This month, on 9th November, six weeks after Scotland voted to remain a part of Great Britain, ‘a self-determination referendum’ was held in Catalonia. The citizen participation process on Catalonia’s political future was originally the ‘Catalan Independence Referendum’ but was rebranded as a ‘popular consultation’ after the original was suspended by the Constitutional Court of…
I found this during various researches and think it is inspiring. From Portland, Oregan https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fLXgxNSwaY8 I think this is worth reposting. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/doctors-nurses-urge-ban-on-neonic-pesticides/article21605544/ I have signed. Perhaps you would like to too? https://secure3.convio.net/lcv/site/Advocacy?page=UserAction&id=1835&s_src=CK-LCV-BEE-A03-FB-FBLP.D-FKW.OCPM-US-AN112-BO-18p-T01.P01.C02.D01 This is worth a read http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/11/25/science/clues-to-bees-history-tucked-away-in-drawers.html?smid=fb-nytimes&smtyp=cur&bicmp=AD&bicmlukp=WT.mc_id&bicmst=1409232722000&bicmet=1419773522000&_r=2&referrer
I have just returned from a brief stay in Palermo and the western coast of Sicily. Autumn at the heart of the Mediterranean can hardly be bettered. The grape harvests have been completed, the olives are soon to picked and the weather is usually absolutely splendid. I first visited Sicily in 2005. This trip kept…
This post will talk a little about my recent travels rather than promoting anything new in my work field. It is another ‘while-I-write-my-novel’ post. It has been a busy month in terms of travelling. I spent a week in Sicily – I have written about this for my 26th October post for the History Girls…
Pro-active Canadian beekeepers. Terrific. Let us hope that they win I wish them every success. http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/canadian-beekeepers-sue-bayer-syngenta-over-neonicotinoid-pesticides-1.2754441 Do bees prefer city flowers to country flowers? Those flower patches squeezed into postage stamp–sized spaces in cities do much more than add a splash of color to the urban environment. The 30,000 schoolchildren in the Big Bumblebee Discovery…
Many years ago, in a period of my life that is almost history now, while I was filming the TV series All Creatures Great and Small, I was invited to take part in a Save the Whale rally which was to be held in Trafalgar Square. It was a Sunday. A high stage had been…
I am writing this from Biarritz, a seaside town originally put on the map as a holiday resort by Napoléon III when he built his beloved Spanish wife, Eugénie de Montijo, a two-storey villa set high on a windy bluff overlooking the town’s grand plage (largest beach). The villa still stands. Now augmented to five…
Tangerines remind me of childhood Christmases. Can you recall that tangy aroma once you’d pierced the skin with your thumb, peeled it away and the juice began to spray out like an ignited sparkler? Dates were rare in my childhood home. Amber-coloured like big sad eyes, dry and sugary, they arrived in elongated oval boxes,…
Here is me getting wet!!! The Ice Bucket Challenge has gone viral and for good reason. It offers a laugh at the sight of others suffering momentarily while creating awareness for a disease that I had never heard of before, ALS The ALS researchers are looking for funding to find a drug to help combat…
July has been one of those months when, as they say, I hit the ground running. I am not sure that I have ever actually used that expression before, certainly not in connection with my own life, but it seems fitting this time. On 5th July, I arrived into Cork just before the start of…
I wrote this for the History Girls blog over two months ago. It was posted today… Planting olive trees in the West Bank : http://the-history-girls.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/the-tree-of-peace-by-carol-drinkwater.html Carol
I am in Bantry, West Cork, attending the West Cork Literary Festival where this afternoon I am In Conversation with the Irish writer, Alice Taylor, talking about gardens and the healing powers of the earth, and throughout the week I am teaching a workshop on Memoir writing. I was here for the same workshop last…
I sincerely hope this is not true. I am posting it so that any of you who reads this in the States can look into it for us all. http://www.globalresearch.ca/illinois-illegally-seizes-bees-resistant-to-monsantos-roundup-kills-remaining-queens/5336210 Friends, if you haven’t signed this, please do. https://www.rainforest-rescue.org/mailalert/953/red-alert-for-bees-support-the-eu-pesticide-ban Please can we post this on BEE page? I hope the link opens correctly https://www.facebook.com/GMOFreeUSA/photos/a.468695639837571.108816.402058139834655/778403705533428/?type=1&theater It…
On 12th June, I attended the Prix Fitzgerald award ceremony at the Hôtel Belles Rives in Juan-les-Pins. The hotel looks out over the Mediterranean and has views all along this famous stretch of French Riviera. I live inland of this smart address on a rundown olive farm and although I am no longer one for…
I am sending this from Rome where I have disappeared to for a few days to escape dogs, sheep (yes!), olive trees and all commitments other than writing. I have found myself a perfectly airy studio in the eaves of a hidden complex in one of the fabulous old ochre-toned Roman streets near the Spanish…
My goodness, we are June already. I am not sure where the time goes but we have been enjoying the splendours of early summer with its wonderful balmy evenings, drinks outside and plenty of reading in the garden after a hard day at the desk. I have two events coming up in the next month…
It is six in the morning, the birds outside my window are chattering away. Aside from their song, all is still and quiet – I am the only one awake. A few kilometres down the hill, the Cannes Film Festival is in full swing. Alas, due to my own work commitments, I have not paid…