@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

perkinsy

@perkinsy@aus.social

Writer (technical writing, blogging at stumblingpast.com), digital history, owner of #OfficeKitty (see profile pic). Enjoys gardening in #Melbourne #Australia

Interests:#OzHist #DigitalHumanities #documentation #WriteTheDocs #GardeningAU #Environment and watching a bit of cricket on TV.

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perkinsy, to melbourne
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

#melbourne Beach Road is chockers with Melbournians flocking to the bay hoping to catch some #aurora action tonight. Nothing to see at the moment except for creeping fog from the south.

perkinsy, (edited ) to worms
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

Managed to do a fair bit of gardening today despite battling the start of a migraine (eventually thwarted by caffeine and rest in the afternoon). I repotted a blueberry plant that was in a way too small pot. I also repotted my $5 tubestock camellia I purchased recently.

My big success was finishing sieving my worms from their worm poo and therefore being able to retire one tray of my worm farm. It has taken me many hours over a few weekends to accomplish this because it is the first time I have done it and I didn't know what I was doing. Eventually with advice from @treevan and @earthmothering9 I got it and this morning I was much more efficient. This is what social media is so good for - sharing skills and experience as well as encouraging others.

So I cleaned up a worm tray and felt good!
<- newly learned word for me :-)

perkinsy, (edited )
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

I used the worm poo slurry for our street garden. After a harsh summer I have been giving it some loving care. Despite the perargoniums being stunted while they held on for dear life during the period of no rain and high temperatures I pruned them a bit yesterday to encourage new growth.

I have grown the pelargonium (geranium) pictured below on the left from a cutting I took from a street planting in North Fitzroy. Those pelargoniums needed cutting to invigorate them and make them bushy. The cutting had thrived in a pot so I planted it out yesterday.

The pelargonium on the right is a slower growing variety grown from a cutting from my mother's garden. I have put it in a more sheltered position in the street garden as it is a slow grower and seems to be a bit more delicate.

While I was tending the street garden this afternoon a neighbour I have not met before stopped and said he likes seeing me take care of the garden so often. That makes me happy because that is the point of the garden. In an area covered with signs of addiction, rubbish and grafitti of the tagging variety, I want this small patch to uplift passers by and awaken in them the thought that it is possible to make things better here.

perkinsy, to melbourne
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

Sitting on the couch after spending a couple of hours sieving worm poo to extricate bits of plastic from the shredded material I added, and to extricate worms (some tiny) and worm cocoons. I then poured the worm poo slurry onto the garden.
#GardeningAU #Melbourne

perkinsy, to random
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

Australian children are missing out on learning music at school and out of school. Parents are cutting back as cost of living rises.

Learning to play music as a child is so important for people's well-being and enriches society.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-05-11/families-cutting-back-music-cost-of-living/103823896

perkinsy, to melbourne
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

This morning our gardening group gave away a lot of cuttings to a family nearby. We had been nurturing the plants over summer. We also gave away plants that my mother no longer wants.

Gardening can be an incredibly cheap hobby if you know a bit about plants. Many gardeners have piles of black plastic pots they no longer want and some plants like pelargoniums (geraniums) are easy to grow from cuttings. I pick up cheap potting soil from a supermarket as the easy to grow plants don't really care about what they grow in.

perkinsy, (edited )
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

@melanie Gardening requires a lot of hope doesn't it?

I am nursing a rhododendron cutting that is probably 5 years old. It only grows during autumn. This year it has grown a couple of tiny shoots at the base (if you expand the photo you can just see them). I am looking forward to the year it flowers. It is a cutting from my mother's garden and has beautiful orange flowers (see the right-hand photo). It is a Vireya Rhodedendron 'Simbu Sunset'.

perkinsy, to australia
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

A man who was born in Australia, who has never left Australia and has Australian parents, unknowingly lost his Australian citizenship over 20 years ago because he applied for an Irish passport as he had Irish grandparents.

The government needs to change this law retrospectively as this could mean hundreds of thousands of Australians have unknowingly lost their citizenship.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-05-10/australian-citizenship-lost-due-to-section-17-law-repealed-2002/103829242

perkinsy, to random
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

Extraordinary error by Google Cloud causes major Australian superannuation to go offline: “Google Cloud CEO, Thomas Kurian has confirmed that the disruption arose from an unprecedented sequence of events whereby an inadvertent misconfiguration during provisioning of UniSuper’s Private Cloud services ultimately resulted in the deletion of UniSuper’s Private Cloud subscription,”

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/article/2024/may/09/unisuper-google-cloud-issue-account-access

timrichards, to random
@timrichards@aus.social avatar

Oh god my flight's been delayed. In my experience, the more tired and desperate you are to get home, the higher the likelihood of your flight being delayed. [sigh]

perkinsy,
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

@timrichards I learned the hard way, never get an evening flight out of Brisbane in February. For a few years I would only work up there in February and get caught at the airport with flight delays caused by their afternoon/evening storms.

perkinsy, to random
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

Unfortunately perpetrators of domestic violence appear to be 'good blokes' to their mates and others who know them.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-05-07/afl-violence-against-women-stance-tarryn-thomas-brad-scott/103811342

perkinsy, to melbourne
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

Day 3 of my quest to separate the worms from their castings and retire one bin of our worm farm. I have been following helpful advice from @treevan and @earthmothering9. This morning I bought a cheap sieve and have been pouring rain water through the castings to separate the worms and put them in the other tray.

