Rain Water Harvesting

Here are some pictures of our water butts, nice. The thing about rain water is that it is one of the more reliable sources of drinking water, and it's free when it falls out of the sky and onto our roof and garden. It's simple and cheap or free to get a water butt and connect your gutters to it. With the lovely amount of rain fall we've had recently we were very lucky to get our 500litre butt full in one day. You only drink about 3-5 litres per day so this is very good. Here water takes quite a chunk of money to get it collected, cleaned and piped in from somewhere else. Seems daft doesn't it when it's falling on us all the b----- time.
The other free and often overlooked source of water is dew, as the recently applauded and 'invented' dew collector advertises. In survival situations wrapping a T-shirt round your ankles and walking in long grass, provides some much needed water when you wring out the T-shirt or other article of clothing. Now with the dew collector you can get the water that would otherwise rise into the air and disappear and give the plants their daily drink.

free version

The Tale of the Energy Efficient Lightbulb

Everyone's going on about the hoo ha of climate change at the moment. 'Hoo ha' they're all shouting, 'the ice caps are melting' we're all going to be wiped out by giant hurricanes and the sea flooding over our flower beds' and this is a lot of the sort of reality hoo ha you get to hear and see all the time. Then celebrities rake their minds for what they've read about 'green stuff', for solutions, and they remember 'hooray, 'light bulbs', yes and 'hybrid cars' - hooray if you can afford a hybrid car, the rest of us have to settle for light bulbs. What they're not talking about though is how boring this all is. If being green is just talking about lightbulbs and turning off appliances at their sockets etc, it's boring - even with the urgency and the message, it's not going to make all of us race out of our doors like we do when the latest Harry Potter book has appeared on the store shelves. 'Oohh, the latest energy efficient lightbulbs in stock, I must rush out and get one before anyone else' just doesn't have the same appeal does it?
But here's the real myth. The real myth is that mankind as a whole is facing an unknown global threat. We've mustered up a vague sort of name for it 'Global warming' but like 'Voldimort' none of us really know, do we, what that means? In the same way that few of us really know what 'death' means. We're all of us a little bit afraid of the unkown and we call it different names 'Climate change', 'Global dimming', 'The El Nino Effect'; lots of names that have all garnered mythical proportions.
Myth was the language once used to explain why things were the way they were - 'Where did fire come from?', 'Why is the Sky blue?', 'How was the earth made?' and we are told that, the earth was a giant turtle that swam about the ocean, or it was the 'Big Bang', or God took a week to set it up, and that fire was given to us by a magical being in exchange for a good deed (or a bad one), and many other stories. All of these stories had in common the ability to hold our attention, to transfer meaning. Through stories we learnt about the nature of nature; we learnt about plant medicine and the dangers of rivers and cliffs, storms and beasts, and our own human enemies, failures and triumphs.

Now we are living in a time when there is the arousing of a new myth and it isn't all to do with light bulbs, or cars or our choice of material purchases, but also to do with us, with our strengths and our weaknesses, with our fragility and the enduring wonders of being human.

We are, each of us, suddenly put upon to be the central characters in an emerging myth. We are all looking at each other asking 'What do we need to do?', 'What's the most important thing to do?', 'How do we solve this?' - I'm asking you, you are asking me; the 'experts' are telling the 'experts' and vying with each other to grab the attention of the rest of us, and the popstars and celebrities are, bless their hearts, trying to do the best they can within their means, by all of us and of course their fans.

Well, I thought, maybe there's another way to go about this. You know, the-take-a-few-deep-breaths, that's -it-calm-down-a-bit way.
The earth is being crawled upon, quite literally, by all of us. When you think of this big round ball, of air and space floating in the ether and you imagine the sprawling cities, the dwindling forests, the animals and plants fleeing (albeit sometimes slowly at a grass growing, seed floating sort of way) and being knocked off willy nilly, you begin to get an impression of what it's like to be the earth and you also get an impression of what it is the earth might be wanting in all of this. We might all of us give a second to listen and hear what the earth has to say...

In the same way plants shared their secrets with the medicine men of the past so to can the earth share the secret of what it is each one of us is needed for. It might be as simple as 'Take a few deep breaths and calm down' or 'Rush out and buy an energy efficient lightbulb' or it might be 'All of you, stay home a few days, don't fly anywhere, don't drive anywhere unless you're in the emergency services. Stay home a few days; plant some trees in every patch of grass within walking distance. Learn how to mend stuff instead of always buying new' It might be that.

Humans are best at adapting, that's why there's six billion of us. That's why, when there's a flood, or a fire, or some threat, we count our costs and get on with it. So whatever the costs are of our past actions, we will adapt to them, or we will run away and hide under our duvets in an underground military bunker. I think though that we are the myth makers, that we can change the endings of our stories.

We hold within us the power of our ancestors to face the beasts of the unkown and to overcome them. So here is a shadow, and it casts its darkness over the land. At times this shadow is darker in some places than others. Yet it casts it's shadow and all of us feel something at some level whether or not it reaches our awareness.

Last night I watched the 'Live Earth concert' and today incongruously I watched the Grand Prix with my dad, and he told me how he had put energy efficient lightbulbs all over the house. No doubt when I put this article up there will probably be an Adsense for Content (internet advertising) advert up for energy Efficient Lightbulbs because I have mentioned them so often in this article. The companies who are selling the Energy Efficient Lightbulbs and the Hybrid Cars are probably making a mint right now and good for them. For some reason these lightbulbs have stood out in our minds more than insulating the house, getting a rain water butt, putting a brick in the toilet cistern, and turning everything off rather than leaving it on standby - you know 'boring stuff'. Why is it boring? You know you're really helping the earth by doing these things, you're cutting carbon emissions, you're doing all the right stuff - why then is it boring?

