Tuesday 9th March 10

A good day, despite not spending enough of it in the garden. After breakfast I did my emails etc and then at about 10.30, got ready to get to Robin's for 11am, which is when he'd asked me to get to him to help him install his solar water system.

We had a go at this before Christmas... but he found the ?manifold had the sensor doobrey on the different end that he was expecting, so he had to alter things and today, all was ready and in the right place. His plumber/electrician friend Andy was there to help, so Robin did the on the roof stuff, tied on with climbing rope and carabiners. I climbed the ladder with the tubes and reflectors. Andy smeared 'Chinese Toothpaste' on the copper ends (prevents oxidation apparently) and helped clean the tubes.

What a great team! BUT... sad to say, on the 15th and last tube, Robin got a bit over enthusiastic and banged the tube on his knee... not hard, and by accident of course, and it broke. Fortunately he had a spare. These tubes work by heating a copper rod in a vacuum, the rod warms up and the heat is transmitted to the end of the tube which sits in the water flow, warming the water. Despite the day being overcast, these tubes heated up significantly... the tubes themselves didn't, but the copper rod did. Amazing though simple technology. Also, as water doesn't actually flow in the tubes, if one breaks, it can be replaced easily.

I left at just after 1pm and came home via a place where a large number of willow trees have been felled, and conveniently chopped into large chunks and just left... although willow isn't the best wood for fuel, I'll take anything! So, one huge chunk of willow and home.

Lunch. The rest of the afternoon went too fast. I had several Fiddlesticks enquiries.

I did manage to do some outside stuff, keeping me sane.

During the evening I had three long phone calls, one from a Channel 4 researcher who wanted my input to a programme about an interesting approach to reducing supermarket food waste, which I may be able to help with, and two long chats with people I know, all good conversations to have.

Friday 27th March 09

Quite a relaxing day, although I did a lot. At about 10, two Film and TV students arrived, Liam and Laura, to do a piece on recession, freeganism and green, low carbon lifestyles, drying fruit and composting.... well, they wanted to do recession and freeganism, I turned it into all the rest!

We cycled down to Country Fresh where unexpectedly, Richard wasn't working and Shirley was, so she got the starring role of handing over the box of compostables. We came back via Freshways, but Raj, the 'Mr Charisma', wasn't there, so no filming. Back at home, we did a bit on composting and how I re-use some of the stuff that the shop is unable to sell... such as a blemished red pepper which had three quarters of it perfectly edible. Back inside, we did the dried fruit theme, and by 1.30 they had got enough 'footage' and they went. I hope that they got something useful and interesting for their project. I've asked them to send me a copy so I can see what they've made me say. Anything can happen in the editing suite!

After lunch I did a bit of work in the garden, weeding and more compost heap loading and some work out at the front, bow-sawing some smaller timbers... and then David came with his LETS bank account paperwork and we discussed him photographing another gig, so we can finish off the new publicity material. Then the children came home and all was good humoured and happy.

I had the hot-pot with scone top that Gill had made yesterday, reheated on the woodstove, and I attempted to catch up on assorted e-jobs such as doing some publicity for a forthcoming Green Festival meeting.

So, an unhurried day and quite productive.

Tuesday 24th February 09

Gill got up early to make pancake batter for the kids' breakfasts. She got me up at 8 so I could take our youngest to school, and then go into town to deal with the paperwork I failed to manage last night. So got to town just before 9 and waited to get into the Building Society, then waited outside the bank til 9.30 to pay the water bill. Got back home before 10, Gill getting ready to go into town to help Melody celebrate her birthday with a girly lunch.

I awaited the phone call at 11.30 from Shannonside FM who had arranged to interview me about my low cost/low carbon/verging on 'Freegan' lifestyle. The presenter, John, chatted to me for about 10 or 12 minutes and seemed pretty positive about most of what I said. The interview might be made into a podcast... it certainly generated some interesting comments afterwards!

I then had lunch but stayed in afterwards ding various things on the computer and phone. This included trying to get the York City Screen to show The Age of Stupid nice and early after release. I found out that the out-of-town 'Vue' cinema in Clifton Moor is screening the Public Premiere on 15th March. I wish that City Screen had got this... they still might, with a little bit of pressure! The Vue cinema is mainly visited by car users and the Premier tickets are a hefty £10.

I cycled down to school at 3 to pick up our youngest son and again stopped at the trashed woodland to pick up some quite large chunks of Scots Pine which filled the trailer very satisfactorily...

We had a relatively peaceful after-school time. Gill thickened the carrot soup with some of yesterday's mashed potato, and this was eagerly demolished by all... much appreciated, and better with the thicker texture. I had a cheese sandwich which one of the boys hadn't eaten with my soup. And a slice of Gill's cake with an out of date free yoghurt for pudding!

I managed to make time to sort out four bags of seedless grapes retrieved from the compostables, and blanched a big saucepan full for a few minutes before draining them (re-using the water for the washing up of course!) and spreading them on a baking tray to balance on the water can on the stove. The duff grapes and stalks, of course, will be composted....

So a productive day.

Monday 25th February 08

Spent most of the morning retyping in my paid blog but also got a call from a TV company wanting to do a programme on green people, and a Professor Fiddlesticks enquiry.

I got the blog done by lunchtime and spent most of the post-lunch hour or so doing washing up, recycling duties etc, then went to school to pick up the boyos who were in a good mood.

I did some composting down the bottom of the garden whilst it was still light, I dug out a builders bag of mature and ready-to-riddle material, into another builders bag, perhaps two thirds of a tonne of compost. I can't wait to put it through my motor-riddle! Just as I was coming to the end of this, Gill called me to the house as I had an intersting phone call.

It was from Oxfam who have been running an e-competition to find some people with very small carbon footprints, three of whom will be invited down to London to talk to people in Government about climate change and policies which could help reduce our national Carbon emissions. I had done the Carbon Calculator http://actonco2.direct.gov.uk/index.html and they were ringing to say I had one of the smallest footprints and I might be picked to go to London. The researcher went through the calculator with me, asking me my answers and came up with an annual figure for me alone of 0.45 tonnes. This was slightly smaller than the first figure I got, as I had included the boys' computer and printer/scanner in with my calculations, whereas with the Oxfam person, we ignored these items. I'll be contacted when the 'lucky people' have been chosen. What a suprise! What a buzz!

Very soon after this I got a phone call from an Irish radio station researcher who had seen the Observer article and they'd never heard of CRAGs and were very interested, and wanted to do a live radio interview about CRAGs and my way of being green. I'll be getting another call tomorrow afternoon, and a call on Thursday morning for an interview..... very exciting! Again!

Tea was rice and veg cooked on the woodstove.