Micro Fibres be gone!

At least the science for microfibres seems to have nailed the issue. The serious pollution of the oceans is from synthetics going through the household washes. https://arbtech.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Browne-et-al-2011-Global-Microplastic.pdf

Three solutions have already been devised for the clothes we already have and may purchase:

1. The Guppy Bag, a European invention is just a laundry bag. Half full and placed in the machine, it picks up most of the fibres but we have to clean the bags by handpicking the lint from the seams. Available from both Kathmandu and Patagonia for about $A45 https://www.kathmandu.com.au/summit-journal/sustainability-behind-the-label/guppyfriend?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=summerLaunch&utm_content=summer_blog_guppyfriend

2. A Canadian filter for the washing machine that takes out something like 75% of all the microfibres. Requires fitting and costs around $A200 from overseas

http://www.environmentalenhancements.com/Lint-LUV-R-install-clean.html

3. Cora Ball. Thrown into each wash, it picks up about 25% of the microfibre lint . Made in Vermont USA, it costs about $A60 when available https://www.floraandfauna.com.au/cora-laundry-ball-blue-1-ball?gclid=CjwKCAiAuK3vBRBOEiwA1IMhuhEqT8nV2WJ5kLyMAqme8nKs9NIoQL1oJ2Bm00G6MS_SlPpD8D1ptRoCAqAQAvD_BwE

A university study said that the filter and ball can be complementary with the filter capturing the long fibres and the ball the short. https://arbtech.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Browne-et-al-2011-Global-Microplastic.pdf

Good to see solutions being promoted but when are these stores going to stop selling the synthetics that shed the microfibres?

Climate change? What Climate change?

Australia burns at an unprecedented ferocity and our fire defences are failing. Murdoch's Joe Hilderbrand blames the greenies in a long rant strong on denial that people have been putting the scientific case to the Government for many years.

I found an exquisite quiet rebuttal buried on Catherine Perry's website

Gridlock begone

Manhattan situation normal

Despite the number of vehicles on its streets, those who live in Manhattan often choose to drive rather than take the 24/7 subway and bus system, ferries, cycle,  or walk. And that is irrespective whether they are traveling for work, errands or recreation. Result: intermittent gridlock

The term "gridlock" had to be coined in the 1970s in New York City, meaning traffic congestion that blocks a city’s network of intersections. It was when the Manhattan core was overwhelming traffic volume which began to happen regularly in the 1980s  https://www1.nyc.gov/html/dot/html/motorist/gridlockalert.shtml

Now, the known busiest traffic days of the year in New York are designated as "Gridlock Alert Days" and the city's department of transport(DOT) pleads for New Yorkers to consider walking, biking or taking public transportation whenever possible so the number of days does not increase.

And the DOT is now taking biking much more seriously.  Biking in NYC has grown a lot in the last 15 years with ridership up 262% from 2000-2010 and growing. Around 500,000 New Yorkers are biking each month for a number of reasons. 

The City’s “cycling risk indicator” shows that the danger of serious injury has fallen 73% in that time https://brokelyn.com/5-reasons-youre-less-likely-die-biking-new-york-anything-else-new-york/

A key reason, apart from the proliferation of cycleways and lanes has been the recent introduction of a slower speed limit. It dropped from 30mph (about 50kph) to 25mph (about 40kph). 

Dances with Greeks

Viewing the vintage 1961 war film The Guns of Navarone and struck by the care taken in the introduction titles to acknowledge the help of the people in Greece in making the film on Rhodes.
The film was based on Alistair MacLean's novel about a fictitious action on the fictitious Greek Island of Navarone but rooted in the reality of the Battle of Leros during the hopeless WW2 Dodecanese Campaign. The allied forces lost badly but it delayed the Axis forces enough that the Russian attack was forced into the Autumn and then Winter. The rest is history.
But, returning to the shooting of the movie, and how well the makers were treated.  One of the cast, Anthony Quinn ( a native of Chihuahua, Mexico) loved the area so much that he kept returning and eventually bought property around a bay that he particularly warmed to.

