Getting ready for Thursday! That’s four boxes of “Vote Today” leaflets printed for some lovely Green Party candidates in Manchester.
Like me, our Risograph may be elderly and a bit temperamental, but still has some uses.
riso strikes again
Category: Environment & Green Party
blue letters
The sound of the riso is heard in the air, heralding the spring local election season! Although we don’t have elections in Worcester this year, many of our neighbouring Green Party groups do, and we do our best to help out where we can. This is part of a batch of “blue letters” for the eight candidates for a Borough Council over in Gloucestershire.
A turning point
I’ve been a Green since January 2012. It’s been a long hard slog, both locally and nationally: we owe a lot to the charismatic leadership of Zack Polanski, of course, but also to the many thousands of devoted people who have created newsletters, delivered them in rain or shine, stood for election both a real candidates and as paper one (to ensure that as many people as possible did at least have the option of voting Green), and all the other tasks needed to keep the party running.
This is a cause for celebration.
assorted bits
The lat few days have been a steep learning curve! I took over “routine updating” of the Worcester Green Party website some months ago, which was fine. However, we now needed to add a couple of new pages (“supporters newletter” and “press releases”), and it’s been a bit of a struggle. The site runs as part of the national Geen Party site, which has some pretty strict templates, so it’s not always easy to work out the best way of doing things … in some ways, the 1990s way of working in raw HTML was easier! However, all is now done.
A chilly night last night, with temperatures down to zero. Warm bright sunshine today, and the iberis sempervirens (perennial candytuft) that spills over the side of the steps up to the patio was positively glowing. However, it’s not really warm enough to encourage me to spend long in the garden, so it looks as though washing walls is the afternoon project. I’m planning a re-paint of the kitchen as the “replace gas cooker with electric” project happens: perhaps a wash and single coat before, then a touch up of areas previously hidden by sockets and stuff, followed by couple of finish coats.
catch-up post
Today was vaguely sunny in patches, and the first day this year that I’ve managed to spend time in the garden. Last year’s tomato pots were emptied and cleaned, and the spent compost put on the bed that will have beans in it. The “done” side of the rotary composter was emptied – the “compostable” Waitrose bags haven’t really composted at all, and the rest was soggy and squelchy: I think I’ll have to drill better drainage holes in the beast. The compost, such as it was, was trenched in where the runner beans will go.
As the stock of 8-foot bamboos bought about ten years ago are now nearly all broken or otherwise past it, I’ve ordered a metal construction to grow runner beans and climbing French beans up. A bit over £30, so if it does a few years I’ll be happy. Indoors, courgettes and a squash have been sown (tomatoes were potted on last week, though I had to re-sow the “Monkton Wylde” as only one germinated).
The project to get rid of the gas cooker progresses (slowly and expensively). I’ve accepted a quote to run an electrical supply (which will also provide a connection point for a future air-source heat pump when the ten-year-old gas boiler dies). Today, I’ve booked in a “gas safe” (was CORGI) to cap off the gas as soon as the kitchen work is done. I also said goodbye to the hob kettle – I’m now the proud owner of an all-singing, all-dancing electric kettle that boils in less than half the time – photo below! The whole project is going to be around £3,000 by the time I’ve added in the cost of the cooker, redecoration (which I’ll do myself, but materials cost) and suchlike. However, a cooker with a wipe-clean surface (induction rings) and a catalytic self-cleaning oven will remove an enormous housework/cleaning burden that I really haven’t coped well with. It also will mark a stage in getting rid of fossil fuels in this house, which is unlikely to save money but which is very much driven by my Green conscience and awareness of climate change.
Also electrical: the Mayfield Road house electrical inspection came back as “unsatisfactory”. Part of this is non-double-insulated fan/light fittings put up by Clare and Ian, which Ian has agreed to deal with. Sadly, the fuseboard cover is broken, so a new fuseboard is needed, which is going to be a couple of hundred quid (including labour), but I clearly do need a valid electrical inspection test certificate.
Last Saturday was the Rainbow Hill & Fort Royal “Big Day Out”. Based in the old chapel opposite Mayfield Road, about 40 people in total over the day. I was there all day, in a “support” role: opening doors when people were carrying things, helping set furniture, looking after the occasional lost-looking person, and so on. Form 0930 to 1615, on my feet most of the time; nearly 10,400 steps for the day.
