Ruby the dog has her own ideas as to how the world should work. Experience may slowly be disabusing her of this rather quaint notion. Earlier today she was sent to her very first morning at dog obedience school. Initially, the kelpie was frightened by the sudden change in routines. Fear soon turned to anger. During socialisation low tolerance for other dogs was expressed. People can sense this, and even the attending dogs quietly avoided Ruby. An inquisitive poodle thought the kelpie was hot stuff, and kept hanging around. They may end up being friends.
Life rarely works out like you imagine it will. Ruby will soon discover this, and perhaps a poodle for a friend is better than none at all? A human can only offer her the opportunity to improve, she has to do the hard work of changing. Despite what it sounds like, the kelpie is good enough for here. With the training and socialising, we’re simply attempting to file off the rougher edges of her personality.
Frankly speaking, there is a larger need for reform school. There sure is a lot of misbehaviour out there these days, and very little of it is canine related. It was difficult to ignore the news this week that the share market had reached a new high. Houses also cost $3,000 more than previously. Neither increase in cost was alleged to have been related to any sudden improvement of the assets. It’s not encouraging news. Such excesses should be curbed. A correction collar for the miscreants may be needed perhaps?
Sometimes I wonder if the folks creating this intriguing combination of economic circumstances even concern themselves with the thoughts or cares of the younger folks who are faced with ever higher hurdles to jump? It’s hard know really. Recently I read a concept which suggests that people invariably hate others that they are doing a wrong to. The basis for the concept was that the hate allows the wrong doers to sleep at night, presumably in the comfort of their own righteousness. It gives pause for thought doesn’t it?
My grandfather was a good one for giving advice. Sadly I was too young for the advice to register. He used to have the habit of referring to every other male by the nickname: ‘D@#khead’. Somehow the old guy was a commanding enough presence that he managed to engender the term with a sense of affection for the many foibles and failings of the individual so addressed. Certainly no trouble ever stemmed from this intriguing use of the language. He failed to pass on the how-to instructions for that little trick. If I tried it, there’d probably be no end to the punch-ups which would result from speaking to other folks with contempt. An unwise path for the less commanding!
As an old fella myself, I do wonder about these sorts of issues. What lessons should the elders in society offer to the young? And how would providing those lessons affect the lives of the people so proffering them? Of course a person has to abide by their advice lest they appear the hypocrite. It’s a complicated story, and it hardly surprises me that advice is rarely offered, and is often met with derision. People are highly sensitive to hypocrisy.
A few days ago I encountered a short paragraph of a fictional grandfathers advice to his grandson. The book was written by my favourite author, the now deceased, Jack Vance. Many people enjoy the works of P.G. Wodehouse, and they’re great reading. However, in those books the toffs always seem to win, despite their many misfortunes and acts of sheer foolishness. Jack Vance writes equally smooth and silky dialogue, clear narrative, with superb depictions. Of course there are the toffs, but the underdog usually wins against the odds through sheer skill. My kind of story! Anyway, the short paragraph of advice was taken from the book ‘Ecce and Old Earth’ and is reproduced here purely for educational purposes:
“My only specific instructions are these: do not allow well meaning but impractical theoreticians to exert any control over you; make sure that your associates are competent, experienced and tolerant folk, without ideological axes to grind.”
Sound advice.
Upon reflection, it seems odd to me that my experience has been that such good advice was rarely imparted. From a young age most of the training I’d received was geared towards vocational outcomes. The other stuff about people and things, well, that seemed to be up to the individual to learn. And that was often learned the hard way, by trial and error. Seems like a strange option to me. But anyway, as inequalities increase there’s just so much trouble brewing in society that I’m guessing the current arrangements will eventually change. And hey, it might even be for the better. But before then, I’m just trying to teach Ruby some lessons about how to be better socialised.
After a dry and mostly cool week, the very air now smells of honey. The tall Eucalyptus Obliqua trees in the surrounding forest are the second tallest flowering plant on the planet. And this week, the trees are producing flowers. Masses of flowers.
With all the flowers, and smell of honey, there are insects everywhere. Clouds of butterflies and moths are all over the place enjoying the nectar and pollen feast. The trees flower best when they have a bit more room to grow (I’m guessing). Some patches of the forest are so thick with the tall trees, they’re struggling for water, light and minerals. You won’t see any flowers there.
A few days ago, we headed about an hours drive north of here to have a poke around the gold fields relics. It’s amazing to see the abandoned industrial plant in out of the way locations. It’s all being taken back by nature. This week, we visited a large plant which was a wood to gas plant. The combustible gas produced was then used to power a 200hp engine which turned a water pump. That baby could shoot an extraordinary volume of water as a rock blasting jet. The plant was last in operation 70 years ago, and it would have taken a lot of gold to pay for the thing.
The machines must have used a phenomenal quantity of timber because a small narrow gauge rail line was used to bring the wood fuel in. Abandoned equipment was left all over the area, like this old stationary engine which looked to me as if it had been used as a generator.
Incidentally, when operating, the jet of water could be heard 3km (2 miles) away. Still, all good things come to an end. Economic feasibility always trumps technical possibility, and now the equipment looks rusty and abandoned.
I have no plans to ever use so much timber! Far out, that machine would have been a monster forest eater. However, having almost run out of dry firewood two years in a row, we do need a slightly larger firewood shed. Recently we have begun the excavations for this project. A day of digging this week, improved the site and provided space for another steel rock gabion cage as a soil retaining wall.
The excavated soil was relocated and used to complete the low gradient path on the underside of the chicken enclosure. A layer of crushed rock with lime was placed on the path surface, and that part of the job is now finished.
With space for another steel rock gabion cage and a hot day, we made a new cage – in the shade of course.
The new cage was put in place, and an existing cage was also sewn up.
The little bit of hot weather we enjoyed, helped the plants grow – a lot. A cucumber was harvested and added to a salad. Yum!
It seems to me that every single bird living in the area enjoys Elderberries. We have a number of those trees, and I’m fine with the birds taking all the fruit. Generally we use the flowers for wine making, and it’s a tasty drop, despite the rank smell when first cooked.
A number of chilli plants failed to die last winter, and those got off to an early start and have produced an excellent crop. Chilli plants can live for up to fifteen years. Who knew?
The tomatoes in the greenhouse are still green, but are showing signs of giving a decent harvest. Outside of the greenhouse, the growing season has been an epic fail for tomatoes.
The grapevines need no greenhouse! They just need serious protection from the birds, which they have.
Japanese chefs would probably kill me, like seriously dead. Those guys have sharp knives made from excellent steel! Sadly my risk is that we’re yet to harvest the ginger flavoured Japanese ginger flowers so often used in Japanese cooking. But they look good.
Onto the flowers:
The temperature outside now at about 10am is 15’C (59’F). So far for last year there has been 193.0mm (7.6 inches) which is up from last weeks total of 192.6mm (7.6 inches)