A story about balloons has been brewing for quite a while. I’ve been promising myself to write something ever since I wrote the story about foiletti and my slightly more ranty but factual post about foiletti and balloons, and there have been various times when I’ve said to myself that I’ve got enough photos of Read More…
Waste Stories Blog
Back from a Waste Stories journey
We’ve been a bit quiet recently, partly because we’ve been expressing some of our waste stories energies through our daughter site, Future Archaeologies of Waste, and particularly through our work with the Solway Firth Partnership and the Scottish Islands Federation Marine Litter Working Group on Future Archaeologies of Marine Litter. In that project, we tok Read More…
Many a True Word is Spoken in Jest
contributed by George Robertson Anna has previously posted a story telling of our early encounters with disposable vapes. One fine day, walking along a very rural road in Dumfries and Galloway, we found a partly squashed mettle tube with some wires hanging out of the end, and the remains of some kind of wadding. What Read More…
Mermaids’ Tears
George and I have been going to a lot of coastal areas recently, for Waste Stories and for the Waste Stories daughter project, Future Archaeologies of Marine Litter. The litter that washes up on our shores is incredibly varied, depending on the local currents, windes, topography and geography. In some places, such as Mullock Bay Read More…
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 Braeside tar pit
This story was created as part of our work with the Royal Highland Education Trust. It is a continuation of our Future Archaelogies theme. It is inspired by the enormous number of old tyres there are, stashed in various places throughout the country. It has a strong link to farming and the land, and is 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…
Rubbish reflections
On the Thursday 18th August 2022, refuse collection workers in Edinburgh started strike action as negotiations over pay and conditions failed. They were joined by their colleagues in other Scottish local authorities at various points over the next few days, including Glasgow (where strike action began on Wednesday 24th). The Edinburgh strike in particular gained Read More…
Small hands, close to the ground
The story below reflects the way in which two projects I’m currently working on – Waste Stories and a project called Water and Fire – have begun to combine in my mind. Water and Fire is a collaboration between the Universities of Stirling and Glasgow in the UK with the Universities of Cape Town and Read More…
“Vorsprung durch Technik”
I found the detonator at the side of the road to Sandhead, on the Rhinns of Galloway. It had been run over, possibly by one of the big, heavy trucks transporting grass to the farms for silage, but its wires were still attached and some of the inner wadding material was poking out of one Read More…