To my annoyance I found that there was a bit of shredded plastic amongst the shredded paper we had been feeding the worms. I have been painstakingly fishing the plastic out as well as the worms.

I will get there! I am being slow and nitpicking doing this but that is my nature and it is better to get those personal qualities out on the weekend and in solitude rather than annoy people at work with them.

perkinsy, (edited )
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

Back aching from bending over patiently sieving worm casts for bits of plastic, worms and worm cocoons. I am in the back yard having a cuppa amongst my pot plants.

In our small inner-urban back garden I don't have enough sunlight or garden bed space to plant all the plants I would like, so I have a collection of pots that I move around to catch the sun or avoid the sun, depending on the time of year.

I am also growing cuttings for our street gardening group. Our group met this morning and consulted on what we have coming up. We are hoping to give away the cuttings we nurtured over summer to residents living nearby. I have also picked up some plants my mother doesn't want, but I don't want them either, like the frilly pink camellia in this picture (grown from a $5 tubestock purchased about 5 years ago). I might see if I can find a new home for those plants too.

One of the members of our group has taken to naming his cuttings. He might find it a bit hard to give away 'Herby' so I suggested he keep it.

perkinsy,
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

The light failed so I finished the weekend's gardening work. I managed to repot and divide 3 gazania pots. I watered the lemon and lime trees as well as the gazanias with the worm castings that I had filtered through a sieve with rain water.

Last week I planted a geranium (pelargonium) which grows a couple of feet next to the garage. In front of that I planted a jasmine plant I grew from a cuttingnso that it can grow up the fence. Then on the street I planted a 'Big red' geranium that has a small bushy growth habit. Today on the other side of the garage I mirrored the planting of the previous week.

You can see the stump of a tree on the left. The builder planted a Cyprus on each side of the garage which predictably became nuisances in such small spots, so close to the building. The previous owner had them cut down but when we moved in a couple of years ago, they were sprouting. We poisoned them and waited. They have not sprouted for about a year and the wood is rotting, so now I am planting some more suitable plants.

This is the right side of the drive which mirrors the left side of the previous photo. Growing in front of the red bricks of the garage is a geranium. There is a jasmine plant in front of it but it is rather difficult to see it amongst the large, brown autumn leaves on the ground. Rather hidden by the leaves in the foreground is the stump of a tree.

gordonkerry, to random
@gordonkerry@mastodon.world avatar

Another bushfire

perkinsy,
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

@gordonkerry at this time of the year?

siftinsand, to random

Yeah it's time, my linguistic skills would be invaluable in the peloton if only I could bend my legs

perkinsy,
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

@siftinsand We are watching too. I watch these things as a virtual tourist, the views are stunning, the cycling adds a nice story line

perkinsy, to melbourne
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

My mother's garden in full autumnal colour: this morning I divided more clivias and planted the extra plants in the communal garden that lines a long path. I also pruned some Ivy geraniums and placed cuttings in the communal garden.

The body corporate does not have much of a gardening budget so we we are filling the big empty gaps beneath trees with plants that Mum can't fit in her garden. I follow the 'don't seek permission' principle but we both understand that if they don't like them then they can feel free to remove them.

After the working bee in Mum's garden last weekend there are fewer potted plants and the camellia in the foreground on the left (dark green leaves) is free of the jasmine that was covering the top of it.

perkinsy,
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

I finished the day with working on the worm farm. I am fairly new at worm farming. This is the first time I have emptied a bin. The worms love their castings. Over the last couple of weeks I have been fishing out worms from the castings and putting them in the current tray we are using.

The photo shows me dealing with the last lot of castings. I have created little piles. The idea is tha the worms in each pile migrate to the bottom. I then scoop off the top and find the remaining worms left at the bottom which I can then add back to the current tray.

perkinsy,
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

@earthmothering9 What a wonderful idea! I will try that. If you know that woman, please thank her for me.

chestas, to Tasmania
@chestas@aus.social avatar

We were doing a bit of gardening out the front of our house when we heard and saw some Yellow Tailed Black Cockatoos in trees across the road. My wife went to check them out and took this photo of one flying away, with our house behind.

perkinsy,
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

@chestas great photo!

perkinsy, to random
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

An indulgence for fans - ranking the top 20 Doctors:

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/article/2024/may/03/the-greatest-doctor-who-ranked

perkinsy, to random
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

How machine learning and other advanced technologies are transforming the reading of previously unread ancient texts.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/article/2024/may/03/how-scholars-armed-with-cutting-edge-technology-are-unfurling-secrets-of-ancient-scrolls

perkinsy, to environment
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

"A Sumatran orangutan has become the first wild animal seen self-medicating with a plant to heal a wound."

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-05-03/orangutan-uses-plant-for-medicine/103799228

perkinsy, to iPhone
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

IPhone users: it is not you. It appears that there is a problem with the iPhone alarm causing it to not make a sound when it goes off.

My daughter is standing outside waiting for an urgent Uber because she woke up late for work for the second time this week. She was feeling bad about herself sleeping through her alarm, but then I saw this article.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0kl4glp547o

perkinsy,
@perkinsy@aus.social avatar

@mativity I suspect that the problem will be with newer models or operating systems. Sometimes it is good to be behind

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