out!)

Hugh Bayley was on good form and he too was pleased about the 'Eco-District' to be built on the brown-field British Sugar site. I didn't make any more notes about what Hugh said, nor any from Mike Childs apart from he was talking about leadership and the power that ordinary people have to lobby our leaders. The Climate Change Act only got through because of the thousands of us pushing the Government into it.

The Question Time bit of the meeting was excellent, with a first question on population and another on economic growth. I asked if any of the panel had measured their carbon footprint and which calculator they'd used. Mike said he had done his but had forgotten what the figure was, and that he 'was doing enough'; Andreas said he'd done lots of them and they all came up with different figures, but as he refused to fly, he was pleasantly surprised how low it was, Hugh admitted it was something he was going to have to do, to be able to say whether he manages his personal 10:10 pledge, and Andrew also didn't give a figure. Kate was the only one who knew her CO2e footprint had dropped from 16 tonnes to 12 over the 2 years she was writing her book. I suggested that people try The Carbon Account as it was so easy and visual. It actually doesn't matter which one you use... what's important is that people measure it now, make changes, and use the same calculator again to see the changes. Kate added some information about the Green Streets Challenge which she is involved with (door knocking!) and there were further questions about the Local Transport Plan and a complicated one about outcomes and policy.

All together it was a packed evening, with lots of information and I really enjoyed it.

I didn't hang around for too long, and was home by 10pm. I read Gill my notes and then typed up my blog whilst listening to music on BBC 2 and then Channel 4.