Beguine
Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
Hmmm…. thanks, Reverse Engineer. I’m trying to imagine Mrs Pete trying to find a seat in the lounge room/lab. I wonder how many people could grow their food like that and still have a normal family life? 🙂 But all power to Mr Pete if all of that works!
I think I’ve had my penny’s worth… 🙂 thank you!
‘Hydroponics! Check out Peter’s setup inside his house! He grows enough inside to meet about 80% of his nutriition needs. Rest comes from the local fishing’.
Thanks Reverse Engineer! I clicked on the link and stood outside patiently listening to Peter’s ‘discussion of the political aspects’ but unfortunately, I didn’t get inside his house to see his set up. Maybe one has to wait for Part 2 for that? 🙁
PS Please remember that I’ve paid my penny to get in? 🙂
Come on peeps…… tell us what you are doing, interesting articles/links you have found that will be helpful for the transition – what YOU are doing!… commenting on TAE posts is fine … and informative…. but can we please DO something constructive and put forth some ideas?! Don’t feel inhibited… don’t feel you have to say something extraordinarily momentous or highly intellectual or learned! Are you building something, baking something, growing something, saving money, energy etc? Tell us!
Stoneleigh…. please push the boat out?…. 🙂 …and jump in?:)
Glennda, as we’ve already corrupted the responses to this serious post on Democracy can I suggest the most common uses for beautiful blue borage flowers in decades past have been accompanying alcoholic beverages such as the very old fashioned and slightly deadly Pimms No1 Cup (once favoured by English spinster ladies who demurred when proffered anything too alcoholic as unseemly) and the ubiquitous gin and tonic, widely accepted by all – lady or no. But of course, each to his/her own and if tea is your tipple then so be it. 🙂
Perhaps Gerard said borage “purgeth melancholy and quieteth the phreneticke and lunaticke person” only because it ‘prettied up’ and disguised (the temporary mood lifting effects of) an alcoholic ‘remedy’?
I think we should move across to food in the Lifeboat so we can further explore the magical properties of plantlife (and nightlife) and let everyone get on with democracy, now, don’t you?
🙂Nassim, pending rapeen’s response perhaps this will help, also.
I buy my organic, stoneground, wholemeal baker’s flour (Demeter Farm Mill) which is milled in Gunnedah NSW from an organics outlet in Sydney – (Honest to Goodness organic food & natural food).
But I’m sure you could find it at most health food stores where you are, too? If not ask them to order it in for you.I find that using all wholemeal flour can tend make the bread a bit dense, but nonetheless delicious. I mix it with their regular stoneground organic baker’s white flour – and it’s very good! I gave my breadmaking machine away a few years ago because the no-knead recipe was just so easy and quick to prepare. Good luck!
You may be faithful, El Gallinazo, but you’re not an idiot ..
You may have to come out of retirement and educate us a little more.. and yes, I like the humour, too!Birdshak and scandia: this sounds like an interesting theme emerging on food. Perhaps it could be further developed in the Food section of Lifeboat? 🙂
I’m planning on developing a largish organic salad greens and stir fry vegetable section in my under utilised glass house and would love to learn more on such things as growing and using nasturtium seeds, flowers and leaves, Birdshak, and any other interesting leaves you can suggest. I may sell them at the general store in my local village.
Don’t be disheartened, scandia. Maybe you can best lead by example. Set up a veggie garden on your balcony. Or try window farming?https://www.containervegetablegarden.com/blog/window-farms-replace-vertical-gardens/ (a TEDtalk last year)
‘Earth turns to gold in the hands of the wise’… Rumi
birdshak, it seems you’ve come down a line of good decision makers (and hard workers!) well done!…. hopefully, you’re growing lots of food to feed the locals…
Thank you, yapeen. My daily bread is the NYT no knead bread and I have found it reliably good for the last few years cooked in my wood fuel stove most days.
But encouraged by your great pics, I’m going to have another go at the Hertzberg/Francois recipe again. I wasn’t so impressed with my first attempt. I obviously need more practice when I look at your great loaf 🙂
I found the recipe a while back on Mother Earth News https://www.motherearthnews.com/ – a site for discovering lots of good information and reminiscent of the 60s (if you are too young to have known or remembered them this will be a good intro!:). You’ll be ‘coaxed’ a bit to join up each time you open another window but it’s not really necessary to do so.