Three years later he starred in the famous Zorba the Greek. The film was shot on location on Crete. Specific locations featured include the town of Chania, the Apokoronas region and the Akrotiri peninsula. The famed scene in which Quinn's character dances the Sirtaki was filmed on the beach of the village of Stavros.
The film was incredibly successful. In the 1980's he revived the 1968 Broadway musical that had adapted Zorba to the stage and at age 67 took it on a four-year US tour.
Today his memory is kept alive with a bay and beach named after him on Rhodes. But in a typically Greek way, there is a messy ownership issue
The story goes that he was so angry about the broken promises made by local politicians that he stopped only in Crete and never once mentioned Rhodes.
Quinn died in 2001 at 86 and was buried on his family estate...on Rhode Island, NY

The well bred baguette

When it comes to culture nothing beats the French for protecting their heritage..and nothing is more French than the baguette. 

In France, strict rules have been applied since 1933 to protect the recipe, and the artisans, from cheaper breadsticks. The threat never more real than in contemporary France where preservative laden knock-offs frozen down and shipped from the sweatshop bakeries of countries with cheaper labour.

Each year they hold a fiercely contested competition for the best baguettes from the Parisian bakeries. First prize is for the winner to deliver 20 baguettes a day to the President's Élysée Palace

As a further precaution, to be called a boulangerie, a French bakery must bake on the premises. Boulangeries often display a sticker on the storefront or add to their outside advertising that it is an “Artisan Boulanger.” 

Another protection is the name. The baguette traditionnelle is a step up from ordinaire being hand-formed, as evident by the pointy ends and bumps in the loaves. In the photo above the traditional loaf is on the right and will cost a little more than the baguette ordinaire on the left.

An innovation has been for the Artisans to install 24 hour vending machines into the outside walls of their bakeries. The one below was in a small village in Brittany. Not everyone agrees that this is a good move

A recent concession to the modern world: the artisan boulangeries vending machines 

Last year, President Macron ratcheted up the game by started the process for the traditional baguette to get UNESCO World Heritage status

East coast ablaze

The East Coast of Australia is suffering unprecedented fire outbreaks on Friday. In NSW alone, at least 100 homes have been destroyed on that day. Three people are are dead. More than 30 people have been injured. By early Saturday there were 77 NSW bush or grass fires with 42 uncontained.  Meanwhile by Saturday night a state of emergency was been declared for 42 Queensland local government areas. Authorities say that it could be several days before thousands of residents who were forced to evacuate on Queensland's Sunshine Coast will be allowed to return home.

The latest picture for all States

The Bureau of Meteorology State of the Climate 2018 report for Australia noted strong land surface temperature increases and a 10%-20% decline in cool season rainfall across southern Australia since the 1970s. These changes are closely associated with increasing human greenhouse gas emissions, as well as natural variability.

Elaine Johnson @ElaineEDO the lawyer who pursued and won the Rocky Hill case made it clear that the NSW is not responding very well

And the NSW Govt response to the unfolding #ClimateCrisis?
Next week it will rush a Bill through Parliament that REMOVES a requirement to assess downstream emissions from coal.
And PROHIBITS regulation of development in relation to climate 

The despair continues with the Sydney Morning Herald playing a double game.  They write an excellent report but then push it to page 7.  According to the article, NSW residents have been told to brace for 'unprecedented' conditions as fatal bushfires persist. The story that replaces the coverage on the front page is about a TV host's tribululations.
Trying to get people to realise just how serious this is and how it is linked to Climate Change, Federal Green MP, Adam Brandt tweeted on Saturday

‘Just to recap.
Today’s fires are “unprecedented”.
fires in Qld earlier this year were “unprecedented”.
Townsville flood was “unprecedented”...
The central Qld fires last year were “unprecedented”.
The drought is “unprecedented”.’
It’s an emergency.