Why do we feel more alive when we're in the middle of a disaster, or an accident, or some such 'story' - we're definitely not bored then, are we. Myths give meaning to our lives, in a positive sense. It is in amongst the twists and turns of a story, from the mystery of it's beginings to the questions at it's end that for a while in our lives we have purpose and thrill. We gain fulfiment when we are imagining ourselves as Harry Potter facing and surviving his most terrifying nightmare; we are happy for a while becuase we experience companionship at a depth most of us never get to experience in the real world. How many of us can say like Frodo and Sam, that we have a friendship formed by such hardships as facing the Dark Riders, or the absolute destructive power of The Ring, and their long ordeal of saving Middle Earth. Today, we are so isolated, many of us have lost our 'tribe' our value to a community and we feed like voyeuristic vultures on the imagined companionship that the stories of todays media gives us. Then when rare occasion brings us together in times of hardhip, that's when we have the opportunity to make our 'friends for life'.

We have an opportunity now to choose to go on a journey together that is full of mystery. To forge deep bonds of friendship that will last us for the rest of our lives. Each of us have the solution to our problems within our very hands. It might not be the Cloak of Invisibility or the Marauders Map , but it is the very essence of our own self, the best gift that we have as one amongst so many human beings. For on your patch of earth, wherever you are; whatever money you have or don't have; whatever property you own or owe money for, or have to borrow- on your patch of earth you are King or Queen, you are the magician who did not know you could do magic, you are the healer who did not know that people would feel such relief at your touch , you are the gardener who did not know plants would flourish from your attention. Maybe you are a programmer and can put together the right code to do the right jobs that you want it to do, or you are a surgeon whose hand remains remarkably steady no matter whether you are calm or emotional.
Perhaps it doesn't look like it from the inside. In your life, you may be preoccupied with things like invoices, and shopping trips, insurance and credit card bills - maybe you don't get to 'be the change you wish to see in the world' because instead of training for the Iron Man contest or American Idol your body is taking on the image of someone who maybe eats and drinks a little too much and who has to sit at a desk or in a car seat for more hours in the day than means you get to have the streamlined, slick and beautiful body you envisioned for yourself. Your myth hasn't been made yet. The TV you watch has become a little stale and doesn't quite reach the spot.
Is what absorbs your attention and is making your life just using up the minutes and hours in a way that leaves you feeling like nothing has been done, or achieved - that you're missing the point. Are you missing the point? What is the point?

Say we come at this as though we've got hindsight, as though we're our future selves. We're standing on the other side of the present, even of tomorrow. Instead of acting in our usual hasty manner where we just react rather than respond, we take those few deep breaths and really meet and greet our future self.
'Hi me,' we say
'Hi ' we say back to ourselves
Two time-conundrums meeting each other with a Doctor Who sort of normalcy.
'What is it I should do?' our past self asks our future self.
What should I do? being the optimum question, and of course, our future self knows the answer, because they are the potential outcome of all the collective choices we might ever choose to take. They know because we haven't chosen yet, we don't yet know what it is we are going to do, or should do, or will do. The point is for once, we're thinking to ask, we're thinking to look ahead of next week, the next deadline, the next due date and consider what else? And that's just it, when you are a myth maker, you are the one who makes the mountain, you are the one who builds your soul, puts credit in your bank account, or cultivates your image by shaving and/or dyeing your hair

Do you do it with notes and profit margins or do you do it with magic? For magic is something that is eternal, it lasts beyond now and is stored up in our dreams and the images that rise in our everyday consciousness to prod and pull us in all the directions we find ourselves going in. The wonderful thing is, that at this time, our personal myths and our collective myths, our past and our future myths are all coming together. There is an opportunity now for Big Magic, for potent medicine and for the realisation of our ultimate dreams.

It should be easier now for us to put aside our differences. Looking at the planet from space, seeing television broadcast live, simultaneously, from all the metaphorical corners of the planet. Easy for us to see our similarities and to lose our strangeness to one another. I saw that image of the earth from space and I said jovially to my Dad 'That's my house' boasting in a way, as the amazing pictures of forests, and mountains, oceans and animals followed and were brought close before our eyes. 'That's my house' I said.
And it is.

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tags - energy efficient light bulbs, hybrid car, myths, famous, helping the planet, going green

