Posts Tagged ‘documentary series’
Thinking Things
I hope you don’t mind that I haven’t asked you, dear readers, for money, and I haven’t splashed advertisements all over this virtual space, either. It’s not what I do. I consider myself lucky that I can get away with that. Obviously, asking for money is a reasonable thing to do when you have no other source of funding.
These thoughts have been triggered by two things. First, the multitude of activist organizations that are bombarding my inbox with messages emphatically spelling out all the atrocities occurring in our country that need to be stopped.
“Send us $9 monthly.”
“Donate now.”
It’s hard to argue with the craftily written paragraphs that imply the money I give will stymie all the threats to our democratic freedoms unfolding over the last three months. Alas, they are undone by the repetition of requests and the absolute nothing that happens to stop the horrors piling up by the day.
The second thing that has been irking me is the massively intrusive advertisements that a certain weekly documentary series mashes into its podcast format with overdone hype. I am grateful that this person is traveling far and wide to gather stories and employing a crew of staff to record sound and video, which costs a lot of money, I’m certain, but there must be other ways to finance the project.
The current method they use is making it hard to listen to their otherwise very interesting story.
I had a very interesting –read that “chilly”– bike ride yesterday afternoon. When I finished mucking about with various small projects, I was warm, and the air temperature was almost 60°F. I figured the exercise of cycling would naturally heat me up, so I didn’t put on long sleeves.
From our wonderfully nestled property, I did not perceive much in the way of wind. I also didn’t notice that the brief clearing in the sky we had been enjoying was over, and thick clouds were blocking the warm sunshine.
I soon discovered it was closer to 50 than 60°F and felt more like 30 when creating my own wind chill effect during rapid spurts down hills.
The route I selected was a short square that ended up putting me into a stiff headwind for the last miles to our driveway at a time when my arms were already uncomfortably cold.
Checking the wind speed when I got home verified why the neighbor’s flag was stiffly blowing straight at me as I passed. My weather app indicated a steady 15mph directly out of the north. Yeah, brrr.
I’m thinking I should have worn long sleeves.
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Gardening Again
The starters have had a few weeks to sprout and grow so it is time to get the garden planted for the season. I gave Cyndie a hand turning soil and hauling compost, she has done all the rest.
There were a few hours when it wasn’t raining on Wednesday, so we did as much as possible in the time allowed.
Cyndie accomplished pretty much everything except moving the starters outside into the dirt. When we woke up yesterday morning, steady rain was falling and our drainage ditches were flowing near their maximum rate. It was too wet to do anything outside.
Of course, that doesn’t mean we don’t still need to tend to the horses and walk the dog. Manure management is barely discernible from mud management. Walking reached the difficulty where an attempt to pick up one foot might leave behind your boot if you do it wrong.
You can’t try to lift your foot straight up or the suction holds the boot. You need to roll your step, heel to toe.
Our land is as wet as ever which I didn’t anticipate would happen coming out of a winter with almost no snow. That’s not all bad when it comes to growing a garden. Plants are much happier growing in wet soil compared to parched dry dirt.
I read somewhere that the British documentary series, “Clarkson’s Farm” about Jeremy Clarkson and his farm in the Cotswolds was releasing a 3rd season this month. Last week, I discovered Cyndie and I had only watched the first season. To prep for watching the new release, we binge-watched all the episodes of the Season 2 on Prime.
Even though it is very different from the experiences Cyndie and I have had for the last 11 years in our move from suburban life to 20 acres in the country, there are enough parallels to make the events of the show feel very familiar to us.
Since we haven’t had a professional television production crew following along every moment, my narration by blog posts will have to suffice for our “reality show” presentation. In my estimation, the stories of Wintervale Ranch and Clarkson’s Diddly Squat Farm would likely appeal to a similar audience.
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Future History
Our favorite network, PBS, has offered up a gem of a new series that Cyndie and I are really appreciating. “A Brief History of the Future” hosted by renowned futurist Ari Wallach, presented me with a wonderful opportunity for reframing right from the very start.
