Sigh

There's no putting it off any more - it's time to reinstall Windows XP. It's been getting more and more sluggish as time goes by - a consequence of untidy uninstalls no doubt - I could get technical with registry checkers and so forth, but it's quicker (and requires less savvy) to reinstall it and hope for the best.

If I'm not back in three days please send a team of Sherpas, brandy, and a slab of Kendall Mint Cake. Actually bugger all that, just send the brandy.

The timing of this is not entirely random, since my old friend FruitBatInShades is coming down for a few days and he's one of those people who can fiddle around with your computer for ten minutes and have it not only running faster and smoother, but also making your toast in the morning. He's due tomorrow so I'll attempt the reinstall tonight, leaving ample time for him to find me weeping, hunched over the still-smoking corpse of my machine.

Before I go, let me just apologize for all the wind over the last week or so - this is an application of Sod's Law,* and entirely due to the fact that I loosely tacked the netting onto the fruit cage, so now if you go anywhere near it you are thrashed soundly until you resemble the Weirbeast from the dreadful Event Horizon.

Ave, morituri te salutant!




*Anything that can go wrong, will. This is as distinct from Dodd's Law (the more fine adjustments you make to something that isn't quite right, the higher the probability that it will break entirely) and McKee's Rugby Rule of Mutual Opposition (if you push something hard enough, it falls over). I look forward to your variations!

Driving Me Dental

I just got less fond of dentists, if that's at all possible. Actually, that's being unfair; I'm only unfond of one particular dental practice, and it's my own bad luck that it happens to be the one that I'm registered with.

The NHS (once held up as the best health care system in the world, if only by the party who happened to be in office at the time) seems to have buggered about with dentistry a bit too much over the last few years. I won't bang on about it, because it's rarely out of the headlines. X million people without NHS provision, Y million without any dental care whatsoever; even the Simpsons had a little fun at our expense, with a dentist making Homer fear for Lisa's future by showing him The Big Book of British Smiles. The only good thing about it so far as I can see is that most of the permagrinned inhabitants of Hollywood are too terrified to live here in case, you know, it's catching.

So. The present dental contract is horrid. There's a shortage of NHS dentists, and my particular practice is well aware of it. Having failed to persuade us to sign up to a private dental plan, they're now making it very clear that we're second-class patients, and the only thing world-class about the service is the wait for an appointment. Add onto this the attitude of the practice manager (who this morning effectively told me that she wouldn't piss on me if I was on fire*) and the result is a Hedgewizard who's going to vote with his feet.

I've been lucky enough to find myself another NHS dentist with a somewhat less Barnum-esque reputation, but the whole deal has started me thinking. Good dentistry influences our life expectancy by a variety of means; for example, there's a link between periodontitis and your risk of stroke. Who'd have thunk it? But even more simply than that, an untreated dental abscess can kill you. But I wonder what dentistry might be like in 2020?

Rest easy, because the British Dental Association has been wondering about that too in a recent report, catchily titled Dental Futures – forward to 2020. I've been wondering what a dental future is - perhaps similar to a pork future, except with less... erm, never mind. Anyway, as Ben Brangwyn of the Transition Network points out, this report deals with the likelihood of problems in the provision of energy and materials in twelve years time by... er... ignoring them completely. This is a bit disturbing, but hardly surprising. The concept of peak oil has yet to fully penetrate our group psyche fully. To be frank, nobody wants to believe it. Even more alarmingly, very few in Westminster even want to talk about it, as I found out this week.

I'll give the last word to a dentist who responded to the Transition Network's questionnaire about what long-term changes we can all make to our preventative dental care:

"Don’t eat refined sugars, at all, period. Do not drink ANY drink that contains sugar. No excuses, do not pass go, do not collect £200. This will not only help your teeth, it will get you off the western diet and a dependency on unnecessary calories. Brush twice a day religiously for at least two minutes. Floss every day. Don’t smoke, don’t open bottles with your frickin’ teeth and be damned strict with your kids on what they eat. A bad tooth in an environment where there are no dentists can kill you. This is what people seem to forget. Every tooth is an organ of your body and should be respected as such."

* I'm being disingenuous, of course. Pissing on patients who are on fire is actually the job of General Practitioners who, as a result of the extremely generous contract** that they negotiated with the Department of Health, are now able to contract pissing on people who are on fire out-of-hours to an agency. Sadly, this now means that if you are incautious enough to catch fire between the hours of 6pm and 9am you now have to ring a national hotline, and wait for an appointment slot for a complete stranger to come and piss on you. Furthermore, the agency's own figures have revealed that 60% of cases are resolved by a telephone consultation which is, frankly, not the same.