'The Benefits of Hiking and Climbing - Becoming a Human Animal

This article was written in a guest article for www.realwomensfitness.com
'Before' 1987 first week at Pilgrims aged 9
When I first went off to the wilderness I was with a small group of kids who all had asthma/eczema, diabetes, epilepsy, cystic fibrosis or some such ailment. I attended a special boarding school for kids who suffered from different illnessess to the point that they would usually be permanently hospitalised. Our first 'wilderness' camping trip took all of these ten and eleven year olds out to a field in the south east of england. It was surrounded by ancient woodland, huge lakes and nothing but countryside. We had to get our water from a natural spring and cook over a fire and sleep in tents. 'After' Summer 1988 aged 10
The benefits of this trip for children who may never have been into the countryside let alone to stay in it for a weekend; were innumerable. A lot us hadn't been able to go to school; were more used to looking at a ceiling from a hospital bed and hearing the sound of traffic rather than bird song.
I remember sitting in a canoe in the middle of a thunder storm with the rain drenching me. I was watching a heron as it caught an eel and then took it's meal to the shore not five feet from my boat. I felt vibrantly alive, the contrast was so great. Not a year before my mother had been convinced I was going to die. I had severe eczema that had worsened to the point of germ warfare carrying itself out energetically between the layers of my skin and driving me literally mad with pain. My Mum had fought to get me a place in this special school and it had saved my life. (Pilgrims School has sadly since closed due to government cuts). Now I was out paddling a canoe by myself, collecting my own water, running among giant trees, and waking up to the gentle sounds of the birds.
The health benefits of being in the outdoors aren't simply about the physical. Improved circulation, excellent cardiovascular fitness and normal elimination that combine to provide that natural 'glow' are the expected benefits of any constant exercise regime.
Hiking and climbing have particular qualities that will make you more flexible, have greater endurance and provide you with the ability to focus on whatever tasks you begin. But most of all, they are the ways you choose to make your life. 'We are what we repeatedly do' Aristotle said and exercise outdoors in nature makes us more than simply 'fit'. I would add to Aristotle's phrase that not only are we what we repeatedly do, but we are where we do it and how we go about doing it. In beautiful places you breathe in that beauty, you press pure oxygen into every part of your body and you experience the freedom of an unobstructed skyline.
In wilderness pursuits, some of that wildness passes into your bones. 'Ingwe, one of the founders of the Wilderness Awareness School born M. Norman Powell in 1914... spent his childhood running barefoot through the plains of Kenya with the young warriors of the neighboring Akamba tribe. Adopted into their tribe, Ingwe learned how to live close to the Earth.' one of his students said of him 'The first thing that you notice when you're in a room with him, it really and truly feels like you're in the presence of a Leopard. Honestly. His eye contact is difficult to meet and you feel like at any moment, if he chose to, he could leap across the room, kill you, and be back in his chair before anyone knew what had happened. The second thing I noticed was that he had better senses than anyone I have ever met. He can see, hear and smell things that I can only dream of. His senses, like his presence, are those of a hunting cat.' When this student asked Ingwe how he could do these things Ingwe answered simply 'Practice'.
So if your goal is to become fitter, you can go to the gym or the pool and become gym fit and pool fit and that is a great and good thing - it will help you to be healthy and have a happy life and it often fits in more easily with a work schedule. But if your goal is perhaps wider than this and you wish to make your muscle, and become what you do and you wish to influence the outcome of this decision to its utmost postitive result, then consider every aspect of your day (s). Think about what exercise you are doing and what kind of person you are becoming by repeatedly doing this type of exercise. If that's who and what you wish to become brilliant! If however your soul isn't inspired on the running machine, and the weights just aren't doing it for you; head for the rocks and the wild country.
Get some proper professional guidance, join a local Adventuring Club and get to know people who are already climbing/hiking on their weekends, take your holiday with a well known Adventure Sports School and kayak around a wild and remote coastline. Learn to work with horses, learn to ski and then travel cross country by your prefered method. An adventure sport is exactly that it means you reach within yourself for qualities you didn't know you had and you only find them because you're outdoors and the weather's closing in and you have to make decisions, or because you have to get a fire going and there's only wet wood available. They may very well be simple decisions like knowing when to put on extra layers and take them off or knowing when to call it quits and rest up, but they give you an edge; they give you a life.
Exercise is a funny thing, it's come about because our lifestyle has changed so drastically that it does not create the opportunities for us to be at our absolute fittest. We may think ourselves lucky as women that many of us don't have to do laundary or bake bread by hand anymore and that we don't have to walk to collect water and wood, but it was these simple things, done everyday that kept us superbly strong and fit and often delivering baby after baby and let's face it that's got to be like climbing Everest again and again!
There's a balance involved and it's one we have to give great care and attention to because everything we do has an effect. As well as making our own lives, we are impacting upon everyone elses and upon the collective future of the planet. This is what makes us so powerful. As women we have the ability to create within us - it is a natural power or energy that not enough of us connect with and the very reason that tribal societies had 'moon times or 'moon lodges', it's not superstition - but respect.
Part of getting in touch with the outdoors through hiking/climbing and other outdoor sports conditions us to be in touch with ourselves and with the energy's that move through all lives. Our ears are opened, our senses alerted and we are keenly switched on to everything around us and within us. In the city where we have to turn off our awarenes most of the time to stay sane amongst the noise and the onslaught of modern life, we have limited circumstances to be 100% alive. Our bodies truly become what we breathe, what we eat and drink and what we do, and our spirits are reflected in those things
Be your potential you, don't settle for second best, or third rate. Let the earth sing through your actions everyday and let the words of your unique song ring out to the people who are really in need of it. For only you can carry some of that fresh air from the wilderness back, in the lightness of your step, and only you can carry back some of that pure water in your blood and in your fresh complexion; back to the places where people have forgotten what it is to be a human animal, in sync with everything around us, between sky and stone.
These are the benefits of hiking and climbing and other outdoor pursuits.

Louise Brookes has set up The Positive Impact Living Life Skills Pages where you can freely learn the skills to live your Ultimate Life go to
http://viewsfrommytent.blogspot.com
Louise has travelled, climbed mountains, picked grapes, waitressed, worked in a store in central London, been an Apprentice of Tibetan Medicine for four years, been homeless with two full time jobs, gone round the S of England with a horse and cart, learnt about herbs and wilderness living from native people in Canada and generally been making an outstanding nuisance of herself during her time on this planet. She is currently living and making a nuisance of herself in France.

