Friday 8th August 08

I started the day by doing a collection round with a wheelbarrow, calling out 'Bring out your Biodegradables' and 'Cooked food, raw food, cardboard, tissues, anything compostable' and got a good load plus lots of positive comments and laughter.

At 12 I did a workshop in the Permaculture area on composting... the sign-writers had changed my title (something like 'How home-composting can reduce your carbon footprint') to 'How composting can save the Planet' which I found quite funny... but it drew a crowd of three who were all eager to hear my 'What it is, how to do it, why, and info on Master Composter schemes' talk, followed by a question and answer session. At about 12.50 I asked my lad if he'd get his stuff from the tent and we then scooted along to the entrance to meet Gill and our youngest who'd got a train to Harrogate, bus to Ripon and a 'Little Red Bus' service up to Grewelthorpe.

We had a quick walk around the site and ended up at the crew mess tent for something to eat. Gill had brought a birthday cake for our youngest who has his birthday over the weekend, and that was fun as the whole table sang to him. We then went to the entrance so Gill and the boys could get the 2.30 bus back to Ripon.


I continued working during the afternoon, and later when it chucked it down watched a film in the solar cinema called 'On the Verge' which was brilliant. I bought a copy of the DVD too. I had some fun in the evening when I went to see a band called The Electric Brains, and I blew up a load of long modelling balloons which people waved around. I really loved the theramin.... the chap playing it could really play it, not just make sounds, but get tunes out of it and that's not at all easy... a fab gig.