January 2012
1 post
I'm going to be spending the next eight months or...
I submitted the research proposal today. I’m going to be paying particular attention to the use of home energy monitors in energy education, holding focus groups at a couple of schools. Now for some reading…
September 2011
2 posts
Photo of my latest tape picture, this time using a...
Image of my print for latest ELP exhibition
The latest East London Printmakers exhibition (“The FishWick Papers”) kicked off last Thursday at Forman’s Smokehouse Gallery and runs throughout September. Here is the piece which I submitted (a smoked woodcut print called “Preservation”):
The gallery is great — a really large, modern space which shows off all of the work to its best advantage. And as...
August 2011
2 posts
How to donate your surplus stock/supplies to...
My friend Rachel works for a charity called In Kind Direct. Businesses can donate surplus supplies or excess/end-of-line stock to them for resale to charities. In Kind sell it on at a super-cut price, basically covering their costs. I think it’s a great idea — finding a use for stuff which would likely otherwise be thrown away, and giving charities access to a wide range of useful...
How to make a smoked woodcut print
The next East London Printmakers exhibition is at Forman’s Smokehouse Gallery in Hackney Wick (details here). I decided to try out smoking my prints (in the “smokehouse” rather than the “cigarette” sense…). Here are some photos of the process.
I used wood I cut from the plate to create the smoke:
I used our Cobb BBQ to generate the heat:
A tarpaulin...
July 2011
3 posts
Update on living in Loughborough Junction
I mentioned in a couple of posts below that I had recently become aware of the Beanery cafe and the Whirled Art Cinema, both in Loughborough Junction. I now go along to both pretty often; the Beanery to get out of the flat when I’m working at home, the cinema to catch up on films which I missed in the Ritzy (or which themselves missed the Ritzy). Both are excellent and highly recommended....
London Kettle Popcorn now at a market near you
Well, if you live in south east London (for the moment anyway). My friends Rob and Karen have set up London Kettle Popcorn, to my knowledge the only place you can buy freshly made kettle popcorn in London and possibly the UK. It is cooked at over 400 degrees C over a raging flame in a huge cauldron — so good theatre (and more importantly is great tasting and very addictive). Check out the...
Image of my print for the East London Printmakers...
A woodcut of me playing the ukelele:
June 2011
2 posts
East London Printmakers annual exhibition 7th-11th...
I’m taking part in the East London Printmakers annual exhibition this year. Details available on the Facebook page here. It is (surprisingly) in East London, and the private view is in the evening of 7 July (which coincides with the whole First Thursday thing that goes on around that area). I’ll try to upload and image of the woodcut I’ll be showing to my Flickr page at some...
Co-op brewpub in Loughborough Junction?
I saw plans/dreams for such a thing at the pop-up Warrior (part of the Seven Bridges Festival) this weekend gone. It would be in a railway arch, and have a beer, hop and barley garden on some abandoned platforms above. I have to admit — this would be amazing.
March 2011
2 posts
In other local news...
A new cafe has opened up at Loughborough Junction station called The Beanery. I don’t tend to buy coffee (prefer to make at home) but their pizza is meant to be excellent so definitely keen to check it out.
Surprise local cinema
After over a year of living in Loughborough Junction, I just discovered that there is a cinema a couple of minutes walk from my flat. Whirled Art cinema shows world/art films every Thursday, Friday and Saturday evening. Intriguing.
February 2011
1 post
Electricity gets cheaper the more you use
…which is just wrong. More from the BBC here, or check out Fixing Fuel Poverty by Brenda Boardman.
January 2011
12 posts
Amazon sold more ebooks last year than paperbacks
I heard this on the radio this morning, and there is more detail here. It really feels like a watershed. Ever since I was at primary school and people were talking about electronic comic books that would update automatically each week there has been this expectation that books will make the transition. At university I used primarily electronic resources for research, but still the standard trade...
Just bottled my Koelsch and put on a random new...
The random new brew is called Gundred’s Draught Excluder and contains toasted munich malt, carapils, and a decent amount of Hallertauer and Mount Hood hops. Last night it was fermenting so vigourously the bubbling from the airlock woke me up.
Just having an @kernelbrewery Imperial Stout. Wow....
Almost like those salty Scandinavian liquorice sweets.
Good NY Times article about more sustainable...
