ripplestone review

The January Garden

2012-01-12T08:20:00.000-08:00

Outside, as I write, a grey squirrel is busy collecting grass and dead leaves from the untidy margins of the garden. Stuffing it all carefully into a manageable, squirrel pillow-sized mouthful, she then scampers away along the fence with it. She makes a good half dozen runs within a few minutes so I think her dray cannot be too far away, perhaps in the neighbour's trees.

On the bird table the robin is on guard, the squirrels and he are locked in a dirty swearing match over the bird seed, despite the fact that the seed is regularly topped up and, what with the squirrels and now the influx of overwintering tits, the robin's lot is not a happy one in midwinter.

January is a hard month in the garden, and it is hard to love the cold winds, rain, the rotting dank of last year's annuals, the scratching bare branches and ankle-wrenching slippery lawn. Yet it is not the garden itself that commands attention now but the weather and the wildlife.
This January is a mild, wet, gale-strewn affair, punctuated with big fleeting bright days and crisp frosts. After a dismal growing season last year, it is a relief to focus on something other than the plants. With dark mornings and early evenings, the brief daylight hours are crammed full of wildlife-watching opportunities. Being situated near woodland, the early mornings (4.30 to 5.30am) are a good time to hear tawny owls hunting. Their calls are clear in the winter air whereas in summer, these hours are full of the dawn chorus of other birds.
Bird tables, water baths and the last of the berries on bushes are busily frequented by the garden's winter birds. This year, there are blue, great, coal, willow and long-tailed tits all visiting the garden. It's easier to spot some of the larger woodland visitors; jays, woodpeckers, squirrels and foxes all pass through for the easy pickings from the feeders and bird table.
January is all about the weather too. From silent, cold mists to fierce, bright days, the low sun lends itself to the dramatic lighting of bare trees, frosts and dews. Rainbows, late morning scarlet and gold sunrises, huge moons, dramatic storm clouds and eerie, swirling low fog sweep through the garden as each day slowly creeps out longer and longer. One day a storm, the next a still blue sky.

If the garden is to be enjoyed at all, it is in the detail, the tracery of last year's leaves, the slowly emerging bulbs, the lush green of the mosses, the old seed heads and berries still clinging to bare twigs; the dry rattle of long-dead grasses and the swelling of new buds, reminding me that Spring, with a bit of luck, is just around the corner.

An International Hub Airport in Kent?

2011-11-29T03:03:00.001-08:00

This morning it was announced that the Government is looking into plans for an international hub airport in the South East.

So where, if the South-East has no option but to have a new airport, would be best for Kent? I still believe the existing airports could be utilised (see previous blog) and in Kent that means Manston, (Kent International Airport). The runway is already capable of landing the size of aircraft required for long haul to the China and Asia and expansion of this airport into an international hub that flies only to far-east destinations would prioritise this new market for the South-East.

It also means that infrastructure already in place can be upgraded meaning a quicker lead time for businesses wishing to access the UK and Europe. A upgrade of existing lines to a fast shuttle train to the Channel Tunnel Rail Terminal and Ashford International Station provides a gateway to Europe and to London. There are also an abundance of ports in Kent, not least of all Ramsgate and Sheerness, ideally situated to benefit a Hub Airport, Europe and the North-Eastern ports of England and Scotland.

Kent offers a large, skilled workforce in towns such as Ashford, Margate and the Medway Towns without the stranglehold of an already congested, built city and all the associated development costs involved with London. It brings regeneration to areas which have suffered neglect through the slow centralisation of post-industrial markets to the city and uniquely offers a superb opportunity for a lower-impact, greener, technologically innovative approach to a hub airport in the south east.
If the only alternative on offer is an airport in the Thames Estuary, built on Kent land, then I would prefer the jobs and economic opportunity to be wholly for Kent and would want the hub at Manston.

Kent and it's extraordinary historical, cultural and recreational landscape could provide a 'green city' for new and emerging world markets but it could also so easily lose out and be sidelined by the already proposed London-centric plans.

Why I am apposed to a Thames Estuary Airport

2011-11-24T03:04:00.000-08:00

By building new airports we will be contributing to the global rise in greenhouse gas emmissions, air travel being one of the worst culprits, increasing to the problem of climate change in already stricken locations such as the Sahel region of Africa and increasing the burden of support required for future generations, not to mention hindering rather than helping to meet our Kyoto and domestic emmissions targets and placing even more burden on the domestic power user.

The cost of the project raises concern as well, how much are the tax payers going to have to contribute to the billions required when the NHS, education, housing and welfare and elderly are all in such need at the moment?

Then there are the practical considerations, the chaos of the South-East road network last winter during the snow highlighted the problems faced in an already crowded South-East. No matter how many train links are built, there will still be many airport users who will be relying on their cars to get them to flights adding to already congested roads in the area and the dreaded prospect of more cars on the M25.

There is also the practicality of building an airport on or near the Isle of Grain and the marshes on both sides of the estuary. These are important sites for migrating birds and the birds are not going to simply move away from their traditional winter sites, causing bird strike hazards for every plane arriving at the airport. Marshes also help to protect the Thames itself, a natural valve for floodwater and water level rises. There will have to be, no doubt, extraordinary engineering projects to not only protect the Thames valley and London but the airport itself, all at potentially huge further cost as sea levels continue to rise due to climate change exacerbated not least by the increase in air traffic...

Which brings me to the noise pollution, increasing air traffic over the already busy South East, the fact that the train lines are pointing into London and bypassing the (hopefully soon a city) Medway Towns, the removal of the wrecks lying in the estuary...

I can see there is a desperate need for more jobs in Kent and the UK but I firmly believe that the airport, like many vanity projects before it (the cost to the tax payer of the millenium dome for one) will ultimately cost this country far more than it would eventually provide in jobs and homes and would not combat the problems our school leavers/graduates face right now.

If this country really needs more airport capacity it makes far more sense, would cost far less and have infrastructure already there to look again at existing airports.
There is a perfectly good train system to Europe from London and the south-east which businesses should be encouraged to use, cutting down pressure on Stanstead and removing the need for European flights from Heathrow and Gatwick and allowing that spare capacity to be used for long haul flights. Business should also be encouraged to use far more innovative technology to keep in contact globally, such as conference calling and the internet, providing cost effective measures in travel budgets for companies in a time of global downturn. I believe the business communities do not need more airports but a better rationalisation of the services already available and better rail network within all areas of the UK.

If new runways are unavoidable, we should look again at existing runways in the UK such as Manston, Bournemouth, ex-military airfields around London and northern airports that might provide capacity and better value for money for the tax payer.

And finally, I can't help feeling that because the site is the Thames Estuary and in the already very built-up South-East, the environmental impact on these fragile, remaining natural estuary reserves is being overlooked, I guess if it was called 'The National Thames Estuary Park' nobody would want to concrete over it.

The Garden in November

2011-11-17T05:44:00.000-08:00

Red Line Quaker moth

This November has thrown up all sorts of challenges for the garden, not least the arrival of a monstrous layer of mist and cloud that has swallowed the sky for weeks. There are the odd days of sunshine and bright skies, where the slow autumnal tints burnish deeper red and yellow. But mostly the garden is dripping with mist and lost in a dank, dull greyness that leaches the enthusiasm out of even the most cheerful of gardener.

The unseasonabaly warm temperatures have caused mayhem in the flowerbeds and a ballooning of funghi in the long, now too wet to cut, grass. Leaves lie where they fall, a blizzard of bright yellow confetti and once bare branches have started to bud again. The chrysanthemums are just about holding up against the damp but everywhere mould and rot starts to creep. Slippery paving stones turn green and black and squidgy drifts of leaves moulder untouched by even the lighest of breeze.

Buddleja is budding again. The oak in the pot lost it's leaves and is now sporting a modest jacket of green again. The wallflowers are growing softly lush and leggy. Love-in-a-mist seedlings have sprung up in a carpet of green. The camelia has an impressive set of new flower buds. Spring bulbs are emerging. If this mildness continues I might have irises for Christmas.

And what of the wildlife? Well, it's good weather for snails. The bird feeders are visited by the usual crowd; jays, magpies, blackbirds, bluetits, great tits, robin, dunnock and a small creeping wren. Collared doves and wood pigeons, a rook and squirrels are all there too.

The worry now has to be when will the cold weather arrive? Will the garden be caught by a sudden frost and all this out-of season tender new growth be burnt by plummeting temperatures? Do I wrap up the fig and camelia now and risk damp and mould setting in, or leave it another week and risk a sudden temperature drop?
Outside the sun is low in the sky, just making it through the clouds, a pale golden disk chasing the moon, wispering sweetly it's still too warm for winter yet.

World Food Day 2011

2011-10-16T01:42:00.000-07:00

Link to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN with information about World Food Day.

BBC article about the benefit of trees for crop security.

Information about TreeAid.

Independent newspaper article about the one billion that will go hungry this year.

A link to the HEWS(Humanitarian Earling Warning Service) map.

Fairtrade Foundation article on Food, Farming and the Future.

The Compendium of Games

2011-10-06T02:12:00.000-07:00

In rote and rhyme and rattles
In small mimes and giggles and stumbles
These first games played out
In baby pink and blue
Then a hopscotch of summers
Stretched out over gardens and pavements
Beaches and street corners
Chased through recs and littered lanes
Older then and the games change
No more french skipping, cat's cradle and jacks
Now cards and the roll of the dice
All hopeful glance and wishful dalliances
A whir of bikes and skateboards
Until the rules
No longer drawn in chalk upon the pavement
Change and a new game emerges
Casino neons and smoky glare
The chance, the dare
A lottery thrill of winning big
The chase, the race
The nine to five cut and thrust
Navigating the profit and loss
Until the pieces move into place
And you have won or lost
And fortune's played your hand
Now the crossword
Now the quiz show
Now a quiet game of patience
As the clock slows

It's all boxed up now, in the loft
Those games we played so long ago
A compendium of who and where and when
And how life goes

2010 ~ 2012 Ripplestone Review Biennial Awards cancellation

2011-09-27T05:26:00.000-07:00

It is with regret that the Ripplestone Review will be cancelling the 2010 ~ 2012 awards due to the increasing financial pressures caused by the ongoing economic downturn. All events/music/places etc reviewed during this period will remain eligible for the 2014 awards (which may be called Quadrennial Awards) when, hopefully, the economy will have picked up.
Many thanks to all the fanatastic places/events/music that have been reviewed in the last two years and wishing everyone the best of luck going forward.

The restorative landscape of the Somerset Levels.

2011-08-17T07:41:00.000-07:00

High across the meadow pastures, lazy in the late summer sun, swoop house martins and swallows, coursing the waterways for insects while willows scrabble along the banks below. Roads, barely above the water level, intersect the canals and ditches, meandering through villages built of mellow ham stone. Georgian and medieval houses, thatched cottages, farms and hamlets all holding back the surrounding wetland with stone walls and neat kitchen gardens.

All of this spreads out from my vantage point on Glastonbury Tor. It is one of those beautiful late Sunday afternoons, where the heat of the day is slowly rising to reveal a landscape that stretches from Dorset round to Devon and the Avon estuary then back round to the Mendip hills in the north. It is beyond picturesque, it is deeply captivating, a landscape that drinks you in, restoring the soul from the steep climb up the hill.

Of course, I am not alone, there is a delightful mix of pilgrim, rambler, coach tripper, cyclist, didgeridoo player and holiday-maker here on the Tor. Perhaps it is just the effect of the didgeridoo echoing in the tower, or the heart mown into a nearby field or the sheep grazing on the dizzyingly steep sides or the kites flying overhead but suddenly, I am filled with benevolent cheeriness and am even driven to compose a few lines of verse.

Heart on a hill beneath a tiger sky
Over rippling fields swallows fly
Footsteps echoing this path once more
All the way round Glastonbury Tor

It was a lovely start to a week on the Somerset Levels and I have detailed below some of the places I thought were not to be missed in the area.

In Glastonbury town are the beautiful ruins of Glastonbury Abbey. Try catching a talk in the Abbot's Kitchen, a vivid insight into life at the Abbey before it's dissolution. The Abbey is situated where Joseph of Arimathea is reputed to have built a small wattle and daub church in 63AD. The Holy Thorn, said to be from the bush that sprung forth from Joseph of Arimathea's staff when he thrust it into the ground at Glastonbury is also in the grounds as is the grave of King Arthur and Guinevere.

It is almost impossible to extricate the Abbey from the wealth of myths and legends it contains and so it is worth visiting Mulchenay Abbey, a nearby ruin for another glimpse of monastic life before the dissolution. For a complete example of medieval stone masonry, try Wells Cathedral. The extraordinary modern-looking scissor arches, the West Front and the octagonal Chapter House are not to be missed.

Tucked into the high street of Glastonbury is a building called the Glastonbury Tribunal, it houses the Tourist Information Centre and the Glastonbury Lake Village Museum, an interesting exhibit about the iron age village nearby, dating from 300BC and from a time when the Levels were an inland sea.

A couple of unusual but extremely interesting places are Wells Reclamation Yard and The Forge of Avalon. Pretty much anything you could ever want for your house or garden can be found at Wells Yard and worth wandering round just so you can marvel at the thought of where you would put a statue or a column or, indeed, a Russian tank in your garden!
The Forge of Avalon is where the sword-smith Richard Hoecker works. His beautiful pattern welded blades keep this centuries-old Celtic craftsmanship alive. Details of events, workshops and commissioning information are on the website.

The stunning landscape of the Cheddar Gorge, carved out by glacial melt-water, is best viewed from the top of an open bus with a guide to point out the salient features but for the more intrepid there are rock climbing courses and the 274 steps to the look out tower and cliff-top walk. The view from the top of the gorge, across the Glastonbury Tor, Cheddar Reservoir and off to Devon just about make the 274 steps worth it (and provide a good calorie-burning excuse for indulging in some cave-matured cheddar cheese afterwards).

Mountain goats have been introduced to reclaim the original landscape and form part of the varied and unique fauna and flora of this area. Within the gorge are the caves, Gough's cave in particular providing a good audio guide exploration of the cave system and it's history. The Museum of Pre-History provides context to 'Cheddar Man' and has a good hands-on demonstrations of prehistoric skills.

For days further out from the Levels, try the Fleet Air Arm Museum or Longleat (check for ticket discounts in conjunction with Cheddar Gorge).
For the beach, try Weston-Super-Mare but bear in mind the tide goes out a long, long way over mud flats. Entertainments include The Grand Pier, Ferris wheel, sand sculpture park, aquarium, kids play park, donkeys, fish and chips, promenade....

(click on photos for larger image)

Seven hot dogs and a bottle of pop please!

Pouring with rain for the week, run out of things to do, kids are bored? Then it's time to turn to man's best friend, the DVD dog. All the family fun of a real pet without the poopy scooping!

Eight Below(PG) Eight dogs left behind in the Antarctic, struggling to survive the winter. Expect tears.
Turner and Hooch (PG) A classic cop and dog comedy drama with added slobber.
Snow Dogs (PG) Miami dentist inherits Alaskan sledge dogs. Mayhem ensues.
Beverly Hills Chihuahua (PG) Little dogs, big hearts.
Marley and Me (PG) One man and his dog, oh, and his wife, career, kids...
Beethoven (PG) Just a big dog with a big brain.
Bolt (PG) Animated superhero and his sidekick-in-a-ball hamster friend on a mission to save the day.

July: The Garden at High Tide

2011-07-13T10:07:00.000-07:00

(click on photos for larger image)

July always seems like a high tide kind of month in the garden. Midsummer has passed and the swelling buds and green expectation of Spring has blossomed into the full on riot of flowers and weeds. The garden has yet to fall into the lazy stupor of Autumn, when all that green growth mellows out and chills for a while in long afternoons under gold skies. But for now, the garden is at full reach. The lawn is awash with clover and daisy. The flower beds, at any moment, will surrender to waves of bindweed and brambles and the jasmine and buddleja are in full sail.
Overhead, on clear blue evenings, swifts are hunting. This year's fledglings are still visiting the bird feeders, young woodpeckers and jays the last to arrive. Slugs, snails and spiders are in abundance. The ants have not yet flown and the bush crickets are not yet singing. Butterflies are arriving, red admirals, ringlets, large whites and the lovely hummingbird hawkmoth.

Hummingbird Hawkmoth.

