TIME FOR OPTIMISM?

I received a piece from Gary, at the Green Providers' Directory and thought I would post it here, as he suggested. Thanks Gary.

The prospects for the emergence of a genuinely sustainable global economy have been given fresh impetus with the election of Barack Obama, extending beyond the well intentioned rhetoric characteristic of new administrations. I think we can be optimistic for several reasons.

Firstly, it signals a radical departure from the previous administration’s policy of denial, apathy and denigration of science. Gone too is the unthinkable prospect of Sarah Palin presiding over US energy policy, whose ignorance on scientific and environmental matters are truly breathtaking.

Secondly, the Obama administration does not regard sustainable energy investment as ‘nice to have but not during a recession’. In particular, there is a stark recognition that a reversion to old coal mining technology and a reliance on foreign oil are not in the US’s long-term economic or international interests. Investment in sustainable projects is seen as a growth opportunity that will contribute to (i.e. not dilute) the US economy, creating new jobs and new technologies. For example, the Obama administration aims to create five million new jobs by strategically investing $150 billion over the next ten years to catalyse private efforts to build a clean energy future. It has also set a target of 10% of US electricity from renewable sources by 2012, and 25% by 2025.

Thirdly, US environmental and energy policies have ramifications far beyond its borders. The old adage that when the US sneezes the rest of the world catches a cold applies not just to financial markets, but also to the global environment. As the largest contributor to global emissions, its commitment to developing renewable energy sources, cutting back on fossil fuels (which should concurrently reduce its involvement in foreign conflicts) and investment in sustainable living will naturally have the largest impact whilst encouraging other nations to follow suit. More specifically, the new administration seeks eliminate its current imports from the Middle East and Venezuela within 10 years.

Of course the Obama administration will be criticised by both sides. The oil industry, loggers, car manufacturers, arms industry, et al will claim that his ambitions are unrealistic, and that they will cost jobs – they will use lobbying, corporate influence and every tactic available to undermine him (expect to see Bush’s involvement here too). On the other side, he will be condemned by the doom mongers as doing too little too late.

The transition from the world’s worst polluter to a leading, sustainable economy will not happen overnight. Old infrastructure, corporate inertia and scepticism, vested interests and general apathy will slow down progress. However, green campaigners, long frustrated by the Bush years, now have cause to be imbued with real optimism.

Dr Gary Robertshaw

The Green Providers Directory

The Green Providers Directory is the UK's leading resource for finding green, organic and fair trade products and services. We are a not-for-profit search directory whose aim is to encourage more people to buy from ethical and sustainable sources.

In my opinion what we now need from President Obama is for him to take up Roger D's idea of a vegetable garden at the White House, as a personal commitment to a truly sustainable future for us all.

FUNNY THINGS ABOUT FRANCE

On Tuesday, we went to a lovely market in the streets of a village nearby, Castillonnès, on the top of a hill. There were people with stalls, selling their vegetables, fish, meat, plants, flowers, cheeses etc. It was freezing and I had on 3 layers under my ski jacket, and a scarf and gloves and I was almost warm enough! I bought a chicken to cook and it still had its neck, head and red comb attached and came with a little bundle of gizzards. Very French, evidently. 

 

Vegetarians beware!

We have discovered celeriac, which I often see in the Adelaide market too - you must get one to try. It is an ugly, knobbly thing but you can cut bits off, like a pumpkin, and roast them and they are really, really delicious. You can also grate it into a salad to eat raw which is also nice. It lasts for ages so you just keep cutting bits off when you want to. I also have really enjoyed endive.... a kind of stem and leaf veg like spinach, that they grow in the dark and it goes pale. I dug them at Roger D's place in Maine. We roasted them in the pan with the celeriac and pumpkin etc and I thought it would dry out but Ian assured me it would be ok and it was much better than ok - it was fabulous.

Then, there is blette, which we learned from the dictionary is Swiss chard. It is like a short, fat version of silver beet. I am going to make spinach and fetta pie tomorrow.

One funny thing is that it is hard to get raw beetroot - it is always sold boiled, on the vegetable stalls. You can get the large, round ones or large, long ones but they are nearly always cooked.

One of my favourite blue cheeses is St. Agur, which son Hugh first told me about at the Adelaide market. It costs about $75 / kg there but you wouldn't believe the price here! Ian buys a kilogram of it at a time and freezes it in pieces. You only need a little. It is less than $30 / kg and you can get it at the supermarket!! There are lots of other beautiful and reasonably priced cheeses here too and it is very difficult not to eat too much. So much local stuff is available from the supermarkets, it is very good.