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tags - hiking, climbing, childhood illness, asthma, eczema, recovery, benefits outdoor sport, special school, Pilgrims School, Ashburnham

Some rights reserved louisembrookes@hotmail.com Louise Brookes 29th June 2007
http://positiveimpactliving.blogspot.com

An Attitude of Fierce Resolve

Fierce resolve is something that cannot be beaten. Some people seem to be born with it. They know exactly what they want to do and they then spend their lives single mindedly doing it. Then there are those of us who admire them from the sidelines in wonder. While we are dithering, prevaricating and worrying about worrying - they have sailed around the world, climbed the highest mountain, dug wells in Africa, gone too space and won the Open at Wimbledon. All while we stood before two items in a shop wondering whether to get the one with the higher back or not!

Single-mindedness does not belong solely to the realms of athletes and A-students, it is an attitude that can be cultivated and you could call it magic, for it is the art of moulding reality to take the form of our dreams.

Reality can and does bend at our will. This is where the phrase fierce resolve clarifies itself. When you are firmly decided upon a goal, you cultivate the resolution to achieve. You don't do this half-heartedly. Whether your desire is to be wealthier or healthier, you do it with every ounce of your being in total accord with your destination. If it is wealth you want - you eat, sleep and breathe that feeling of wealthiness that you want to realise - you live off that anticipation, and then you do everything you can to get there. Everything that pops into your mind that seems possible to do, you do, you exhaust it as an avenue of possibility. It either works or it doesn't work. The point is you've done it and ruled it out and learned.

When I say 'fierce' I mean fierce. When you wake up you remind yourself of the presence of your enemy - 'Yourself, your negativity, your doubt, your disbelief, your lassitude' for here they are all present and correct whether you invite them or not, whether you recognise them or not. Any obstacle that arises and obscures your goal is your enemy. Often it is subtle. It is the insistent voice in your head that says 'Someone else has probably done this already' or 'Are you sure this is what you want' or 'You'll never be good enough' and these are the enemies you have to fight, even though sometimes you forget that they are there, and they slip up like samurai - but then a moment of distraction occurs and you remember 'Didn't I want to sail on a Tall Ship' or 'Go to Mexico' or 'Learn Salsa'. Something, something that nags you and is like a gaping hole of unfulfilment gnawing at you. Perhaps you hide in a bag of chips, or a pint of beer; when what you should be doing is fighting. Teeth bared, snarling, claws at the ready to pounce on the next unsuspecting doubt that threatens your precious ambition. And it is precious, it is your life - it is your beautiful goodness. The adventurous spirit in you. That vein of insight that only you have and nobody else on the entire planet can do or be it like you can. They cannot turn that piece of wood like you can - and they haven't those exact words that you so easily use to put ease in someone's heart when they most need it.

It's funny, I have known so many people over the years and all of them delighted me in some way that was their way and their way alone. They had a way of being themselves that I loved and that they weren't even aware of. Oh, but it's a beautiful thing and you all know what I am talking about

So this fierce resolve has to come about, sometimes, only after we've reached rock bottom. We don't have to, but often it's in our psyche to have to go there first before we are able to find the belief we need in ourselves to reach for 'impossible heights' Then it's up to us to remember, at all times of day, the reaches of passion; because sometimes our passion is quiet, buried beneath something perfunctory and we're in a bit of a daze -busy doing but not seeming to get anywhere and time's just passing and we're wondering where our lives have gone. It is in those moments that we snap at someone close to us, or drive up the curb or trip over our toes, because we're not there - we're not in our blood. we could be anyone in that moment, any Jo.

You probably want to be healthy and you probably want to be wealthy but have you thought about being wise. Being wise and not tripping up over your toes. Doing everything you can to get to your goal. Your dream is there, in you, there's a simple picture that you hold somewhere; a way of being, a quiet moment, some warmth, an emotion, something physical, a new car, cheaper insurance or a long cherished dream. Whatever it is don't continue relegating it so that it remains a dream. Live by it as though it is about to happen and do eveything you can to be there. You want to be comfortably out of your comfort zone; don't forget to live this life now in it's best possible way - don't over-exert yourself, but be kind.

I don't know why but now that I have started this journey - there really isn't enough time in the day. I stay up till late, I wake up in the middle of the night with more ideas than I have the time to do them. I get stiff from sitting typing for too long, because of this thing called 'fierce resolve'. It makes me labour without thinking about time or food, and sometimes it's only thirst or the need for the loo that forces me to stop whatever I'm doing to tend ridiculously, to my basic needs. You can become a very unkind 'potential', potential successful business person, potential best selling author, potential world famous actor. Whatever your potential don't let the realisation of it take away from something that is more important than anything else. The only human magic I think, 'kindness'.

I sat and watched the Princess Diana Concert last night along with about everyone whose got a TV on the planet - about 1 billion people. I remembered where I was when she died and how shocked I was, and also surprised about how much loss I felt for someone I didn't even know. She had kindness down to a tee and everyone loved her for being that and being beautiful, and being herself with all the vaguaries and fragility that comes with being a human-not-hiding.

Subconsciously, Princess Diana had formed a hope in my mind, a hope I didn't even know was there until she went, and with her my hope - or so I thought. Someone had been out there doing what I wanted to see being done; she tried to be truthful; which is so hard to be to yourself let alone to the whole world, and she took what power she had and gave it to people who had none saying kindly with her whole being - here use mine. She sincerely hoped it would help and sometimes that is the best we can do. The best we can manage is to hope; to live bravely with our fear that things won't work, and to share what we can that's simple and good.

