The Daily Blog Open Mic – 23rd October 2023

1. Here is a well-known fact about small communities, usually rural, that has been forgotten and is newly presented to fat-heads and brains filled with tertiary sludge from low-class trainers professing to KNOW ALL.
   https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/countrylife/audio/2018912007/why-rural-schools-rule
   Tomarata School is more than a school – it’s a hub for the community that surrounds it.
   While chickens cluck loudly in harmony with the sound of children playing, cows peer over the neighbouring fence to glimpse what they’re missing out on.
   In the summer evenings, a pile of utes line the school fence while the farmers that drive them use the school’s courts for a match of tennis …

2. This guy makes good points that should be part of understanding mood, philosophies and the present modes with overview that enables the most intelligent decisions to be made, especially in times of brouhaha. (Would have helped Trevor Mallard if his brains hadn’t been pickled and ossified from too long in politics. Which would also be expressed about others in L and N.)
   https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/audio/2018911994/how-fear-has-driven-modern-civilisation
   …Robert Peckham is a historian of epidemics and pandemics who has held fellowships at Cambridge and Oxford. He is the founder of Open Cube – an organisation that promotes the arts, scienc..
   When fear is wielded for power, though – as in dictatorships – it often comes back to haunt the person or people involved, he says.
   “Fear can’t be centrally managed – ultimately it will always dissipate and confound the authority using it.”
   Fear has a duality too – just as it can shatter communities, it’s also fundamental to the construction of new communities and the motivation for social change.
   “Fear can be motivating in the sense that it alerts us to the threat that if we do not tackle these things, the consequences will be pretty major.”
   New technologies emerge both as new conduits for fear and new platforms for managing it, Peckham says.

   The complexity of thinking as illustrated in this is far beyond the range of discussion and thought required from citizens for deciding which management team to vote for in our recent election.

   Sun Tzu c544BC understood more than we now, with all the education and fact gathering etc that we now have at our fingertips, or some of us do. But was he better at making decisive quotes than achieving? I think he had a good record. My idea is that outcomes is the test – ‘the proof of the pudding is in the eating’. So down-home, folksy, meaningful. How goes our contracts coming out on budget with good quality work and raw materials? Do we run on ideology and brash statements? Or fear of …? But what if fear sharpens the mind and is necessary for making change?

   One of my thoughts/fears:
   “Anger may in time change to gladness; vexation may be succeeded by content. But a kingdom that has once been destroyed can never come again into being; nor can the dead ever be brought back to life.”
   Talking about ideas, possible manouvres:
   Bravery without forethought, causes a man to fight blindly and desperately like a mad bull. Such an opponent, must not be encountered with brute force, but may be lured into an ambush and slain.” https://parade.com/1074916/kelseypelzer/sun-tzu-quotes/

   End note: What can we gain by sailing to the moon if we are not able to cross the abyss that separates us from ourselves? This is the most important of all voyages of discovery, and without it, all the rest are not only useless, but disastrous.
   Thomas Merton USA author
   

3. https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/500725/absolutely-great-news-migrant-workers-association-welcomes-arrest-of-immigration-advisor
   Some improvement here. Good I should think. Wait and see if it is the right action leading to other similar! Why start now when maladminstration has been going on for so long? Just wondering.

4. Booksellers are heroes. Going onto the internet after books, quotes and its eems that behind all the names is actually one of the biggies. No real choice. The capital accretors want to do the same with human knowledge and thoughts and images. Can it be that someone or some corpse will want to have copyright on everything we say and do? What’s so great about being up to the mark modern?
   https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/500784/a-way-of-ensuring-our-survival-kiwi-booksellers-band-together-to-take-on-amazon

5. Taranaki has had other structures, buildings (airport) that have gone above the reasonable cost line. Think basic, build well with opening windows, and other nice things to have. Build practical don’t have internal guttering etc. Think battering from western storms and tornadoes.
   https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2023/10/21/the-daily-blog-open-mic-21st-october-2023/#comment-788688

   To What Aura do we owe this situation? Cancer has been turned into a disease of celebrity, like heart – both common and constantly fundraising. There are other worthy patients waiting patiently too though; ME/CFS is one, the people too low in energy to raise funds and amenities. Add long Covid in the background now too.

   • What’s this? Wrong link above about Taranaki. Sorry. Here is what prompted response.
     https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/500777/price-of-building-taranaki-cancer-centre-more-than-doubles
     The budget for a “game-changing” Taranaki Cancer Centre has more than doubled to more than $56 million.
     Construction of the state-of-the-art facility – originally set to cost $20.6m – began this week.
     Te Whatu Ora group director of operations for Taranaki, Gillian Campbell, said expansion of the project to accommodate all Taranaki cancer services and construction-cost inflation were behind the budget increase.
     “After a huge amount of planning and preparatory work behind the scenes, we’re very excited to be breaking ground and starting to build this game-changing facility,” said Campbell.

     Taranaki, Waikato, farming territory, oil and gas still? Sort of Cinderellas being visited by the prince of darkness. Hah just wild imaginings.

6. It appears to me that human life and behaviour and societal norms in history are cyclical and if anyone has found a study on that I would be interested if they would put the link  up.  