Everywhere are bees and hoverflies. In the late dusk the bats flit and very soon, the dragonflies will join them in a feeding frenzy on the insects that fill the July air like so much woodland krill.

The green glow of a gloworm.

There is no time to stop, I should be weeding and deadheading and clearing and mowing and... then it rains, a heavy downpour that threatens to flatten all the flowers, only it's July and within an hour or two the garden will be swell again.

The hot friday of a London June

2011-06-10T12:27:00.000-07:00

The train slows outside the station
Long enough to let me notice
Towering over the platforms' sleek arteries
A shard of glass and steel
Holding the sky in it's nettle grasp
All around new tower blocks jostle
To London Bridge
The frantic pace of change
Echoed in the insistent alarm
And slow hiss of pneumatic doors
I alight into the hot friday of a London June

First point of call is Southwark Cathedral
A quiet stay in the fabric of passing traffic
All welcome here, even the cat
And I marvel at the wooden bosses
The icon and the poet's tomb
I rub Will's knee for luck
And pause at the door
Visibly moved by the Marchioness Memorial
But the river runs on regardless

I walk with the quick pace of a city dweller
Not the slow doodle across the pavement
Of the day tripper who stops and stares
At every blue plaque and brass doorknocker
No, I sweep pass the Golden Hinde
And into Clink Street
A detour over Southwark Road
And Bankside finds me by the Globe
Neatly thatched and insular
To the passing street theatre
Clowns and mimes and latin americana

Now I am here
Outside the Tate Modern
Industrial cathedral
With it's hallowed spaces
Of art and culture held within
A red brick certainty

A coffee and biscuit on the members' terrace
As people wander over the Millenium Bridge
And sailing dinghys ply the stretch upriver
With a breeze as sharp as Cleopatra's needle
Down stairs and through doors
To find the Miro exhibition
In the theatre of his war
Every canvas his stage
Every print a soliloquy
To art
To freedom
Perhaps to dream
An infinite blue silence
Against the outrage
Of bloody opression
No voice more eloquent
In these thronging rooms

On South Bank there's a beach
With sand and huts
And a large straw fox
It makes me laugh
The juxtapostion of this day
From surrealism to surreal
Yo!Sushi
Lunch is such a treat

Across the footbridge at Charing Cross
And on to Trafalgar Square
Where the sweet spray from the fountains
Cools the heat from my face
As light as summer rain
On the people's plinth sails a ship in a bottle
By the National Gallery a green wall grows
And here, the Olympic Clock, still ticking
Counting down my passing feet

Picadilly and the Royal Academy
Sipping Pimms from room to room
As canvas after canvas adorn the walls
In ever greater scale and price
My eyes alight on beetled buttons
And a fat kingfisher
A dog rooting in a bin
A swirling red galaxy inexorably pulling me in
All punctuated by a circle and a square
The tide of flourescent red dots
Rising up the wall
To remind me
The river runs on regardless

Now London in high afternoon heat
Heaps sweat and dust and noise on my brow
Rush hour soon as pavements swell
Under the bridge the neat rows of coloured lights
The final shattered bones of buildings
Being shored up with comedy clubs and beer kellers
And all around the commuters press ahead
To London Bridge

Against this human tide
I catch a glimpse
A face
A moment's recognition soon lost
They were heading in the other direction anyway
And my train is due

Scrambling into Spring.

2011-03-24T02:51:00.000-07:00

narcissi

After a cold, miserable winter, the arrival of the Spring equinox this week has been a blast of much needed sunshine and birdsong. With temperatures climbing into the high teens and no rain, the garden has burst into life with daffodils, primroses and the first violets and grape hyancinths budding.

clematis shoots

Everywhere are new buds and new shoots. Hoverflies and bees are emerging and the still air is draped with the shimmering threads of busy spiders, drifting lazily across the lawn.

willow leaves emerging

The birds are full song and the bird table has quite a variety of visitors. So far in the garden I've seen:

Robin, Blackbird, Dunnock, Chaffinch, Nuthatch, Starling, Thrush, Jay, Wood pigeon, Collared dove, Long tailed tit, Bluetit, Great Tit, Magpie and Rook. But there is one casualty of the harsh winter, no signs of any wrens.

magpie

The supermoon seemed much brighter over the woods last weekend and was a great chance to catch sight of the bats that fly in over the garden.

supermoon 9.00pm

This weekend sees the Kent's Big Weekend Out , let's hope this glorious weather lasts till then.

Click on photos for larger image.
More photos can be viewed at Ripplestone Garden.

I Dream in Science Fiction (short story)

2011-02-17T06:37:00.000-08:00

I open the envelope and unfold the letter, smoothing out the pages in front of me on the desk. Outside, the early evening mist is sinking low over the hedges. The house is quiet save for the muffled double-whoop of a wood pigeon echoing down the chimney.
The pages are written in crisp black ink, beautiful handwriting, a joy to read, equal margins and proper paragraphs. What was the word for this... calligraphy, no... copperplate. I start to read.

'My Dearest One,'

Immediately I stop, how beautiful, to be someone's dearest one. I glance briefly, ruefully at the envelope and wish I had used a letter opener on it, this is a letter I would keep. A letter to read and reread until the pages were turned into frail cobwebs of ink and dust.

My Dearest One,

Here I am, at the beginning of another century, writing this to you in the hope that you will understand how I came to be out here, so far from you. I don't really know how to write this, how to make this make sense so I will start with my present situation and work back and, perhaps, I'll reach a point where you will understand, where it will all fall into place.

The work here at the base is routine and dull, checking temperature and humidity on the seed-banks. Keeping the food farm productive. An endless dull routine of checks and maintenance protocols. Of course there is timetabled interaction with the others too. There are in all, four of us at any one time, to have less would be to produce an unsustainable chain of continuity so for now, four of us it is.

I am fast approaching that age when the years behind me stretch back longer than the years in front but I am not yet ready to retire to that rambling world of reminiscence and so, with the spare hours left in the day, I have been working on this letter and on ways of sending it to you.

Sitting here, from this vantage point the world stretches out in front of me solid and tangible through the glass and yet still so very far out of reach. We are a long way from returning to the earth. Such a long way to go still, did you all realise just how long? Thousands, hundreds of thousands of years. Were you all expecting some big reset button to be pressed? A sudden annihilation of those last centuries of collective guilt, washed clean by some cathartic cataclysm and then, nature would carry on as normal. Start to reboot the complex, dynamic ecosystems, build food chains, breathe life into the dead oceans, regrow the rainforests, re-carpet the grass plains. Like some magical force that would relight the candle once it had been extinguished. Did you all not once think how slim the chances of that happening were? Where else did you find life in the solar system, in the universe beyond?

There are so many papers in the archives about tipping points, reached and passed, as though the inevitable extinction of life on earth was beyond your control and yet through it all is this idea of redemptive hope, of gaia and the robustness of nature which would always mean, given long enough, life would return. Could you not for a moment, understand how infinitesimally small the chance of that tipping point back into sustainable life would be? But I am not blaming you, or trying to turn this into some moral lecture. The plain truth of it is, despite all the hope and theories, all the predictions and graphs and experiments, the planet remains barren and, to date, there has been no sign of a tipping point back to life.

Of course those last couple of centuries where you all tried very hard to predict the point at which the planetary ecosystems would reach unsustainability have a poignancy that, with hindsight, is almost unbearable because the truth of it is, you had reached the tipping point long ago. Not when you killed the last dodo. Not when there were only 1000 tigers left in the wild. Not when the last whales were culled for food, not when the last rainforests had been cleared and the great lakes were little more than malaria infested swamps. But long before, you tipped the planet over into extinction when you first decided the planet existed for you and not that you existed because of the planet.

As the top creatures in the food-chains started to disappear, none of you were too alarmed. Why would you need tigers, elephants, whales, sharks, lions, bears. Were they not the simply the dinosaurs of their age? They were troublesome, competed for resources with you, were dangerous to kill and often killed you. Those big creatures could be exhibits in parks and zoos instead. Safe behind inches of glass and steel, abstracted into an ideal of life, such as I am now, stuck here in this base. The irony is not lost on me, that all humanity tried to save the last few of these creatures, without really knowing, ultimately, the life of the zoological example would be their own fate.

Alarm bells only started to ring when it was far too late. When the globally warmed superstorms swept the planet. When smaller mammals and reptiles suffered mass die-outs. When crops failed, when some insect species died while others thrived. When disease stopped being epidemic and became endemic to human existence. When you woke up one day and discovered all that was left were humans, insects and disease. Of course, the smart money was on the insects surviving the catastrophic extinction of life on earth. If you look at the human body and realise it is a walking Petri dish of exploitation for every bacteria and virus and then add in a climate that is hostile to that body's defence mechanisms but lets diseases flourish and replicate faster than ever predicted, it was only decades before you reached your own extinction point. And the insects? Well they have to eat something and when there was nothing left, they too were turned to dust in the superstorm chaos that still ravages the planet.

So, here I am, with my three others, going about my daily routine, ensuring that here, in this ark of collected human existence we continue. Of course, over the centuries we have perfected the cloning techniques pioneered by humans and I am the perfect replica of my old self, my younger self and my infant. We still keep to a human timetable of life expectancy and growth experience, there really is no better way to mature the brain, to optimise it's functionality than through time and experience. Of course, over the years, we have extended the lifespan slightly to an average of one hundred and fifty years, any longer and the burden of decrepitude outweighs the knowledge base and functionality of the brain and body. And so we stretch, in an unbroken chain back to when this base was built to store all the knowledge, all the lessons learnt, all the saved flotsam and jetsam of the shipwrecked human world. Stored, preserved and catalogued on computer circuitry and in sealed vaults. Every sequenced piece of DNA, every word of remembered poetry, every example of human enterprise. The plan was, when earth had healed itself, we would return and insert ourselves back into the environment, leapfrog a few millennia of the evolutionary process by resurrecting ourselves at a point where we could learn from our mistakes, start again.

But it has not turned out that way. There has been no tipping point back to paradise and we are abandoned and lost here in this base for all time. So, in this short span of life I have been working on ways to send out a distress flare, back through time, to highlight our plight. A message in a bottle, a clarion call for change. To warn of what lies ahead for humanity and for the planet. For humans to stop, reflect and change before it is too late and to say, here, here is the tipping point! The final point of no return for you and all life on the planet.

I have spent many years working through the records and, with extensive computer modelling, the last point where change might be effective and scientific reasoning optimised enough for comprehension is in the 1700's when the dodo was pushed into terminal decline by human activity. A compelling example of what is to come to help prick your collective human conscience. It will give you a few centuries to mend your ways, just the slimmest chance to reach for survival. To tip the scales back in yours and the planet's favour. The technologies I am using to send this letter back in time are not so far removed from traditional human practises. Astral projections, meditations, these are techniques widespread throughout human history. The hardest part will be to narrow the window of projection back to the right century, to narrow in down the millennia of years that stretch out to this present day. Building the brain function to perform this projection through time was relatively easy in comparison.

And so, my dearest one, this is the hardest part, putting this distress call in a way that is both comprehensible to the human mind while knowing it is also a letter of farewell. Because, if this message works, if humanity can find a way to alter the balance in their favour, then all this, this ark, this last little bubble of humanity preserved out here on the moon will not be necessary and I, my three others and the base will cease to exist. So, I have addressed this note to myself, to the human me whose DNA, stretching back down through the generations of human existence, will end up as the model for the clone all humanity will become. This is it, this is the tipping point...

There is a loud thud and the double glazing shudders as a wood pigeon flounders against the glass, wings frantically beating to stop it's forward momentum. For an instant it is helpless in it's course into the window but at the last moment before the pane must surely smash, it gains lift and banks away into the mist, leaving a perfect, dusty imprint of itself on the window. The noise has jolted me to the core, as though I am falling. I glance back to the letter but now there are only thin cobwebs of black drifting over yellowing pages of paper turning into dust front of my eyes. For a moment or two I cannot work out what the noise I can hear is but then I realise, the alarm clock radio is blaring and I surface to the morning from the depths of sleep.

By the evening the dream has receded deep into my memory, just the vague uncomfortableness of a restless night remains and I turn on the tv after a microwave lasagne and a glass of wine. There is a nature programme on about how there are now only 1000 tigers left in the wild. Somewhere, far off in the recesses of my brain, this figure strikes a chord and I ponder for a moment what this figure could mean. But still, as the programme points out, there are plenty of tigers in the zoos and all kinds of plans for reintroduction, for new tiger ranges, it's not like we're going to kill them all for food or sport. It's not like we are going to treat them the way we did with the dodo, we know far better than that nowadays, don't we?

Short Story ~ Pen Pals

2011-01-14T10:30:00.000-08:00

(Another short fiction story written a couple of years ago.)

Pen Pals

I’m the first to admit it, I’m an average person. I have an average life. I have a steady job with a middle income in a middle sized insurance company. This has led to a nice house that my wife, Savannah, has turned into a home for our two kids, Alice and Jack. I’m forty three, in reasonable shape and my name is David. We have two cars and a mortgage that, with any luck, will be paid in eleven years time. We go on two holidays a year and spend every Christmas with my family. In fact, I’m so average and not worth noting that you should have stopped reading by now except….
Except that any minute now, despite me not really comprehending it, my average little life is going to change beyond all recognition and the old proverbial is going to hit the fan. Big time.

It’s Christmas, a wet, dull Christmas this year and we have just pulled up outside my parent’s house. It’s a big red brick Victorian place bequeathed to my mum by her parents and it’s where me, my two older brothers, Julian and Simon and my sister, Louise all grew up. We are the last to arrive and the drive is already full of cars. Louise is busy unloading presents and bags from her little two-seater sports coupe. Louise is two years older than me and completely not average. She’s a high flyer. A creative entrepreneur who, by thirty, had made her first million and now runs her own international design company. You’ve probably heard of her, in fact, you are probably drinking your decaf out of one her mugs right now. Good for her, I’m not jealous; in fact she employs Savannah as a home tester for her kitchen products. It’s great to have the second income but sometimes, it would be nice if Louise was just a bit more…average. Alice and Jack adore her.

I unpack the luggage after a round of hugs and hellos. My parents usher us through into the conservatory at the back of the house where my two brothers are. They are twins and are four years older than Louise, six years older than me. It’s a big age gap and we don’t have much in common. They have both been married twice and divorced once. Their second wives are the type who play golf at the weekend and do lunch in London. Lucy and Andrea. Julian is a college lecturer. Simon is an editor for a publishing house. Like Louise, they have no children; I’m the only one with kids. This, as far as my parents are concerned is my one redeeming feature, I gave them grandchildren.

The conservatory is a sprawling glass structure reaching out into the garden and full of palms and orchids and old cane furniture. Pride of place is the Christmas tree, a Norwegian spruce, covered with fairy lights and dripping with silvered glass balls and stalactites. Louise and the kids are in raptures over it and Dad is organising drinks for everyone. Lucy, Andrea and Savannah are helping Mum with arranging presents under the tree while in the corner of the room the twins are chatting in front of the TV. The TV is, as usual, on the news channel with the picture flickering from story to story, the sound on mute. I wander over to the twins to say hello and I am stopped midway across the room by the picture on the TV screen, or rather the caption running under it. It is the name that stops me, makes my heart start racing, and my palms begin to sweat. Amy Sturdle. It’s a name I could never forget.
Julian and Simon pause mid sentence and, with their strange ETP (extraordinary-twin-perception) both stare at me gawping at the TV screen, frozen to the spot like some sad middle-aged mime. Amy Sturdle.
‘David? You OK?’ ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost.’ Julian and Simon finish each others sentences as only twins or people married for years can.
‘Oh, uh, fine Julian, Simon. I think I left a bottle of Scotch for Dad in the car. Never mind…I’ll get it later. So how are you?’
‘Fine, fine.’
Over Julian’s shoulder I can see the TV screen still featuring a picture of a woman at a book signing. Underneath the caption reads, ‘Set to be an overnight literary sensation, with her first book already a bestseller, Amy Sturdle’s vivid and moving biography follows the harrowing tragic life of her childhood pen friend, based on the many letters written to her over the years. Already in talks with Hollywood…’
‘…and the children look well. David, are you sure you are okay?’ I drag my eyes away from the screen back to the twins’ conversation.
‘What? Sorry! Just wondering what the fuss about that book is. Not one of yours is it Simon?’
‘Hmm?’ Simon glances at the screen. ‘Oh, no, the Sturdle thing, no but wouldn’t have minded if it was. Set to be the book of the year and it’s barely been released. Another misery memoir but, because it has that novelty aspect, with the letters from the dead pen friend… Ah, here’s Dad with the drinks.’
I take the proffered glass with trembling hands. Amy Sturdle had written a book about her dead pen friend. The only problem was her pen friend was alive and well. Louise wanders over. ‘Are you alright David? You look a little stressed?’ She glances at the twins with raised eyebrows but they shrug their shoulders. Oh yes, Amy’s tragic dead pen pal was well and truly alive because she was the millionaire business women standing right in front of me, only Louise doesn’t know that she’s Amy’s pen friend because the person who wrote all those tragic, dreadful letters was me. I can’t think of anything to say to Louise, I’m too busy praying that Amy Sturdle changed the name of her pen friend in her book.
I need to regroup my thoughts and dash off up to the bedroom, claiming I have eaten a dodgy sandwich at work yesterday, locking myself into the en-suite where I sit, shaking and cursing on the loo. I try convincing myself it was alright, after all, who would equate the Louise in the book with our Louise. There must be loads of Louise Smith’s in the world. They were worlds apart. I could barely remember half of what I had written over the years but every time my sister had achieved some new success, my fictional Louise had some disaster.
It would be fine. I take a few deep breaths. I stop shaking. I splash water on my face. It will be fine, really.

