Adrian Hollister

Gave the Disco 300TDI a service today. This is the first service since rebuilding the engine and by the thick and lumpy oil coming out I should have done it earlier. Decided to use just cheapo 15/40W engine oil (value branded) and see how it goes. Sump plug was a little tight, but other than that everything went ok. Because I run on old veggie oil I change the fuel filter at every service (and even in between services) and it was a good job too - quite a few bits in there caused by my less that perfect filtering techniques on the waste veggie oil plus I ran out a few weeks back pulling loadsa crud down the line and into the filter. Finished off with a good spray round of light oil to arrest some of the rust and a cetane booster in the fuel tank for a bit more go. Seemed much quieter on the journey home from the field. Next items are the gearbox/transfer box oil levels, FTC2203 in the gearbox yolk and all round greasing.

Had a great walk to Wayland Smithy today with the dogs and family. It's such a great walk from the White Horse hill especially on such a nice dry afternoon. Wind is a bit chilly though. You can find more about Wayland Smithy from Wikipedia or from the National Trust site. Don't forget if your a National Trust member your parking is free.

My youngest seems to have had a reaction to the MMR - covered from head to toe in what look like measles or perhaps allergy spots and bright red cheeks. Decided to call NHS direct this morning, who answered very promptly, but they didn't seem too interested - suggesting that it was likely to be an allergic reaction to the MRR jab. Given the side effects reported to the jab and the whole host of other things it could be I would have hoped for a more comprehensive check. We were not asked for example to check the spots with a glass etc. So it's off to the pharmacist as recommended by NHS direct to see what they recommend to reduce the allergic reaction. I hope this advise is good and appropriate.



If you need to contact NHS Direct you can find their web site here. Other good resources include the BBC (for example measles and allergy).

"I had the great privilege to send my daughter to the Buzzin Brass workshop at Trinity School in Newbury on Saturday 6th March. Run by Berkshire Maestros the kids played five new arrangements starting increasing in complexity, played a few games, sang a few songs and won a few prizes for answering questions correctly. All of the teachers demonstrated new instruments and their obvious skills both with the kids and with the instruments they were playing. At the end of the event there was a concert from all of the kids to the parents which was a resounding success. Please pass on my many thanks for the event and I strongly recommend that anyone interested in music for their kids should get in contact with the Berkshire Maestros on 0118 9012370 or email johnwatts@berkshiremaestros.org.uk.

Adrian Hollister
Green Party Parliamentary Candidate for West Berkshire"

Also see the Berkshire Maestros web site.

The great thing about having your own land with barns is that you have a lot of flexibility - at least in terms of what you can do and what you can store. This year we were able to secure a large number of bags of kindling and general firewood from off-cuts and general wood waste. So up I trundle with a landy full of bags of wood and logs and I safely stored them in the driest part of the barn for safe keeping. I brought back the last two bags a couple of weeks ago now and busily set about using the wood in the fire - which has been an especially good boost over this cold winter. Anyway, most of the way through the second bag I noticed the dogs going bonkers at the bag. The usual alarm bells went off in my head thinking it was rats or similar (something the dogs especially love to chase when we walk the field boundaries), so I dropped the bag and let the dogs loose. After a few minutes of the dogs sniffing like a loss-less vacuum cleaner should they came up with nothing apart from a lot of old leaves, a few seeds and what turns out to be a very large mouse nest.

This normally wouldn't be a problem, but the bags were stored in my outbuilding and there were no sign of the mice. So I did perhaps not the most humane thing and left the dogs to stuff around the whole of the outbuilding looking for other signs of life, but they were not interested in anything but their large bag of dog food (no surprises there). So thinking that this was an old nest I cleared everything up and didn't think any more about it.

In hindsight this may have not been the best tactic. Last week whilst moving the filing cabinet I noticed a trail of little bits of paper underneath the filing cabinet. It's not one we use often and generally stores our serious 'to keep but no need to look at' type documentation. So with a slight opening of the top draw of the cabinet it was clear that all was not well with my files. Only a super enthusiastic shredder would have done a better job on them. They were just piles of paper dust. But alas no sign of mice.

