Stfling rules halt young person's endeavour.

Step by step we gradually creating rationalised and bureaucratically controlled society that is becoming paralysed by seeking risk adverse solutions. Take this example; Our daughter Jessica is studying Agriculture at University. Although coming from a farm she has found she is ignorant of much of modern Agriculture. She is very keen to learn more. Last year she went to a YAP (Young Agricultural Professionals) conference and she came back buzzing with ideas.

Any way it was suggested by one of her Uncles that working for a large Stock & Station agency in a pastoral area would give her some valuable insights into how things work. She found someone who would be willing to host a voluntary work experience student. All good until it was mentioned to the upper management. It seems she would have to have insurance! What that means I suspect is Worksafe. Anyway previously this situation was covered by the University, but they no longer have work experience as a subject because there was too much paper work.

So a student who is trying to be proactive and ultimately more informed and employable is being stifled by rigid rules aimed at protecting existing employees and to hell with the next generation of workers and leaders. It must be happening in all sorts of other places as well now the rules have changed for the not for profits sector.

Still cold (open fire on in the house again), showers max 19 C min 9 C rainfall 2.4mm. Finished setting up the grading machine and began rubbing and grading. The bulbs could a little drier as not all the outer skins are being rubbed off, the cool humid conditions don't help. As we go through the bulb stack the wholesale orders are being counted. Four bays were graded which is a fine start. Office work in the evening.

Catalogue returns

A feature of the last couple of days has been the size of our mail.  This is because we have just done a mailing to our older (not ordered for a while) customers and you get a lot of returned catalogues because people have left their addresses.  Apparently something like 12½% of people move address every year is every eight years on average we move address.  Happily our customers keep us pretty well informed and so we don’t have anywhere the theoretical wastage.

BTW we run a mail order business supplying daffodils and other spring flowering bulbs to home gardeners.  This is our 13th season and our predecessors have done the same since the founding of the business in 1917. Our web site is www.daffodilbulbs.com.au

A mailing also results in a lot of phone calls and Chris has been busy answering them. One thing we have noticed is that phone calls are fewer than they were.  We would also get them at all hours. The latter I think because people were expecting an answering machine, as the office is in our home the phone gets answered whenever it rings. The use of e-mail has probably meant people are less likely to ring you up.

Our current mail order catalogue;

Rain in the morning, heavy at times moderating to showers, strong squally southerly wind max 15 C min 6 C rainfall 9.4 mm. Spent the day finishing up the cleaning and rearranging the shed to start rubbing and grading the bulbs. Power went out for a couple of hour, which was a little, inconvenient.

Simon selected for Top Arts 2012 exhibition

Simon (son) received a letter from the National Gallery of Victoria that one of his photos had been selected to be shown in the VCE Season of Excellence Top Arts 2012 exhibition. He is very proud of this and is a notable step towards his chosen career.



The letter says “Only 148 applicants were short listed for Top Arts from over 1800 applications. You are one of the 54 who made the final selection. The exhibition opens on the 21st March at The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia.

Generally fine day  max 19 C min 9 C rainfall 3.5 mm. Finished cleaning bulbs, tidy up in shed putting stuff away. After work filled in trench, under house nailing up wires, evening District Scout leaders meeting till late planning dates.

Just like you used to be

Today Chris (wife) said to me "you are just like you use to be". I was a bit puzzled by this statement. She said yesterday was like old times with you doing stuff around the house and me helping, holding things etc. I guess she was right I hadn't done a lot of stuff around the house in the last few years. When I wasn't working I would be too tired to do things.

What triggered this conversation was me adding an ethernet connection to our shed today,   I have been planning it for ages and this morning decided it was time to get it done. I wanted it to be working before we started the despatch season. Having a computer in the packing area connected to our network would be a great time saver for us all.

The shed is about a hundred metres from the house so it is at the limit of the run for ethernet. By lunch I had a 50 metre trench dug, the rest didn't need to be buried. Late that evening the connection was made, a bit slower than normal but better than none.

Dr KK when discussing the drugs she wanted to prescribe for treatment of the symptons I have for Parkinsons Disease went over the side effects of them.  She was very thorough and did it three times making sure I was completely aware of what could happen. The dopamine agonist drugs can cause all sorts of compulsive behaviours. Happily mine seem to be fairly mild. She also warned Chris that the extra energy I may have could be difficult to live with especially if it impacts on others in the family. Many people have become obsessive do it yourself  hobbyist. I had been planning this stuff for ages, I don't think I have gone that far, more the difference is I have more energy and a feeling of "wellness".

Generally overcast with the odd sunny break max 22 C min 10 C rainfall 7.8 mm. We mainly did shed work, cleaning bulbs and tidying up plus the boys helped pull the cable through the tubing at the end of the day.