There is a local baker that drives around this area twice a week, selling bread from the back of the van. We bought 2 croissants and a baguette and they were still warm. The croissants are a bit smaller than in Adelaide and generally straight, not curved, and very good. I am trying to avoid going anywhere near a patisserie until I lose a few kilograms but I do love the croissants, which come from bakers not patisseries. And the chausson au pomme..... a kind of pasty shaped, apple filled croissant.... perfect with a noisette, which is a short black coffee with a dash of milk. You can't get flat white so I am now getting used to noisettes, and sometimes they bring it with a little jug of hot milk extra , which is great.

This morning at the Villereal market it was icy cold but sunny and I was not even nearly warm, even with a woollen spencer, long-sleeved shirt, woollen jumper and my ski jacket, scarf and gloves! So we bought our chausson au pomme (for me), pain au raisin (sultana croissant, for Ian) and then Ian bought this thin paper-wrapped tube of crepes. We took them to the bar/cafe in the market square and had our noisettes inside in the warm. This is what they do, buy food from the boulangerie (bakery) or patisserie (cake shop) or pizzeria or from the hot chicken stall and then take it to the bar/cafe and eat it with your coffee. The waiter sometimes calls out 'Bon appetit', even though you didn't get the food there and will bring you a plate and hot handtowel, if like me, you get in a mess with your chicken! The bag of crepes was just that..... a bag of cold, soggy,very sweet, rolled crepes, that felt like long, fat worms.... yuk! The first French thing I haven't liked at all.

You have to be quick to get your goods from the bakeries / patisseries / sandwich shops etc because  even they close for 2 - 3 hours every day for lunch....well, you can't expect to buy lunch at lunch-time can you?? The supermarkets and all other shops except restaurants close for lunch too. Restaurants and cafes won't serve you though, if you don't get there by about 1pm. Why? They need time to enjoy their own lunch break, of course! Only foreigners would dare ask for lunch out of the time slot 12 - 1pm or soon after. Food is a serious business in France.

 

On Thursday we drove through the pretty countryside, dotted with farm houses and sprinkled with fields, edged in hedgerows to Monflanquin. It was about 12.30 by the time we got there and of course everything was shut but the streets were nice to just wander about. One shop (above, right) in this tourist village opens only from 10.30 - 12.30 then 3pm - 6pm. Another sign sat (left)  prominently on the footpath and it said in French "Due to a general lack of interest, tomorrow will not take place" !! OK, so do we all jump forward a day or what?? Yeah, lets give Friday a miss this week.... who needs it?

 

 

 

There are more photos here.

Well it’s almost cool again.

It is a lovely evening, there is little cool breeze, a lovely moon, some bright stars.

The plants are scorched and need to be cut back.

There will be a few warm days before it is hot again.

Time to prune and refresh and water, time to get on the gardening road again.

Time to enjoy the cool and make plans for our Autumn gardens.

Tomorrow we will meet together and tell tales and make plans.

We've been here before...

SAID HANRAHAN by John O'Brien

"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
In accents most forlorn,
Outside the church, ere Mass began,
One frosty Sunday morn.

The congregation stood about,
Coat-collars to the ears,
And talked of stock, and crops, and drought,
As it had done for years.

"It's looking crook," said Daniel Croke;
"Bedad, it's cruke, me lad,
For never since the banks went broke
Has seasons been so bad."

"It's dry, all right," said young O'Neil,
With which astute remark
He squatted down upon his heel
And chewed a piece of bark.

And so around the chorus ran
"It's keepin' dry, no doubt."
"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"Before the year is out."

"The crops are done; ye'll have your work
To save one bag of grain;
From here way out to Back-o'-Bourke
They're singin' out for rain."

"They're singin' out for rain," he said,
"And all the tanks are dry."
The congregation scratched its head,
And gazed around the sky.

"There won't be grass, in any case,
Enough to feed an ass;
There's not a blade on Casey's place
As I came down to Mass."

"If rain don't come this month," said Dan,
And cleared his throat to speak -
"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"If rain don't come this week."

A heavy silence seemed to steal
On all at this remark;
And each man squatted on his heel,
And chewed a piece of bark.

"We want an inch of rain, we do,"
O'Neil observed at last;
But Croke "maintained" we wanted two
To put the danger past.

"If we don't get three inches, man,
Or four to break this drought,
We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"Before the year is out."

