Had such a brilliant ride home again. Wish I had the goPro camera.

The kinderwagen is going!

..up above Mühlbach in Austria, an hour from Salzburg. So nice up there.

Bug on the brim

Eyjafjallajokull at the crater 4 days ago. Mesmerizing..

Apparently the ash is now safe for planes to fly through and although they were wrong about it being dangerous before, this time they are right about it being safe:

The new “Time Limited Zone” will be put in place over UK and Irish airspace from midday on Tuesday, allowing airlines to fly through areas of medium ash density that were previously off limits, it said in a statement.

How’s this for a contradiction in the same article too:

The volcano, under the Eyjafjallajokull glacier in Iceland, has been erupting for weeks and shows no sign of weakening.

and a few lines below:

British Airways Chief Executive Willie Walsh said “The rate of ash eruption and the height that it reaches have both decreased over time, though now and then they temporarily re-intensify”.

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE64G3E820100517

It’s dangerous, it’s not dangerous, it’s weakening, it’s not weakening. Talk about a mixed message. Me thinks the consequences of not flying are seen as more dangerous (economically) than the volcano and the possibility of a plane going down.

Clickable

Golf always was and still is a little too slow for me, but it’s usually quite fun anyway, especially with the old man who I don’t usually get to see more than a couple of times a year. Played 9 holes with him last time I was back in the UK, and Jule took some nice shots with the 550d.

All pics with 35mm prime lens.

My camera broke, but managed some decent shots anyway despite IO system erros and about 10 seconds between turning it on, and it starting to vibrate and shutting down.

As shite as the camera is on the BB phone, it’s wicked the way it catches the sun rays.

Up on Untersberg, Salzburg, we hiked a couple of hours up to the Cross at the top and back.

Flying up and down to Hamburg this week, there was cloud cover for almost the entire journey, with the occasional small window down to a frozen snowy Europe below. In the United States, at the same time, there was cloud cover from Canada all of the way down to Texas. Pretty heavy winter so far.

Let’s say just for arguments sake that global warming was a problem (it’s not), and let’s say that it was somehow possible, through the reduction of co2 (despite co2 levels FOLLOWING climate, and being essential to life) to stop the climate from warming, then what would happen if the earth started cooling? (it has already been cooling for 9 years). Would they then try and extract another few trillion from people to warm it up again? The whole politically motivated global warming debate is ludicrous, and many, many good people have been taken for a ride.

I don’t know if this is a record or not for Christmas coverage, but it is certainly reminiscent of the winter of 1977-78 where we had similar bouts of cold and snow. About 99% of Canada has snow cover also, with some parts of the Pacific Coast excepted, and it appears that all of Canada’s Lakes are frozen as indicated by the “yellow ice” in the photo.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/25/nearly-two-thirds-of-the-continental-usa-gets-a-white-christmas/

September spring storms have been hammering NZ all month (think April showers in the northern hemisphere only more potent) and with the temperature yoyoing up and down, its been doing weird things to the mountains…

More here

We’re growing Silver beet – first attempt…

I was thinking about the post I put up on growth, and the effects of Peak Oil and overpopulation on food production and distribution, and came across this:

How far does an average piece of food travel before it goes in your mouth?

Apparently between 1,500 and 2,500 miles (2,500 and 4,000 kilometers) from farm to table. A new study by the Worldwatch Institute details the lengthy journeys that much of the nation’s food supply now takes, finding a growing separation between the sources and destinations of American food.

The distance that food travels has grown by as much as 25 percent, according to the report by the Worldwatch Institute, an environmental and social policy research institute based in Washington DC. The nation’s reliance on a complex network of food shipments leaves the United States vulnerable to supply disruptions, the group argues.

Real? Fake? The guy claims it is all real (check the link at the bottom for more info)

I dunno but I’ve watched it 5 times and I’m still finding it ridiculous…

More info…