Last night there were one billion people remembering Princess Diana. There were one billion people who weren't fighting each other, who weren't stealing someones' lands, or possessions or life. There were so many people who were just sitting down watching the TV, sharing, each one with their own dreams, their own culture, each one very different from the next.

I felt a healing in a way, for something you don't expect to need healing for, becuase it wasn't my grief to have, not really. But nevertheless it was there and it was real; experience doesn't lie.Yes, Princess Diana lives on through her sons and they carry that responsiblity with so much integrity, but I wonder if she doesn't now live on in all of us. Princess Diana was a 'beacon light of a hope' in Martin Luther King' words, for something none of us could phrase; only translate into feeling and that after all is a far deeper communiaction

She gave us with her passing her responsibility to share; to use what power we have, what 'resolve' we have and share it with those who do not have either our freedom, or our resources of health or wealth

When I went grape picking last summer I worked with about twenty Moroccans, and upon meeting me they were trying to establish where I was from and I said 'Je suis Anglaise' and immediately one of them said delightedly 'Ah Princess Diana' and peered at me. I was a bit taken aback. Suddenly Diana had become a sort of passport in common understanding between me and these new preople I had just met, whose culture and religion I didn't have much of a clue about. We went on to commiserate with each other about her tragic fate, but I couldn't help feeling a kind of delight that a door had been opened and I had had to do nothing to open it for it had already been done, and strangely enough it was Princess Diana that had done it, nine years after her death, she's still working her magic. Her 'fierce resolve' may perhaps have gone further with her death than it would had she remained here with us. Her 'soul force' is an inspiration, for soul force doesn't die. It is something we all have and we should use it.

I am tired of violence and war. I am tired of political squabbling while vulnerable people are withering under the bullets and knives of men and women who are supposed to be protecting the unprotected not persecuting them. I think this tiredness is shared by many people and it is a statement that our soul force is now willing and able to meet physical force. 'Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness' are human words, they are words for ordinary people; they are precious words that stand as symbols for our peace and our well being. They are words that cross borders and boundaries, races, religions and creeds. Where they are outlawed and citizens of the world suffer unduly because of such neglect, then our human kindness is necessary, and our fierce resolve is necesasary. 'The majestic heights' that Martin Luther King spoke of, of 'meeting physical force with soul force' apply to the whole world. 'Their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom, we cannot walk alone' does not now apply only to the apartheid of the sixties but to the entire planet in the twenty first century.

I thought about yesterday how I imagined an old granny, upon realising she is in the company of a terrorist, going for him with her handbag. It was a really wonderful simplistic day dream, that made me full of glee becuase I could really see it, which means it's possible. There are so many of us that know how to live together and do so, and then there are those that don't yet know. When a person threatens another person in any way it's so rude. Bombing is rude - it's not just violent, it's a total infringement of privacy and personal space. You might think I'm overlooking the real tradgedy of such methods but I want to focus in on this infringement. Missiles, mortars, screaming fighter planes, bullets and the intention to do harm, are rude, and I have a fierce resolve to say as much.

For us ordinary folk who just want to get on with our lives, to go about our work, grow food, watch TV, have the odd festivity; we have nothing to throw back at bombs that fall from the sky or on our streets. We don't much understand them, we might think that bombing is a necessary evil, we might put up with them stoically or take to the streets in protest. We might get angry, upset and take vows of revenge or start our own jihad - some of us. But we are ordinary people and as such we don't want war, we don't like it and we go to it reluctantly.

In the past ordinary people have been capable of extraordinary feats and I think it's about time ordinary people revealed their superhero not-so-softcentres; and said we are unwilling to put up with being ordinary. We are unwilling to put up with wars over wealth and resources, unwilling to stand idly by and quiet while others are suffering at the hands of those who use their power so rudely. Freedom, many of us have had won for us, some of us have not yet tasted it and some of us are having it taken away as I write. I am indignant over any rude infringement of anyone's freedom on this earth and in my own way I will no longer stand for it, in my own way and for my own dignity and sensitivity I will 'hew out of the mountain of dispair a stone of hope'.It might be in another's country that they must win their own freedom as we have slowly done.

I am disturbed that Japan who gave up war and their own military after the second world war should be selling arms to Darfur now. I disaprove of this. I'm unhappy that the British and US government intervene in one dictatorship and not another.

My words might fall harmlessly on the sand, but my soul force will not. My 'fierce resolve' is that everyone has at least one taste of freedom, a taste that lingers and can be savoured long after I've left the earth. I feel like by writing, I'm like that old granny - there's not a lot that's in my power to do. I haven't got millions of pounds. I can't send armies here there and everywhere or pay politicians to be under my sway, but I can wave my handbag around and give blood curdling yells of disaproval. I'm enjoying a special kind of peace, a costly one I think I have been privileged to know the value of and I'm not about to waste my life letting it amount to nothing.

Life is a beautiful thing and we should all of us get to see that; those who cause suffering and those who are suffering 'Their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom - we cannot walk alone' Martin Luther King, means just that -it means that 'we are one person' Pueblo Indian

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tags - determination, resolve, faith, Martin Luther King 'I have a Dream', Princess Diana Concert, Japan weapons to Darfur, perserverence, non-violence, war, ant-war, the little people

Solar Water Heater Part 1 Motivation!