**Which is wholly unrelated to the number of MPs who are doctors, naturally.

What's Happening in Whitehall?

Transition economy. That's the name we can give to what happens economically speaking when oil starts to get scarce. Machinery in general will get more expensive to run and maintain, never mind produce. Food will have to be grown closer to where it will be consumed. Transport will become problematic. Big companies will have problems, with knock-on effects for share prices, pensions, and so forth. Transition town groups are springing up all over as more people realize the serious implications for their local community - but what about governments? Frankly, nada.

That's hardly surprising, really. You see there are four possible directions that our civilization could follow over the next few decades;

Techno-Fantasy: (Hello, by the way, if you're the CEO of a major oil company, you probably spend a fair bit of time selling this to your backers.) This is the notion that there's a new technology just around the corner, or already in development, that'll pull our asses out of the frying pan. Zero-point energy, gravity harnesses, cold fusion, whatever. Flying cars will become affordable and when we can't breathe the air any more - well, we can all teleport to the new colonies on Europa. Or at least, anyone with enough money can. Hooray!

Green-Tech: New and emerging technologies can enable us to fully harness renewables, we'll manage to stabilize the world's population, global warming will be minimized, and it's business as usual. We may have to manage with lower growth than before, but it's doable.

Earth Stewardship: Otherwise known as Energy Descent, this looks ahead to a future where energy is much less abundant, and remaining fossil fuel precious beyond counting, and seeks to work towards it rather than trying to fend it off. Localization of production, planned economic decline and food security strategies are vital.

Atlantis: Total anarchy, favoured only by anarchists and survivalists. Increased competition for dwindling resources leading to war in resource-rich countries, and increased concentration of wealth in the hands of already wealthy coporations and individuals (hang on, this is looking a little familiar). Food and fuel riots, mass starvation and "dieback" of the population. Society fractures - and unless a scaled down Stewardship model emerges (run by some of the very rich, from their new estates), our civilization perishes. In five hundred years it will have faded to legend, and tales will be told of how our own technology destroyed us.

Well, there you are. Governments are backing Green-Tech, because of fear that talking about anything less might make them unelectable. I took a few moments to poke around on official political party websites, and this is what I found in order of MP share;

Labour: Michael Meacher forms the focus of the concerned minority in the party, and predicts a rocky road ahead. Little interest. Party is Green-Tech.

Conservative: Zac Goldsmith probably appreciates better than any other mainstream politician what is coming up, but precious little of what he says penetrates into policy. Green-Tech.

Lib-Dems: John Hemming chairs the 32-member all-party parliamentary group on peak oil, to which nobody listens. Party is Green-Tech.

Green Party: I had higher hopes for the Greens, but to my surprise their website is almost silent on peak oil. They are well aware of it, as perusing a few blogs shows, but they're choosing not to publicize it at the moment - presumably because they feel it would undermine their argument on climate change and nuclear energy. So the party is Green-Tech for now, but probably ready to move on peak oil when the energy crunch becomes more apparent.

So - there can't be a national lead on the transition economy, at least for the time being. If we leave it to the big boys it may well be too late; day after day I hear about new government initiatives that cost big bucks and will be irrelevant by the time they begin to work!

This is why the transition town movement - and the post-carbon movement - are so important. If, by the time things get bad, we have a network of people who are ready to stand up locally and say "Hold on there, put that brick down - stand in this line to sign up for the community farm, sign here to register for a course in fence-making, and give us a hand on Saturday - we're grubbing up a car park to plant vegetables". Maybe that will be enough to make us pull together. Maybe then, we'll have a chance.

We Made Our Own Entertainment In Them Days

Meet Jimmy. Jimmy's an old friend of mine. He's witty, professional, and an intelligent chap. He's also a terrible scrapper - I dare not go out for a drink with Jimmy because the evening inevitably goes like this;

Drink 1: Convivial. Winding down after a hard day. Jimmy unexpectedly necks a pint of beer in just under eight seconds.

Drink 2: Enthusiastic. Just as I am putting my own glass down after my first sip Jimmy returns with his second pint, full of zip and zest and other things beginning with z. Jimmy in enthusiastic mode is quite intimidating since he's also borderline Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, so he is bursting with the desire to a) tell you about his day, and b) create symmetrical stacks of beer mats and line up the contents of a packet of peanuts in strict size order. This phase doesn't last long, however, because soon we're on to

Drink 3: Lairy. This is a handy Brit word meaning agressive or confrontational, especially when drinking alcohol. At this stage Jimmy stops paying any attention to his friends, because he's now looking askance at other drinkers in the pub daring any of them to hold his gaze for too long. At this point it may also occur to him that a glass of whisky (or whiskey for that matter) is an excellent idea, but on no account must he be allowed to have it - because if he does he moves quickly onto

Drink 4: Did you spill my pint? Yes, it's scrap time. As inevitably as a CEO raiding their company's pension fund, so Jimmy finds himself disposed towards thumping someone in the eye for some minor, or indeed wholly imagined infraction. And the interesting bit is that the poor fellow that Jimmy goes for is inevitably at least a head taller than him, for Jimmy is not a large person - in fact, he's fairly short. Compact, I'd say. Bijou. But I know him well, and so I'm really not aware of his size (until he reaches for the beer, that is).

