A modest recommendation

Sitting by my fire now, quietly polluting the night air via my chimney, and so I come to this.   A recommendation.   Travels with Epicurus by Daniel Klein.  (Sub titled, A journey to a Greek island in search of an authentic old age.)   Funny, smart, direct, thoughtful.   Above all, honest.   He also wrote, Plato and  Platypus walk into a bar.   This... Read More

Cut your solar buying costs and buy in bulk with me and 30 others

The stylish black integrated inverter and battery system on the balcony of my house   It’s all solar systems go.   After the solar info evening last night, we’re going to do it – over 30 of us from across Australia will buy in bulk to bring down individual prices for solar power systems for schools, houses and offices.   A solar power station or... Read More

Off the grid info evening at Sydney’s Sustainable House

    Power your place with the sun Power Australia with the sun Buy in bulk – be one of over 30 off the grid solar energy buyers Cut your purchase price by a HUGE amount  by buying in bulk Stop burning coal for your place       Please join me and about 30 others at my place for an information evening about using solar energy to power your home or business.   Date:... Read More

Chippendale’s road garden plan

Chippo road gardeners Bianca, Serena and Eammon after transplanting the Tahitian Lime on Saturday 8 May 15 In Chippendale, Sydney, NSW, we residents and businesses garden in the streets.   We’ve just made a road garden plan to satisfy the local council’s desire for paperwork.   It’s written in plain English and we’ll change it as we go.   It’s... Read More

A sustainable granny flat in Sydney

For those looking to build a sustainable granny flat here’s an email exchange which may assist: Good afternoon Michael, The tour of your house, and of your knowledge, last Saturday was quite enlightening – thanks.  I am in the situation of having a granny flat built on the property I share with my son & family, at Burraneer (near Cronulla).  We’ve given the... Read More

Anxiety

  “Anxiety is love’s greatest killer. It creates the failures. It makes others feel as you might when a drowning man hangs onto you. You want to save him but you know he will strangle you with his panic.” Anais Nin, February 1947  Read More

How to listen between the lines

I learn a lot from silence. Feeling, for me, heightens in that space, there, too.   So it was with pleasure that I came across a book that explores silence.   Here are some morsels from an article about it: “Smith was looking for a way to get at precisely that unrehearsed language, so the linguist suggested three questions to crack the shell of verbal habit: “Have... Read More

How efficient are solar panels on my house after 19 years?

To check the efficiency of the solar panels on my house after 19 years of use, and to obtain regular reports on them, I’m receiving a report from Solar Analytics. The first report is here as a PDF and you’re welcome to download it and read it for yourself. SA-Report-Mobbs_Chippendale-01.2015  Read More

A Philip Larkin poem – An Arundel Tomb

  An Arundel Tomb By Philip Larkin Side by side, their faces blurred, The earl and countess lie in stone, Their proper habits vaguely shown As jointed armour, stiffened pleat, And that faint hint of the absurd— The little dogs under their feet. Such plainness of the pre-baroque Hardly involves the eye, until It meets his left-hand gauntlet, still Clasped empty in the... Read More

From Bronte to a tiny, tiny thing

Bronte on my mind, in my eyes and on my flesh   An almost invisible, tiny critter a centimetre long – a baby praying mantis? – on the table in front of me.Earth gifts me beauty, silence, peace.    Read More