In God's good time down came the rain;
And all the afternoon
On iron roof and window-pane
It drummed a homely tune.

And through the night it pattered still,
And lightsome, gladsome elves
On dripping spout and window-sill
Kept talking to themselves.

It pelted, pelted all day long,
A-singing at its work,
Till every heart took up the song
Way out to Back-o'-Bourke.

And every creek a banker ran,
And dams filled overtop;
"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"If this rain doesn't stop."

And stop it did, in God's good time;
And spring came in to fold
A mantle o'er the hills sublime
Of green and pink and gold.

And days went by on dancing feet,
With harvest-hopes immense,
And laughing eyes beheld the wheat
Nid-nodding o'er the fence.

And, oh, the smiles on every face,
As happy lad and lass
Through grass knee-deep on Casey's place
Went riding down to Mass.

While round the church in clothes genteel
Discoursed the men of mark,
And each man squatted on his heel,
And chewed his piece of bark.

"There'll be bush-fires for sure, me man,
There will, without a doubt;
We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
"Before the year is out."

Around the Boree Log and Other Verses, 1921
(Photo: "Pine Hut Knob", Cambrai, South Australia)

How cool is this?

Larry Gilg is very fit and has an effective sprinkler system for his garden. He's also made a large rainwater tank by connecting several small pickle barrels. Have a read:
http://www.harvesth2o.com/pedaling.shtml
(If the link doesn't work, try clicking on the title of this post. If that doesn't work either, copy the address and post it into your address bar.)

Hot tips...

1) If temperatures soar, one can always throw dignity to the wind and park one's bum in the neighbourhood creek (can you spot the Koala in the centre of the photo at Morialta Falls in the Adelaide Hills?)

2) Now's a good time to sort through the leaf litter and clean up snails and slugs before winter comes. Here's 'Russell' the blue-tongue lizard - Tiliqua scincoides scincoides - on patrol in the veggie patch. Apparently he's a 'skink', not a real 'lizard', but we like him 'cause he's a slow and careful worker in the pest-extermination business, active in warm weather. He just needs shelter in the former of old boards leaning against stone walls, rock piles etc.

3) Heat-waves are a good time to test which beans work best in your garden. There's no vegetable more miserable than beans when it comes to heat and wind! Among the bush beans, 'Redland Pioneer' is doing the best, putting out shoots in this past week and starting to flower. 'Strike' and 'Gourmet Delight' are holding their own in the heat, but 'Windsor Long-Pod' has turned-turtle and curled up - perhaps it prefers an English climate? I'm growing out the last of Kate's scarlet runner-bean seeds, and they've buckled at the knees through the heatwave, despite plenty of water and partial shade. 'Lazy Wife' beans are climbers, and they're in the hottest part of the garden and still OK. Now that is a great bean!

4) Egg-plants, capsicum, basil and rocket are doing beautifully in half-shade; they face east, and are protected from the worst of the afternoon sun by the orange and lemon trees behind them.

5) Be grateful for those things that the garden does provide. Every set-back holds some lesson.

I'm thinking that the hot weather might continue well into Autumn, so I'm planting more tomato seeds directly along the fence-line; perhaps I'll be enjoying those in salads after growing them in the shoulder-season rather than through the full heat of summer? Yellow tomatoes seem especially frost-resistant.

Watery loopholes...

Now, I can't claim to know much about Aussie girls (being married to a European) but I reckon they've all fallen for the same bloke, some chap called Jim 'Gym' Pilates, whose got his sign out the front of a place down on the main road, and dozens of young Aussie girls' cars parked out the front. I can hear Jim in there shouting at them about keeping their water up while they jump around to his orders, so perhaps they're doing some sort of indoor gardening down there?
I recall one of Jim's great ancestors, Pontius Pilates, was also pretty famous some 2000 years ago, calling for water to wash his hands any time he had to make an unpopular decision...
Nobody deserves to see me in gym shorts, but that doesn't matter. I've got the Government of South Australia to help me keep fit. I guess they hadn't counted on pig-headed old blokes like me when they drafted up the Level 3 water restrictions - they left a loop-hole! It says: "Watering cans and buckets can be used on any day/time."
Great, I say! I never use drippers or hoses with nozzles (both restricted to 3 hours per week). I can hump watering cans for up to two hours at a time, three times per day if needs be, seven days a week. At 15 litres per fill, I reckon I can move almost a tonne of water per day. And sometimes I do!