Nationally, our PM, who so proudly bought a lump of coal into Parliament last year, saying fossil fuels were Australia's future, tweeted

....useful.

Shelby Story

A prime player in the 1966 and later wins by the Ford GT40 was the motoring legend Carroll Shelby. in the movie Ford v Ferrari, he is played by Matt Damon. Shelby had the gig to built the Le Mans winner mainly because of his reputation in building the AC Cobra, an outstanding Californian production racer. Every US teenager at the time dreamed of having one.
One day, one such dreamer turned up at his workshop and said she wanted to buy a Cobra. It was a diminutive 17-year-old singer, Carol Connors who had just had a hit with "To know, know know him" and had a wad of money to burn. As Shelby told it in an interview, she took the car away telling Shelby that she would write a song about it. According to Connors, Shelby had promised not to charge and would be his guest at the Le Mans. Six months later the racing car anthem "Hey, little Cobra" hit the airwaves and reached number one on the charts before being swept away by the tidal wave of the Beatles. Shelby came good on his promise and Connors saw the historic win in 1966. 

As the music industry tarted her up

With her Cobra and "Hey Little Cobra" sheet music

And yes, that is her in the picture above. She ended up owning three Cobras then a Rolls.
Enjoy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oc6FmZCT0Zc&list=PLJrZSd1VE406KtRAIAORyruhK9U9IJDYf&index=5
Bio details at http://www.spectropop.com/CarolConnors/

Update: The Hollywood epic of Shelby's attack on Le Mans, Ford v Ferrari is running hot in cinemas https://g.co/kgs/wHqGyy It gives the Reader's Digest version of the next chapter of Shelby's career challenging the Steve McQueen classic Le Mans for visceral racing excitement. Try to see it on the big screen because the photography is pretty special.  Liberties have been taken with the storyline but in the good cause of trying to capture the spirit of a fast disappearing era of American dominance.  

Ferrari woh-woh

Spanish Fantasy

A cheeky, tourist magnet of a bronze devil doing a selfie is unloved by locals but adored by visitors who happen upon it. 10% of the population signed a petition against it as it was inappropriately “jovial” and “exalts evil,” It added that Satan should be “repulsive and despicable — not kind and seductive.”

But the Tourist Bureau went ahead and the Devil now sits self-absorbed with his back to a commanding view over the city and famous Aqueduct. The sculpture was by Antonio Abella, a local doctor and a gift to the city he loves.

Whether by design or not, the bronze was not marked officially on Google Maps. One of my photos was quickly featured.

Diablillo haciendose un selfie is on Calle San Juan, 40001 Segovia, Spain

https://maps.app.goo.gl/oGuNzqenpyrWMhGb6

Lovely short article in Time https://time.com/5504047/spain-segovia-devil-statue/

..........

I can't be flippant about this one.

In Western nations, we appear to be passing through an odd moment when, in face of an existential threat, the systems of popular democracy that have served us so well, are failing us.

The Devil controversy is as illuminating as our bizaire support for a looney religious footy hero. Or a Trump, a Johnson or a Morrison.

Segovia is not hicksville. It is rich and happy, living off the local as well as international tourist stream. Its wealth is built on massive public investment that is barely acknowledged. For example beneath those quaint (but superclean) cobbled streets are extensive carparks and lifts so that weekend trips by BMW or Audi from Madrid are the norm. It's a Spanish dreamtown where scores of prepubescent girls in full length white & boys in fake military costumes led by doting parents to be confirmed in an ornate, bell-ringing cathederal. Where the rambling Jewish quarter is devoid of Jews (expelled in 15c.). Where every other non-Catholic was shot or shipped off to Nazi work camps after the Franco victory in 1939

So no, the brilliance of this depiction of the nature of evil is not appreciated: it reflects too well inconvenient truths.