The next morning is grey and murky but no one notices. My parents are entertained by the kids opening their presents from Santa. Everyone is busy either cooking, eating or drinking until, at 1.00pm we all sit down at the long table set up in the conservatory to accommodate us all. By now the Amy Sturdle book is beginning to shrink in my mind to little more than an unfortunate coincidence and I am temporarily lulled into a false sense of security by an ample supply of wine and turkey with all the trimmings. Family tradition has it, that after the Queen’s Speech, the main present giving takes place around the Christmas tree. I leave the present buying to Savannah, for the simple reason that she is really good at getting people what they want whereas I am hopeless at it. This year she excels herself. For mum an orchid, for Dad an almanac of world news and so on until we get to Louise’s present. It is book-shaped. For a second or two I am happy, the rosy, content, over-indulged happiness that comes from eating a good meal with your family and then Louise unwraps her book.
‘Oh, well done Savannah, fantastic choice!’ No one even pretends anymore that I have anything to do with the present buying. ‘I’ve been itching to get hold of this. Did you know I nearly had a pen friend once, years ago, when we went on that holiday in Cornwall, do you remember Mum? Anyway, I often wondered what would have happened if we had kept in touch…’ the rest washes over me as my heart turns to ice at the words pen friend. Savannah had bought her Amy’s book.
The present opening continues and Louise places the unopened book on top of her growing pile of gifts. Soon there is a blizzard of wrapping paper across the room and presents strewn all over the place. People drink coffee or champagne and chat and, on the pretext of getting up to find the TV remote, I manage to kick Louise’s book under the chair hoping that once out if sight, it would be out of mind. Later still, when Louise is engrossed in a game of ‘Articulate!’ with Alice and Jack, I retrieve the book and lock myself in the en-suite again to find out just how bad the damage is. The pale blue front cover features a photo of a silver locket opened to reveal a picture of a dog who stares at me with unwavering accusatory eyes. I start to read:

‘Pen Pal
By Amy Sturdle
Foreword by the Author
This memoir is based on the letters written to me by dear friend and confidante, Louise, over the course of thirty years. I hope, by illuminating the tragic circumstances of her life and the way she dealt with it, she will give others hope in their hour of need and that her sad death, at the untimely age of forty three, will not go unremembered…’

I stop reading. Any warm glow from dinner is turning instead to a fiery acid eating into my guts, I return to the page and scan through but there is no mention of Louise’s surname. I read the first few pages, they are all too familiar in content, the whole book being laid out in the style of correspondence but apart from that, there is little actual evidence of who Louise really is. I start to relax slightly; I might actually get away with Louise not realising it is about her. There is a knock at the door and Savannah asks if I’m coming back downstairs because the pudding is about to be served.
‘Uh, yes, just revenge of the sandwich again, I’ll be fine. I’ll be down in a minute.’
When I return to the conservatory, the room is in darkness save for the lights on the Christmas tree and the flaming pudding Mum is carrying through to the table. In the semi-darkness I slide the book back under the chair, out of sight and out of mind.

It is the summer of 1977 and I am twelve and obnoxious. There is no point denying it. My brothers are off cycling round France and it is just me and Louise left at home so Mum and Dad take us for two weeks in August to Cornwall. We rent a small caravan on a farm campsite a mile from the sea and I spend my days looking for crabs and shells in the rock pools at the beach and dripping rich yellow ice-cream down my legs while gawking at the sunbathers on the beach. That is, when I’m not trailing after Louise and making her life miserable.
On the second week of our holiday the next lot of campers arrive, a cavalcade of caravans and cars pulling trailers full of the latest camping gear. One car that arrives has a girl in it about Louise’s age. There are no children my age. As soon as they shyly swap names while buying sweets at the farm shop it is obvious that they hit it off and are soon best friends which means that as far as I am concerned, I can clear off and leave them alone. But I have other plans.
‘Other plans’ include following them and pinging them from time to time with chewed up pieces of paper blown through the case of an empty plastic biro and threatening to tell Mum and Dad every time they saunter along the harbour wall, making eyes at the local lads busy mending nets and hauling up lobster pots
for the trawlers. Needless to say, Louise and I argue a lot about my plans
for the week.
On the second from last day it rains so I trail after them to the cinema where they meet up with a couple of boys and spend the matinee performance snogging them three rows from the back. In disgust I sit behind them and decide to use bits of ‘Bubbly’ gum in my biro shooter which sticks remarkably well in Louise’s long, curly layered hair. Later, back at the caravan, Mum slowly tries to tease out the bubble gum out of Louise’s hair, it doesn’t work. As she gets out a pair of scissors to cut Louise’s hair and Louise starts to cry, I begin to realise I might well be in big trouble this time. Really big trouble.
I am grounded for the rest of the holiday and will have to pay for Louise to have a proper haircut when we get back home, out of my paper round money. I work out it will take three months of paper rounds to pay for it. Not only that, because Louise refuses to stop crying like a complete girl for a whole day, I am banned from going to the cinema again for six whole months. (It means at Christmas I miss out on seeing ‘Star Wars’ with my friends and become the only kid in the class who didn’t see it at the time.) Not good. I declare war on my sister for the remainder of the cinema ban and by war, I mean war.
Whereas I can really harbour a good grudge, Louise is the kind of girl who quickly moves on from any event in her life so, by the time we arrive back home, despite her shorn locks and promises to always stay in touch for ever with Amy, the holiday is already receding into the back of her mind at the prospect of the ‘new boy’ in her class and changing her Bay City Roller posters. When the first postcard arrives from Amy it is easy for me to sneak it into my parka as I leave for my early morning paper round and after that, to keep intercepting all Amy’s letters so that, by Christmas, Louise has forgotten all about her pen pal.
It was the first postcard that did it. I should have just torn it up and put it in the bin or, even better, snuck it back onto the table in the hall when no one was looking but instead, I read it:
‘Dear Louise,
Hope you got back OK. I’ve heard from Chris!!! Can you believe that! I’m not writing back – let him pine for me 4 ever! Was really upset you had to have your hair cut after the cinema incident! Hope the loathsome toad-creature (LTC) got into lots of trouble!!!!
Best friends for ever, write soon,
Amy xxx (SWABS - sent with a big smile)’

Loathsome toad creature! What was I supposed to do? I would make them sorry for that nickname. That night I wrote back to Amy, trying to make it sound like I was my sister.
‘Dear Amy,
Thanks for the postcard. David had to pay for me to have a proper haircut using the money for his paper round. He decided to take on an extra round as well to pay it off quicker. Last week he didn’t come back from his new round. There had been an accident on a very busy road. We are all in a state of shock. The funeral is next week.
Best friends for ever,
Louise’
I had been very proud of that phrase ‘we are all in a state of shock’, I had heard Mum use it once and thought it leant a nice touch of gravity to my note. I posted the letter the next day and that was that. From then on, I would intercept any incoming mail from Amy and write back to her as Louise and every time Louise got me into trouble, excelled at something better than me or generally just annoyed me, I’d write another letter to Amy with the next desperate saga of my imaginary Louise. I must admit, if nothing else, I have a very vivid imagination.

It is two days after the Christmas break and I am sitting in my office at lunchtime, having just dashed back from the local bookstore, staring at the cover of Amy Sturdle’s book. I have opened the book randomly twice already and tried to start reading but each time I can feel horror well up in me and my hands recoil from the page I’ve landed on. Each time, as I let go, the pages fan out and then the book snaps shut with the soft thud. Did I really write that? Did I really write that?
I have to read it, Savannah emailed this morning to say Louise was on her way over with a new job offer for her. This meant they would have time to talk about the book, if Louise had read it. I try again, this time from the beginning, trying to read it objectively. By the time I am ten pages in, my hands are sweating profusely. Two hours later I have finished it. I shall spare you the details but will instead outline the life story of my fictional Louise.

After I had written that brief postcard outlining my death, my next letter detailed how my fictional family had taken it very badly indeed. Within a year my parents’ relationship fell apart, Dad became work-obsessed, Mum became a reclusive alcoholic. By the following summer Dad had walked out, running off abroad with his young secretary and leaving Louise and Mum alone and penniless. Mum took to having dodgy boyfriends who, while supplying her with booze, variously made Louise’s life hell. One was an emotional bully, one used to beat her and then one abused her. To deal with it, Louise started to run away from home and fell in with the wrong crowd. Within four years, fictional Louise was an alcoholic teenager living rough when in reality she had just passed her A levels with A grades.
During her twenties, fictional Louise variously had an abortion or two, overcame her addiction to alcohol, finally tracked down her father, now a successful businessman abroad who promptly disowned her. Lost her mother (who died from cirrhosis of the liver after being admitted to hospital in a coma with a broken neck after falling down the stairs during a drunken brawl with yet another boyfriend) and had a miscarriage when her drug-dealing boyfriend dumped her.
In her thirties, while my sister’s business went from success to success, my Louise buried her two remaining brothers who were killed instantly in a car crash on a holiday of a lifetime, (they had suffered with various ill health throughout their short lives, due to being involved in a freak industrial accident at the factory they had both worked in.) was made redundant twice, lost her flat to negative equity and ended back up living rough on the streets. By the time I hit my mid-thirties, fictional Louise was back to drinking and turning tricks to survive and the letters to Amy had dwindled to one or two a year. In truth I was fed up of it. This pen friend thing had run its course and I no longer enjoyed writing the secret letters. So, when my sister turned forty-three, I killed off my fictional Louise.
She had just won her battles with breast cancer and the council for a new home and had taken in a stray dog she named ‘Victory’ who was turning into a loyal companion. She found a job as a drugs counsellor and set-up a soup kitchen, when Dad reappeared on the scene. His business had failed and his second wife had run off with a corrupt business partner of his. She had the greatest of pleasure telling him to clear off and was not the remotest bit remorseful when he washed up on a beach a few weeks later. But, despite all this change to her fortunes, disaster struck and my Louise contracted a superbug while at a routine check-up. Within two weeks she was dead. Of course, I had to forge a letter from the coroner’s office, there being no family left to write and tell Amy. I enclosed a cheap little silver locket on a chain with a picture of ‘Victory’ in it (I had cut it out of one of those missing dog ads that are regularly posted in the local Advertiser) as a final bequest from Louise and that, I had thought, was the end of that. How wrong could I be?

The book is well written, heartfelt but not overly mawkish and, while there is no attempt made to hide the identity of the main character, there is little content about location of the family or when the events took place. I try to reassure myself that it could be any of hundreds of Louise Smith’s up and down the country, even if Louise had read it, she may not suspect it’s meant to be her. By the end of the day I have soothed my nerves and leave the office early, convinced the book isn’t a problem.
I arrive home and pull up behind Louise’s coupe that is still parked outside the house. I’m sure Savannah had said Louise was popping over to talk to her in the morning. From the road the house lights blare out from every window, casting strange shadows across the front lawn. Not a single curtain is pulled and the front door is open. As I sit in the car, a figure emerges from the door lugging a large suitcase and loads it into the boot of Savannah’s car. It is Louise. Then, she is followed by the kids, each with a bag. I stare for a moment or two unable to comprehend what is going on, then, with wave of panic I am propelled out of my car and up the drive, at a run, to find Savannah at the front door with another bag. She pushes past me as I try and grab her arm, missing and stumbling at the same time, ‘What’s wrong?’ I ask. She stops, mid-step and turns to me. The light from the doorway illuminates her expression with stark clarity. ‘How could you. Your own sister. Your mother, how could you write such stuff about her? What were you thinking…’ the anger and pain in her voice is a knife in my belly and I am paralysed with fear and confusion.
She loads the bag into the boot. As she walks back past me she announces coolly, ‘We will be staying at your mother’s until I decide what is best for us to do. Do not try and contact us there.’
As I stand on the doorstep, Louise bundles Alice and Jack past me, shushing their questions and helps them into the back of Savannah’s car. Then she turns and stares thoughtfully at me for a moment or two.
‘I don’t know why you did it, David…you must really hate me. Anyhow, I’ve contacted the publisher; the matter is now in the hands of their solicitors. I expect they will contact you in the next day or so, as will mine.’
Savannah reappears, carrying her jewellery box, she doesn’t even look at me as she climbs into her car and reverses off the drive, pausing long enough for Savannah to pull out in her coupe and then they are gone.

The next few weeks pass by in a fog of empty misery as lawyers and solicitors fire phone calls and letters at each other and Savannah and my family refuse any contact with me. Amy Sturdle’s literary reputation is in tatters as the ‘true story’ turns out be a work of fiction and the public’s affection turns tide into a wave of angry condemnation and I am threatened with legal action from the publishers, Amy Sturdle and my sister on behalf of my family. I am let go by my insurance company as they cite my behaviour bringing them into ill repute not to mention my erratic office hours and my car is repossessed. The weeks stretch into months, Savannah and I formally separate, my parents disown me, Savannah and Louise move in together, I am allowed to see the kids once a month, the house is put on the market and the lawyers sit back and wait for their pay checks as agreements are reached. Savannah and the publishing house decide that any more publicity is bad for business and, as I move into a hostel, it occurs to me that my life is beginning to echo my fictional Louise’s. I have lost everything and am at rock bottom.

A few days later, on a sunny summer morning, I am sitting at my usual table in the corner of a café near the river, eating a breakfast of egg and sausage and nursing a mug of weak tea. In front of me is a letter from my solicitor, it states that I am being sued by the real dog owners of the fictional ‘Victory’, and that the photo I used without permission in the locket was of their pet. The subsequent stress and anguish arising from the use of the photo on the book cover had forced them to seek compensation. Their dog, a pedigree champion called ‘Inestimable Fancy, Prince Handsome the Third’ known affectionately as ‘Han’ was stolen, ransomed but never returned, presumed dead. Their compensation claim was substantial. My solicitor’s advice was to declare bankruptcy. I find, when I notice that my hand is shaking and spilling tea, that I am both laughing and crying silently at the same time. The girl behind the counter scowls at me. My life is beyond tragedy and is now a comedy and I sit there, laughing and crying at the pointless absurdity of it all until a voice brings me back sharply to my senses. Someone has sat down opposite me and is watching me as I try and wipe away the tears and compose myself.
‘They said at the hostel I would find you here,’ she turns to the girl behind the counter and asks for a cup of coffee before adding, ‘I’m Amy, Amy Sturdle.’ She smiles a clipped, sad smile and I recognise her from the TV, although the style and colour of her hair has changed.
‘Look, you’ll have to talk to my solicitors if you want any more money. But I warn you I’m going to be declaring bankruptcy.’
She does not answer as the girl brings over her coffee.
‘Why are you here?’
‘Well, I was very angry with you, to begin with and then, as things unfolded I..., well I started to write again. Only this time the whole story, how you forged the letters. How the publishers bailed out, having my career ruined, the public condemnation, you losing everything, your life in ruins…’ She sips at her coffee and I notice her neat, shaped nails.
‘It turns out to be a much better story than your letters ever were but…’
‘But?’
‘It’s written from your perspective…with you as the main character. Your fall from grace…’
‘Great.’ I reply sarcastically. ‘I wish you well. Want did you want?’
‘I want your permission to ghost write your account of what happened. We can sell this story…I have already had an offer from Hollywood…a huge offer. As a team, we can make a fortune; this is much bigger than that memoir ever was. They want to make a film. A proper ‘A’ list film.’
She smiles the sad little smile again and hands over a manuscript and a card. ‘Look, read what I have so far and then call me.’
I stare at the manuscript as she starts to leave.
‘Wait!’ I call after her as she reaches the door. ‘Here, you might want to read this.’ I hand her my solicitor’s letter about the dog and she quickly scans it. Then, slowly, she starts to giggle and then laugh which sets me off laughing and crying again as I notice around her neck is the little silver locket containing the photo of Victory.

