A few days ago, a friend told me he’d lost his job some weeks ago. It’s hard thing on a bloke losing his job, I’ve been there long ago, done that, and even got the metaphorical t-shirt. Felt the feels, as the kids might say. A few people have also told me recently that they’re thinking of selling their houses and downsizing. Heard this morning some news that someone else I’m vaguely aware of lost their job as well. Not much happens, then things happen all at once. Must be something in the water?
Are they all isolated incidents, or part of a larger trend? It’s hard to tell. The official news media barely mentions such incidents, unless the journalists jobs are getting axed, then there is much hue and cry. Cheap debt and low prices have fuelled a lot of activity over the past couple of decades. Now debt isn’t so cheap, and prices are rising. It hardly surprises me that activity is ever so slowly waning. Won’t go out for dinner there. Won’t catch that taxi here. Skip that coffee. Pack a lunch. Those sort of choices get made by people when income gets tight. Heck, nowadays even the dentist pressures me to get an x-ray, just because. Resist the hopefully unnecessary dose of radiation. Saving some mad cash through that method, is a no-brainer! It simply means that other peoples incomes fall, and around and around the wheel of economic hard choices goes, where it stops, nobody knows.
It’s been such a long time since we had a proper recession in this country. I can’t recommend it as a fun way to experience the adult job market for a young person. I learned that the last one in, was usually the first one out. For me, that worked out to beinging made redundant from a previously ‘safe’ government job. Honestly there are still some scars from the experience, and a distinct lack of trust. Sandra had a similar experience at around the same time, but at a much better paying job. Still, you learn some things, like how to survive and get by during hard times. After 27 years of only ever ascending though, makes me wonder if other people even know how to come back down to earth, or realise that you can be forced to do so.
Back in the day, saying someone was ‘down to earth’, meant that they were a practical kind of person who knew useful stuff. They may also have been a master of some of those activities. It was a funny kind of saying because it was meant both respectfully, but also as a put-down all at the same time. I’d like to flatter myself with the belief that I know at least some useful stuff. And possibly I’m a master of a least one or two useful activities. The truth is, on this path Sandra and I have chosen, there’s always more to learn than we can ever possibly take in, let alone master. We’re doing good enough, but I’d hardly be surprised at all to hear whilst taking my gasping final breaths in this here life, someone saying: Yeah I knew Chris, he was a bit of a dilettante. Thanks very much in advance for the unsolicited future and rather brutally candid death-bed opinion. Charming.
We do actually know some stuff. About two months ago, we began making ‘how to’ videos for YouTube, and we’ve sure learned a lot over that short period of time. Just for one thing, it’s become hard to escape the fact that either the platform or the viewers have a preference for short videos (two minutes or less). As long time readers are by now well aware, a brief and concise essay, let alone a short reply is probably not my forte. However, exceptions can be made, and artistic integrity be damned! Cheap viewer statistics on that media platform are now very much in. Heck, I can do that!
After the run of how-to videos we’ve got waiting in reserve are depleted, we’ll go short. Real short. If that’s what they want to see, there’s no reason not to give it to the people. Anyway, short videos are bizarrely less work for us. The other reason for abandoning the original concept, is that there are already a plethora of ‘how to’ videos on the platform. A casual observer might say that they’re over supplied in that regard. In our case, the how to videos will be there more as a proof of competency, if anyone even bothers to concern themselves with such matters.
Over the past few months I’ve read literally hundreds, maybe even thousands of comments attached to all sorts of videos on the platform, just so as to get an idea of what people want out of that service. By and large the impression I’ve been left with, is that people mostly want entertainment by way of a one way connection with the people providing the videos. It’s not at all about the slow discussion of ideas and/or observations. It ain’t even for the pure dialogue. Nope, it’s mostly about entertainment.
Sometime over the next few weeks, we’ll begin maybe with a longer walk around of the farm video, or series of, then every week there’ll be a very short episode with: ‘what did we did around the farm this week’. Simple enough to do, and it will provide the viewers with an entertaining narrative.
