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Journal: March, 2010
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A Walk Around the Isabella Plantation
Spring in our step
28 March 2010
After finishing the first full draft of the GRI report, and completing the latest round of five media columns, Elaine and I drove - though the Volvo needed a jump-start, having been left undriven for many moons - to the Isabella Plantation. Faint scent of skunk cabbage and occasional buzz of pollinators as we walked around. Some spawn visible, bit not much. Wondered whether the ducks eat it? This evening, I worked on the slides for the Lisbon conference on Tuesday.... more >
Improbable Green Heroes
The Somali pirates
28 March 2010
Last few days have been spent intensively writing the report for the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), which is now beginning to go out for comment. Too much time spent at the keyboard, tapping away. Tired - and my cough of the past 5-6 weeks isn't going away. But weird form of good news yesterday when the Financial Times Weekend Magazine carried a story about the Somali pirates. Their depredations have been so great that the outside world - including fishing vessels - now shy away from regional waters. Since it is said that foreign overfishing was one factor creating the piracy problem in the first place, it's interesting to read that fear has created effective 'no-take' areas. In the areas affected, fish catches have doubled.... more >
Mark's Leaving Party
One era ends, another begins
22 March 2010
Mark (Lee), Valerie (Lee), Seb (Beloe), Geoff (Lye), Sam (Lakha), Yasmin (Crowther)
Seb, Geoff, Sam, Yasmin, Alex (Hammer)
Valerie, Seb, Geoff, Sam, Yasmin, Alex, Frances (Buckingham), Amy (Birchall)
Nadine (Mendelbaum) shows Geoff a book on her childhood
After the downturn, SustainAbility gets its mojo back - Gary Kendall's thumb
Wonderful evening at SustainAbility, with mix of SA and Volans team members, to mark Mark and Valerie's move back to San Francisco. Emotional, but overall very upbeat. Afterwards, Elaine and I went off for supper with Alois Flatz, ex-Sam and now with zouk ventures, and for many years a member of SustainAbility's Faculty.... more >
Life's in the Details
A couple of still lives
21 March 2010
A couple of the images I too around the kitchen, in hope of stimulating Caroline in her current painting marathon.... more >
Another Whirlwind Week
And I thought March was going to be slower ...
21 March 2010
Eco-sentiive driving training at BASE
Washing down the Excel Centre
Statue of window-washer on my way to the Hilton, Edgeware Road
A whirlwind week, this one. But almost over the pestilential cough that has haunted me for a month, thankfully. Elaine in Edinburgh, tidying up her aunt's estate, for much of the week. Small highlights from the Barnes front: our mimosa tree is in blossom, with wonderful scent, and - a less attractive natural input - I discovered that a flock of birds, probably seagulls, had bombarded our glass-roofed kitchen during the night with the most insane quantities of liquid guano. Took quite a while to hose off. Could have done with the hosing mechanism I saw when leaving the Excel Centre in Docklands earlier in the week (see penultimate photo above).... more >
Bob Doe and Charlie Gillett
Among this month's obituaries
19 March 2010
Two among a series of obituaries that resonated powerfully this month were those for Wing Commander Bob Doe, who Tim flew with in, I think, India and Burma during WWII, and Charlie Gillett, one of the key figures in the world music movement from the late 1980s. I wrote many of the books of that period late into the night listening to Gillett on Capital Radio, in the days when you listened to the radio on the radio. In my mind he's up there alongside John Peel in terms of DJs - and alongside Chris Blackwell and Ry Cooder in terms of being an ambassador for world music.... more >
Further Adventures in Academe
Parachuting in to Imperial College, Goodenough College and LSE
11 March 2010
Yesterday and today have involved rather more swimming in academic waters than I'm used to, though all three events - at Imperial College (yesterday), and (today) Goodenough College and LSE - were surprisingly lively. The Imperial session was my annual stint there, with MSc students, and thoroughly enjoyable. The Goodenough conference saw the launch of Rebecca Harding's new report on Hidden Social Entrepreneurs. And the LSE evening event was a speech to an open audience on the links between economics and climate change. Began by admitting I had given up economics in 1968, at a point in time when it seemed to have little to do with what was going on in the streets and wider world at the time.... more >
Can Cleantech Davids Learn to Love Corporate Goliaths?
My first Fast Company blog
10 March 2010
... more >
Breakfast with Arsenal
08 March 2010
Up at some unconscionable hour to trek across London to see Arsenal Football Club, starting with breakfast with Ivan Gazidis, their Chief Executive, and Svenja Geissmar, now their General Counsel. Then a session with their Board. Found myself much more interested than I had imagined I might be. Odd to be in a boardroom and Chief Executive's office that had been moved in their wood-panelled entirety from another site - reminded me a little of the recent party in San Francisco with the house into which the owners had inserted a reasonable facsimile of a British pub. Then back to Bloomsbury Place to work on various writing projects and a couple of slide presentations, with the occasional telecon with people like Jeroo Billimoria of Aflatoun.... more >
Ocado Graveyard
A moment in the sun
07 March 2010
Elephant graveyards - and now Ocado van graveyards, apparently. Seen on our way back from Barnes bookshop - and dropping off Amelia at the video store, the film of Amelia Earhart's life that attracted highly critical reviews, but which I have to say I rather enjoyed. Hilary Swank was the spitting image. ... more >
Back to Neal's Yard
Of mandarin and frankincense
05 March 2010
Lively start to the day with a group of 15 or so MSc students in branding from University of East Anglia, brought in by Robert Jones of Wolff Olins. Later in the day, Sam kindly walked me across to SustainAbility for a Board meeting - and then came and picked me up for the walk across to Neal's Yard in Covent Garden, for a visit to the osteopath. Afterwards, Sam gave me a couple of bottles of mandarin and frankincense oils, which are meant to be delightfully relaxing and sedative. Can't wait. Then back for a telecon with SAP, which was fascinating - part of the GRI project.
This Damned Cough
03 March 2010
Dog leash hook outside Barnes chemist
One way through the orchid
A fraughtish week, with back pains - bravely tackled by a couple of osteopaths by the name of Ron - and the bronchitis I have been nursing through six flights in the past couple of weeks. Still, this morning I collected a course of antibiotics from the chemist - and was somewhat shocked to find that I don't have to pay for medicines now I am over 60. ... more >
Ageing, Entrepreneurship and Sustainability
First round-table at Accenture
03 March 2010
View from conference room
Gone fishing: painting outside the conference room
We held the first of our roundtables on ageing, entrepreneurship and sustainability at Accenture's offices this evening - and attracted an extraordinarily diverse range of participants. One of the receptionists wanted to know what the theme was, because the guest list was so out-of-the-ordinary. A great sense of momentum, though there's still work to be done on how these three great areas of interest overlap. Extraordinary feeling reflecting that all of this span out of a short conversation David Grayson I had last year while I waited for a taxi back to Milton Keynes.... more >
Looking for TIGERS ...
... we found lions
01 March 2010
We were actually looking for TIGERS: Nelmara, Maggie, Amy
Very productive day, with white-board and flipcharts, at 2 Bloomsbury Place, with Nelmara Arbex and Maggie Lee of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), working on the new report. For lunch, we ducked across to the British Museum. After a morning spent discussing TIGERS, of which more anon, all we found were endless lions, Imperial and otherwise.... more >
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