Three weeks later and here I am, packing a small suitcase of clothes and checking my passport is still valid. Amy and I are on our way to Los Angeles to finalise a deal with the studio executives. It includes worldwide rights on a film and book deal, plus a percentage of merchandising and plans for a sequel, a play and a musical. Amy was right. It is the deal of a lifetime. On the plane she hands me her finished first draft. I open the cover and look at the title, Pen Pals. I turn to the first page and start reading and I don’t stop till I reach the end, because it turns out, despite first appearances, there is nothing average about me or my life after all.

Reading matter for 2011

2011-01-09T07:01:00.000-08:00

In the hope that I will actually get down to some reading this year I thought I'd note down the books on my reading list for 2011 (so far!).

Kate Mosse ~ The Winter Ghosts

Elizabeth Gilbert ~ Eat Pray Love

Ian McEwan ~ Solar

Carlos Ruiz Zafon ~ The Angel's Game

William Boyd ~ Brazzaville Beach

Robert Harris ~ Lustrum

Watching the winter garden

2011-01-09T04:30:00.000-08:00

Winter arrived in November with a blizzard of siberian proportions, leaving behind a garden hidden from view, blanketed in deep snow. Over the last few months the snow and sleet, mist and fog, murky and freezing days have reminded me how temperate and pleasant our weather normally is.

Today is one of those rare, frosty blue-skied days that have been lacking so far this winter. But in every snow-laden storm cloud there is a silver lining and for a few months the garden has been full of birds.

Robin, wren, dunnock, wood pigeon, collared dove, blue tit, great tit, chaffinch, woodpecker, jay, magpie, starling, blackbird, thrush, the list goes on and it's been a delight to get to see these birds, not hidden shyly on a background of green but up close on the bird feeders and table. Keeping the bird bath unfrozen has been almost impossible, keeping the squirrels from running off with the fatballs they have pilfered from the hanging feeder absolutely impossible.

The garden has emerged from the snow over the last couple of weeks, dreary and bowed, the remnants of autumn leaves now a sludge across the lawn and various shrubs and plants broken and dead from the weight of snow and overnight temperatures that dropped into double figures below freezing. All around the remnants of last year's autumn still clinging to branches and fences, uncleared before the snow fell. But already I can see new growth and the delightful pale green of new shoots as the garden decides, for now, this winter tempest is over.

(click on photo for larger image)

snowfall over garden

cold buffet

robin and dunnock on buddleja globosa

willow covered in frost

ivy covered in frost

The Final Vote ~ Short Story

2011-01-04T08:39:00.000-08:00

Sci-Fi Short story written a few years ago.

The Final Vote

October 22nd 2007

‘And this works?’
‘Yes, it does. It’s very simple really. The fusion of the two technologies has been very successful. I think you’ll find the nanobiobes are a valid and effective inclusion into this new entry system you propose. Nano tagging is the way forward.’
Dr. Harris Hope leans back in his chair, fingertips lightly pressed together, elbows resting on the polished granite slab that passes for a conference table. In front of him, his computer screen takes a second or two to refresh; they were clearly trying to reach a decision. Well, he could wait. He had waited before.
The screen reloads and this time Dr. Salts’ face is sweaty and tense. ‘The board would like a little time to think through their decision… a matter of determining the ethics. Can we extend the offer period at all?’
Harris stifles a laugh, to be concerned with ethics at this late stage was ludicrous. ‘Take as long as you need Dr. Salt, the offer stands till midnight tonight.’ As he leans forward to switch off the video link, Harris can see the visible relief on Salts’ face. The man was clearly under pressure. Ethics, indeed. Culpability more like. But they’d buy it in the end even if they shelved it. They had to. Otherwise the technology would go to their competitors. Harris sighs and runs a hand over the cold marble. He had six hours before he needed to be back on the secure video link. Just time to get into town for dinner.
Harris retrieves a small portable phone from his jacket pocket and texts his favourite restaurant. They have his table free at nine which leaves him enough time to shower, change and maybe ring Martiece.

Dr. Parson Salt sighs and turns off the flat screen panel and the freeze-frame face of Harris Hope shrinks to a pixel then vanishes. Behind him the board are in deep discussion already about the new technology. Nanobiobes. Infinitesimally small bio-engineered organisms, fusing micro-replicating viral electronics and biological tracers into intelligent markers, ready to be activated at the unique signature pressure of the fingerprint. Electronic tagging was nothing new. Nanobots were nothing new. The genius lay in combining the two technologies. An intelligent marker virus, activated at the touch of an individual fingerprint, jumping from the touch pad to it’s new host. Replicating and mutating at a specific rate in the microscopic terrain of the fingertip. Invisible to the naked eye, unobtrusive. Yet every touch pad in the system would immediately be calibrating the same rate of mutation and only, only the fingerprint containing the right sequence for that particular period in time would be viable. It also relied on a live host. Dr. Hope’s nano tagging system was, admittedly, only an add-on security feature but nevertheless, not one they can ignore. These days, even fingerprint scans were being deemed as unsafe. Parson blamed the movies, all those fingers being chopped off, public perception had been tainted, leading to distrust of the technology and falling sales. The Portal Security Access Company (PSAC) was in trouble. Big trouble. Retinal scanning technology was being heralded as the holy grail of security entry systems and their main competitor I-Scan-U-Safe had the patents sewn up. Their legal department had spent a year looking for loopholes but there were none. PSAC had to make their touch screen panels and keypads as effective and tamperproof as the retinal scan and Dr. Hope’s research seemed to provide just that solution.
He checks his watch, only six hours to go, then he calls the meeting to order. They needed to decide and decide fast in order to secure this technology from their competitors.

Martiece is ready and waiting as Harris pulls up outside her front door. She smiles as he holds the car door open for her and comments on how beautiful she looks.
‘Harris, you’re an angel. But to be quite honest, you didn’t leave much time for me to get ready in. Are we celebrating tonight?’
‘Yes, well, not yet. Anyway, if this deal goes through tonight I shall be a very wealthy man. Will you marry me, then?’
‘No, not for all the gold in the sea. How rich? Richer than me?’ Martiece smoothes her skirt back over her thighs and snaps the seatbelt into its catch. Then, retrieving a small mirror from her purse, proceeds shape her eyebrows with her index finger.
Harris watches her for a moment before answering, it was impossible to tell what she was thinking sometimes. ‘No one is as rich as you.’
Martiece laughs at his reply, ‘Actually there are about half a dozen people in this country who are and that’s before we get to the rest of the world.’
‘Well, rich by my standards, if not yours.’
‘You don’t need to be rich, Harris, I quite like you as the poor struggling inventor. So, where are we eating?’
‘The Pickled Egg, where else?’

Parson glances at his watch again. It is twelve minutes past nine and they have stopped the discussion for a much-needed break. They would reconvene at nine-thirty. Instead of following the others to a nearby suite of rooms where there was a buffet already waiting, he heads for his office and straight for his small, private bathroom. Once there, he locks the door and, in its sound-proofed safety, calls a number on his mobile phone. The number is unavailable. He waits for a few minutes and then tries again. Still no connection. He shakes his head and then, seeing his reflection in the mirror, runs a sinkful of warm water and proceeds to freshen up. He would try and get hold of Martiece again in a few minutes.

The Pickled Egg is as good as ever. Harris always enjoys the understated ambience of the place and tonight is no exception. Just as the lobster arrives, Martiece’s mobile starts ringing and she smiles apologetically and answers, gesturing to Harris to continue without her.
‘Hi, yes, it’s me. Darling, can you hold for a moment… Harris, I’m going to have to take this call, carry on, do. I’ll be in the lobby.’ and she leaves the table, her napkin sliding to the floor from her lap. Harris reaches down to retrieve it and by the time he returns it to the table she has left the main room of the restaurant for the private lobby.
‘Martiece, I need to know if he’s got any other companies on board over this. We’re pushing the deadline as it is to reach an agreement and I don’t want to have to lie to the board. But I can only make the deal on the referendum franchise if I can promise this new technology. Otherwise the contract will go to I-Scan-U-Safe. Retinal scanning is burying us.’
‘I’ll try and find out for you darling but you must understand its not easy…’
‘Just find out, Martiece and get back to me before midnight. I pay you more than enough.’
‘Ok, ok, I’ll find out.’

Harris is losing his appetite for lobster, its not quite the same trying to eat it on your own. Martiece returns looking angry. ‘Everything ok?’ Harris gives up trying to crack open a claw.
‘Yes, fine. So sorry, just business. Talking of which, tell me about your big deal tonight.’ She smiles and the anger lifts away from her face and Harris, with half a bottle of good wine in him, cannot help but think how beautiful she is.
‘I’d rather talk about you.’
Martiece laughs and sips her wine thoughtfully, ‘No, but if this deal falls through, will you be really set back? Is there some way I can help? Financially I mean?’
‘Well, if does fall through, I simply go to their competitors with it. I’m pretty confident it won’t but thanks for the offer.’
‘So, single client, then. Not in some bidding war?’
‘No, no. No point. Someone will buy the technology and for the right price. More lobster?’
Martiece shakes her head and wonders how soon she can leave the table again without arousing suspicion.
After the main course is cleared she makes her excuses and calls Parson. He answers after two rings. Martiece can hear the anxiety in his voice.
‘You’re ok, so far as there’s only you in the running. But after midnight he’ll be approaching your rival.’
‘Martiece, that’s great, I’m going to double your fee for this!’
Martiece swiftly rings off and then sighs. No wonder PSAC was going down the drain, Salt was far too trusting. And, since her loyalty could always be bought, it always went to the highest bidder. She dials a new number from memory and is put through almost immediately to Gregory Church. Church was paying her ten times the amount Salt was, usually a fair indication that whatever he wanted the information for, it wasn't legal.
‘The deal will go through by midnight.’ She immediately terminates the call and then, spying a large tropical fish tank in the lobby, drops the phone gently behind the rock ledges. It disappears from view. From her handbag she retrieves an identical looking mobile and returns to the table.
‘Harris, my darling, I’m afraid I seem to have some trouble tonight and have to rush off back to the office, you couldn’t drop me back at home could you?’ Harris looks peeved but does his best to hide it.
‘Of course, shame though. I was enjoying the meal.’
‘We can do this another time. I’m sorry about your celebration but you probably should be getting back anyhow?’
‘Yes, I suppose so.’ Harris gets up from the table reluctantly and calls for their coats.

Parson, buoyed up from Martiece’s news, finds it easy to swing the views of the board to his way of thinking. The ethics were a pill. Legally, they would be able to sell the technology with the onus for disclosure firmly resting with the company buying the product. What that company did, or didn’t tell their employees was up to them. Legally, PSAC would be in the clear as long as they fully informed their clients of all the risks involved. Spying, industrial espionage, infringement of civil liberties, these would all be the dilemmas facing their clients. A rather monumental corporate pass-the-buck. Bitter, but not too hard to swallow and the board, with the added sweetener of the referendum franchise, reached an agreement by eleven twenty-three p.m.

Sunday, February 13th 2008

The referendum voting system was unique. Old paper ballots and locked tin boxes in parish town halls and schools were being replaced with touch pad screens at supermarkets, post offices, garages and libraries. National voting was about to go online as secure computer lines fed information back to a network of computers, housed in local council offices. These, in turn, reported back to a national data bank where the results could be finally tallied and ratified by independent inspectors. And, with the inclusion of the nanobiobe technology, fiddling the vote via multi-voting either by accident or on purpose, would be eliminated. The government was proud to herald in the new technology and PSAC’s touch screen voting panel technology had afforded the most economical, tamperproof solution. The first and possibly the biggest vote was about to take place on the Monday. Gregory Church slips into his stolen uniform in the back of the nondescript white van he has parked outside the only supermarket in the main street of Pindlehay. He picks up a clipboard with spurious paperwork and a small plastic briefcase and then climbs back into the front of the van and opens the door. No one even notices him as enters the supermarket and heads for the supervisor’s desk.
‘..Oh, yes, the referendum unit is over here. Been having trouble have they, with the tests? Wouldn’t surprise me at all. Don’t know how many people round here will trust it tomorrow. I don’t hold with this kind of thing really, ballot papers are much better. So, will you need anything else?’ The name on her supervisor badge reads Janet.
‘No Janet, that’s all. I can connect to the mainframe from this end. Should be about half an hour.’ Gregory watches her turn as a bell rings on one of the checkouts and smiles to himself. The shop, as he had predicted, was reasonably busy as it was a Sunday. He would go largely unnoticed, just another technician installing more equipment. Within minutes he had bypassed the security codes and logged into the local council office terminal. No one would be working in the offices today, it being Sunday and the computer, with the information coming from a validated source rather than being hacked in, would accept his new programme without raising any alarms. It was an easy enough bit of programming. For every yes vote, the touch screen would tag the fingerprint, not with nanobiobes already built into the screen, but with a new hybrid generation he would create in a moment. A mutation to the viral code which the nanobiobes would find irresistible and immediately start replicating. And the genius of the system was that it was linked in its whole entirety and once it all went online on Monday, the re-coding programme would infect the whole system within minutes and the nanobiobes would start replicating and tagging almost immediately. He carefully types in the new code, a bio-patent for a new and lethal influenza. This referendum was going to be more than a landmark for national voting, it was going to be the start of the end.

Dr. Harris Hope lies back in his bath and peruses the Sunday newspaper. Outside, through the huge windows of the atrium he can see the steam rising up from the rolling fields as the sun burns through the low river mist. The headlines were mainly about the referendum tomorrow and he makes a mental note to stop in at the supermarket in Pindlehay on his way to the office to vote. It would be fun to use the technology he had helped to create.

Friday 18th February 2008

Martiece sips her champagne cocktail and dips her toes gingerly into the ice bucket at the side of her sun lounger. The ice is instantly refreshing against her skin and she smiles as she rereads the lead story under international news on her laptop’s internet browser. England seemed far away and almost forgotten as her boat pulls into the harbour in Sydney.

‘Millions Infected as Flu Spreads like Wildfire.
Widespread panic ensues amid government calls for calm as an epidemic of a virulent and as yet unknown, strain of flu grips the nation. Army troops are mobilised as looting and lawlessness spreads from inner cities out into the countryside. Temporary morgues are being set up in town halls and schools as the death toll mounts into the thousands. All schools, public institutions, public transport systems and airports remain closed as the country grinds to a halt. The government is holding crisis talks amid growing fears of there being no cure for this dreadful contagion.’
Beneath the lead article, a much smaller headline grabs her attention,
‘Referendum a Failure.
Less than a third of the population turned out on Monday to take part in the first national referendum via touch screen voting. Such poor turn out figures could spell the end for touch screen voting.’
Martiece chuckles to herself, logs off the computer and pours herself another drink.