The regular long form essay blog is my preferred habitat. Dialogue is where I’m most comfortable. Ideas, news and opinions are best aired, shared and discussed. That takes shared effort for both the author and readers, and it’s fun. It’s not lost on me that the people who drop by here week after week for years, clearly enjoy reading and dialogue as well. The world of video I’m rapidly discovering, is an entirely different beast. Hmm, I still don’t know what to make of that other world, but the thought occurs to me that the societal arrangements in place right now, can change. I’ve seen it happen. And casting the mind back almost three decades to how things were during the last recession, it’s hard to forget that the pace of life was slower, whilst the activity of chatting with friends didn’t cost much at all.
This winter has been significantly colder than previous winters. The firewood reserves suggest as much, although we’ve also been at home more this year relative to previous years. The story the firewood reserves are telling me is that we’ve almost run out, and today is only the first official day of spring. Looking outside you wouldn’t know it. The rain has drizzled for most of the day and a massive cold wind storm with it’s origins in Antarctica, has been pounding the farm for almost a week now. The constant wind is unprecedented and outside of my experience. Truly I’m a bit over the wind, a gust on Saturday night was the strongest the household weather station ever recorded. It’s not usually windy here at all. As I review this essay, I believe there are a 100,000 houses in the state without electricity.
Mostly what’s in the above photo, I’d call kindling. The larger chunks of firewood keep the wood heater burning for hours. Kindling is really there to start the fire of an evening and provide enough energy to get the larger chunks burning. Funnily enough the wind is rapidly drying the decent sized pile of seasoning firewood. That stuff is sitting out in the weather. Despite it all the sun now at least has some warmth. So every couple of days we’ll dump a wheelbarrow or two of that well seasoned and mostly dry firewood into the shed. That keeps it out of the rain and it’s then ready for use. It’s not an ideal arrangement, but neither is freezing when the night time temperatures get down into the single digits.
Regular readers will recall that last week a large fruit tree which had proven to be rootstock was cut down, and the smaller branches were then mulched up in the scary old wood chipper. The mulch was used as soil food for a new large garden bed.
The larger fruit tree branches were this week cut up into firewood sized chunks. They were then brought back up the hill in a power wheelbarrow, and then dumped into the firewood pile. The timber is still very green and will require a year or so to dry out, but eventually the firewood will be ready to use.
The fruit tree stump was also ground out. There’s no point allowing another rootstock tree of that variety to grow in the area. It’s looking pretty neat now.
One of the lessons we’d taken away from this non-fruit-tree in the sunny orchard, is that the area had poor access so it became hard to observe and maintain. The vegetation in that area has now all been cleaned up and pruned, but we considered how to add better access to that area. We decided to commence constructing a new concrete staircase through that garden bed, thus breaking it up. The cement for the first step was poured.
Observant readers will note the use of plastic covering the cement used to make the first stair tread. That is there to protect the surface of the cement from becoming pock marked due to the incessant rain. The plastic also had to be more firmly anchored down because of the strong winds this week. The conditions have been challenging to say the least.
A form of early season Brassica species plant known as ‘Bittercress’ (Cardamine hirsuta) kind of exploded and took over the sapling fenced enclosure. During the week the plant was everywhere and producing flowers. Clearly it was in a good paddock.
It’s all good organic matter. The entire surface area of that enclosure ended up being mowed. Only took a few minutes of work and now the cut plants will provide feed for the soil critters.
Whilst I had the push mower out and working, I decided to munch up all of the vegetation growing on the swale which is just on the downhill side of the sapling fenced enclosure. The swale is a ditch which fills up with water that overflows from the house rainwater water tank collection system. It just helps to get the water into the ground where it is less likely to cause erosion. Anyway, the vegetation on the swale had become very woody and needed cleaning up. It’ll grow back just fine.
Onto the flowers:
The temperature outside now at about 11am is 7’C (44’F). So far for last year there has been 654.0mm (25.7 inches) which is up from last weeks total of 645.6mm (25.4 inches)