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The audible worlds of poetry and dirt, and Growing Out of Hunger
Online marketing… just when you thought your inbox couldn’t take any more – more and more is coming from all directions. And when it’s from the right sources it’s not unwelcome. But it’s still too much. Every new piece of mail nudges another few minutes away from something else I might choose and prefer to do. Increasingly I find the best way to manage my time is to take my laptop and hide in a library where there’s no WiFi.
Even the Poetry Book Society is doing it. And if the emails about the TS Eliot shortlist are not enough, you can go looking for more. Their Online Poetry Readings promises to bring you some excellent poetry.
As I’ve probably said before , I love love love radio. It’s great company for the multitasker. Here are a couple of shows by our own David Suzuki – episodes from his Bottom Line series – about soil. Among others, they feature the hyphenated self-described grass farmer from Virginia, Joel Salatin, who is always entertaining to listen to. Podcasts for Bottom Line Part 3 are Soil: Life in the Dirt followed by Soil: How to Feed the World.
Meanwhile, I’m gearing up to see and hear a live person next week in Vancouver. Urban agriculture giant Will Allen is going to be speaking on the topic Growing Out of Hunger.
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Poetry & Food: PEP & another winter market
We started off the year in a little anxiety. The home for Planet Earth Poetry has been sold – the Black Stilt is in transition to becoming another Moka House – but so far the poets hold sway, and the coffee still flows of a Friday.
Wendy Morton wanted to call our attention to the Solstice Poets feature – the only full page poetry feature in a Canadian newspaper – and offer thanks for its support by departing Times-Colonist editor in chief Lucinda Chodan, who is doing things a little backwards and leaving Victoria for Edmonton.
She was presented with an autographed apron…
After which there followed the open mic
and Patrick Lane introduced the main event, which was a reading by various contributors to the annual Leaf Press anthology of a group who have been meeting with him for retreats for many years.
The January winter market took place at Market Square, luckily missing much of the rain that started falling again in the afternoon.
Terra Nossa proving popular with the meat crowd again
and Sea Bluff Farm attracting a queue for the vegetables.
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Green marketing, and get it off your chest: complaints central
It’s hard being green, and don’t we all know it? Everything’s so complicated. Local or organic? Paper or biodegradable plastic? On and on.. For some perceptive insights into the advertising angles, catch while you can the Green Marketing podcast on one of CBC‘s very best radio shows: The Art of Persuasion. From Rachel Carson, to BP’s rebranding errors – well in advance of the Deepwater Horizon fiasco, to green pizza, to Marks & Spencer’s Plan A, it’s a good, pithy story well told.
And the website now offers visual content, like this fabulous ad:
Well. Once you’ve mastered your green strategy you still have to cope with the rest of life’s irritations. It seems sometimes that things go well beyond annoying. For those still looking for a new year’s resolution, might I suggest direct consumer action? It has the double benefit of being a stress reliever for the complainant, and a public education service for the industry in question.
The Consumers Association of Canada provides a most helpful list of agencies to complain to, arranged by industry, as well as tips on complaining effectively.
Those of you not happy to be test dummies for Canadian airport security geeks wanting to play with their new body scanners can vent your spleen at the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority.
The Advertising Complaints Authority is the place to go to complain about advertising by email, mail or fax.
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In her latest collection, Rhona McAdam navigates the dark places of human movement through the earth and the exquisite intricacies lingering in backyard gardens and farmlands populated by insects and pollinators, all the while returning to the body, to the tune of staccato beats and the newly discovered symmetries within the human heart.
“…A beautiful, filling collection, Larder is a set of poems to read at the change of the seasons, to appreciate alongside a good meal, and to remind yourself of the beauty in everything, even the things you may not appreciate before opening McAdam’s collection….”
Rhona McAdam is a writer, poet, editor, and Registered Holistic Nutritionist with a Master’s in Food Culture from Italy and a deep-rooted passion for ecology and urban agriculture. Her work spans corporate and technical writing to poetry and creative nonfiction, often exploring the vital links between what we eat and how we live. Based in Victoria, BC, and available via Zoom, Rhona is always open to new writing commissions, readings, or workshops on nutrition and the culinary arts.