The Spanish Garden

Just when you think you've seen everything, a European city can surprise. Huerto de Calixto y Melibea, is a small, very beautiful public Salamanca garden overlooking the river and below the cathederal. It was made famous by featuring in one of the great literary works in Spanish, La Celestina. Huerto de Calixto y Melibea, Calle Arcediano, 20, 37008 Salamanca, Spain
https://maps.app.goo.gl/bNCqve8ptN26sqMJ8

Roses, fountains, rustic well with lots of contemporary romantic padlocks; intimate nooks. Accidentally came across a two young lovers reenacting the garden assignation rather explicitly. Averted eyes and did not take pics.

Rushed to the Librería Nueva Plaza Universitaria bookshop in the basement of the Philosophy Dept. and bought the classic in paperback for Nancy who was, at that moment, doing battle with some of the tougher parts of the language's grammar. Very appropriate antidote for her.

Details of where the 1599 dramatic dialogue sits in the history of Spanish literature and details of the narrative at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Celestina

She goes to work today

Loved this cropped shot that I took on Salamanca's main business district street, Gran Via of a woman on a flash motorscooter riding past one of the many examples of street art in the town. The difference between the employment realities and the dream was strong.

Air today, gone tomorrow

Just noting an excellent explainer of the 1999 Le Mans disaster for Mercedes. 

Three of its entries took flight on the superfast circuit, tumbling end over end. 

Miraculously no-one was killed but it was a very public design error by Mercedes that, 20 years later, it is still living down. The explainer is a masterclass in instructional video describing how hard it is to make a good racing cars.

Canberra in transition

God lends a hand with Canberra public housing  demolition

Beneath the surface

The submarine used in filming the 2018 TV-series Das Boot. But wasn't a sub, it was a faked up non-diving replica built in Malta.

I was then cast as the 'modified' American sub S-33 for the film U-571(U-571), also shot in Malta. The S-33 had been a real sub of WW2.

The story of the US movie is a lie presenting that the yanks snatched the Enigma code machine from an operational U-boat. 

Worse, they tried to present it as real. IMDB says

• The theatrical version contained some captions before the end credits, explaining that the Enigma was, in real-life, recovered by the British Royal Navy, and not by the American Navy as portrayed in this movie. The captions have been removed on the R2 DVD.

Footage, sets and models from that movie have been reused for other productions, including Submerged, depicting the loss of USS Sailfish, and the fictional Ghostboat. The Maltese replica is still afloat, moored in Marsa in the inner Grand Harbour. 

A special rig was built for the Das Boot production by a Maltese armory team, that allowed the submarine's anti-aircraft gun to both fire and recoil, something not done before with a blank-firing gun.

Malta, Germany (Munich), France (La Rochelle), and Czech Republic (Prague) were chosen for the location shooting, which started on 31 August 2017 and finished after 105 days on 20 February 2018. The budget was $32.8 million.

Solar Saviour

Church rooftop cross in solar panels, Canberra.

The promise of EVs to come

And with the sound of the petrolhead 2019 Summer Nats still ringing through my Canberra suburb of Lyneham, it is good to be reminded of the massive wave that will break over the car culture in the next decade.

Probably the easiest way of keeping up is to enjoy the YouTube episodes of Fully Charged as they come out.

The first episode of 2019, a ramble through expected developments in EVs this year by producer and host Robert Llewellyn is only a "talking head" but reminds just how out of touch Australia is becoming.

As a point of comparison Red Victor One, the worlds fastest street legal car was on display at Summer Nats. It boasts 0-100kph in one second but cost the owner roughly $200,000 to custom build and potters about the streets at 56 L/100 km.  The production Tesla model s p100d with ludicrous mode costs about half of that and does 0-100kph in 2.5seconds with a pottering equivalent fuel consumption of 2.26 L/100 km...and quietly.

New Year Photowalk

Commonwealth Park: Birds in Flight

Derelict housing on Northbourne Avenue

Friend's go shopping

Cycling through Commonwealth Park

Police Building, Constitution Avenue

Bikes

While the hotrods of the SummerNats roar only a kilometer away, Canberrans find their own quiet way

For the record

Day after the New Year, supermarkets move to celebrating Easter withe traditional buns