If you have plenty of disposable income available then there are a few positive things you can do immediately and on a grand scale:-

You could install your own top of the range ultra-efficient solar water heater. You could also have your roof(s) completely tiled with solar panels allowing you to maybe even sell electricity back to the grid - as well as having a wind turbine installed in an appropriate place and a hyrdoturbine (waterwheel) in the stream that runs through your property. In your backyard you could build a natural swimming pool with a living machine connected to it that cleans all your grey/black water (bathing water, waste, washing up suds etc), and you can make sure that your house is passive solar heated and cooled( so it makes the most of the sunlight and is insulated so it doesn't loose heat in winter and stays cool in summer. Being this conscientious already you would try and source all the materials for this overhaul as locally as possible. Maybe you even have fruit trees growing and a healthy harvest from them each year, and can grow all the vegatables you need. If you keep animals you might even try your hand at using a methane-digester to make fuel - you don't have to have animals for this, in London in the nineteenth century all the street lights were run on methane gas from the sewers! Then there's Biodiesal manufacture and /or the prospect of buying a hydrogen car, or hybrid vehicle(runs on dual fuels). These are some of your options if you have enough disposable income.

The wonderful thing is that behind these expensive installations and complicated looking technology is some deceptively simple thinking. I mean come on, how complicated is a wind-mill, or a water-wheel, or plants that; let's face it, pretty much know how to grow by themselves.

This means that what the rich folk can do so can everyone else as well. There's a bit of a process but it's nothing that a ten year old couldn't handle. Yesterday I read this story about a chinese man who made his own solar water heater using 66 green bottles (hanging on a wall - sorry couldn't resist it). Ma Yanjun, a farmer in China's Shaanxi province, According to Weird Asia News, water flowing through the bottles is heated by the sun and then used for showers. Apparently, ten other families in his village. Qiqiao, have since built similar systems. From Weird Asia News:
"I invented this for my mother. I wanted her to shower comfortably," says Ma Yanjun, of Qiqiao village, Shaanxi province...Ma says it provides enough hot water for all three members of his family to have a shower every day. Ma’s invention features 66 beer bottles attached to a board.

The bottles are connected to each other so that water flows through them. Sunlight heats the water as is passes slowly through the bottles before flowing into the bathroom as hot water, reports China Economy Network. Ma says it provides enough hot water for all three members of his family to have a shower every day. And more than 10 families in the village have already followed suit and installed their own versions of Ma’s invention.

The simplest solar water heater is your common garden hose left out in the sunlight, and we know how hot that can get. Then there's variations on a theme, like the green bottles one above or a man 'in the southern US who had a solar hot water heater made from an old Chevy, that was up on blocks, painted black and the proud owner had run 200 feet of garden hose through the interior. It provided enough heat for his family to shower he said'. You can get lost on the internet trying to find the right Solar Water Heater design. I want one that's so simple it hurts to think that we've had to pay for hot water all this time when all we needed to do was...

... and then it has to be one that is acceptable to my mum, i.e. it can hold it's own in Ikea.

So, today I went on a hunt for bits for the solar water heater and I was pretty surprised to find myself feeling very negative. My mum came along for this venture because I figure if my mum and I can do this, anyone can (that's not to belittle my mum in anyway as she is a very capable lady). It is to challenge the opinion that it's necessary to have a plumber, an electrician and a carpenter to do all this. I think I had a bit of trepidation even so and I think that's why I was feeling negative. I was annoyed that I even had to be doing this; to spend time rummaging around for nuts and bolts, panes of glass, bits of wood and rubber insulation and all the paraphenalia that goes into making a solar water heater, especially when I could have been out in the woods instead - all because we humans relish hot showers, hot baths and hot washing up water.

Well, once I got over my little tantrum I realised that what we were doing wasn't bringing me the same amount of joy as I had when I was, for example, cleaning my teeth while standing on the shore of a large glacial river in Iceland, and then putting my socks out to dry on the rocks. There is certainly something invigorating and stimulating about such washing facilities. There was something else - we already have hot water; what did we need a solar water heater for anyway?

That put me right. At the moment 59 nuclear plants produce 78 percent of the entire country of France's electricity, and France is the largest exporter of nuclear electricity in the European Union. There's one thing I don't like about nuclear energy besides the chance of a nuclear accident (be it terrorist or human error) and that's nuclear waste. The inevitable accumulation of something so dangerous it's being sold to the Chinese so that they can put it far away on the remote Tibetan Plateau. www.nicholsoncartoons.com.au.

Just for me to enjoy my hot shower today some very vigilant human beings are going to have to sit around on that Plateau for the next 5000years or more until it's reached the end of it's lethal shelf life. One - I don't trust humankind enough to be able to sustain that level of vigilance for that amount of time and two - Tibet is one of the most beautiful and inspiring places on the planet; whose people have chosen a difficult non-violent pathway that sets an example to all of us; and look how we are saying thank you - by using their homeland as our nuclear waste tip.

In our house our electricity comes from a nuclear power station. When I washed my socks in that glacial river, yes, I was joyful because it was a beautiful place, but it was also because I didn't have the subconscious responsibility for any possible nuclear fallout just for me to have a shower and do some laundry. Here was my motivation to build my solar water heater.

-Some good news that I heard today was that all of the hospitals in Wales have switched to green electricity - they have roof solar panels, steam generated boilers and have reached their 15%carbon reduction target for the year 2010. If we bear the responsibility for our childrens' futures then we will choose to switch to ecological sustainable technologies as soon as we can; then the nuclear question will remain just that, a question, because none of us will have need for it.