Ben Folds & Nick Hornby's brilliant collaboration

Last year Ben Folds put out a CD (Lonely Avenue) of songs written by himself and author Nick Hornby. Hornby wrote the lyrics and Folds composed the music, this song-writing was done by e-mail. Each song is like a mini-story often told in the first person. The songs can be very personal and in many ways could be taken as metaphor for other life experiences.

Jessica is a big fan of Ben Folds and went to one of his concerts when she was in year 11. I remember siting outside the Palais waiting for the concert to end to pick her up and thinking I didn't need to be inside to hear the music and you could even hear Folds between songs banter. I bought Lonely Avenue for Jess's birthday which she was very pleased to receive.

One song I particularly enjoyed is Levi Johnston's Blues, which is about the young man who was boyfriend to Bristol Pallin (former Vice-presidential candidate Sarah Pallin's daughter) it includes lines paraphrased from Johnston's pre-infamy MySpace page: "I'm a f___ing redneck, I live to hang out with the boys/Play some hockey, do some fishin' and kill some moose".

The full lyrics are worth checking out and are pure poetry;

http://www.songlyrics.com/ben-folds/levi-johnston-s-blues-lyrics/

Rain in the morning and then scattered cloud with sunny breaks, very steamy Max 27 C min 14 C rainfall to 9 pm 18 mm. Odd jobs around house, finally re-erected the shade sails over the verandah decking. It was only 2 years ago we rebuilt the verandah that had a lot of rotting timber in the structural components.

Miracle of herbicides

Modern herbicides make farming possible in the competitive world we live in. Pressures to produce ever cheaper food, fibre and flowers means a farmer must be ever more efficient and productive. We grow about 2 and a half hectares of daffodil bulbs and if we had to weed by hand then that is all we could possible do. Labelling and registration of chemicals is very strict and if a farmer uses chemicals as per the label there is very little environmental effects and you could argue it is a positive one when you are removing noxious or environmental weeds.

Today with the digging completed the tractor is free to do other jobs around the farm.Weed control is on the agenda at the moment. Early before the wind picked up I sprayed out the semi-permanent plantings (seedlings) which have to be done in January as the Nerines & Belladonnas begin growing in February. Also sparyed was the land that I am readying for next years plantings and is showing some perennial weed growth ( it is best to get rid of these before planting). The other patch I sprayed was this years plant which will be harvested next year, we let "weed trash" to grow over summer to protect the bulbs a little from the heat but it still needs to be controlled a bit.

Whilst spraying I flushed a Stubble Quail. My management of the paddocks can't be too bad as these ground dwellers are regularily seen.  Some mornings you can hear the booming call of the Painted Quail coming from the top paddock. I have found a Quails nest in the middle of the dried daffodil leaves and that same year the baby quail (they were Stubble Quail) were seen being shepherded away from me on the tractor. Another time I had a Painted Quail doing the broken wing act obviously trying to lead me away from it's chicks. This season I also had views of another ground dweller, (a Buff-banded Rail) which was seen whilst slashing the fire breaks around the perimeter of the property. This is a bird I often have flashes of when it is flushed but rarely get a good look.

Fine & sunny max 28 C min 13 C a little windy in afternoon and then a gradual change came over with light rain in the evening. Tractor based herbicide spraying in the morning and then some knapsack spraying around the shed, paths and gardens. In the late afternoon fuzzy (my cousin) came around and we did some repairs on the sizing machine motor and the hydraulics on the tractor

Nature's treehouse

During the month we have been digging we have often had morning or afternoon tea under a giant Mountain Ash (Eucalyptus regnans) tree pictured below on the left. It is a large tree which is mature and pre dates the 1926 fires. These fires cleaned out most of the older trees in our district. You can see fire scars on some of the old-timers in this group so the fire proabably wasn't of an intensity to kill them.

Thse trees are dropping branches regularily and in the scars left tree hollows are often formed. One windy day a branch fell where we usually sit, that day we were a bit wary and hadn't sat under the tree. ai have been watching the coming and goings if nature around this tree. It is a very rich part of our farms eco-system.

This photo shows avertical scar which must be hollow behind and Indian Myna's have been coming and going due I assume to them having a nest there. A bit further up the tree is a starlings nest also in a hollow. Iff these birds come and go at the same time there would be quita a commotion. Sometimes a Magpie Lark would join in. Its nest is a bowl shaped none made of mud perched three quarters of the way along the second branch from the ground that hangs over the paddock. The king of the paddock birds is the Australian magpie who would often fly into this commotion and remind them all who is boss.

Fine and sunny with a light south easterly max 23 C min 9 C. Dug the last 3 rows, finally all the bulbs are out of the ground, yeah. Cleaning dirt from dug bulbs in the shed. I cleaned, greased and put away the digging machine. I stupidly forgot to undo the PTO shaft before driving the tractor off and have damaged it, not sure yet if it is repairable. Second time I have done a similar foolish thing. Swallowing peoblwm last night when my pills got stuck and left foot cramps and stiff neck troubling.