Bells and Rings

The Christmas and New Year period bring many reminders of waste and consumption, so it’s a particularly productive time of year for Waste Stories. For example, I now have enough pictures of Christmas trees abandoned on kerbs and paths to constitute a series (rather like our series of pictures of inappropriately disposed of dog-poo bags). Read More…

The lost – and last – blueberry crop

Peter Thompson is a soft fruit farmer in Blairgowrie.  Approximately 80% of his business is in blueberry production, with the remaining 20% in cherries.  This year Peter did not harvest his blueberry crop.  Spiraling costs and cheaper imports from Peru and South Africa meant that picking the crop would cost Peter far more money than Read More…

A Feast of Souls

  Night falls. The last light fades from the sky. The white of the snow, the bright red and glossy green of the holly: all turn to grey. Inside, Julia shivers and pulls the curtains tight. Marguerite wimpers in the corner. “Shhh! You must keep quiet, especially now.  Dusk is the most dangerous time.” “But Read More…

For the love of pisgetti!

I grimaced as Noah used his sleeve to wipe the tomato sauce off of his chin for the third time. “Yummm, I love pisgetti mummy! It’s my favourite you know.” “It’s tasty, isn’t it?” I replied smiling, “try to use the cloth rather than your sleeve to clean your face though bud OK?” I’m a Read More…

The box of lost treasure

  I wasn’t working last night. Or not at first.  Perhaps not at the end.  I was on a mission to find a small pouch or bag, perhaps the kind that you might be gifted jewellery or a small trinket in, or perhaps the kind that a Tooth Fairy might carry.  I had practised my Read More…