If like me, you might be a little lazy and find green stuff uninspiring, that's ok. But if maybe you have already stretched your brain enough to know how to rewire a plug, or change a fuse; then your brain is stretchy enough to understand the simple technologies behind solar energy systems and other sustainable/ecological designs and make them part of your life in the same way cars, vacuum cleaners and mobile phones have done.This is the motivationary part of the Solar Water Heater D.I.Y Project. If your raring to go right now then I suggest you do this instead; as we have today. We have hooked all our gutters up to big barrels to harvest the rain water. It's very simple to do and you can use it (before purifying) to water the garden, flush your toilet and do your washing if you wish. Just a thought

Next comes a little theory, then the practical bits and bobs and then the free hot water.

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The Thinking Blogger Award!

Well, I have been honoured by being tagged for the Thinking Blogger Award, which is a great incentive to keep doing what I'm doing and do it better where possible. So, the participation rules state:-

- I have to link to five blogs that make me think
- Link back to the The Thinking Blogger Awards page
- And proudly display my Thinking Blog Award

As I'm very fond of ceremony that's exactly what I'm going to do:
Five Blogs that make me think:-

http://www.amritapuri.org/children/experience.php
This is a list of personal experiences that's updated at intervals which I find very moving and inspirational. They often make me think.

Mātā Amritanandamayī Devi also known by her followers as 'Amma', 'Ammachi' or 'Mother' is an Indian spiritual leader revered by her followers as a saint. She is a widely respected humanitarian and called by some 'the hugging saint'. Her devotees claim that she had many mystical experiences as a child. Since 1981, she has been teaching spiritual aspirants all over the world. She founded a worldwide organization, the Mata Amritanandamayi Mission Trust, which is engaged in many spiritual and charitable activities. From humble beginnings she undertook a journey to attain "universal motherhood". She addressed the United Nations General Assembly

I have personally met Amma four times and received a hug, she makes me step off the edge of the planet in terms of how I think and feel about myself and what I'm here for.

http://beargrylls.blogspot.com/
Bear spent three years with the British Special Forces. During this time he had a horrendous parachuting accident whilst in southern Africa and broke his back in three places. Yet two years later, after severe rehabilitation, he overcame the odds to become the youngest British climber ever to reach the summit of Mount Everest and return alive. His book on this extraordinary story soared into the Top 10 of the Bestseller list. He has since written two further best selling books and lead numerous other record breaking expeditions. Bear has also hosted several hit TV series both in the UK and USA.
Bear is one of the youngest and most successful motivational speakers in the world. In the words of one newspaper, Bear is "the ultimate modern day adventurer - the real deal!"

http://www.ellenmacarthur.com/
Dame Ellen Patricia MacArthur, DBE is an English Sailor . She is best known as a solo long-distance yachtswoman who, on Feb 7th 'o5, broke the world record for the fastest solo circumnavigation of the globe

http://torjusgaaren.blogspot.com/This blog is posted by skilled primitive skills practitioners. It is an informative blog, where you can pick up skills and read about hands on experiences with primitive skills. He's going out there and doing it and helping us as well, wonderful, simple - that's the lesson.

Torjus Robert

http://www.sarvodayatrust.org/index.htm
"Man becomes great exactly in the degree in which he works for the welfare of his fellow men"
Dedicated to promoting the Gandhian ideals of Truth, Non Violence, Peace, Universal Brotherhood and Humanitarian Service. Sarvodaya is a concept of Gandhis outlined here.

I greatly admire the work of the Sarvodaya Organisation set up in Sri Lanka by Doctor Ariyatne
but their website is in a pickle at the moment http://sarvodaya.org/. That was the blog I wanted to put up here.

I hope these inspire you to greater and greater things or to simply doing the little things really well. These people thought of something then they did it; they did it exceptionally well and they did it for they greater good. Thank you to them for such beautiful inspiration, and thank you to the reader who tagged me for the Thinking Blogger Award - I have added you to my Links.

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Find your way out of Trauma:- The Survivor Warrior Workbook

This powerful workbook is used as a teaching tool with therapists, support groups and community education programs. It was inspired by Angela's Removing the Sword of Trauma events. It is for survivors, warriors, advocates, loved ones and supporters ready to move past pain and suffering and reclaim joy and happiness. You can use the workbook in a group, on your own or with your therapist.

This workbook is 117 pages long and is a DOWNLOAD. Thank you for your commitment to healing BUY NOW $9.99

'Prepare to be Raw' by Matthew Warner

Click here to view more details

Please check out and have an amazing life. Thanks.

Copyright 2010 Louise Brookes

Making money online

Text Link Ads are an excellent way to make money from your blog, if you aren't already you could be - just by copying and pasting a simple code into your layout and because a blog is free and simple to set up, it's a win-win situation.



By monetising your website, you allow yourself to earn income passively day or night - Easy Money! Finally there's a way! If you want to reach a wider audience the cyber gurus say:- have useful content, use keywords that would reflect the words people use in search engines and what the bots read, join search engines and blog carnivals like ezinearticles.com and blogcarnival.com. I'm not a cyber guru but I didn't want to disapoint by this article not having the goods it says it does.

There is a keyword selector tool at overture.com that allows you to see how many hits certain words and word combinations get, so that you can adjust your titles accordingly.

Text Link Ads offer an affiliate program, and a publishing and advertsing program. You can also become an affiliate with people like Auction Ads, Amazon.com, and Chitika eMiniMalls if you have enough traffic (over 10000hits/pcm). These are simple ways, but worth doing because they cost you nothing up front.

AuctionAds: Increase the bid on your site's income!