With my finest Shelock Holmes hat, pipe and super large magnifying glass I followed the shredded paper trail to find my first nest. I say my first as that day I found three others the last of which the dogs firmly pointed out were in my tool box. It's a plastic thing, industrial enough to stand on and no obvious holes in them (I have a few of them). Anyway, the dogs were going mad telling me that the tool box was 'hot' - actually one dog (the boy dog) was insistent that I should look at the big bag of dog food - daft thing.

With tool box in hand I took it outside and gave it a thorough examination. In one corner there was a small hole with neatly nibbled edges. Out of that hole was a small nose and whiskers. I'm not sure who was more shocked: me the mouse or the dog. Anyway the mouse got a away and the daft dog just sat there looking at me as though it was my fault. The inside of the tool box was a mess - smelly old mouse nest with bits of paper, bag and anything else the mouse could gnaw away at in there.

Feeling slightly more confident I went back in the outbuilding with the dogs and let them loose again. No surprises that the boy dog went straight for the big bad of dog food again. I know he's a little (well ok a lot) motivated by food, but this was a little unusual for him so I went over to the bag to look it over. It's in a clear plastic bag so I could see through into the brown contents. Sure enough in one corner was a little hole and yet another mouse nest. I shouldn't have chastised the poor dog so much but to be fair he did find a nest so I gave him a treat.

After a good sweep out and a clean of every cupboard, work surface and nest area I felt quite confident that they were now all gone. At least I felt confident until yesterday when I opened one of my tool cupboards to find a ruddy huge nest on the top shelf. How the bleeding heck the things managed to get into a closed cupboard I've no idea, but get in there they did. Electrical wire, some tools, gloves and anything non metal has had a bite or two. So another round of cleaning has begun and tomorrow I'm off to find some mouse traps. Humane ones if I can find them, if not it back to the basics and off with their nibbly little heads.

What a great village hall in Speen. We had a small jumble sale today to raise funds for the Green Party - made a nice amount of money and met some really great people too. So from Adrian Hollister: Thanks to all those that donated items for the jumble sale, those that can along to help and those that turned up. Hope to do another one in a month or so and see you all again!

As Tory policy starts to fall apart under scrutiny it's looking more and more like a hung parliament. It's easy to see why people are questioning the Conservative policies who's headlines seem to be to make the top 2% much richer and the rest of us have to pay the countries debt off. Not a great set of policies by any stretch of the imagination. I also can't help thinking if the latest Gordon personality bashing has been inspired by Tory spin doctors - doesn't sound like something New Labour would actually release at this time - their spin machine is just far too professional; but the reports of concessions the Conservatives have offered the Murdock news empire may explain their entry into print.

So now we just wait for the official release of an election date and see how things pan out. Adrian Hollister said "Let's hope it's possible to change the political system during the next parliament - from confrontational to co-operative; from unfair voting systems to a fair one."

The darn glass has cracked in my Charnwood multifuel stove. It started with a little crack and soon developed to a full blown glass falling out of the door sized crack. This is a right pain as the old screws holding the fixing plates in place are just stubs of their former glory. So I've let the stove go out and cool right down. Taken all the glass out and have had to drill the four screws out and re-tap them. Only managed to do two of them today, but that's enough to get the new glass back in with one of the two screws in each of the glazing bars. It's a good enough hold for the moment and I'll have to work out how to safely drill the other two without breaking the cast iron doors.

Interesting though the price of new glass: the two local fireplace shops in and around Newbury stock glass at over £96 for just one door; Charnwood themselves are cheaper even including delivery; but I ended up searching the web and got the glass and the gasket for £20. It's a wonder these local shops get any business - if their stove prices are the same as their glass prices it won't be too long before all of their potential customers look in their showroom, get a price and then compare it to web prices.

My other gripe for today is why is the price of wood and coal 50% more in West Berkshire than in Somerset or Devon - even from the same branded shops?

How the Tories have changed. They have embraced elements Blairism and decided marketing is better than real policy; sound bites are more important that real decisions; and honesty is allowed to be embellished to sell the Tory message. A lot of the Sunday rags and online web sites have made great fun mocking the Tory need to airbrush Cameron's picture to make him look - well who knows - perhaps more human? less like a dodgy car salesman? less like an Etonian toff?

My favourite site out there has to be 'Airbrushed for change' by http://mydavidcameron.com where there are a multitudes of mockup's of the latest Tory posters. Perhaps my favourite is entitled 'This is going to hurt. Don't worry your not going to feel a thing.' or 'My chums from school and I are going to absolutely, thoroughly, bloody-well sort the country out.'