Put that red felt-tip pen away and fight me like a man!

Anyhow, while I waited for a meeting to start today I treated myself to a pint of Courage Best and idly leafed through a copy of the Daily Mail that someone had left behind. The combination of excellent beer and amusingly paranoid journalism made me feel quite at peace with the world for a spell, and when I finally wandered into the conference hall I joined Jimmy - just nearing the end of Drink 2 by the looks of him - and a couple of others gossiping about a female colleague with a famous temper and flame-red hair. Naturally, the conversation turned into some baseless musing about the feisty nature of red-heads in general - and before I knew what I was doing my mouth opened and words came out. Anyone who knows me well will tell you this is seldom a good thing, and on this occasion I started talking about this article before I realized that the three people I was talking to had an average height of about 5'6" and were listening very attentively.

Time slowed down, just as it does when you're in a traffic accident. Fuck, I thought to myself as the words flew out of me like slow-motion machine gun rounds. How do I get out of this? In a moment I'm going to say the S-word and I'll be about as popular as a Monsanto exec in an indian restaurant.

Happily it was Jimmy himself who saved me, because at that moment the drink he'd ordered arrived - a scotch on the rocks - and his friend Mick interrupted me. "Here, Jim," he said anxiously, "are you sure that's a good idea? You're an arsey little shit when you get going."

Hattage

Can anyone tell me why people who drive wearing hats are such a disaster? I mean, I can see that some sorts of hat might possibly restrict your vision, so those are an obvious no-no; but this seems to go beyond that. It's got to the point now that when I realize I'm behind someone in a jaunty little fedora or a cheeky beret, I bellow "Hat wearer!" and immediately reduce my speed. That's how bad it's got.

Has anybody seen my keys?

Hat-wearers don't drive purposefully (what driving examiners over here call "making good progress"), they pootle. The speed of this pootle varies from hat-wearer to hat-wearer and can be anything from 20mph to 50mph; the important bit is that the speed of the pootle does not vary with conditions, so the hat-wearer either blasts through tiny little villages at 50mph, or else dribbles along major roads at 20mph. The only alteration to their speed that they make is on long, straight sections of road when you might conceivably overtake them. Then they floor it.

Hat-wearers are oblivious to all other road users. They are apt to make sudden and unsignalled turns; to stamp on the brakes in order to read posters by the roadside; to come to a full stop in the road to chat through the window to other hat-wearers travelling in the opposite direction; to check their hair (or make-up, if female) in the rear-view mirror; or to suddenly disappear from view completely as they ferret around in the glove box for a humbug or a forgotten fragment of Kendal Mint Cake. Drive anywhere near hat-wearers with extreme caution.

Yesterday I was stuck behind a car travelling at a speed probably best described as twelve furlongs per fortnight. It was not a fast car. It was, however, proving somewhat difficult to overtake because the driver was well aware that they were entitled to half of the road, and had obviously decided to take the middle half. I automatically checked them out for telltale signs of millinery, and found to my shock that there there didn't appear to be anyone in the car at all. However a second or so later I realised that this was an illusion; there was a driver but they were so low down in the car that they were actually peering over the dash through the arc of the steering wheel. Perhaps they had removed the seat, and were sitting on the floor? Or were a child, operating the gas pedal with blocks tied to their shoes, like Short Round?

But no, the hat clinched it. It was green. It was indecently furry. And it was a cloche hat, of the kind that went out of fashion in about 1928. No unsedated child would willingly wear a hat like that. I scanned the car and found that the rear of it had been gently compressed from several angles, in a style that can only be accomplished by reversing firmly and repeatedly into stationary objects. I dropped back, and then further back, and then took a diversion that added ten minutes onto my journey - but at least I arrived more safely than everything between the hat-wearer and their intended destination.

Perhaps the hats make their brains overheat. Or perhaps the hats are to disguise the lobotomy scars, I don't know. Anyone got another suggestion - or care to admit that they wear a hat while driving?

