Becoming One With The Land

This weekend has brought an unexpected change in the lives of many. Our flat joined the new wave of economically and environmentally friendly homes that grow some of their own vegetables.

Although not uncommon for people to have their own vege garden, it is uncommon for people in the age bracket of 20-30 to have a vege garden. This age bracket is the product of an upbringing as to where all self sufficient tasks are taken care of by the mall, the supermarket or the slaves the capitalist pigs have taken advantage of to make our coffee[1], shoes and rugs. All for the purpose of giving our lives more free time, free time we use to watch television [2], or even worse, go shopping for goods that bring only false purpose into our lives. Enough.

I want my food, the fuel that keeps me alive, to be beneficial to the world. Not to have it trucked thousands of kilometers to my plate [3], not to have it sprayed and pumped with pesticides and preservatives, and definitely not at the cost of native forests.

Being from the useless generation of people who have had everything done for them, and have only learnt anything valuable but absolutely inaccurate from watching home renovation tv, we have started small with great ambitions so that we get it right.

Today I focus on step 1. The hardest of steps, overcoming the sitting around on my butt and doing some real man labour. So far, so good. A patch in our old overgrowing weed garden has been cleared. Some old recycled wooden crate has been pulled apart to provide a basic container to the patch, and the soil turned over, and mixed with some new composting soil. The seeds are now ready to be planted!

Over the coming weeks/months I will document the growth of the vege patch. While providing new music that is played to the vegetables to stimulate growth through love.

Here is the first song played to the garden. Its called Gas, as it is inspired by the fact that our petrol prices in New Zealand have risen at an alarming rate in the past few months. Be it a bad thing for the economy, but hopefully a good thing for the planet.

Water Creatures - Gas

How to throw a wild and ethical party

This weekend my flat is having a party. It undoubtedly will be awesome, our parties always are... In preparation for the party, I've been thinking about some ways to make sure the party is a total success and also to ensure the guests leave not only with memories to last life time, but also with some food for thought. Which I will convey in a list of helpful tips:

1. Food and drink

Obviously you need food and drink, don't cheap out on it! Spruce it up by having only healthy options. Carrots, celery, and peppers make a fantastic alternative to chips. And for a bit of dip, try a salsa or hummus to reduce that fat intake.

All drink should come in recyclable bottles. Creating lots of garbage is not cool, so make sure you have an empty recycling bin all ready to use to collect bottles and cans. And buying fresh food doesn't require as make packaging as chips etc, so double bonus on the trash reduction if you go fresh.

Remember to take care of guests who are starting to drink in excess. Spew on the garden is not good for plants and trees and killing vegetation is not helping reduce carbon dioxide levels.

2. Activities

Depending on the type of party you are having, you might want to think about what kind of activities you have at your party. The party we are having this weekend is a sophisticated wine and cheese night, so we are mostly planning on having wankerish conversation. If you are having trouble thinking of ideas of what to do during your party, try hard! If you don't, guests will have to resort to the obvious which is usually destructive. Breaking property, and lighting fires is not ethical at all! So be prepared, maybe line up some karaoke or a dance off. Keep the trouble makers busy and in the morning you'll be happy you don't have to repair the neighbours letterbox.

3. Conversation Topics

A great way of giving the guests something to think about upon leaving is having rich conversation. Don't get too competitive in discussion, no one likes the guy at the party who has to win every argument, and turns all discussion into a yelling match. Example, a few weeks ago at a very quiet party with a few friends, three people decided to have a conversation on radical politics and ended up just yelling at each other. This was extremely disappointing, not only because none of them actually cared about coming to a conclusion that would benefit them, but instead was determined to win the argument at all costs, which meant yelling abuse to one another. This also meant the rest of the party couldn't talk, because their volume was way above speaking levels. Bad Times.

Instead try to aim for good conversation, like where people learn interesting facts about issues they might not know of. A good way to make sure this happens is to actually learn to agree with some points other people are making, and actually listen to what they have to say. If you are struggling for conversation topics, just look up prior to your party a few issues in the world today. Maybe fair trade for banana growers, or the correlation between car theft and the rise of petrol costs.

4. The end of the party

Don't let a party drag on all night. The longer a party goes for, the drunker people become as well as becoming more tired, which generally results in angry destructive people. Arrange for the party to go somewhere controlled like town, or pull out a cup of herbal tea around 1.30 am to let all the party goers start to wind down.

But the most important part of the ethical party is to make sure it doesn't end in a destructive riot. Although this can at times seem great, when viewed from an outsiders perspective, it is actually terrible. Riots generally destroy a lot of property and also result in the police being called up which is just a waste of tax payer money, which could be going towards more efficient power generation.

So think about some of these things next time you are throwing a party, but most of all have fun. Just make sure it is beneficial to the planet fun.

To celebrate our up coming party, I've got this little jam I had earlier tonight here for your listening pleasure.

Water Creatures - Standing on Fire

All My Inspiration Comes From Music

I like it when it snows, and it is snowing right now. Perfect. Christchurch is a place where snow is rear, maybe once a year or so. Hence why I get excited when it does. Christchurch is a pretty good place to live, it is very close to lots of amazing places to visit, and there are some quality people around, if you can get past the majority of jerks. In even smaller quantities are people who are really interested in new and original music, namely indie music, but also whatever the flavor of the month might be (which is under the umbrella of indie).

One such aficionado goes under the guise of Mount Pleasant Music. The purpose is clear, get the Christchurch scene to look less like a myspace emo band page, (re: a band with guitars and bass and drums which sound alright apart from the constant mistakes, until the singer starts and any illusions the music made are swept away in a whine that would make a young teenage boy's first girlfriend sound like welcome home serenade) and rather turn the scene to be inspiring and to have lots of great bands/music coming out of this little city on the far ends of earth. As quite clearly Christchurch lacks a degree of culture, and a rise in independent music would give those troubled teenagers something to do on a Friday night.
Take a look at http://www.mountpleasantmusic.blogspot.com/

In other water creatures news, the water creatures may possibly be appearing for the first time ever live at the mountpleasantmusic debut gig, making it a debut gig of wild proportions. You might expect something similar to this here piece from Yeasayer, except more computers, less people playing and probably no where near as good as yeasayer...