Operating a business over the internet has none of the overheads that a land based business is plagued by, and now it's possible to use an intermediary delivery service shop host like Cafe Press to create and sell your merchandise again with no money up front. The fact that you are creating a network with your site, that is self-revolving, enables you to put much more energy into what you really want to be doing.

You can produce your own e-book for free with lulu.com

I have also joined MyBlogLog.com because they allow me to see where readers come from and what they read and this gives me the ability to share their experience; so that if they have come from a google search, I can see what for and whether or not they were able to easily find what they were looking for on my site. Then I can change my site so that they are able to get to the things they are looking for and everyone is happy! You can join MyBlogLog for free initially and after that the up to date privileges are $3pcm.

Just trying out visionbuzz.com which claims to up my traffic, I'll let you know here how that goes Submit a Site

I will be adding to this page as I come across new cost-free ways of making money on the internet, please contact me if you know of something and don't see it included here.

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'Navigation Using the Sun' Guest Article by Mark Bradshaw

'Where am I ?'

Introduction
A basic introduction to a few methods of ROUGH direction finding using the position and movement of the sun in the sky.

Fundamentals
The sun rises in the east and it sets in the west. In the northern hemisphere at 1200 local time it is due south, at 0600 it is due east and at 1800 it is due west. Its travel across the skies is constant, it neither speeds up or slows down - so with those irrefutable facts determined we can work out the position of the sun in the sky using only the time of day.
We are going to look at three methods of finding the suns position; each method takes longer, and is more accurate, than the last.

Instant Method
• Ensure your (analogue) watch is set to local or solar time.
• Keeping the watch face horizontal point the hour hand as accurately as possible at the sun.
• An imaginary line that exactly bisects the angle between the hour hand and the 12 O’clock
position on the watch points due SOUTH.
• Continue that line in the opposite direction and you have north.
• Mark north with a stick or stone before you move around and lose its position.

The higher the sun is in the sky the more difficult it can be to determine its
direction.
Practice this skill when you have a compass handy so you become proficient without having to think too much about what you are doing, and practice without using a watch but visualising a clock face.
Even when you have a map and compass available you can use this method to make sure you don’t make one of those very common and embarrassing ‘180 degree’ errors, we have all been there!
Develop the ability to use this method as you walk, it is a great way of
checking your navigation on the fly.
Be aware, this is northern hemisphere specific, it is possible to do in the southern hemisphere but the technique is completely different.

Hasty Method
As good as the Instant Method is it has a couple of failings, if you
cannot see the sun for clouds or mist it is unusable, it relies on a
humans accuracy in pointing the watch in the correct direction, and
without knowledge of the correct time you are stuck!

This second method overcomes all those potential pitfalls but it has a
couple of its own; it is only slightly more accurate than the first method
and it needs 20 minutes or so to complete. Its big plus point is that it
works so long as the sun is strong enough to create a shadow.

• Place a straight stick vertically in the ground and mark clearly
where the end of the shadow is cast.
• After a period of time, the longer the better, place a second stone where the shadow now falls.
• The line between the two stones is the West-East line.

Don’t make the relatively common mistake of transposing the two and getting things horribly wrong. Just remember the sun travels from East to West so the shadow moves West to East!

Deliberate Method
The third and most accurate method. Key for this last method of determining direction to work is that it is started before midday and ended after. The longer before and after you take the measurements the more accurate you can be.

•Before noon place a stick in the ground in a similar way as for the
previous method.
•Mark the point where the shadow cast by the sun ends with a
stone.
•Using a piece of string as a guide scribe an arc around the stick
creating a circle where the first stone rests on the circumference.
•Watch while the shadow shortens, moves east and then lengthens
again.
•Mark the point where the shadow again intersects the arc with a
second stone.
•The line between the two stones is the West-East line.

Important Considerations
All times mentioned in this article are Solar Time, you may need to make adjustments for Daylight Savings Time and similar.

Unfortunately the sun, or more accurately the Earth, does not behave as we wish it might because it tilts on its axis so is not constantly over the equator. If you are in, or near, the tropics (defined as areas of the Earth where the sun is directly overhead at some point in the year) it may be impossible to determine North or South using the instant method. Keep in mind that the two solstices are when the sun is furthest from the equator and the two equinoxes are when it is directly over it.

The Arctic and Antarctic circles are the two areas where the sun refuses to set at midsummer and does not rise in midwinter. There is very little hope of judging the rise and fall enough to navigate by, it gets worse - because the sun is visible at night you will make a 180 degree error if you try these methods when it ‘should’ be dark!

Please practice these methods before you use them, trying to remember if the stones mark East - West or West - East as the smoke is still rising from your vehicle would not be a comfortable situation to find yourself in.

Mark Bradshaw writes of himself:-Born in Manchester, I joined the army at 16 after rebelling against an education that was better than I deserved. I served as a tank gunner before moving into reconnaissance where I became a section commander. I completed soviet studies at the intelligence school at Ashford in Kent then did a stint at the International Long Range Reconnaissance School in Weingarten. I also qualified as a Schools Instructor at the Royal Armoured Corps radio school in Bovington. In my spare time I climbed throughout Germany and Sardinia, and canoed from Guatemala to the Mexican Gulf through Belize. I also managed to spend several winters cross country skiing in Norway. I currently work for a UK Police force in the training department.

Some rights reserved mboutdoors@mac.com Mark Bradshaw/Mountainboy 2007

tags - navigation sun, orientation, orienteering, direction, finding, compass, bearing, sun navigation, learning navigation, teach yourself navigation, homestudy, online

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