NEW UPDATES POSTED BELOW:
I was link surfing today over at Dellers, and I found myself looking at the long list of bios for the 1010 team on their website. I noted something curious in the bio posted on Splattergate’s designer Franny Armstrong, because it was rather off the wall. She listed a “guilty pleasure”. Well no harm, we all have those, but at the same time she says her Actual job: “Asking powerful people for money and/or emissions cuts“.
The “emissions cuts” part I get. But wait a minute…not in season blueberries? Hmmm.
Now I don’t know much about growing blueberries, but I did find this on a BBC gardening site:
Blueberries produce fruit on branches that were produced the previous year. For the first two or three years of a blueberry’s life it’s not necessary to prune it much, apart from keeping the plant tidy. After this, blueberries need regular pruning to maintain plant vigour and high quality berry production. Prune them between November and March when the plant is dormant.
They need cold weather apparently:
“These bushes are hardy and require a minimum of 750 hours accumulated chilling time below 8 degrees centigrade in order to produce good yields of berries, so please do not put them into your greeenhouse over the winter.”
OK, so you can’t grow them “off season” in a local greenhouse. That means UK “off season” blueberries have to come someplace where the “off season” is opposite, like another hemisphere.
Looking more into blueberries, I find this from a Latin American Markets site on Chilean blueberry production:
While the US is the main importer of Chilean blueberries, Europe, and in particular the UK, are also strong markets.
“We’ve seen an explosion in UK blueberry consumption over the past two to three years,” says Hortifrut’s Francisco Ortuzar. “Unlike some other parts of Europe, the market is familiar with blueberries and category managers have done a good job of promoting the fruit.”
Huh, imagine that. Demand for blueberries in the UK is ummm ‘exploding’. Given what I know, I would imagine the demand would increase in the “off season” when no local blueberries can be harvested.
I wonder how they get there? Oh, here we go:
Tesco blueberries are harvested in Argentina and are flown to the UK for sale.
So I think it would be safe to assume that Franny is eating off season blueberries, flown in from Chile or Argentina using the speedy but horrible CO2 belching airplanes to preserve freshness.
Yet WE are the ones that have to reduce our consumption of things like “guilty pleasures”. Ya know, modern, guilty, dirty things like air travel, cars, and incandescent lights (though I do like the new LED replacements), to keep the planet from “burning up” due to CO2 emissions. And if we don’t, or give an indifferent shrug like those school kids in her movie…we get the red button.
She also mentions in her bio:
“Not flying to America or Australia to launch my climate movie”
…yet Franny can have her off season jet set blueberries. No pressure to eliminate that. I guess Franny never stopped to think how “not in season blueberries” get to her local shop.
Now that’s just plane stupid.
UPDATE: 8:05 PM PST 10/7/10 I was informed by email of some silliness. For the record, somebody who obviously didn’t like this story has signed up my name as a “supporter” at the 10:10 website, here: http://www.1010global.org/uk/people along with Christopher Monckton, and James Dellingpole. This is of course false, and the product of a simple minded prank. I don’t know what this stupidity will do for them, especially since it is obvious none of us would sign up to 10:10. Here’s the screen cap:
UPDATE2: 11:40PM PST 10/7/10
It appears the application of names is being handled by a static list superimposed at the website. The people counter continues to rise, but the list does not change. Here’s a screencap from 11:38PM of the “people” page at http://www.1010global.org/uk/people
If you visit the other pages on the website, you’ll find that static list with my name on it, along with Monckton and Delingpole, superimposed on it, even though the counter has advanced from 94,885 to 94,910 signups, a total of 25 names, more than enough to move the list down.
But it appears the “legal” page here: http://www.1010global.org/legal has what appears to be a correctly updated list:
How fun! Let’s watch the amusement unfold.
D Caldwell says:
October 7, 2010 at 4:06 pm
Typical for a “climate campaigner” to be clueless about her own direct and indirect CO2 footprint.
A well-to-do friend of mine has fully bought in to climate alarmism and is pressing me for silly measures at work to reduce our energy usage. Since she and her husband travel a lot in their private jet, I indicated that when she stops traveling, I will get to work on my office energy saving program. Her reply? “My travel has nothing to do with this.”
Where do you even start with these people?
Well you are definately for the Big Red Botton 😉
10/10/10 is coming and I have plans.
My solar panels are charging the lawn tractor batteries today and I’ll use it to put wood in the basement for the winter. I won’t need any oil this winter.
The wind has been driving my turbine and I’ll use some of the free power to celibrate 10/10/10.
I won’t drive anywhere, but I only use a vehicle a few times a month anyway.
