Silver Birch

@JimBethell @ShippersUnbound The Dahlgren-Whitehead Rainbow (1991) 1991!!!

This is worth thinking about. Israel was asking Qatar to pay Hamas only a month before Oct 7. Hmmmm.

Israel has destroyed the final bridge to Southern Lebanon. There is now no way for millions of displaced people to reach their homes. There is no means for essential aid and supplies to reach those who were unable to flee. Another mammoth war crime, another act of barbarity.

@TXFreebird @SamaHoole @naomirwolf I have an alpaca wool coat which I've had for 29 years. It was bought in a sale for £200. Still going strong and nice and cosy in winter. I appreciate your point though. Initial outlay is beyond many purses. My coat was a present. I do try to buy ethically and look after things.

@suerobin46 @SamaHoole @naomirwolf This was a “tongue in cheek response”. Yes I understand ☝🏼. I still cannot afford more that one cashmere item of clothing - if that.

Let's check in on Eduardo, who is failing to be petroleum. Eduardo is a Huacaya alpaca in the Brecon Beacons. His fleece this year measured 22 microns. For reference, cashmere is typically 14 to 19 microns and is priced accordingly. Eduardo's fleece is finer than most commercial wool, warmer at equivalent weight, and does not require the lanolin scouring that sheep's wool needs before processing. Eduardo produced it by grazing a Welsh hillside on rainfall and rough upland vegetation. The fleece is removed once a year. Eduardo stands with the specific patience of an animal that has done this before and found it resolves pleasantly. The fibre goes to a mill. The mill produces yarn. The yarn becomes a garment that will last twenty years with basic care. The polyester fleece currently in approximately 60 percent of outdoor and casual garments sold in the UK: Crude oil is extracted from geological storage where it has been for roughly 300 million years. It is transported to a cracking facility. The naphtha fraction is polymerised into polyethylene terephthalate at high temperature and pressure. The PET is extruded into filament, texturised, knitted or woven, dyed in a water-intensive process using synthetic dyes, then shipped, typically from East Asia, to a retailer near you. Each wash of this garment releases an estimated 700,000 synthetic microfibres into the wastewater system. Water treatment facilities do not filter microfibres effectively. They pass through. They reach waterways. They enter the food chain. Microplastics have been found in human blood, in lung tissue, in breast milk, and in the placentas of unborn children. The research into their effects is ongoing. The effects are not yet fully understood. The production continues. Eduardo sheds nothing into the water table. Eduardo sheds fleece. The fleece becomes a garment. The garment does not shed microplastics. The garment will outlast every conversation about whether it is sustainable. Eduardo is grazing the Brecon Beacons. Eduardo has not been invited to a sustainable fashion conference. Eduardo would hum. The conference would not know what to do with the hum.

@andrewswalks Thanks Andrew. Lovely photos. Love a path through woods with bluebells.

Paths through the bluebells today

@HWarlow I see The Lady of Shallot has popped up again. I so enjoyed looking at John William Waterhouse paintings after your post the other day.

George Hartley (1933-2020) American painter Oil on Linen ‘Visions of Tennyson’ Such a beautiful painting All the details.

So this article from the latest @PrivateEyeNews states that Teesside Freeport is going to close down. Considering Teesside Freeport was Sunak's flagship Brexit freeport/SEZ policy, which was one small cog in the wider free zones rollout, 74 SEZs, 12 Freeports, and now 5 AI Growth Zones, (all fully backed/extended by Starmer's Labour government), what are the implications for the rest of these free zones now that Teesside has collapsed? It should also be noted that the original amount of state aid allocated to each UK freeport was £25 million. Teesside freeport was lavished with £560 million in state aid, profits generated by this were 9 - 10 split in favour of the private sector. If Teesside required £560 million to fail, what's the true cost across the entire programme? Labour has inherited and expanded this architecture without apparent scrutiny of Teesside's financial implosion. How can the 9-10 private profit split be justified when public entities carry the debt?

Palestine Action defendants are blocked from explaining their motives or mentioning Israel, genocide, or the target of their actions The British state is destroying its own courts to protect Israel's apartheid system We are reporting this because British media can not

£64bn is the cost of UK capitulation to pharmaceutical companies. Secret deal commits the NHS to pay higher price for new and existing drugs No debate in parliament. Govt can tax the rich, cut other services, let people die, start manufacturing drugs. thebureauinvestigates.com/stories/2026-0…

Israel’s Zone Fever expanding from Gaza into Lebanon👇🏻

Green Party is the most popular party for all British voters under 65 It is already official Green policy that the "Israel Defence Forces" should be proscribed as a terrorist organisation Soon, it will become 1st major anti-Zionist party in West This is all highly significant

BREAKING: JD Vance just told the Pope to be careful when opining on theology. The Pope. The head of the Catholic Church. The Bishop of Rome. The man whose institution has been the authority on Christian theology for two thousand years. JD Vance — who converted to Catholicism in 2019 — is telling the Pope to be careful about theology.

@Megatron_ron I wish that the world could see and realise that this war on Gaza has such a terrible cost for *both sides*. And all to make a few suits richer from Gaza gas fields, maybe a Ben Gurion canal and to save Netanyahu from justice in the courts. It is truly heartbreaking.

Israel just blew up a public high school in Marwahin, South Lebanon. Not a military base. A school.

👉NEW -- Strong pro-Israel bias among BBC bosses, new data indicates by @daniaakkad BBC executives met nine times with pro-Israel Jewish groups and just once with pro-Palestinians in 14 months of genocide, Freedom of Information shows declassifieduk.org/strong-pro-isr…

@pritipatel None of you were up to the job when in govt. You're not up to effective opposition either. Too busy feathering your own nests. Totally unfit for office Priti.

No idea Keir has forgotten that PMQ’s is when he has to answer questions! He blames others for his failure to do his job, because he’s not up to the job. Britain deserves better than his arrogant refusal to be held to account on issues that affect us all mol.im/a/15736315

@LeeHarris We are used to being governed by people who are unfit for office; we had to endure 14 years of the Tories. Cameron, Osborne, May, the dire Johnson and even more dire Truss. I've left Sunak out deliberately.

I hear Keir Starmer got angry and stomped out of parliament like a child after Lindsay Hoyle had "words" with him after PMQs. The man is thin-skinned and has a nasty temper. He's going to HATE getting booted out after May 7th! He's on borrowed time Completely unfit for office!

Keith Bowen artist Born and living in Wales The first painting attracted my attention. Beautifully textured I felt I could reach out and touch the stones , and the palette. Wow The study of the old man is excellent too

@HWarlow Agree. So craggy and impressive.

Yesterday, the government passed a law effectively banning repeat protests. The government is fed up with people protesting about genocide. Well, we are disgusted by its complicity in the greatest crime of our time. The government wants to silence us. It will never succeed.