I’m sorry Ian101 but I think your comments are unfair. 🙁
An educational speaking tour such as the one Illargi and Stoneleigh are on -rather than being ‘much more exciting… than to slog away at home’ – can be an exhausting and boring road trip at times as well as uplifting and fulfilling – and all the while hoping that you’re making a difference in people’s lives that will translate into wider action.
A new day, another town, a new group of people to engage with no matter how tired one might feel and often having to smile and make small talk – it’s not always easy.
Plus being away from family and friends and always trying to keep each talk fresh (no matter how many times it’s been delivered with variations) and answer the same questions over and over, as if for the first time.
It would be almost impossible for them to find the time to write and post to TAE as well.
Someone has to mind the shop and I think that Ashvin is doing a very thorough job, posting pretty much every day. If you write yourself, you’ll know how time consuming that is – so let’s not make it thankless, as well.
As you say, your experience is in a different context but it’s drawing a long bow to equate TAE with being a ‘boring old business’ such as the one you ran and sadly lost – we’re all trying to do our bit to help make the world a better place.
So encouragement’s the way to go, I feel…
I really enjoyed this documentary on Earthships as I’ve built and now live in a large solar passive mud brick farmhouse, specially designed for the Women’s Communal Living Project which is running as a ‘social experiment’ for women on their own over 50 who need to create affordable and sustainable communal housing http://www.womenscommunallivingproject.com
Another earth building system worth investigating is from Cal Earth, in California. They gave a one week workshop on making Superadobe buildings at CERES in Melbourne, Australia, in February 2011. We spent the week filling continuous sandbags with earth mixed with a small amount of cement and water to create a dome for the children’s adventure play area.
Liveable, sustainable (even elegant) buildings that withstand earthquakes can be made using sandbags, earth and barbed wire. Images of some of their buildings are at https://calearth.org/galleries/earth-one.html
They seem simpler, quicker and easier to construct perhaps than earth rammed rubber tyres which are very labour intensive. But I admired the way Michael built and designed his Earthships to provide almost everything within them that people might need to live.
and….The Club for subversive gardeners
What’s in a name? Digger’s was born (in Australia) on July 1978 in an old tin shed! Our purpose was to rescue the wonderful old varieties of vegetables, such as Scarlet Runner Beans, that mainstream companies were dropping from their lists.
Due to the buying power of Coles and Woolworths, the only way to reach the keenest gardeners was to set up mail order distribution, bypassing retail shops. Over the past 30 years, a hardware collossus, such as Bunnings, have gained dominance and now control the garden market, just as Coles and Woolworths control the fruit and vegetable market. Buying food, rather than growing it at home, is a greater contributor to climate change than all the CO2 from coal fired power stations. Multinational chemical companies, like Monsanto, can now introduce chemicals into our food supply (ie: G.M. seeds), which threatens our health and the existence of our best plant varieties.
So to preserve our best plants and garden traditions, and to help solve climate change, Digger’s has to become a club for subversive gardeners. We are anti-G.M. and anti-industrial agriculture and pro-organic, as we campaign to increase the growing of food in our backyards.
Since 1986 The Seed Savers’ Network, based in Australia, has pioneered community seed action in forty countries with community groups and government departments. It has helped establish a hundred Local Seed Networks around Australia to locate, multiply and distribute thousands of local food plant varieties that may otherwise have disappeared. The Seed Savers Foundation is a self-funded, subscription-based non-profit registered as a charity in Australia. The two entities, as Seed Savers, help you to learn how to save and exchange local seeds and use a wider range of vegetable and fruit seeds in your garden to improve your nutrition.
Let’s keep cool, peoples… it’s very early days. Setting this up is not easy – even Apple and Microsoft work out their bugs in the marketplace – and a little patience will reward everyone – tyros and pros. Thank you to all who responded to my request for help.
Thank you, Yapeen…. we all need bread as well as circus.
Down here on the farm we have lots of zucchinis just now – so we’ll get to work! 🙂