Garlic Scapes

Continuing on my theme of how to get more eats from your plot, this is all about using the edible flower stems thrown up by garlic as it grows. Scapes come straight up from the centre of the bulb and are initially curly and flexible, often looping around on themselves; if you leave them be they straighten out and toughen, and the flower head develops (technically it’s not a real flower, but we’ll pass on that). If you’ve never seen scapes, then chances are you’re growing a softneck variety; only the hardnecks produce scapes.*

Gardeners generally snap scapes off close to the bulb around the time that they loop round on themselves, because if you leave them on then you tend to get smaller bulbs. However, don’t be tempted to throw them away, because they’re very good eating! They can be chopped and added raw to salads, brushed lightly with olive oil and grilled briefly, or you can add one or two to any other vegetables that you’re steaming, boiling, roasting or frying to give them a light garlic flavour. They are delicious simply sautéed in butter (and any leftovers can be folded into mashed potato for something truly special) - but in my opinion the best use for garlic scapes is as the base for a simple pesto.

Take a handful of scapes – say six or seven – and chop them roughly.** If you’re feeling fainthearted, add a big spring of parsley – the flavour of scapes is milder and less pungent than regular garlic but this recipe still packs a punch – and puree them in a blender. Hurl in a handful of grated parmesan and a small handful of pine nuts (or some briefly toasted walnuts if you don’t have the pine nuts), a good glug of olive oil and some salt and pepper, and zap the blender again until it’s the consistency that you like. Then – oh, hang on, we’re finished! Store it in an airtight jar in the fridge. When you’re ready to go then mix it into some pasta fresh out of the pan, and pour a little pasta cooking water back in if it’s looking too stiff; and serve with a summer salad and a glass of elderflower champagne with all your loved ones.****



*Okay, so what’s the difference? Softneck bulbs store for longer, but the flavours are milder. If you want to keep ropes of bulbs right through until spring, choose a softneck; if you want garlic that knocks your socks off, then choose a hardneck.

**I chop everything roughly. I don’t mean that I fail to shave for several days, let my personal hygiene slide and use coarse language*** - I just cook like a peasant. If a recipe says “chop finely” I just chop it; if it says “chop” I cut it into fairly large pieces; if it says “cut up” I generally just wave the knife at it in a menacing manner. This sometimes leads to some unexpected mouthfuls, but generally makes no difference at all – apart from once when I was making hot & sour soup, but let’s not go into that. We’ll just say that it was perhaps a little more sour and quite a bit more hot than I’d intended, and apparently featured small pieces of someone’s brain.

***Although I could, if you’d like. You naughty person, you!

****Or at least, all the loved ones you want to continue loving you that day. I did say it packed a punch… as a footnote, scapes can also be tied every few feet round the outside of fruit trees, at browse height, to deter deer.

Furry Trifle

Spring must be here, since the Bleedin' Cats have presented me with a headless bunny. I'm not entirely sure why they think I want one, since it wasn't on my birthday list, but I have a sneaking suspicion that it's to do with kitty eyes being bigger than kitty belly. You know, like when you help yourself to a massive spoonful of trifle at Christmas and end up having to give it to Fat Uncle Bernie at the end of the table. Except this trifle has fur. Um.

At the moment Number One Son is very handy in the matter of leftovers, since he has hollow legs. He grew another inch at camp last autumn, thus becoming officially Taller Than His Dad when my back was turned.* Since then he has been as skinny as a whippet with the runs, but for the last month or so his appetite has really increased so perhaps he's going to start filling out at last. Nothing escapes his eagle eyes, and I have to watch him carefully in case he whips N2S's leftovers away before they actually become leftovers. I mean, seriously, don't get your hands or feet too near his mouth. It isn't safe.

N1S's burgeoning appetite is a joy to watch, if a little alarming at times. Last night I made a steak and mushroom pie with sweet-and-sour leeks and french beans on the side and he ate a double adult portion without breaking into a sweat, scarfed down his dessert (a Bramley crème brûlée**) and stole N2S's portion as soon as it looked like he was struggling with it - and then he had a chocolate bar in the evening. I mean, wow.

*For some reason this seemed to trigger the gene sequence for "attitude problem", and now he tries to second-guess me about every little thing from bedtime to internet access. This would be merely irritating if it weren't for the Asperger's thing, which means that he often picks the most bizarre thing to argue about; yesterday it was the turn of the computer workstation which he now fancies - minus the computer that lives on it - as a bedside table. I mean, what?

**Okay, so it was Mother's Day and I was showing off to my beloved. Why not?

Of Unexpected Edibility

Last night we had the Squints round for supper and served steamed kale flower shoots tossed in garlic and herb butter as a side dish. It was excellent, quite the equal of broccoli, but this is something that none of my gardening books mention. I've gone back to my earlier kale article to add this to it, and for the next few entries I'm going to gather together other examples of food we might be accidentally throwing away.

Garlic scapes next. Any other suggestions?