Monday was also an active day, at rather over 6,000 steps. A GP appointment in the afternoon, postponed from a fortnight ago. All tests came back negative, and apparently I seem to be in quite good shape for my age. However, I’m still troubled by aches in my arms and struggling to keep weight down – I’m mulling over a private checkup and tests.
assorted
A good day yesterday. Gethyn and Sue came over for coffee here, and then we went into town. Parked in the Copenhagen Street car park, and went towards Bowns. Council workers were hosing the mud of the quay walkway – the Severn has just got back within its banks, Although there were steps up to the Browns entrance, they were blocked off. Uncertain as to whether it was open, we walked round the back, where it clearly was.
A pleasant lunch, but brought to a bit of an abrupt close when I got a phone call from the Green Party saying that a delivery driver was outside my house – where was I? I’d actually not expected the unused 45,000 sheets of paper to be collected until next week, as today is Election Day in Gorton & Denton, where our candidate stands a very good chance, and I’d expected everyone to be far too busy to deal with it. Fortunately, we’d all finished eating, so were able to scamper back to Gethyn’s car and back to Church Road. They had other plans for the afternoon, so it was a hasty goodbye.
Today, I’m not feeling great. Overcast morning, and when I woke from an early nap the rain had reurned. My back really did not appreciate it! Fire lit around 4pm, and settling in for a long evening – today Worcestershire County Council considers its budget, with a County rise of nearly 10% (the City’s bit of it is only 3%), which looks like passing. It’s the Gorton & Denton by-election, and some good pix of WGP folk who’ve gone up to help on social media. It doesn’t look as though there will actually be a BBC election special, just rolling updates on the BBC News channel, though I think that Sky are doing an actual programme. Result expected sometime around 3 or 4 … I’m guessing it may well go to recounts.
And I’m overdue for a veggie day. I must summon up the energy to make an apple pie for later, which can also do if I get peckish while waiting for the byelection result. Rather a shortage of other veggie stuff, so it looked like making a batch of chickpea fritters (frozen ratatouille to go with them), but in the end I exhaustedly settled for baked beans on mix toast. Which used up the last of the loaf, so the bread machine is currently working on a replacement. That won’t be ready until well after my usual bed-time, but I’m trying to stay up or, failing that, awake for the by-election results.
Ummm…
No afternoon rest yesterday or the day before, due to ongoing discussions with the campaign team in Gorton & Denton about the possibility of doing a major rush print for them. We Greens stand a real chance in this by-election, and I’ve felt obscurely guilty about my inability to help out in any meaningful way (apart from chucking them a few spare ha’pennies). I still don’t know if it will go ahead, but because paper deliveries can’t be done over the weekend, we discussed them sending me the paper anyway.
I was very tired (on account of missing afternoon rests) last night – asleep before midnight instead of my usual 2am. Alarm set for just after 8, but I was jolted awake by the doorbell at 0750. Paper. Lots of paper. More paper than I’d expected: we’d talked about 30,000 sheets as I’ve a bit over-stocked anyway, but a full constituency worth of 45,000 was delivered, as I stood in my dressing gown in a still slightly bemused state by the front door.
Now waiting to see if the paper will actually get used! It would be around 12 hours printing, and about eight to ten hours folding (the folding machine is so noisy that I can only do about 90 minutes at a time).
Aspie stuff
I’m lucky that the sensory issues that being on the autistic spectrum presents me with are, in general, fairly easy to avoid. I can’t wear artificial fibres next to the skin, but cotton, silk, wool etc are widely available. Being Green, I buy second-hand when I can (underwear excluded!) on line. However, a couple of recent shirt purchases have not been great – the articles were good value and in excellent condition when they arrived, but had been doused in some vile fabric conditioner, I guess in an attempt to make them “smell fresh”. This kind of penetrating artifical odour is something I really can’t handle, and am particularly sensitive to, and it takes two or three full hot washes to properly remove the bloody stuff, as it gets absorbed into cotton fibres. I shall never understand why people have let themselves be conned into thinking that garments that are deliberately made to stink are in any meaningful sense “clean”.
Just loathesome.
Eeek!
I’ve been asked to take over the job of making minor edits on the Worcester Green Party website. Tonight was the first one – removing a “Green Wednesday” event that happened this evening. Very scary – the WGP site is run under the national one, and entirely block orientated, which I’ve never really used. Hipefully I’ll get to grips with it in due course.
ladder of engagement
Facebook has remined me that thirteen years ago today, Neil Laurenson came round to ask me to stand as a paper candidate for the Green Party in the the local elections due the following May. I said yes … setting my feet on the “ladder of engagement”, which has led me to some unexpected places. One of them is the job I’m currently prevaricating about getting round to: replacing the broken mains inlet socket on our Risograph printer. Like me, it’s getting elderly … together, we’ve done about one and half million copies over the nine years since Marjory Bisset persuaded me to adopt it.