Football For All

2010-12-04T03:01:00.000-08:00

The other day I watched a film called Invictus, a lovely movie depicting how Nelson Mandela, in his quest to build a new nation, recognises the ability of sport (in this case, rugby) to touch every heart, regardless of circumstance or ability.
As an England fan I watched the build up for the announcement of the 2018 FIFA World Cup with anticipation but it seemed far removed from those ideals of sport. Instead it seemed much more about the marketing of a huge money-making machine that is now international football, all decided in an opaquely secret manner by only 22 men as several countries vie for the honour of holding the finals.
It seemed of no use to a planet where 925 million people still do not have enough to eat, let alone a chance to play a sport. International football should not about turning the very gifted few into millionaires, it should be about teaching values of fair play, promoting healthy exercise as fun and providing cheap, easily accessible sporting entertainment to a global audience. It should be a league that represents every country and every person on this planet in the ideal that football is for all.
Of course, as an England fan, I was disappointed we did not win the bid. I was also horrified at how much had been spent on it. When we have a global recession with poverty steadily rising worldwide, this is how the we spend our money?
It occurred to me that international football has a monopoly. With no competition, it can demand what it likes, brand new stadiums, shiny logos, marketing tie-ins, pretty much whatever it wants. And so we have seen, pre-recession the growth and growth of a multi-million pound industry with no competition to hold it in check. What we need is not more world-class stadiums and expensive tickets and t-shirts, but another world league, a little healthy competition in international football.
So, to soothe my disappointment in state of the beautiful game, I thought about what that league would be:

The Football For All Global League (FFA)

This would consist of three equal global divisions:
Men's FFA
Women's FFA
Under 16's FFA (or youngsta's)

Then, every three years, with men's, women's and youngsta's teams in an international competition, everyone from every country can have a dream. Every country can compete as well, all they need to do is put together a team. Because, as everyone knows, all you need to play football is a ball, jumpers for goalposts and a lion in your heart.

Watching the Autumn Garden

2010-10-29T01:46:00.001-07:00

(click on photos for larger image)

Autumn arrives with a blanket of dew and flurry of activity from birds and squirrels as the boundary between nearby woodland and the garden blur. Misty mornings leave the cobwebs bejewelled, illuminated like garden chandeliers as the sun slowly rises over the trees. The spiders and their cobwebs now replace the industrious activity of the summer bees in the lavender.

Autumn is when a lot of the larger woodland birds are more visible in the garden; jays, magpies, wood pigeons, collared doves, green and great spotted woodpeckers. In the last high blue skies of the year, house martins and swallows swoop before following the earlier swifts south for winter.

One of the funniest seasonal spectacles to watch is the pantomime performed by the jays and squirrels. As the jay briskly stashes his horde of chestnuts in flowerpots and box hedges, the squirrel scampers up afterwards, digging them up and stealing them. No matter how often you tell the jay 'He's behind you!', he still falls for it every time.

(spot the woodpecker)

If you're quick, you'll notice a flick and a dart, a hop and a bob as the wren marks out his territory while the robin takes up guarding the bird feeders, although the long-tailed tits are now long gone.
The winds turn northerly and the leaves start to turn, a few more weeks and then Autumn's shawl of golds, reds and browns will slip to the ground and bare trees and cold winds will start to shape the winter bones of the garden.

RSPB Feed the Birds day is on Saturday 30th October.

Autumn Sun

2010-10-16T02:01:00.000-07:00

A glimpse of her golden smile
As she bends low through the trees
Fingers outstretched
To gently caress your face
One final kiss as the river mist rises
And she is gone
Lost below the horizon

Blog Action Day 2010 ~ Water, adding up the facts & figures

2010-10-14T06:05:00.001-07:00

Almost 1 billion people (1 in 8 of us) don't have access to clean, safe drinking water
+
3.6 million people die each year because they don't have clean water to drink
+
Nearly 38,000 children under the age of 5 die from unsafe water and unhygienic living conditions
+
African women spend 40 billion hours each year walking to gather water

= water POVERTY

Every day 2 million tonnes of human waste is disposed of into water courses
+
70% of industrial waste in developing countries is dumped untreated into the water supply
+
1 quart of motor oil can pollute up to 2 million gallons of water
+
50% of the world's wetlands have been lost in the last 100 years
+
Each year, 3 times as much rubbish is dumped into the oceans as the weight of fish caught

= water POLLUTION

73% of water used in homes is either flushed down the toilet or washed down the shower drain
+
400 gallons of water are needed to grow the cotton for 1 t-shirt
+
24,000 litres of water is needed to produce one hamburger
+
17 million barrels of oil are needed to produce all the plastic water bottles used in the US each year, 86% of them are never recycled.

= water WASTE

If you don't like the way water is adding up you can do something about it.
See the links below for charities helping to provide clean water, ways to reduce water consumption at home and how to recycle water bottles and plastics.

Water charities
WaterAid UK

Ways to help reduce your water footprint in the UK
Environment Agency
waste online - plastics
Virtual Water

All facts and figures kindly provided by Blog Action Day at change.org

2011 ripplestone garden UK calendar available now...

2010-10-02T05:21:00.000-07:00

Each month features my favourite photos from the last five years in the garden, click on button above for more information.

National Poetry Day '10

2010-09-28T07:51:00.000-07:00

(National Poetry Day will fall on Thurs 7th October this year.
The theme is 'Home'.
Visit the organiser's website here.)

Planet Home

Rarely call it home
No other place I'd rather be though
Despite the terrible weather
And the endless fighting
(We do all fight a lot)
The feeling that we could all do with a bit more room
I love its noisy, messy, chaos
It's lived-in feel
I belong here and nowhere else
And yet I rarely call it home

If I step outside for a moment
To view it with a dispassionate eye
And try and distil its essence
Into a word
I find I am so gobsmacked by the beauty
Of this small blue-green planet
All words fail me, except one
Not Earth, nor world
But home
Planet Home

Rarely call it home
No other place I'd rather be though

This year's butterflies...

2010-09-08T01:32:00.000-07:00

Despite the extreme weather, there has been a good range of butterflies in the garden this year including:

Ringlet

Comma

Gatekeeper

Brown Argus (Aricia agestis)

Large Skipper (Ochlodes venatus)

Peacock

fritillary

Speckled Wood
(Click on photos for larger scale)

City Pride

2010-08-19T06:24:00.000-07:00

Lions of Bath (Click on photo for full image size)

Stopping off for lunch in the beautiful city of Bath, it was plain to see that something was afoot. This summer, over 100 life-size lion sculptures have been specially commissioned and now, while prowling around the elegant Georgian crescents and terraces, you can bag your own big cat (with camera only!). Each one is sponsored by a business or community and individually decorated. They all form an impressive piece of public art and are great fun to either happen across by chance or to go on a lion safari across the city. At the end of the summer they will be auctioned off for charity and so you have until mid-September to see them in situ. Visit the Lions Of Bath website for more information and a full list of lions.

The Bath Lion, sponsored by Longleat

King of Fudge, sponsored by The San Francisco Fudge Factory

Big Game? sponsored by Walker/Jansseune

Art in Bristol, Summer 2010

2010-08-17T03:39:00.000-07:00

Art from the New World
There is still time to catch the 'Art from the New World' exhibition at Bristol Museum and Art Gallery as it runs till Sunday 22th August.
There are 49 pieces in the exhibition ranging from sculpture, painting, photography and print by the best of the contemporary American art scene. The show is curated by Corey Helford Gallery, LA and the most of the works have been made for the show.
The artists themselves are often self-taught and their work builds on the pop art movement from the end of the last century, appealing to the mainstream market and trying to take art beyond the constrains of elitism within the industry.
Look out for the gorgeous silver/pink graphic immediacy of Buff Monster, who started out as a street artist and illustrator Luke Chueh's moving painting 'Pin Cushion'. Sas Christian's 'Fever' and the gloriously macabre 'Silent Partner' pick up on pop culture and glamour themes that run throughout the show. There is an undercurrent of bleak humour and unease with modern culture, picking up in places on body image, sexuality, fantasy and the decadence of a post-war America that makes this showcase a brilliant, thought-provoking snapshot of the current American art scene.

Near and Far, RWA Artists
Running till the 5th of September at the Royal West of England Academy, Near and Far is an exploration of travel and place by RWA artists. Over sixty artists are showing work.

David Hockney 'Grimm's Fairy Tales'
Also at the RWA is a series of etchings based on six of the Brother Grimm's fairy tales. All produced in 1969 while a student at the RCA, they feature quirky moments chosen from the stories and show off Hockney's sparse, graphic style beautifully in monochrome.

The Historic Dockyard Chatham to launch £13m new museum and cultural venue.

2010-07-17T12:14:00.000-07:00

This summer sees the launch of the No. 1 Smithery building at The Historic Dockyard in Chatham.
A partnership between the Historic Dockyard Trust, the National Maritime Museum and the Imperial War Museum, this sympathetically restored building now houses a stunning collection of maritime models and art while providing a cultural exhibition space and hands-on educational entertainment for families.

Inside the original shell of No. 1 Smithery, there are a series of climate-controlled storage cubes housing the model collection, the restored Pipe Bending Floor, a static exhibition, National Museums Maritime Treasures and an art gallery for travelling exhibitions, kicking off on July 24th with 'Resonance and Renewal, Stanley Spencer, Shipbuilding on the Clyde'. There is also The Courtyard a large open space for family activities, school programmes and performance art.
The static maritime display of art and models in the heart of the building is a beautiful snapshot of the long heritage of model making and maritime art that this country holds. From an exquisitely worked Napoleonic prisoner of war model ship to a replica of the dockyard built to impress King George III, there has been careful thought to make the exhibition relevant to the Historic Dockyard itself and its rich history.
This is supported fully by an exhibition in The Gallery of Sir Stanley Spencer's series of paintings depicting shipbuilding at Port Glasgow during the second world war. These eight extraordinary, recently restored canvases capture the physically demanding life of a shipyard, illustrating vividly the day-to-day exertion and tight-knit communal life of the shipbuilders. Included with the canvases are Spencer's drawings and a direct comparison of just how revolutionary his art was at the time, placing the viewer directly amongst the action of the scene rather than from a remote vantage point. This opening exhibition will run until December 2010. The No 1 Smithery will open from 24th July 2010 to the public, full details of opening times, cost and all the other fantastic buildings to be found at The Historic Dockyard Chatham are on the website.

Hands on fun for everyone on the Pipe Bending Floor.

Insects in the Garden

2010-06-21T10:53:00.001-07:00

This is National Insect Week and so I thought I'd note a few things down about some of the fantastic insects that visit the garden. But first of all I'll start off with a very brief explanation of what insects are.
As a gardener it is easy to fall prey to the idea that insects are pests. From sap-sucking greenfly to tree-munching beetles all those voracious garden mini-beasts can ravage your prize veggies and gorgeous blooms quicker than you can say 'where's my spray gun!'. But, if you can hold off with the pest control and use it only as a last resort, then your garden will be richly rewarded not only with the occasional munched leaf but also with visits from those creatures we don't call pests like birds, bats, frogs and hedgehogs. Because insects are pretty much the first rung up on the food-chain ladder after salads and, to a lot of creatures they are not pests at all, they are lunch.
Generally an insect has six legs, three body parts, antennae and often in adulthood has wings. This means that spiders, woodlice, slugs, snails and worms are not insects. Insects often have complex life-cycles of their own, think of the metamorphosis of butterflies and dragonflies. They can live in highly ordered and complex societies like bees and ants and there are lots of different orders and sub-orders of insects, from beetles and bugs to moths and flies.
But best of all, insects can be beautiful and weird all rolled into one. Like this little lady who has taken up residence on our patio during these past few warm summer nights.

She looks like a cross between a woodlouse and a caterpillar and is called a Glow-Worm but is actually a beetle (Lampyris noctiluca). She's attracting a male by lighting up her abdomen with her strange greenish glow. The male beetles have wings and so just have to look out for her glowing bio-luminescence in the garden as they fly over.

Another strange insect is this creature. It flies like a humming-bird and looks like a big woolly butterfly but is a day-flying moth called the Hummingbird Hawkmoth (Macroglossum stellatarum). It is quite happy humming around the summer garden sucking nectar from the hanging basket flowers and not at all like those strange, powdery, light-flittering night moths that people dislike so much.

And here's another weird day-flying moth. This one a male with antennae that are up to five, yes, five times longer than its body, the Green Longhorn moth. That puts all those large antlers, horns, trunks and tail feathers in the shade. Up to five times longer than its own body and it still flies!

Or how about the Scorpion Fly (Panorpa germanica) which is, unlike its namesake, completely harmless and the Bee-fly (Bombylius minor) which also has no sting, isn't a bee but, as a larvae, lives in the nests of mining bees.

But if those insects are all a little too weird to be beautiful then feast your eyes on the butterflies (Lepidoptera), from Common Blues to Peacocks, these gorgeous jewel-winged beasts are always a delight to spot among nectar-rich flowers.

Or, if you like your insects a little shinier, faster and more streetwise how about the dragonflies (Odonata). Zooming in low over the garden, hunting smaller insects on a hot summer's evening these surely are the hot-rods of the insect world?

Fascinating and fantastic, insects are also valuable in the garden. They pollinate flowers, clear up dead animals and rotting vegetation, prey on slugs and snails and provide food for mammals and amphibians. Weird and wonderful, and best of all, we can find these creatures by just stepping out into the garden.

Photos from Ripplestone Garden
More about the 2010 International Year of Biodiversity.

Watching the Spring Garden

2010-06-09T06:01:00.000-07:00

Watching the bird feeders this morning, a family of great tits arrived with much cheeping and rustling of leaves through the trees. The fledglings were being shown how to search through the leafy boughs for insects before visiting the fat ball feeder under the strict supervision of their parents. They were closely followed by a fleeting visitor to the garden, a female great spotted woodpecker enticed out of the local wood by the fat balls, presumably with a brood somewhere to feed. These quick snapshots of their lives are such a pleasure to watch and this year has seen not only the most extraordinary weather but also its fair share of wildlife surprises in the garden.

Like the wrens. Watching from the kitchen window one morning I could see a small commotion occurring on the lawn. I rushed out to find, not some distressed squirrel as I thought but two wrens, locked in mortal combat, rolling across the grass. One had his adversary's foot in its beak and the other had its beak full of wing, kicking and scratching as, like some mad acrobatic team, they tumbled and rolled right across my feet, oblivious to me being there. They fought their way across the garden and rolled through to the next and out of sight.
Then there was the collared dove chick whose nest was destroyed by a storm. We all spent a anxious day watching with the parents as they slowly coaxed it back up from the ground to the fence, then the pergola, then finally back into the safety of the trees.

A couple of perfect twilights watching bats catch insects under a near-full moon. Silently chasing in from the woods and flying low through the garden, little more than ragged shadows torn from the night sky.
What about this year's squirrels, or squirrel, I should say. Lil' Scrumpy, the most scratchy, twitchy, skinny little thing and hilariously adept at scrumpying the bird food. She's destroyed at least two feeders this season and yet, just yesterday, she was back again, with two youngsters in tow. One like a chipmunk, 'Chip' and the other a bigger, fatter version, 'Buttie'. Chip and Buttie will join other squirrels fondly remembered over the years, like Scampi and Chips, surely the fattest squirrels ever who used to gorge on whole fat balls stolen from the bird feeders!
A late-night encounter with a dog fox, slinking through the garden after a clandestine date. (The fox, not me!) A pair of lovely greenfinches always feeding together and a sprinkling of long-tailed tits. A robin, building her nest directly in line with the kitchen window and then the male feeding her a few feet away from the window every day.

Early morning encounters with jays as they decided to build their nest in a neighbour's garden rather than the woods, allowing me to watch them retrieve sticks each day.

And this year, two weeks early, the arrival of the swifts and not the the one or two like last year but up to a dozen delightful swooping, sweeping, soaring boomerangs high above the trees.

As the birds and larger mammals retreat back into the woodlands and abundant summer approaches, my thoughts are turning to the next garden visitors. The bees, moths and butterflies and the garden inhabitants already waiting in the flowerbeds, the little bush crickets dodging the spiders, too young to sing yet.

Soon the dragonflies will be hunting over the hedges, zooming in low under the patio umbrella on lazy evenings and the air will be ripe with whirring and chirruping from all manner of insects. I can't wait to watch it all happen in the summer garden.

Photos from the garden this year....continued...

2010-05-27T06:23:00.000-07:00

geranium

virginia stock and oak

A bed of wallflowers, love-in-a-mist and sweet william

weigela

ornamental cherry blossom

Photos from the garden this year....

2010-05-27T06:10:00.000-07:00

I haven't put up many posts here this year due to the joys of trying to sell our house! But, it would be nice to reflect back over what has been the most extreme winter/spring for quite a while with some photos of stuff that has survived and indeed flowered so far this year. If you want to keep up to date with the garden, I regularly update on flickr and am on twitter as well (see twitter feed >> ).