I might do a laundry in cold water and hang it out on the line.
Night falls early in Canada, so I’ll use my cfc and led bulbs to read.
In other words I’ll celibrate 10/10/10 by living the good life without the silly squandering of resources so prevalent .
Osama Bin Laden has signed up now – I think that gives us a feel for the quality of the 94K + concerned people.
The bios of all of th e10:10 staff suggests people who want to appear cool but don’t want to buy into their own ideas too far – I think that hypocrite is the word.
On the positive side – they all surely have a great future if they choose to go into politics!
Cassandra King@3:26,
Franny is not inventing anything, she really believes the numbers are real. Analysed rather nicely here:
http://www.climate-resistance.org/2009/06/the-age-of-the-age-of-stupid.html
I’ve noticed frequently on this blog that posters slip-in comments like “I don’t fly” or “My electricity usage is already low”, or “I eat canned vegetables in the winter” etc. I myself have a very low carbon footprint. I carpool every day, never use gasoline powered equipment to tend to my yard, burn wood for heat in the winter, and have a very low electric bill. I also try to eat local produce and rarely eat things out of season. I can my own jellies and vegetables I raise in my garden, I raise my own eggs, and make maple syrup in the spring. I also don’t believe in CAGW at all!!!! I don’t have a low carbon footprint because I think I’m saving the planet. I do it because I like saving money.
With other people’s comments here that lead me to believe they also probably have a low carbon footprint and also don’t believe in CAGW, I would like to somehow make a comparison. How can we compare the average carbon footprint of our most staunch skeptics against the carbon footprint of our most staunch Greenies? Or maybe compare the average skeptic to the average Greenie. I’ll bet the skeptics have an overall lower carbon footprint than the Greenies. And this is what fundamentally irks us about being lectured-to about reducing our carbon footprint. I guarantee my carbon footprint is a fraction of AlGore and probably these 10:10 folks as well.
This also makes sense in the context of psychological “projection” mentioned somewhere above. People hate in others that which they hate most in themselves. The Greenies know deep down inside they are ruining the planet (according to their CAGW philosophy). They also don’t want to really change their lifestyle. This causes psychological conflict. To create an offset for themselves, they threaten others to live the lifestyle they think they themselves should be living, thus displacing their own guilt.
I have no guilt about my lifestyle. I also don’t preach to others that they should live like me. My neighbors drive Hummers and keep their 6000 sqft homes at 90F all winter by burning oil. Their heating oil bill is $1200 per month. Mine is $400 per year. But this doesn’t bother me at all. I don’t see their lifestyle as ruining the planet. Live and let live.
Osama bin Laden has now joined 10:10 and is on the list, and Adolf has made a return but is waiting to join the list. No validation of any sort, muppets !!!
The biggest ‘blooper’ in this bio is the statement:
“asking rich people for money/ and or emission cuts”
In other words, the business of cutting emissions is incidental – just give us the money to assuage your guilt.
They used to call these ‘indulgencies’.
When first scanning the post I had a mental image of the scene from the movie “The Caine Mutiny” where Humphrey Bogart as the captain was being cross examined about the mutiny.
His classic line was “It was the strawberries . . .”
I now see old Franny at her desk saying “It was the blueberries . . .”
Chuckle, woooo wheeee
John
Trying to pick on her for a very human like for blueberries is just petty. She’s human, has a sense of humour and self-deprecation – good for her! Really, I was disappointed to see this article on WUWT.
The job description “asking rich people for money/ and or emission cuts” – now that would have been something to fuss about. It is the real indicator of the self-serving greenie attitude: “Buy your indulgences here. A coin in the coffer rings, a soul from purgatory springs.”
Well for 10:10, I’d like to cut down a few hectares of Indonesian rainforest to grow palm for biofuel.
I’d be forced to kill a few orang-utans of course as they keep eating the palms but that’s an acceptable trade-off to save the planet
Has another Foamy moment.
DaveE
John Whitman says:
October 8, 2010 at 5:08 am
When first scanning the post I had a mental image of the scene from the movie “The Caine Mutiny” where Humphrey Bogart as the captain was being cross examined about the mutiny.
His classic line was “It was the strawberries . . .”
I now see old Franny at her desk saying “It was the blueberries . . .”
———————————————————————————
That’s excellent!!!
Oh, forgot to mention.
At 13:23 UK time, Lord Christopher Monckton was still on the joiners list 😉
DaveE.
So essentially until Franny’s, overly gas guzzling delivery, of off-season blue berries stop coming due to horrible petrifying godly terrifying death by a sizzling scorching 9 degrees centigrade of extremely warm weather we don’t really need to worry.