This is an interesting article about the potential for using Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) in maritime transport instead of (or alongside) traditional bunker fuel. The latter is a highly polluting low-grade, low-cost fuel which produces, among other things, high sulphur emissions. These emissions will be getting a much tighter cap from 2015, so a lot of work is being done into alternative fuels.
This...
Nice tale of communication-by-poster on @Londonist...
http://londonist.com/2011/01/kings-cross-dog-bites-dog-via-cyclist-as-told-through-notes.php
BBC News - EU investigating carbon trading thefts →
If You Lived in Any Other Country, How Much Less... →
::::: Euston Tap - London ::::: →
Somewhere to check out
Global surface temperatures in 2010 were the joint...
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/news/20110112/
New site on water purification
My friend Rob West has just set up a website on how and why to treat potentially contaminated water in the wild or when travelling — see www.backcountrywater.com. I think it is a great idea for a site — a relatively specialized subject and very detailed. It reminds me of drinking swimming pool-flavoured water during my various Duke of Edinburgh walking trips.
Of course, a traditional...
The events of May and June last year
On May 31 last year (2010) I had a sudden cardiac arrest while running a 10km race through London. As we have entered a new year, I thought I would write a bit about the experiences which followed, both for a personal record and in case this is of interest/use to anyone else.
I guess in this first post it would be useful to describe the event itself. I entered the race at relatively (but not...
December 2010
1 post
November 2010
8 posts
“Science unleavened by the human heart and the human spirit is sterile, cold, and...”
– Gregory A Petsko makes an important point in an open letter about SUNY Albany’s decision to cut their departments of French, Italian, Classics, Russian and Theater Arts.
“The Spanish government has launched a new regulatory framework that will result...”
– Renewable Energy World reporting on the decline and fall of the Spanish PV industry.
SunEnergy Power International →
I think they are an amazing organization. Their co-founder and CEO, Walt Ratterman, was killed in the Haiti earthquake at the beginning of 2010. It’s great to see them continuing (and ramping up) their work, and to see Walt Ratterman being remembered in so many constructive and inspirational ways.
Perspex
I just bought some to try out some monoprint techniques. Now all I need is a book press.
Photos of the ELP Box Set 2010 exhibition
…over on the ELP blog.
October 2010
20 posts
iPhone app for @Earthscan
You can use it to keep up with the latest from the Earthscan blog, Twitter and Facebook, watch Earthcasts and access the event diary. Get it from iTunes or use:
European Future Energy Forum
I’m on the @Earthscan stand, waiting for everyone to start refreshing the BBC News website on their phones at 12.30. Not sure how many visitors were expected but it seems fairly quiet. This may be because the conference is still in session. Most interest in PV so far; I’m glad Britain has the feed-in fever. (At least for the next 10 mins…)
East London Printmakers - Box Set 2010 Launch at... →
Should be a great range of styles and techniques on show. This is the first time one of my prints (or anything I have produced) will be shown in an exhibition. Plus you can wander around the area and check out other First Thursday exhibitions.
@Earthscan Earthcast on solar energy in developing... →
I posted last week about the spread of solar in non-grid-connected areas. You can find out more about the issue from these videos of a recent webinar by two Earthscan authors, Damian Miller (author of Selling Solar) and Mark Hankins (author of Stand-alone Solar Electric Systems).
Hermann Scheer →
Inspirational figure for all involved in renewable energy, sadly passed away yesterday, 14 October 2010. Article on the @Earthscan blog by Edward Milford.
Wind turbine colour, insects, bats and birds →
Just posted on the @Earthscan blog.
Solar-powered lamp is BBC's History of the World... →
Just posted on the Earthscan blog.
“Ideas and the words to deliver them should be crafted to their natural length,...”
– Kindle Singles allow people to publish and sell articles which would be too long for a magazine but not long enough for a book. I like the sound of this. There’s no reason for traditional constraints related to the sale and distribution of printed material to apply to electronic publishing. I...
Essex, my home county →
First brewer sends renewable gas to the grid →
When I was at Eurosun I spoke to the head brewer at Goesser, one of Austria’s leading beers. They are also producing biogas, although not sure if they are feeding it into the grid.
“Both were later exonerated on all charges, after the chance discovery of a...”
– http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-11511581
Dingos live in dens, not lairs. Odd choice of an emotive term…
I adopted a wind turbine as part of an EWEA... →
You can see the array from Mersea Island where I grew up. If you look the other way you can see the nuclear power station at Bradwell.