   Here is a story about a tree apparently 200 years old which was chopped down – an historic tree by Hadrian’s Wall which is 1900 years old approx.   The thought occurs – why haven’t people removed all the stones to sell for housing or making  crazy paving around their gardens etc. because that’s what people usually do? How does one get people to revere and conserve things, ways that are good for all?
   https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/world/500800/in-search-of-the-old-ones-where-to-find-the-world-s-longest-lived-trees
   Who cut the tree at Sycamore Gap?
   Northumbria Police are still trying to identify who destroyed the famous tree after it was felled overnight in late September. Within hours of the destruction, Northumbria Police arrested a 16-year-old boy, and several days later lumberjack Walter Renwick, 69, was also questioned on suspicion of chopping down the tree.12/10/2023
   Who cut down the Sycamore Gap? Everything we know

   https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-tyne-66994729    Sycamore Gap tree: The story so far..
   …National Trust manager Andrew Poad said the stump was “healthy” and they might be able to coppice the tree, where new shoots grow from the trunk’s base, but it could take up to 200 years to get back to what it once was….

   Out of that vandalism comes an idea that should be carried forward in many areas – coppicing.  In NZ the trees grown in towns and cities could be used for coppicing and the useful wood taken every few years and then regrown.   We need wood.   We need trees and they have been an aid and shelter for us since we began in the world.  We are naked people with no fur to protect our extensive skin and nervous bodies and would need trees for protection!   The climatic conditions we have imprudently brought forth will result in our dependence on them again.  

   Also the destructive and vandalistic tendencies that occur in people without socialisation, ignorant or unversed in rational, practical or moral thought who will always be there likely to cause problems, losses or disasters because of some personal lack, wrath or hostility.   Trees and crops take time to grow, care and water, and can be wiped out by vandals and conflict, disease and swarms of insects.   Note that the police are questioning a man aged 69 and youth aged 16 years.   An example of an older person, not wise, thoughtful and restrained, introducing a new generation into destructive, and volatile action.

   We need trees, and may have to make them sacred objects introducing something like Druidism, of which I know little and must read about.  We should bring the tree groups to the fore and take note of their findings and work, also get involved if not knowing what practical use the rest of your lives can be put to.    This goes further than the excellent idea of replanting native trees, needing to think about food crops, least flammable, length of clear wood as in kauri or the like (kauri being vulnerable to present disease), etc etc. 
   NZFFA are a network of tree growers each practicing sustainable land management in rural New Zealand. Join NZFFA and start networking!
   NZ Farm Forestry – Home
   NZ Farm Forestry Association
   https://www.nzffa.org.nz

   Home – New Zealand Tree Crops Association (NZTCA)
   New Zealand Tree Crops Association
   https://treecrops.org.nz
   31/03/2023 — The New Zealand Tree Crops Association (NZTCA) is a voluntary organisation that promotes interest in useful tree crops: fruit, nuts, timber …
   And remember that St Barbe Baker came to NZ/AO to retire in the South Island, and the outgoing, independent Wendy Campbell-Purdie went forth and was the lead to reforesting around Bou Saada.   We could remember her here with a tree and herbiage group in her name!
   http://www.gardenhousebrighton.co.uk/wendy-campbell-purdie-plant-hunter/Campbell-Purdie successfully planted 1,000 seeds, and the Algerian government subsequently offered help. She ended up planting 130,000 trees in and around Bou Saada, under the aegis of the Algerian Red Crescent. Campbell-Purdie formed the Bou Saada Trust to raise money for her war against the Sahara.  Wendy Campbell-Purdie – Wikipedia
   https://www.audioculture.co.nz/articles/tamburlaine-s-lost-last-song
   Forest FarmingUnited States Agency for International Development (.gov)https://pdf.usaid.gov › pdf_docs › Pnaav6545 What is Forest Farming? 6 Designing a Forest Farm. 7 Planting and Cropping. 8 The Choice of Trees: Leguminous … by courtesy of Bou Saada Trust.  (This might be of interest. Haven’t looked.)

   and St Barbe Baker2014  https://www.stuff.co.nz/timaru-herald/news/9812949/Book-honours-tree-guardian1981  https://www.nzonscreen.com/title/man-of-the-trees-19811989  https://www.nzonscreen.com/title/old-mans-beard-must-go-1989 David Bellamy
   https://smithsbookshop.co.nz/p/nz-natural-history-land-of-tane-the-threat-of-erosion pub1956
   http://stbarbe.library.usask.ca/bio
   The work these people have been doing has been great and extended but should have been embraced overwhelmingly for the world rather than space travel.l  
   Care for our home planet, not just treat it as an airport base for blasting off into the void of space!!!!!!!!!!
     

7. Take note of these cool scientific cautionary words.
   https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/SC2310/S00035/deadly-bird-flu-outbreaks-are-starting-in-new-places-expert-reaction.htm
   Virulent avian flu spreading.

8. https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/500846/buyer-beware-lipscombe-auction-house-selling-fake-rare-coins-can-not-be-stopped
   NZ seems to be a bit shady in business standards – open to fast behaviour. I think that there should now be examples of advertisements that indicate exactly what these coins are, that need to be complied with. Too much caveat emptor here. It is very unsatisfactory to go to Court and be told that first iimpressions can’t be relied on, and not second ones either!

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