The blue berries are our canaries.
Here in Oxford , Nova Scotia, Canada they grow a lot of blueberries. In fact a wild blueberry plain surrounds 3 sides of our house. The berries are processed at Oxford Frozen Foods who operate a large freezing plant.
Prices fell this year because much of last years production has not been sold. High bush ( not wild but plantable) blueberries have been cultivated in Europe and are producing enough to cut into Nova Scotia’s market.
Maybe the blueberries in question are European, frozen ( the freeze well) for the off season. They could have a smaller carbon footprint than North or South American berries.
Hard to believe that a web search would mention only S. America.
Anyone wondering about the Foamy moment
Or if the link doesn’t make it past moderation…
search for Foamy the squirrel going green on YouTube.
DaveE
” John McManua says:
October 8, 2010 at 4:45 am
10/10/10 is coming and I have plans.
My solar panels are charging the lawn tractor batteries today and I’ll use it to put wood in the basement for the winter. I won’t need any oil this winter.”
Very commendable John.
Tell me – where do you get a battery powered lawn tractor that cuts wood?
I’ve got a big garden and I buy lot of power kit for it – but I’ve never heard of such a machine.
Are you sure you aren’t making this up?
I think it’s time to cut the overt Franny-bashing and go subversive. Everybody’s got the first-order message by now, and as someone said, the thing these people fear most is silence. Time, then, to go second-order. How about a sceptics’ lapel button – just red, no text – cheap, post-modern, -ish. Anyone out there in the novelty game?
Well, you see, it’s ok because she confesses this as a ‘guilty secret.’ As long as you confess the sin you will be absolved. You can see the similarities to the Catholic Church.
It’s interesting to speculate the phrase ‘give you the red button,’ will eventually replace ‘giving the finger.’ The updated version of that scene in Matrix when Mr Anderson is hauled before agent Smith, might read:
Mr Anderson: “How about I give you the red button and you give me my phone call!”
What….??? That’s ridiculous.
People wonder about the psychology of all this. I wonder if it has something to do with the notion that the world is getting more populated, not just with people but with more educated people, there will be more competition, and those who currently feel are higher up want to retain their status by convincing the rest, particularly the 2nd world, to downshift their lifestyle, you know, for the planet.
Doesn’t the future just belong to whichever nation innovates the next great technical advance, creating real wealth? Will it be bioengineers in Malaysia, perhaps? Or China developing Africa, maybe?
My private jet has nothing to do with it…. “it” being the masses of new consumers and powerhouses of tomorrow… perhaps?
One of the best ways to encourage wild blueberries to grow is to burn off a marshy or swampy area or some “scrub” forest. This technique was widely used in the pioneers days and continues to be used in some parts of Canada. Sadly, it has become increasingly difficult to obtain these permits due to the “Bambi Factor”.
One factor that will please Blueberry lovers is that as the the world gets warmer due to Climate Disruption, Global Warming and Massive CO2 injection… The number of “unnatural” forest fires is increasing — this of course opens up new areas for growing blueberries — which increases the pleasure and numbers of 101:10 supporters — clearly!
I intend to write a scholarly paper showing that a decrease in the numbers of blueberry lovers would increase global cooling. For this purpose we will use “BlueButtons (C) — takers anyone?
…or maybe we should encourage the lightening and just enjoy the blueberries.
…yet Franny can have her off season jet set blueberries. No pressure to eliminate that. I guess Franny never stopped to think how “not in season blueberries” get to her local shop.
No surprise that she is a shallow, mindless hypocrite. Pretty much like every other eco-fascist.
Foxgoose says:
October 8, 2010 at 6:12 am
” John McManua says:
October 8, 2010 at 4:45 am
10/10/10 is coming and I have plans.
My solar panels are charging the lawn tractor batteries today and I’ll use it to put wood in the basement for the winter. I won’t need any oil this winter.”
Very commendable John.
Tell me – where do you get a battery powered lawn tractor that cuts wood?
I’ve got a big garden and I buy lot of power kit for it – but I’ve never heard of such a machine.
Are you sure you aren’t making this up?
I read this as he already has the wood cut but needs to move it using a trailer attached to his lawn tractor.
Delingpole joins in:
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/author/jamesdelingpole/
I can recommend canned blueberry. Saves a lot of air miles. Available year-round.
Oh, BTW, keep one or two of your carbon-wasting ways til the 10:10 commando knocks at your door. They will ask you to reduce your consumption by 10% (or else…) so you better make sure you have some slack you can drop…