20.02 | Feb 23rd

Well the weather really isn’t being very forgiving at the moment and as a result we had to take an almost unprecedented step yesterday and cancel one of our events.READ MORE>>>

22:01 | Jan 26th

Week 3 began with a trip down to Gallions Nature Centre in Thamesmead – a former Royal Arsenal munitions store now converted into a nature reserve for the local community. We were using the classroom there for the start of our PA1 and PA6 training course which will qualify Thames21 staff to use herbicides on invasive plant species in waterway locations. I’m not going to bang on about this too much here but it certainly opened my eyes to the problem of certain species of plant that were introduced over here but are now seriously out of control! Not to mention the mind-blowing procedures that are involved in trying to keep them under control and to prevent further spread... READ MORE>>>

16:01 | Jan 22nd

So today was my first Thames river clean-up of 2010 (some earlier events were cancelled due to the snow etc.) It was in North Woolwich in East London, the weather was a bit dubious and we weren’t sure how many people were actually going to turn up due to delays with the posters. Its not a particularly appealing time of year for people to be out on the cold, wet, windy river foreshore either, and being a weekday is also hit-and-miss but we got a couple of people and made a big difference to the site by the time we finished...READ MORE>>>

00:01 | Jan 22nd

Wednesday was a rare full day in the office. I stumbled over a new networking website for environmental projects in the London area called Project Dirt and, with consultation with the Marketing Manager, agreed that it would be worthwhile setting up a Thames21 page to generate some new interest...READ MORE>>>

17:01 | Jan 19th

Into week two and following a useful chat with some of the staff I feel a bit more focussed on what I will be doing during my time in the office. It would be easy to continue with what I was doing on-and-off last year – i.e. supporting clean-up events and odd jobs here and there ‘in the field’ but I also need my desk time to be working towards something tangible as well.

My initial thought was to try to get new community groups or individuals on board to do clean-ups, vegetation clearance or guided walks but while we decided this would be worth pursuing we thought it might be easier within my 2 months to try to re-establish contact with people that we have worked with before, but perhaps not for a while. So my job will be re-building some bridges (excuse the river pun) with people who are familiar to us but perhaps not feeling the Thames21 love at the moment.

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18:01 | Jan 11th

…tomorrow is my first day integrated back into society and the world of proper work after a brief…. “career break” last year.

Its also a return to my blogging antics which some of you will remember from my 2007 trip round the world. It’ll be a bit like that again. Except without the sunshine. Or tales of sharing hostels with people who could wake the dead with their snoring.

2009 was a weird year after being made redundant but Thames21 came along just before that happened (almost exactly a year ago) and probably saved me from going mad during the long (and continuing) architectural depression. So thanks to them for keeping me sane over the summer, giving me some fantastic experience in something completely different to my former day job, giving me the opportunity to meet some great new people… oh and go to some Hyde Park festivals! And on a speedboat...

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