What kind of world is presented in the majority of movies about the future? If it’s not entirely apocalyptic, it tends to be overcrowded, polluted, and generally scary. If that is the only way we envision the future, we are likely to doom ourselves to achieve it.
What kind of future world would we like to live in? That is the one we should be envisioning.
“This series challenges the dystopian framework embraced by popular culture by offering a refreshing take on the future. The docuseries asks us all: how can we become the great ancestors the future needs us to be? “A Brief History of the Future” weaves together history, science, and unexpected ideas to expand our understanding about the impact that the choices we make today will have on our tomorrows.
Each episode follows those who are working to solve our greatest challenges. The series also features valuable insights from a wide range of thinkers, scientists, developers and storytellers including French President Emmanuel Macron, U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, sailor Dame Ellen MacArthur, musician Grimes, architect Bjarke Ingels, climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe, legendary soccer player Kylian Mbappé, and more.”
Even though we are currently living in a climate crisis –admittedly the primary doom I allow to color my impressions of what humankind will be coping with from now until forever– some ideas for possible constructive solutions provide hope that a worst-case scenario is not a guaranteed outcome.
I’ve already taken steps to create the possibility of a giant maple tree someday standing as a stoic natural canopy over our 70-foot diameter labyrinth. I like to imagine what it might look like in a hundred years if the tree we transplanted to the center of the labyrinth survives to a healthy old age.
The increased diameter of the trunk will have forced some adjustments to the path and rocks at that point, I presume. By the time that begins to become an issue, it will be someone else’s challenge to address. I will be long gone. Unless the antidote to aging has been invented before I pass, that is.
Take a look at the preview below for a taste of what the episodes explore. I hope you will feel inspired…
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Warmed Winter
So, this is what it’s going to be like on a warmer planet then. January at latitude 44°47’04.1″N will offer periods of rain that will convert any snowpack previously existing into a slushy mash that resembles wet cement in many ways. It’s ugly, annoying, problematic, and just plain no fun to deal with.
For all the times I have grumbled about it being too cold or having too much snow fall all at once, I offer my apologies. The wet slop that has become our current reality is what I really mean to be grumbling about. I am NOT looking forward to the possibility of 5-8″ of heavy, wet snow falling on top of the existing mess tonight and tomorrow, which is what the current National Weather Service “weather watch” alert is threatening.
In protest of the lousy “winter” conditions outside yesterday, I decided to spend the afternoon indoors on a frivolous pursuit that celebrates the freedom of retirement by binging a docu-series in the middle of a weekday afternoon.
Cyndie and I finally started watching “Welcome to Wrexham” and have quickly learned more about the country of Wales than I’ve ever known before. Despite this show being a confusing echo to the fictional series, “Ted Lasso,” which we enjoy so much, we are finding it fascinating in a different way because it is a real story.
There are many fans represented thus far in the series who describe how much the football club means to them and to the surrounding community as a whole. Descriptions of being born into a world immersed in the Wrexham football club trigger my memories of the influence on my early life of my parent’s passion for the NFL Minnesota Vikings football team.
The Vikings just lost a game that knocked them out of this season’s playoffs (like so many times before) and local media is already going on about what needs to happen over the off-season to bring success next year. I can’t imagine what it would be like if I, as a fan, had to face the stress of possible relegation out of the NFL if the team finished at the bottom of the standings.
Watching the quality of the documentary “Welcome to Wrexham” has me feeling swiftly connected to the fans, players, and club staff presented on screen. I feel invested in their concerns, making it hard to interrupt the binge-watching for our own lives.
One reason that is quite all right with me is: It had me forgetting about the rotten weather outside for a few hours in the afternoon.
I hope the warming planet is providing Wrexham with pleasant weather for watching football matches at the world’s oldest international football stadium, The Racecourse Ground.
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Relative Something 