Either way it's good for a laugh at the latest tory sham sales campaign - aimed to make you all think that it's in your interest to vote tory.

What is going on in David Cameron's head? After deciding to cut services heavily to save money (whilst of course giving tax benefits to the top 3,000 estate owners etc) - he has now decided that because that sales message was not going down too well with real people he would back track and change his mind. The Tory sales campaign is just so transparently inept it yet again shows how sleezy and cheap british politics have become. It's time for a change in our electoral system and it's time to end the existing 'old boys club' and 'ya boo' politics that we are suffering from in this country. The country has grown up why can't the political system?

I like a comment left on the Guardian's web site from zinoviev: "Dave knows that you can't fool all the people all the time. He's not attempting that. He's just going to fool everyone until May."

West Berkshire Council bought a number of snow plough attachments for tractors quite some time ago. They now lie rotting in farmers yards unused. Unused because the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats in the council decided not to pay or insure farmers to clear their local roads. Walking through the villages of Chaddleworth, Britghtwalton and Lekhampstead today not one single road has been cleared - either salted or snow ploughed. Why don't the council re-instate the use of these local snow ploughs and help share out the work with our local gritters?

Adrian Hollister
Green Party Parliamentary Candidate for West Berkshire

A happy new year to everyone. I've a twitter blog going now as well, so anyone interesting in following me can find me with the following:

twitter: adrianhollister

I've been out and about walking the dogs all over the place during this cold snap and up here on Berkshire's north downs the Ridgeway and other ancient tracks offer great walks. The salting of the roads have been excellent even up here where our single track roads are often missed leaving some of our community with a much more difficult journey. There were a few notable exceptions with some roads deep in a very skiddy snow and ice combination. The locals avoided these roads and used the ones salted, but others (and I've seen some rather daft speeding delivery drivers skidding into the bank and a few of the 'beemer' set thinking they are invulnerable) have been crashing into banks, cars, walls etc.

It does seem that because of this other set of drivers that we consume so much salt. In order to attempt to stop the looney drivers from crashing we have to liberally salt every road. This consumes a lot of salt - not the most environmentally friendly product out there; a lot of our cash buying and spreading it; and diverts salt from path ways and cycle paths - where it could be better used.

With the continued cold snap and likely requirement for more and more salt to keep our roads open and free - I can't help wondering if we have enough salt stored and available to us. I also wonder if simulated cold weather and skid driving should be part of the driving test - and perhaps even a mandatory top up test for professional drivers and optional education for the rest of us (with insurance discounts?).

It's cold out there tonight. My thermometer shows -1 at 1am, so I'm guessing it's going to get colder up here throughout the night. We seem to be a bit of an odd microcosm up here on the downs in north Berkshire. Nestled around the ancient Ridgeway on high, wind swept chall hill's we seem to largely have a climate of our own. A mile down the road and you can drive off the downs and end up with completely different weather.

The grass tonight though is crunchy under foot and the roads are quite slippery. The dog's of course love the weather, bounding about and eating anything frosty, smelly or both.

It's interesting tonight as at the time of writing there is no wind up here. Something that seems quite unusual, but something that also shows what much of the country must have been like in the early 20th century - at least in terms of heating. We are mostly solid fuel up here and as you walk around the smell of coal and wood burning is heavy in the air. Without the wind blowing it away our houses and of course all of us live in this smog.

We are of course just a very small village, so the pollution we must have endured in the towns or cities must have been appalling. We have come so far from these days, but of course we have just replaced one fossil fuel (local coal and wood) with gas and oil that may have been transported half way around the world. It's true that you don't get the smell and visible smog of smoke and that the heating appliances are on the whole much more efficient; but is their net CO2 increase really that much better when transport and storage are taken into account?

I am happy that my mostly coal and about one fifth 20% wood burn on my multi-fuel stove adds about the same net new co2 as a good gas boiler. I am happy that my sources for my coal and wood are only within the UK with the wood coming no more than a few miles.

So does Adrian Hollister recommend that we all move back to wood and coal? No. But we do need to invest heavily in industry areas that support sustainable heating sources. The use of heat pumps (ground or air source); the use of biomass; and the use of community heating systems would vastly improve our co2 emissions in this country. What are we waiting for?