Update (sorely) needed

Uh oh, it's been ages, hasn't it? I've got the pictures, and I've got the knowledge, but just haven't had the time and energy to update for the last month or so. Suffice to say that there have been changes.

Watch this space, innit.

The Power of Slogans

OK, before anyone accuses us of a lack of originality, we thought of the "Dig For Victory" slogan before this came along:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/sep/14/allotments-food-programme-private-land

Interesting to note that Chris Leslie, my mum's former New Labour MP, is the "Czar" behind all this. Here's what Bradford Green councillor Martin Love has to say about him:

Leslie is a hypocrite. He spent most of his time as Shipley MP campaigning to tarmac over 2 sites of scientific interest (the Bingley North and South bogs).

So, what's the subtext, then? "Tarmac for Victory!" ?????

Right, in case you're wondering why there hasn't been much up here recently about the garden, that's because:

1. Guru Ed's been away on a beekeeping course
2. The political season is back in swing, so we hacks have been getting back to street activism

There WILL, however, be another session soon. Maybe not this weekend. The weekend after??? Let's get on it, Kidz.

Atunement

I've just been trawling around the internet, and hullo, Robocop's here already. If y'all don't start thinking about this now, this is what your bobby on the beat may look like in ten years from now:



I imagine that this gentleman probably isn't what you'd call a core Green voter. If I could get him to turn his swords into ploughshares (and his bodysuit into beercans?????) I think I'd have earned at least a PhD.

I prefer to see a picture like this:

Ah, how reassuring. The Green Party Autumn Conference, held this year in Hove (Brighton Conference Centre is a bit beyond our means). Obviously we were there because all our efforts for next year are focussed on at least getting Caroline Lucas (and preferably a couple more) elected to Westminster.

This was my fourth conference, but I guess you could say that it's the first one where I was feeling really involved, partly helped by the fact that so many people from Hackney were there.

I also learned about one Green concept which was very new to me: "Atunement". This refers to a one minute period of silence which we always have before a full plenary debate on any subject. The notion is that you're spending a moment to reflect and, errr, like, tune in to each other, Mother Earth, the Cosmos, and all that. It's pretty old-school hippie stuff for the wave of members like myself who have only joined the Green Party in the last few years, but I guess I can see why people want to hang on to a few of those traditions. It's certainly not my intention to steamroller over everything, but of course I do think we've got to atune ourselves a bit more to Jo Public, as well as each other.

I really don't know why I've only just learned about that. If I stumbled upon a moment of atunement at a previous conference I must just have assumed someone had died. Sorry.

Anyway, it was all a good laugh. We had cabaret from Mark Thomas and Attila the Stockbroker, and some decent weather. Back to London today, eh. Not sure if we're doing the garden tomorrow. Ed didn't seem too bothered about doing that.

September snuffles

Ahhh, the last baking hot day in the garden before the September weather came upon us. Here's the state of play. House end:

Wall end. All quite a change since we started, innit:

Here's Miss Hughes, addressing the stereotype that we Green Party types are just a bunch of hippies.

and here's a pair of horticultural philosophers

One piece of very good news. Yesterday Ed and I met and talked to the upstairs neighbour. She was very friendly, though initially more than a little surprised to see what had been happening in the garden while she'd been away on holiday. We're very much hoping that we can work something out with her, so that we can really go for the full permaculture treatment.

I'll mix it a bit here, with a few pics from the Climate Camp Tar Sands demo on Tuesday. A shot of a couple of my in-house placards.

Thanks to Leonie the photographer for this one. Do you geddit?

OK, now to put some order to it all....

We started outside the National Portrait Gallery, which is sponsored by BP. Shame on them.

Then we stopped for a while outside the Canadian embassy, which is just off the other side of Trafalgar Square. Here's Clayton Thomas-Muller (see my previous entry), getting the crowd going. Unfortunately I kept missing out on getting a decent short video clip of him shouting "BP - Criminal!" and "Climate - Justice!" but fortunately someone with a better camera than me got that. The clip is below

Finally we headed up to BP headquarters, on St. James' Square, just off Regent Street, south of Piccadilly Circus.

Here's the clip of Clayton that I was talking about



And here's a clip from the mainstream media.

Tar No Ta.

Watch that first. Tar, and see ya Tuesday morning, if you were there.

And then watch the interview with Clayton Thomas-Muller. This guy is an awesome speaker.



And more detail from this link. Here are Lionel Lepine and George Poitras, representatives of the Athabasca region First Nations, discussing yesterday the film and the actions which must follow.

Photo left: Hackney Green Party sends a delegation over to Climate Camp. General thoughts on the experience. Very chilled out and pretty chilly towards the end of my stay, with that healthy power generator that was blowing across the Heath. There were so many things to learn there, and not much time to make choices about that. The Tar Sands issue stood out front and centre for me at least, but I guess that it may not have been the same for everyone. I would have loved to learn a bit about building a pedal-powered sound system, but I think that I maybe possibly don't really have the time for that hobby right now. Shame.

Lewisham Green Party sent a creditably large contingent to greet the Camp, though I must confess I was a bit jealous that the Camp hadn't chosen Hackney Marshes. Another time, hopefully. All but one, I think, of Lewisham's six Green councillors were there (and apologies if the last one was and I didn't count him - I just don't know). Here are those five, plus Jean Lambert MEP

OK then, back to the allotment today, innit.

Tangential Post

Just to show that there's a bit more to Green politics than allotments. These were taken on Critical Mass, on the way to Blackheath to visit the Climate Camp. The quality is low, granted (though the sound isn't too bad). The other thing is that I can't get my phone to record for more than 30 seconds at the moment.

All of which = v. annoying, so for that reason I've put two snippets. Yes, there is a bloke in the second video riding a penny farthing:

Ah, I keep forgetting to take my camera

It would have very been nice to photo-document today's bit of fun in the car park down at the back of Café Oto in Dalston. Never mind, I'm sure that there will be a few more wombling sessions for me to document with the camera.

We stripped a few large packing crates with a hammer, a crowbar and my Streetfighter-style sideways jumping kick. Dangerous, bruv.

Thanks very much to Sally and Phillipa for bringing the pick-up truck. It's a community fing, innit (though we still do need a bigger van for this kind of thing - help somebody, please!) I'll take some photos of the stuff we brought over next time we're in the garden.

Ah, you might want to know what we're planning to do with that stuff we got today. Many's the thing we can do with it, I suppose. Tool shed, garden furniture, full size snooker table. You've just got to use your imagination.