It rained a bit the other day. I’m glad I live on the top of a hill.
Other people had more dramatic pictures, I just saw a lot of rain and didn’t venture any further than the doorstep to photograph it.
Categorylife
The general parent category for most of the things I write about on here.
One of the more interesting Louisa-centric sub-categories is biodata (where I explore my personal history with graphs, maps and whatnot), and if you’re that way inclined, you can read about the wonderful felines and canines with whom I’ve shared my life too.
Another post written considerably after the fact but backdated…
On Bank Holiday Monday, the chaps and I left our normal existence in front of computers in favour of a walk in Hawksworth Wood.
Hawksworth Wood is just off Kirkstall Road/New Road Side (A65) and runs the length of Hawksworth Road, and well, it’s pretty cool considering it’s still in the middle of the city.
While in the wood, we larked, as we tend to do, and I met some doggies. Gianni and John increased the entropy of the wood and Kev hated the prettiness. I, meanwhile, exposed my arse when John tried to take my photo thus lessening the prettiness that Kev had to hate.
Afterwards, we went to have some lunch at La Cafeteria in Hyde Park then to the Fenton where the guys played pool and Gianni repeatedly missed his train.
A good day.
Recycle This has spawned a side project – Compost This.
It answers those difficult composting dilemmas like whether you can compost eggs shells (yes, breaking them up first though help), or wee (yes, just don’t over-wet the pile), or bricks (not so much).
John coded the system it uses and I created the content.
It’s got over a hundred entries in the database so far – all the usual stuff – but we’ll add more as time goes one, particularly more specific plants and whatnot in the garden waste category.
Spent the weekend in Wolverhampton at LUGRadio Live 2006 with around 350-400 other people, which is quite a feat for an anti-social freak like me. John did a talk about the webcomic he writes (well, we write, he “draws” and pimps), Everybody Loves Eric Raymond and we also sold some of our ELER and Knuth tshirts thanks to Gareth on the FSFE stall. I mostly lingered and sweated.
As the official documenter of our trips, I’ve written up a detailed account of our trip (below).
As it is rather too detailed, as per usual, here’s a summary: hot, good food, clammy, nice people, sweaty, interesting talks, did I mention it was above average temperature?, RedHat flying disc, stupidly warm and stuffy, well worth going.
Well, it’s exactly a month since I officially finished work and it has been pretty much entirely awesome.
Amongst other things, I have:
- got much better at juggling (as long as I’ve got room to walk about)
- worked on a whole multitude of different projects I’ve been meaning to do for a while
- relaxed a lot
- babied my vegetables in the garden (aside from the slug damage, all going well)
- set plenty of time aside for reading since I don’t do it on the bus now
- got a bargainacious haircut at the local tech college – £2!
- not been bored for more than a few minutes at a time because there is always something interesting to do
- written some stuff
- invented two new great nickname for Carla – “Tubitha” and in relation to her current conjunctivitis gack, “Sticky-Eye Ay”
- protested against George Bush Snr’s visit to Yorkshire
- made bread on a few occasions
- taught my tastebuds to like sunflower seeds
- been grateful that I’ve not had commute and the like on the hot hot days of the last few week
- started making some plans for the future
- annoyed the cats by sitting in their favourite day-time sleeping spot
- sorted out loads of old stuff to ebay
- listened to a lot of music I’ve not listened to for a long time – and saw Gomez live again for the first time in years
- slept a decent amount every night and woken up in my own time (which makes for a far better mental state for the day)
- got better organised
- appeared in the local paper promoting Recycle This – and generally been pretty pleased with how Recycle This is going
- spent time reading about ways to make my life more sustainable so I, hopefully, won’t have to return to full time work
- been a whole lot happier
John and I have a new little project. It’s called “How can I recycle this?” – http://www.recyclethis.co.uk.
It’s a community-driven site, coming up with creative and fun ways to reuse and recycle various bits and bobs from around the home and garden. Each week, there will also be a green dilemma to discuss because we constantly find ourselves in a tangle about which out of two green or ethical options are best.
As it says on the site’s about page, we decided to set it up after eating a big pile of pistachio nuts. There we were, enjoying the sodium high but at a loss about what to do with the leftover shells. We thought there must be a million uses for them but we just couldn’t think what.
The design isn’t finally finalised yet but we thought we should get going on it since the content is the important bit.
Anyway, go over and leave some suggestions!
© 2025 Louisa Parry