Fox in the garden, 1.30 am

2010-05-13T01:58:00.000-07:00

Woken by screaming
All the dark recesses
Refocus to the bright click
Of the bedside lamp
What's that?
Outside screaming
The house stirs
As I run to the kitchen
And all the dark recesses
Shrink with the long glow
Of energy saving light bulbs
Silence now
In the cast light, staring
Then the ancient lope of animal
Grey ghost against the fence
All colour drained
All senses still reeling
As the fox steals away
More lupine now than ever imagined
Fey creature in the fractured night
Fox in the garden, 1.30 am

Are you vote ready?

2010-03-23T04:10:00.000-07:00

Around about this time in the run up to a general election the phrase 'voter apathy' starts to appear in headlines and news articles. This mysterious condition is a malaise so serious, if you listen to some reports, that most of the UK population is struck down by it just before voting. Various causes are attributed to it from political scandal, sleaze and expenses rows to the weather and what's on telly that night. And there seems to be no cure for it, this year will as bad or even worse as the last general election with millions not bothering to vote, and millions more not even registered to vote.

So why bother to vote?

1) Because it's your money they are spending. National insurance, income taxes, car tax, VAT, duty on fuel, cigarettes, alcohol, pretty much every aspect of our life is taxed. The only way you get a say on how those taxes are spent is when you vote for a political party at an election. Would you spend out £500 on a new handbag only to find you have no way of exchanging it when the buckles fall off a week later? Of course not! In no other part of our lives would we hand over such substantial lumps of cash and then say, 'Oh it's OK, can't be bothered to do anything about it...'.

2) Because your vote can make a difference. You only have to look at America to see how powerful your vote can be. President Obama's health care reform has come about because people used their vote and voted him into the presidency. They made that change happen. Now 32 million more Americans have access to health care. Not a bad result for simply putting a mark in box.

3) Because politicians have nowhere left to hide! Sleaze and scandal however boring and tedious means that, as a democracy with a free press, we can scrutinise what politicians are up to in government. They will be caught out and widespread corruption will not be tolerated. We keep that democratic process alive by using our vote.

4) A vote is about self worth. Really!!? Yes, really. Nothing says I no longer care about myself, my family, my community and my future like not bothering to vote for the very thing that directly impacts on every aspect of your life.

So, not sure where or how to vote or even who to vote for?
Each political party will be busy over the next weeks leading up to the election canvassing for your vote. They have a manifesto which sets out what they want to do for you and your community and why. They have websites with info. There will be tv debates and mailings through the door. They are on facebook, twitter, the radio...everywhere!!
From the age of 16 you can register to vote and then from the age of 18 vote, by post, at a polling station or by proxy. These websites will tell you how. Registering to vote. About your vote.
Easy read guide to voting

Why Birds Sing

2010-03-13T03:17:00.000-08:00

Once upon a time, along long time ago when the world was young and green, the sun used to travel through the skies every day, smiling down on all the creatures and plants. Out of all the creatures she saw each day, she liked the birds the best because their shiny feathers reflected all the different colours of her light, sparkling like jewels. The birds spent their days flying through the trees and fishing in the rivers, eating seeds and preening and admiring their feathers in the sunshine. They loved to talk about how beautiful they were, chatter, chatter all day long. But the sun didn’t mind their chatter and she smiled on them all, making their colours sparkle more.

Then one day, as the sun travelled across the sky, she saw the most beautiful bird she had ever seen sitting in a clearing in a cold, cold forest. As she passed overhead she paused for a little bit longer to watch this bird and smiled to herself a little bit more. The beautiful bird noticed her smiling down on him and smiled back.
The next day, the sun could hardly wait to get to the place in the sky where she would see the beautiful bird. When he saw her, he smiled and said hello. She smiled back and slowed down, pausing to watch him again. The bird liked having the sun above him, keeping him warm and he tried to think of a way to make her stay and so he started to sing. This delighted the sun, who laughed and stayed longer than she should.
Soon, every day the sun would race to the point where the beautiful bird lived and then stop for a while, listening to him sing to her, then carry on her way, hurrying to travel across the rest of the sky before night arrived.

Before long, all the other birds started to notice they were seeing less of the sun, she was paying them far less attention and they started to talk amongst themselves about it. Chatter, chatter. But the sun did not listen to them, she had fallen in love with the beautiful bird. All the other birds decided to follow her to see where she disappeared to so quickly each day and when they saw her, smiling down on the beautiful singing bird they were very jealous. Every day, the sun lingered a little longer with the beautiful bird and every day the other birds became more jealous. Until one night, they held a meeting to try and decide what to do. ‘He’s too beautiful, it’s not fair.’ ‘Why should he get all the sun to bask in?’ ‘What about our feathers?’ Chatter, chatter, all night long.

The next day, the sun rushed so quickly on her way to see the beautiful bird, she didn’t notice that the other birds were watching her. Once again the beautiful bird sang for her and she smiled down on him.
That night, the other birds all gathered together again and this time they set out to find where the beautiful bird slept. They found him fast asleep, deep in the cold, cold forest. They set about plucking his feathers, very quietly so as not to wake him, until they lay all around on the ground and he was left, bare and cold and looking very ugly indeed. As the night drew on, the beautiful bird got colder and colder with no feathers to keep him warm and by the morning, he had become so cold, he didn’t wake up again. Instead he lay where he had fallen asleep, his heart frozen through.

The other birds watched the sun rush to find the beautiful bird the next day, chattering amongst themselves at how she would give them more time now he looked so ugly. But when the sun reached the beautiful bird she could not believe what she saw. There he lay, surrounded by all his feathers, and no matter how hard she smiled, she could not warm him enough to wake him and then she knew he had died and she started to cry. The other birds became rather worried when she started to cry, they had never seen the sun cry before. They cautiously flew over to where she was and when they saw what had happened to the beautiful bird they were very ashamed. They had not meant him to die.

When the sun learnt of what they had done, she was very angry and refused to smile on them any more. Days passed and her crying turned to rain and hail and whenever she saw a bird she clouded over the sky and frowned at them. The birds were distraught. All the other creatures were angry with them and the sun never smiled on them and now even the birds' feathers were turning dull and losing all their colours in the rain.
They held another meeting and tried to think of a way to make it up to the sun. They talked and chattered but no one could think of what to do, until one little bird said, ‘Why don’t we sing to the sun. She liked it when the beautiful bird sang to her. Maybe she would like to hear us sing too.’
So the next day, as the sun appeared the birds started to sing, all at once. The noise was dreadful, and the sun could not help but smile to herself at the sound. The birds were very encouraged by this and the next day they tried it again, singing even louder. The noise was even worse! The sun looked down at the birds with their feathers all dulled by her tears and asked them why they had killed the beautiful bird which she had loved so dearly. And the birds replied they hadn’t meant to kill him, they had just got so jealous of all the attention she was paying him. The sun could see they were truly sorry and so she apologised as well for paying so much attention to the beautiful bird and neglecting her duties. She smiled on them all through her clouds of tears and as she did so, little flashes of colour appeared on their feathers where they caught her smile.
Now, every morning the birds sing to the sun, to try and make up for causing her sadness and the sun cannot help but smile at the dreadful noise they all make.

The Ballad of Blue Bell Hill

2010-02-06T07:03:00.000-08:00

(A rhyming account of its long history & folklore with accompanying annotation)

Together, as brothers stand, whether Man of Kent or Kentish Man.

Foreword

And the last bell(1) rang long ago
Echoing on those ancient stones
As kings of yore and pilgrims still
Walk up on windswept Blue Bell Hill

Stag, bear and baying hounds
Chased the chalk hill hunting grounds
Pilgrim, trader
Refugee, invader
Paced their tales o’er the North Downs

Sit with me, here on this hill
And hear the echoes if you will
Of ghosts and battles long since lost
And how too many paths have crossed

From ancient flint to modern drill
We’ve taken to and from this hill
But this green shoulder sometimes still
Gives up its secrets to those who will
With a care listen on the green sill
And hear the Ballad of Blue Bell Hill

The Ballad of Blue Bell Hill
(Kent)

in several parts :-

Pre-history on the Hill

Roman Roads to Saxon Kings

The Pilgrims Way - from the Middle Ages on

Through the Hill to the Future

Pre-History on the Hill

The arrow sears the bended bow
And seeks its quarry far below
The chalk ridge where the hunter spies
A hart, unsaved as flint-tipped arrow flies

The beast falls as the blade bites deep
And birds rise in alarm and keep
Commotion as the red deer dies
Under the shade of wooded skies

Bow to the moon(2) and dance and sing
For the bounty nature brings
A full belly and the warmth of mead
&, as the hunter tells his heroic deed
The firelight flickers on the faces still
Enrapt by his chase up on the hill

Flints and potshards point to
A passage overland(3) and through
This corner of the ancient land
Where the first Briton did stand
And look to the river and beyond
Westward, Wales and Scotland on
And made a home here on the downs
Neolithic hunting grounds

Up to the hill, across the downs
From east to west and northward bound
We’ll walk the footsteps gone before
Of ancient deeds and long lost lore

Down in the valley above river’s rise
Under the chalk hill’s watchful eyes
Long barrows and two standing stones
Once housed the ancients sleeping bones

Kit’s Coty, long since worn away
And Little Kit’s(4) in disarray
A pile of sarsens on the ground
Where once stood a burial mound
Higher still on the North Downs Way
Are where the White Horse stones(5) still lay
~

Roman Roads to Saxon King

For three thousand years they stand
As hunters turn to traders and
The trackway running on the hill
No longer sings with a flint arrow’s kill
But rings with the metal-workers’ grind
As bronze sword and axe-head brightly shine
The traders route from Ireland to Gaul
Soon offers rich pickings for all

Who decide to invade these shores
And embark on bloody occupation wars
Caesar and 10,000 men
Soon undone by the Belgae when

The roman ships caught by storms
Dragged up on Deal’s beaches form
An easy target and Caesar, twice repelled
Withdraws, a Gaulish uprising to quell

An army 40,000 strong
Sees Aulus Plautius marching on
Durobrivae(6), where the river’s violent breach
In two days, puts Britain in the reach
Of Roman occupation and domain
And has Caractacus(7) in chains

Four hundred years of Roman Kent
And, for Blue Bell Hill, this meant
A road from Rochester, Maidstone and through
The weald for the iron-ore and timber fuel
Past battlefields and White Horse Stones
Roman legions marching home
Over cambered slab, flint and gravel
Constantine’s(8) chariot travels

The Saxon raids take their toll
And the Romans begin to lose control
Constantine’s got a name to make
And leaves Vortigern as king in his wake

Ands as the Romans leave British shores
The country falls prey to the hordes
Of Picts and Scots whose raids bring
Little peace for Vortigern the King

He makes a deal with Hengist who
For a piece of land near Hoo
Will fight with a mercenary zeal
Until Vortigern reneges on the deal
Fighting alliances soon break down
As Hengist seizes the Kentish crown

But the battle at Aylesford ends
In no victory when
Catigern, Vortigern’s second son
Is slain by Horsa, whereupon
Horsa dies on the battlefield
Leaving his brother, Hengist’s, fate sealed
To claim the county for Saxon intent
And start the lineage, the Kings of Kent

At Kits Coty, pagan- blessed
Catigern’s body is laid to rest
To the megalith when Horsa’s slain
Under the White Horse Stone he’s lain

Walk the pathway on the ridge
Look out towards Aylesford’s bridge
Stand a while by the ancient stones
Now the resting place of warrior bones

~

The Pilgrims Way - from the Middle Ages on

St.Thomas Beckett(9), a martyr made
And in Canterbury Cathedral laid
So pilgrims walked down Watling Street(10)
To heal their poor and blistered feet
But scorned the trade route up the hill
Chaucer’s words to keep them to their will

Centuries pass on the wooded lee
En route from Winchester to Canterbury(11)
Crossed by holloways(12) and sunken roads -
Where the swineherds and carters drove
Oxen, sheep and market pigs down to the Weald
From winter heights to summer fields -
Ringing with the bell teams(13) whose names
Still grace the taverns(14) along those lanes

And so those quiet ways came to be
A place rife for skulduggery
Ufflers(15), owlers, ghosts galore
Highwaymen and wild folklore

Three pound duty(16) for wool export
Then smuggle it out and in retort
Brandy, lace and a cup of tea
For all of London’s fine ladies

So the fishermen and farmers trade
And gentlemen and clergy played
Their parts in the smugglers chase
And to keep those oilskins(17) safe
A ghost or two was just the thing
To stop passing eyes from eager prying

Even Kit’s Coty was a smugglers trove
And so the legend of the black beast grows
No spectral hound or wish-dog lair
Just a place to stash misbegotten fayre
Unless, like Charles Igglesden(18), you did hear
Of the poor peddlers’ mortal fear
The Devil’s abroad they’ll whisper late
And here’s the story of their fate

In 1745, two peddlers on their way
From Trottiscliffe into Medway
Spy ‘a great lean hound with prick’t ears’(19)
That, on the path in front, appears

Too late to cry out, it leaps in one bound
And savages a peddler to the ground
There he was buried where he fell
Killed by the grey hound of Hell

~

Through the Hill to the Future

The march of progress quickly goes
As old lanes change into toll roads
In 1728 the turnpike(20) ran
From Rochester to Maidstone and
Though the grey dog was seldom seen
Other ghosts(21) abound it seems

Until a Victorian Reverend was walking home
From Boxley Church when, near the Druid(22) Stone
His way is blocked by a great grey dog
As large as a calf and fierce as Beowulf
It gives chase to the vicar till at last
It disappears just as fast
This hell hound haunts Frith Wood still
The notorious Beast of Blue Bell Hill

Now the hill is cut with newer roads
And in 1823 one of the White Horse stones
Is smashed up and laid underneath
The Chatham Road, out of the historians’ reach

The Turnpike Trusts soon have their day
A Board’s(23) now in charge of highways
By the 1990’s there’s progress all round
Both on the hill and underground

The A229 follows the old Roman road
The Channel tunnel rail link is proposed
And in 2001 The North Downs Tunnel(24)is complete
A modern engineering feat
Over one hundred working round the clock
To beat the budget and bore through the rock

But on the chalk hill’s shoulder lays a sad weight
An Air Ambulance crew lost in ‘98 (25)
There’s a memorial to them at the picnic site
And, from that vantage point, you just might
See a pattern emerging in the fields
A circle26 of interlocking shapes and wheels
How it got there remains a mystery
Strange hieroglyph for all to see

Then, on May Day near sunrise
If you get to the green for five
You’ll see the sweeps wake Jack-In-The-Green(27)
All dressed in his basket of evergreen

And invite him to join them
And the merry sets of Morris Men
Who fill Rochester’s High Street
With the sound of stick, drum and dancing feet

It’s true, from ancient flint to modern drill
We’ve taken to and from this hill
Where future paths will follow, no one knows
But our history was written on these roads
Up on the hill the view is revealed
Across the Medway and on to the Weald
Sings the wind and, listen, if you will
You’ll hear the Ballad of Blue Bell Hill

~

Notes

1 The Upper and Lower Bell public houses rang bells to allow safe passage on narrow carriage way between top and bottom of hill for horse-drawn vehicles.

2 Evidence from Stonehenge and Ireland suggests the moon was equally as important as the sun in Neolithic calendars.

3 The land bridge between England and France existed up until about 5000BC. Running across this land bridge was the Harrow Way a prehistoric trackway that now encompases The Hog’s Back, and The North Downs Way.

4 Kits Coty and Little Kit’s Coty are the remains of Neolithic long barrows.

5 Megalithic stones. Only the Upper stone now remains, the Lower stone was broken up in situ when the A2249 was built.

6 Durobrivae (Rochester)

7 Caractacus was eventually handed over to the Romans in chains by Cartimandua, queen of the Brigantes.

8 Constantine – self proclaimed Roman emperor.

9 In 1160 AD, St Thomas Beckett, the Archbishop of Canterbury was murdered in his own cathedral. His shrine at Canterbury became the focus of pilgrimage in the following centuries.

10 Watling Street was the route used By Chaucer’s pilgrims in The Canterbury Tales, following the old Roman Road from St Albans to Canterbury. By the 1600’s the pilgrimages had almost stopped.
11 The North Downs Way trading route was 120 miles long.

12 Holloways or droveways were routes used by farmers to take their livestock from the top of the Downs down to the summer grazing found on the Weald. Over the centuries these became worn down into sunken lanes.

13 Due to the narrow and steep roads it was hard for two carts to pass by and so bell teams were used to warn oncoming traffic of the cart’s approach.

14 The Upper and Lower Bell inns, on the old Maidstone to Chatham road used this tradition of ringing a bell every time a vehicle went up or down the steep narrow track between them until the road was improved.

15 Ufflers worked as casual labour for the barges along the Medway River and Owlers smuggled wool.

16 The levy of duty on wool and gold exports, started in the 13th century, gave rise to smuggling.

17 Tobacco, lace and silk were smuggled in from the French coast wrapped in oilskins. The goods were normally purchased in France but then smuggled over to avoid the heavy import duties.

18 , 19 In his ‘Saunters In Kent’ Charles Igglesden mentions twice the appearance of a ‘Great Dogg’ near Maidstone. Modern sightings being investigated as wild cats such as the black leopard.

20 At the end of the 17th century, by act of parliament, the Turnpike Trusts were set up to build and maintain new roads. A toll would be charged for use of these roads and was collected at toll gates and houses.

21 There are still many modern sightings by motorists on roads near Blue Bell hill, often of phantom hitch-hikers.

22 The Druid Stone is an alternate name for the remaining White Horse stone.

23 The Highways Boards were public authorities set up in the 19th century to replace the Turnpike Trusts as these were often badly run, in debt and unable to maintain the roads.

24 The North Downs Tunnel is 3.2 km long, has an internal diameter of 12 m and descends to a depth of 100 m below the chalk hills. It is constructed with a sprayed concrete lining. This made it one of the largest and deepest twin-track railway tunnels with a sprayed concrete lining constructed in the UK.

25 The Kent Air Ambulance crashed in fields near Burham while returning to it’s base at Rochester on Sunday 26th July 1998, three crew members were killed in the accident.

26 Crop circle formations have appeared all over the UK and, at one time, believed to have been the work of extra-terrestrials.

27 Jack-In-The-Greens are sometimes known as chimney-sweepers garlands and have long been associated with the trade. They are men dressed in a basket-work or wicker frame covered in garlands of evergreens such as ivy and participate in May Day celebrations, the traditional holiday for chimney sweeps. The Climbing Boys’ Act 1868 made it illegal to employ young boys to sweep chimneys and the May Day processions slowly fell out of favour. The final May celebration in Rochester was held in the early 1900s. This traditional festival was revived in 1981 as The Sweeps Festival, which begins with the waking of a seven foot Jack-In –The-Green on top of Bluebell Hill.

Them Crooked Vultures album review

2010-01-20T06:03:00.000-08:00

The Crooked Vultures (Dave Grohl, Joshua Homme and John Paul Jones) new album is reviewed in the form of a poem here.

And the winners are....

2010-01-14T05:02:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to the 2008~2010 Winners:

Best Place Reviewed
Winners: Pencarrow House, Cornwall and Hall Place & Gardens, Kent

Best Exhibition/Event Reviewed
Winner: Open Day ~ Rochester Airport, Kent (2009)

Best Album Reviewed
Winner: Paul Weller ~ 22 Dreams

Best Album Track Reviewed
Winner: Radiohead ~ Weird Fishes/Arpeggi

Best Family Movie Reviewed
Winner: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Best Older Audience Movie Reviewed
Winner: Sweeney Todd

Best Movie Overall Reviewed
Winner: Wall-E

Click here to go to The Ripplestone Review website

And the winner is...

2010-01-11T03:23:00.000-08:00

The winners of the Ripplestone Review Biennial Awards 2008-2010 will be announced here and on the website by 15.01.10.
The list of nominees is as follows:

Best Place reviewed:

Pencarrow House
Yalding Organic Gardens
Hall Place & Gardens
Jurassic Coast (Charmouth)
Abbotsbury Subtropical Gardens
Bedgebury Pinetum
Leeds Castle

Best Exhibition/Event reviewed:

Mark Rothko Exhibition (Tate Modern)
RHS Hampton Court Palace Garden Show (2008)
Open Day ~ Rochester Airport, Kent (2009)

Best Album Reviewed:

Radiohead ~ In Rainbows
The Black Crowes ~ Warpaint
Phil Campbell ~ After the Garden
Kings of Leon ~ Only by the Night
Paul Weller ~ 22 Dreams
Mars Volta ~ Octahedron
Aha ~ Foot of the Mountain

Best Album Track Reviewed:

The Black Crowes ~ Whoa Mule
The Mars Volta ~ Since We've Been Wrong
Paul Weller ~ Black River
Aha ~ Start the Simulator
Radiohead ~ Weird Fishes/Arpeggi

Best Family Movie Reviewed:

National Treasure, Book of Secrets
Madagascar, Escape 2 Africa
Night at the Museum 2 (Battle of the Smithsonian)
Wall-E
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
Indiana Jones & the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

Best Older Audience Movie Reviewed:

Street Kings
Terminator Salvation
Quantum of Solace
Sweeney Todd

Best Movie Overall Reviewed:

Sweeney Todd
Wall-E
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
Madagascar Escape 2 Africa
Quantum of Solace

This time there are no TV categories and the Best Album Track has been included as a full category.

The Best Place and Exhibition/Event awards are based on the experience of a visit to place/event with a range of ages and abilities.

The winners will receive a Ripplestone Review certificate (which will be sent to appropriate record label, production company, organisation etc) after the winners have been announced in January 2010.

Films, places and music reviewed since the announcement of the nominees in October 2009 will be eligible for the 2010~2012 awards.

The top ten gardening trends of the last decade...

2010-01-09T07:25:00.000-08:00

Skidding out of the noughties and into the teenies, (tensies? tenners?) ensconsed in snow boots, thermals and woolly hat, unable to do any kind of gardening (unless shovelling snow and feeding birds count) I have whiled away the downtime thinking about the gardening trends that have emerged in the first ten years of the new century and thought I'd note down my (very irreverent!) top ten.

10) Grow Your Own. Suddenly it's very cool to be growing your own fruit and veg, whether it's tomatoes in your hanging baskets and strawberries in your window boxes or full-scale smallholding self-sufficiency. Which brings us to the next trend.

9) Allotments. Now as rare as hen's teeth with waiting lists as long as rods, the allotment is the grow-your-own essential gardening requirement.

8) Urban Greening. From guerrilla gardeners to vertical green walls, green roofs, green pavements... the city garden landscape is no longer parks and roundabouts, it's about conservation, regeneration, micro-climate, eco-pounds and reclaiming the urban er.. jungle.

7) Flower Power. No, not the hippy movement or a bid for brighter borders but the emergence of the flower motif on.. well everything. Garden tools used to be grey metal, green plastic or made of wood. Now everything is flowery, pastelly, stripey, dayglo, funky, gorgeous, designer-labelled and rainbow-hued. Garden sheds used to be quiet havens of peace and calm, now they're a psychadelic assortment of eye-poppingly pretty gadgets and gizmos.

6) Rills and Rooms. Garden rooms - Lots of travertine marble paving with a rill traversing it. (They used to be called patios and water features but that's so last century!)

5) Seed Swaps. Like having a penfriend but instead of writing letters, you swap seeds.

4) Real Lawns. Meadows, wild flowers, daisies, butterflies, beetles, birds, the circle of life, labyrinths and a lot less flymo-ing of frogs in spring.

3) The Birds and the Bees. No self respecting noughties garden is complete without being a wildlife haven for them.

2)Solar-Powered Lighting. Ever tripped over someone's solar-powered garden path lighting on the way back from the pub because you couldn't see it?

Of course, once you've perfected your urban/eco/self-suffient wildlife haven garden room you really should take photos and post it on your...

1) Garden Blog. The online equivalent of peeking over the fence into someone else's garden without the embarrasment of getting caught or tripping over their solar-powered garden path lighting...

Avatar movie review..

2009-12-21T03:03:00.000-08:00

Review of the new blockbuster by James Cameron here.

A little festive wish ...

2009-12-17T03:20:00.000-08:00

United Nations Climate Change Conference COP15

2009-12-16T03:23:00.000-08:00

Dear World Leaders,
The tipping point 4 climate change is today, in your decisions. If humanity is to have a sustainable future how hard a choice 4 your heart can it be?

United Nations Climate Change Conference COP15

The Willow Tree

2009-12-15T06:17:00.000-08:00

A couple of musical doodles for The willow Tree.

New tiger designs!

2009-12-02T03:31:00.001-08:00

Shop here.

2012 movie review

2009-11-24T06:18:00.000-08:00

Review of 2012 here

Love Not Hate

2009-11-08T23:52:00.000-08:00

To mark the 20 year anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, I thought I'd post up a poem about walls. This wasn't written about the Berlin Wall but does cover the themes of freedom and liberty. (Please feel free to add links in the comments to your own poems/thoughts/memories about the Berlin Wall.)

Sometimes the news is hard enough to hear
Let alone live through
We have let hate win
If we allow for one minute these borders of hate
To run among us
Dividing our hearts, separating our minds

The truth is this
The medieval mindset that brings violence, distrust
Fear and hate to every doorstep is no weapon at all
Against love
The sanctuary you crave is the human heart
And it beats in every one of us

Violence cannot win
Because it cannot see
How blind it is
To the truth
The walls of hate it builds
Only serve to imprison it
The human heart will always fly free

Truck Racing at Brands Hatch

2009-11-06T01:21:00.000-08:00

Last Saturday was spent at the Delphi Truck Superprix at Brands Hatch watching 1000bhp turbocharged five-tonne monsters thundering round Paddock Hill Bend, charging up to Druids and, occaisionally careering off at Graham Hill Bend. Despite the chill and misty start to the day the sight and sound of these trucks is truly spectacular and it was great to see Brands Hatch looking immaculate and well-cared for.
Among those racing was Andy Akinwolere from BBC's Blue Peter who, having passed his driving test 2007 was set the challenge of gaining his HGV licence, racing licence and then competing in competition. You can find out how he fared on Tuesday 10th November at 4.35pm on BBC1.
Also racing were Ginettas and Mazdas, the Dunlop Motorsport News Saloons, Pick-up Trucks and Legends Cars UK. Don't ask me how the Legends work out the points for their races, it's very complicated with ballots, reverse grids and points for various heats but I can tell you that these 5/8th scale cars are based on 1930s American NASCAR models.

The Legends racing towards Graham Hill Bend.

Nippy and suprisingly easy to park, driver and truck OK, barrier totally totalled. Time for an early lunch as repairs take place.

Blue Peter truck gets overtaken on Paddock Hill Bend.

Race time ~ charging round Paddock Hill Bend.

Blue Peter's Andy on Paddock hill Bend.

European President?

2009-10-28T04:33:00.000-07:00

Mark Steel's article in the Independent today about the post of European President is worth a read.
Here's an article in the Guardian about Nick Clegg's views on the issue.

It's blog action day ! - Tackling Climate Change with the Liberal Democrats

2009-10-15T05:42:00.000-07:00

It's blog action day today and this year's topic is climate change. I thought I'd put up some links on the action the Liberal Democrats are undertaking to secure a fairer and greener future for us and our families.

"Liberal Democrats are calling on the Government to set the example and make a commitment for a 10% reduction in public sector emissions in 2010," said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Energy and Climate Change Secretary
Have a look at this page on the Liberal Democrat website.

The Liberal Democrats have been praised as the only political party "that gets it" by one of the country's leading environmentalists. Have a look at this page on the Liberal Democrat website.

Nick Clegg launches 'One Planet One Voice' Have a look at this page on the Liberal Democrat website.

'A healthy natural environment is crucial not only to our quality of life but also to the sustainability of life on the planet. Liberal Democrats recognise that the threat to biodiversity and the depletion of our natural resources are as great a threat as climate change.' Have a look at this page on the Liberal Democrat website.

Energy prices should be fairer and simpler. Have a look at this page on the Liberal Democrat website.

As an individual, it can be hard to know what actions will help with climate change and whether those actions really can have any effect at all. At the next general election there is one simple action you can take to ensure a fairer and greener future for us all, vote Liberal Democrat.

Have a look at this page on the Liberal Democrat Economic Recovery Plan.

National Poetry Day '09

2009-10-08T02:29:00.000-07:00

National Poetry Day today and the theme is heroes and heroines.

Ripplestone Review Biennial Awards 08/10

2009-10-06T04:37:00.000-07:00

Hurray! It's that time again when the Review trawls back through a couple of year's worth of reviewed stuff and tries to decide who deserves a lovely Ripplestone Review certificate for glorious music, outstanding cinema, great family entertainment or simply a nice day out. The nominations can be found here and results will be posted on The Ripplestone Review in January 2010.

The Kelpie

2009-10-04T11:23:00.000-07:00

In ink-deep water dwells
The Kelpie and it's fearsome spells
Lost in those moor-locked pools
Ripples running from it's hooves

It waits in a weed-choked lair
For passing fools and maidens fair
To ride away with, free and high
Across the lake, beyond the sky

They'll realise all too late
What's to be their awful fate
As the Kelpie dives below
Plung'd to icy death they go

The water horse gallops, see the waves
While mortal bones waste in watery graves

The miller's daughter wanders near
The millpond, up beyond the weir
And there, reflected in gleaming deeps
Her beauty shines, her radiance keeps

The kelpie lost in lustrous sighs
Enchanted by her wildling eyes
While she waits for her sweetheart Will
The Kelpie watches, deathly still

And in it's heart is a plan
To shapeshift into a man
And steal her swift away
Till she's lost beneath the waves

The water horse all clothed in flesh
Calls out, as though his life's last breath

The miller's daughter hears the cry
And rushes to the Kelpie's side
Finding him in half-drowned distress
She lays his head upon her dress

The kelpie, fluttering his eyes
Sees she's fallen for his disguise
And moaning as if with mortal pain
Asks to know his angel's name

She bends low so he'll hear
And whispers 'Morag' in his ear
But his cold eyes cause alarm
And belie his distress'd charm

A water horse to steal her to his lair
The miller's daughter shivers at his stare

With fearful care she strokes his brow
And hopes and prays that somehow
She can escape the Kelpie's spell
And not be lost below the swell

She sings a soothing lullaby
And the Kelpie shuts his eyes
Until he falls, deep and sound
Fast asleep upon her gown

Morag watches as he sleeps
His hair all wound with watereeds
King-cups and lilly-flowers
As though dressed for a funeral bower

The waterhorse dreams on without a care
Cradled in the lap of this maiden fair

At last she dares to slip away
And the Kelpie, left where he lay
Sleeps alone on the millpond bank
Amongst the reeds, cold and dank

Heart pounding with the hope of escape
She runs back along the millpond race
Running fast and faster till
She runs into the arms of Will

And there in torn and sobbing breath
She tells of her escape from certain death
Her skirts all waterlogged and worn
From the Kelpie's frightful sojourn

And when the water horse wakes he finds his prey
Has long since vanished along the sunlit brae

~

In ink-deep water dwells
The Kelpie and it's fearsome spells
Lost in those moor-locked pools
Ripples running from it's hooves

It waits in a weed-choked lair
For passing fools and maidens fair
To ride away with, free and high
Across the lake, beyond the sky

They'll realise all too late
What's to be their awful fate
As the Kelpie dives below
Plung'd to icy death they go

The water horse gallops, see the waves
While mortal bones waste in watery graves

Star of the Week! Eddie Izzard for Comic Relief

2009-09-16T03:57:00.000-07:00

Haven't done a star of the week for a while but surely no one is more deserving than Eddie Izzard and his 43 marathons up and down the UK for Sport Relief.
If you didn't get to sponsor him, you can still donate here, read his blog here, read about the event here. What a star!

Autumn in the garden...

2009-09-09T08:26:00.000-07:00

Seedpods of love-in-a-mist, hops twining round arch, Blue Moon rose, teasel

Caption competition...

2009-09-07T08:23:00.000-07:00

Found this spider with freshly-caught fly in the garden, feel free to add captions in comments, no prize, just the fun of taking part...

I've been tagged - For an internet meme...

2009-09-05T04:46:00.000-07:00

To participate in the Meme Award, you need to:

- link back to the person who gave you the award;
- reveal seven things about yourself;
- choose seven other blogs to nominate and post a link to them
- let each of your choices know that they have been tagged by posting a comment on their blog;
- and finally let the tagger know when your post is up.

So thanks to HappyMouffetard at The Inelegant Gardener for tagging me for this... I'm in two minds as I'm not sure I know seven other bloggers to link to so might well throw that part open for people to nominate themselves through the comments section. Which probably disqualifies me from the whole meme thing...but never mind!

So here's seven things about me that you might or might not already know:

1) Raw pineapple gives me mouth ulcers.
(Note about link: Not sure if it's the same one I visited as a kid, but as pineapples go, it's pretty big!)

2) I've swum with sharks (but didn't realise it at the time).

3) I really liked physics at school but my maths wasn't good enough to take it as an option. Now, in my daydreams, I invent spaceships.

4) We were given a reading list at school for English Lit. I threw it away and read sci-fi instead.

5)I can wiggle my little toes independently of the others.

6) Occasionally, I like to meditate and have done so since I was ten.

7) If I ever win big-time in the EuroMillions, I'd buy Apethorpe Hall, now there's a project which would keep me and the boys out of mischief for the rest of our days!

Will post this for now and try and sort out links to other blogs and notifications later. Should anyone want to participate and be one of the seven blogs I have to nominate, please leave a link to your blog in the comments section!

New Labour's legacy, back to the 70's... and 10:10

2009-09-01T00:48:00.000-07:00

Report here on Government's own predictions for power shortages by 2017.

Another tax on the poorest sectors of society.

Rural communities are still not being addressed by Labour's centralised government.

10:10 a small green change for good.

Constant (plus don't forget..)

2009-08-28T03:43:00.000-07:00

Finding a rhythm through the changing seasons
A wider view from within
Beyond here and now
But still a part of it

The tide flows out and returns
Leaves fall, blossom to fruit
All is change
Yet remains constant

Don't forget: International Peace Day September 21 http://www.internationaldayofpeace.org/

And The Daily Politics returns on same day
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/the_daily_politics/

Pictures from Cornwall

2009-08-21T10:14:00.000-07:00

Pencarrow House

The Seed at the Eden project

Bodmin Jail

Waterfall at Tintagel

Field Tree

2009-07-22T10:39:00.000-07:00

In time and only in time
Will my grand design be revealed
In leaf and bud and spreading bough
My arching triumph of shade and light
A patterned tapestry on the floor below

My leaves, soft and green in Summer
Are soon set ablaze by Autumn
One moment crimson, the next gone
As laughing in the wind I let go
And they spiral down, out of control

Through Winter I keep the sky above
Taut and stretched with brittle fingers
My bark reveals the patina of my age
Lichen on the north and up above
A sprig of mistletoe clings

But when the sap rises
And the birds return
When breaking buds burst open
And the frost melts into Spring
Then I am glorious and reborn

And you may carve your name on me
As a reminder should you forget your love
I will not forget in time, like you
As here I stand
In leaf and bud and spreading bough

Trafalgar square fourth plinth, 'One & Other'

2009-07-06T03:22:00.000-07:00

Anthony Gormley's 'one & other' gets underway in Trafalgar Square today. Check out live feed from participants here

keepsafe angel mugs

2009-07-02T03:55:00.000-07:00

Look! Not only nice t-shirts but also keepsafe angel mugs too, click on link in sidebar to go to shop...

Sweet peas, cornflowers, clematis and hops

2009-06-27T07:34:00.000-07:00

Stonehenge

2009-06-19T05:55:00.001-07:00

Rookery Tree (on the road near Stonehenge)

Around the stones
The rhythm runs
And in the west
The dipping sun
Sears the sky
A bloody hue
As the rook sings
For you

High tree, branch and wind
Feathers ruffle, song begins
Silver seals the soul from guilt
Moonlight gilds the restless flint
In his eyes unwinds the night
So the rook sings

Harsh song
From claw and bone
Calling all those winged home
Chatter, hop and quarrel join
His gregarious chorus line
Harsh song
From claw and bone
He calls you home

Around the stones
The rhythm runs
And in the west
The dipping sun
Sears the sky
A bloody hue
As the rook sings
For you

Feathers ruffle, song begins
So the rook sings

Summer solstice weekend, Wimbledon and British GP (don't forget Father's Day!)

2009-06-19T05:26:00.000-07:00

English Heritage is providing Managed Open Access to Stonehenge for the summer solstice, details here.

Will Nadal's knees be OK? Will this be Murray's year to triumph? Wimbledon starts next week, details of draws etc here.

British Grand Prix at Silverstone, details here. Both Jensen Button and Lewis Hamilton have special one-off helmet livery for their home race.

(Don't forget Father Day on Sunday!)

Celebrating community festival, RSPB and marine bill

2009-06-15T05:43:00.000-07:00

Celebrating Community Festival 2009
There is a local festival celebrating community running from 13th to the 28th June. For more information and a programme of events check here.

The RSPB is asking people to support strengthening the Marine Bill in it's second reading so that highly protected sites can be preserved without the risk of future disturbance.

birds, bees and butterflies...

2009-06-11T10:32:00.000-07:00

How women won the right to vote in the UK.

2009-06-06T01:28:00.000-07:00

I was sad to see tv interviews this week with women saying they wouldn't be voting in last Thursday's local elections. Women in the UK have only been able to vote for just over 100 years and it was such a hard won privilege, a battle fought by women regardless of class and situation and with it, it paved the way for equality in so many aspects of our lives. I have trawled around the internet to find some links about the suffragettes and what they achieved for us, especially in the context of being a free and democratic society.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3153388.stm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suffragette
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy

Without this hard won right to vote, this country could not call itself a democracy and if we don't vote, then we are in danger of throwing away one of our basic principles of democracy, that we all have equal access to government. I would urge all women not to be turned off by the political process and the scandals of recent times but to understand how being part of this process will ultimately bring a fairer and more equal balance to our society.

after the rain...

2009-06-05T08:33:00.000-07:00

2009-05-31T00:09:00.000-07:00

In the garden today...

2009-05-28T06:07:00.000-07:00

Crater (sci-fi)

2009-05-18T10:44:00.000-07:00

Crater - Science fiction story following the crew on board the 'The Gybe' is being serialised over at Oola's Intergalactic Tuneship Eerie.

Chelsea Flower Show on the telly...

2009-05-17T01:13:00.000-07:00

Can't wait week of armchair gardening telly heaven on the bbbc.

Nick Clegg on BBB Breakfast ...Why Europe matters more than ever... autism and asperger syndrome petition

2009-05-12T03:13:00.000-07:00

Nick Clegg being questioned over MPs expenses on BBC Breakfast this morning.

The Lib Dem manifesto for Europe.

Please sign this petition for 10 Downing Street to show your support for Gary McKinnon, a man with Asperger Syndrome facing extradition for allegedly hacking into US Defense systems.

May I have some more please?

2009-05-11T06:06:00.000-07:00

Hey diddle, diddle
MP's in expenses fiddle?
They've got clean away with the moon
The public's aghast
To see such sport
An apology won't help them in June...

(Gordon Brown's apology. )

flowers in the garden...

2009-05-08T03:24:00.000-07:00

Confetti strewn lawn
Rich with footprints running through
The falling blossom

Star of the week for Joanna Lumley...

2009-05-08T02:16:00.000-07:00

Star of the week this week surely has to go to Joanna Lumley.

More of spring in the garden...

2009-05-01T05:44:00.001-07:00

More photos at ripplestone garden

Nick Clegg calls on MPs of all parties to join Liberal Democrats in vote against shameful Gurkha ruling

2009-04-29T08:20:00.000-07:00

Nick Clegg clearly had the moral high ground in PMQ's today, good to see the government was defeated in the commons vote, 267 to 246.

Have a look at this page on the Liberal Democrat website.

cherry tree haiku

2009-04-29T02:35:00.000-07:00

Confetti strewn lawn
Rich with footprints running through
The falling blossom

ohh, I'm getting all twittery...

2009-04-25T03:27:00.000-07:00

Tweet me here...

The Ballad of Blue Bell Hill

2009-04-24T06:02:00.000-07:00

Finally! The Ballad of Blue Bell Hill, (along with footnotes) is up on the Ripplestone Review...just in time for the Sweeps Festival 2009 in Rochester over the May Bank Holiday.

Hell's kitchen - reality burns...

2009-04-23T12:05:00.000-07:00

I saved up the best part of two weeks worth of Hell's Kitchen shows to watch while tackling the ironing mountain..(this was not a good idea as I actually managed to iron over one of my little fingers as I was so engrossed in the show)and I'm completely hooked and horrified in equal measures. Claudia's fabulous pink dress, 'Granthea',the pasta-nicker, Marco's 'Heathcliffe with a meat cleaver' impression, live eels, dead eels, guts,entrails, blood, blisters, walk outs, tears, toast, toast, toast...not to mention the most bizarrely styled interior yet for the restaurant. (I thought the 80's were fashionable again, shouldn't it all be chrome, black leather, industrial stripped concrete and neon pink, silver and teal? Just say no flock wall-paper..)Phew..I feel drained, only half an hour to go and I can have another helping...

Spring in the garden continues

2009-04-22T10:15:00.001-07:00

Golden hops galloping away...

Very early strawberries on the way if this sunshine continues...

The tulips that have decided to grow up through the lavender...

Road safety has caught the kids imagination...

2009-04-21T09:02:00.000-07:00

While a lot more grisly than the hedgehog campaign (not too mention Charlie the cat and for those of us old enought to remember the squirrel...what was his name?), Tales of the Road seems to have caught the kids imagination... so well done to whoever was the brains was behind this cool campaign for road safety. Check out the website for more info, games and competitions for your children to help keep them safe on the roads.

Say no to nuclear power plants...

2009-04-20T06:02:00.000-07:00

Here's a link to a petition to sign against an increase in nuclear power in the UK. I have read a couple of articles with interest recently, on in the gardian abou the propossed 11 sites for new nuclear power plants , this article about Spain's wind power farms in La Mancha having a record breaking output recently and how they already supply 12% of the country's power and in today's Independent, this article about how the UK could be about to miss out on an green energy boom by not investing in wind power. Why is this government so scared of wind power yet prepared to saddle us all with the short-term power solution of nuclear whose legacy will be the huge financial/ecological burden of 11 extra nuclear plants to decomission for future generations? Generations that will already be paying well into their 70's for the economic chaos of today.

Eggstrodinary stories in the news today...

2009-04-12T01:15:00.000-07:00

Oh dear, 9.15 and I've already eaten too much chocolate, turned on the tv to hear about the McBride 'smear' emails, now feeling queasy. Being a very cynical sort of person, as the Labour party lurches from one PR disaster to the next and Mr. Brown is stripped of his once close aides and allies, I can't help seeing a rather larger game of political chess emerging. I will not be suprised if New/Old Labour has a new/old leader for the next election...

Anyhow, political pondering aside, I did just stumble across the Downing Street garden website on flickr, and while I have totally eaten too much chocolate, there is always room for more pictures of lovely Spring flowers on an Easter Sunday.

Hell's Kitchen starts this Monday...

2009-04-11T06:50:00.000-07:00

Need something to get your teeth into after all those Easter Eggs? Monday 13th April at 9:00pm on ITV 1 sees the return of Marco Pierre White in Hell's Kitchen. Among the celebs are Adrian Edmonson and Linda Evans and only one kitchen for them all to cook their goose in ...can't wait!

Orange or purple - which colour do slugs prefer?

2009-04-11T01:33:00.000-07:00

Why do the tulips you want to keep disappear after one year but the ones you don't want, because they clash horribly with your planting scheme, keep springing up, no matter how often you try and dig them all out?

Why does it always rain, persistently, just as the grass really needs cutting?

Why do pigeons only crap when you've just put the laundry out or washed the car?

Why is it only the prettiest of flowers taste the nicest to slugs, why do they never ravage the carpet of daisies or dandelions in the lawn but can decimate a row of pansies (purple and orange) in a matter of minutes?

Spring in the garden

2009-04-10T01:06:00.000-07:00

For poet's sake! More poetry for the people!

2009-04-03T11:16:00.000-07:00

This article about Russell Crowe's poetry acceptance speech caught my eye. Fab! The Queen's looking for a new poet laureate - look! He's hunky, has a band (does he still have a band?)and can rhyme! Look no further. Problem solved. (I do actually really like the poem... it's not just his big puppy-dog eyes...)
Talking of poetry, I have finished my long poem, as mentioned on this blog before about the long history of Blue Bell Hill, Kent and will try and find some space to publish it, probably on Ripplestone Review in the next few weeks. (blatant advertising done..)
This also caught my eye over at the BBC. Yoko Ono's mural, entitled 'Promise' to be auctioned off for Autism Awareness Day. A beautiful piece, I hope it raises lots for the charity and delighted that it was given news coverage in a week when Autism Awareness Day was lost in headlines about G20.

Spring in the garden

2009-04-03T04:18:00.000-07:00

Tansy and Borage... Big day out...

2009-03-30T04:58:00.000-07:00

Tansy and Borage seeds have arrived, potatoes are chitting and onion sets are ready to go... counting down for the allotment!
(Tansy, a natural insect repellent, is said to help get rid of white/black fly and so good for planting between bean crops.. this tansy seed is from Victoriana Nursery Gardens.)

If, like us, you completely missed all the advertising for the Kent Big Day Out but still managed to get out (despite the rain, hail, howling gales and cold, cold, cold temps.) there is a video competition of your day out running until the 24th April. All details on website . We tried walking on Minster beach, screaming winds and rain making it more of a huddled apology of a stroll than a bracing walk and then took sanctuary in the Gatehouse Museum in Minster which was open for the day. a real treasure trove of artefacts from the local area from Victorian samplers to fossils, skulls, roman coins and local artwork; it was a fab half hour of pottering among the eclectic collection in a great building complete with roof views and a stone spiral staircase.

places to visit...

2009-03-27T06:08:00.000-07:00

Yalding Organic Gardens and Hall Place in Ripplestone Review.

Allotments and the wait is over....

2009-03-26T09:03:00.000-07:00

Anyone who follows this blog will know a few weeks ago I was bitching about the huge waiting list for allotments...only to find that actually I turned out to be right near the top of the list and, on a glorious Mothering Sunday...finally got my hands on one! I still think that there needs to be some investigation as to why plots are in such short supply, not just in Kent but all over the country, and so will still look into the matter but for now...I've got a lot of digging to do!

Photos are from the Yalding Organic Gardens.

Don't forget...Earth Hour and World Water Day...

2009-03-20T03:34:00.000-07:00

Don't forget to turn off all non-essential lights for Earth Hour on Saturday March 28th 8.30pm. We did this last year and even the kids were happy to join in.
World Water Day is this Sunday March 22nd and will be focusing this year on transboundary water systems and sharing resources.

'The flow of the water is always to the sea, whether over rapids or through slow pools, the journey is the life of the river and the ocean is where the river becomes one with all rivers, regardless of where they started or what they became.'

spring garden pictures...

2009-03-16T07:31:00.000-07:00

more at ripplestone garden..

and the winner is....(RND 09)

2009-03-16T05:50:00.000-07:00

Loved RND this year on tv, particularly the skit with the England football team but the highlight surely has to be the Lets dance.. contest with Robert Webb as winner on Saturday night. If you missed his Flashdance routine you can catch it here. Welding will never be the same.
If you don't know who Robert Webb is, he is half of comedy duo Mitchell and Webb. (David Mitchell was on the panel last week of Question Time.)

Allotments and the wait goes on and on......

2009-03-12T11:30:00.000-07:00

Well, I feel I should be blogging about something really important, like Comic Relief or the fact that I'm still no nearer the top of the allotment waiting list, (apprently all the lists for Maidstone have been amalgated into one big one - wonder how far down that I am now?) I read somewhere you only need to get six (could be eight) people to request allotments in your area and the council has to address the shortage. Will follow this up. But not today because today has been the kind of day that has culminated with me setting fire to the vacuum cleaner (not intentionally and no, please don't ask but it did involve salad cream and and a back pack!) looking forward to watching the Red Nose Day on telly tomorrow and to seeing the hike up Kilimanjaro tonight.

Ooh, interesting graphic just seen on click..

2009-03-08T00:36:00.000-08:00

A world view of CO2 and population statistics.

Morph tribute at Bankside

2009-03-02T02:24:00.000-08:00

A new model army appeared at Bankside yesterday as a tribute to Tony Hart.