Getting my feet wet. And dry.

In the last week or so we've had the news of North Coast flooding. I was in Grafton the day before the big event, and thankfully made the trip back home before all the action happened.

When you live in a city like Sydney, you can quickly lose perspective on the realities that other people face in terms of the weather.

You only have to hop in your car and drive a few hours north or west to see it. From Grafton in flood last week, to Canberra in drought this week, I'm reminded how limited my perspective is.

Sometimes you don't have to go all that far from home to see things very differently. When you get there, the difference is obvious.

But somehow when you're at home, you can't see it. Homes flooded, and paddocks drought-parched - and here I am, dry and safe with a green lawn in the Sydney suburbs. It all seems so far away.

When more is less

During the week one of my meetings was with the manager of a Paulownia plantation.

Paulownia originated in China, and was naturalised in Japan centuries ago. It is widely used for the building of furniture and fine cabinet-making, especially in the marine industries (the timber at its best is straight-grained, strong and very light).

As the 79-year-old manager of the plantation drove me around, he explained some of the lessons they'd learned along the way.

One of the main ones was: don't plant the trees too close together.

It would be easy to think that jamming as many trees as possible onto the site would make the exercise more profitable. But it's not so.

When the trees are too close together two things happen. Firstly, there is competition in the canopy as the trees compete for light. And as a result, the trees end up with winding, bendy trunks (which translates into shortly harvested lengths, and less straight grain).

Secondly, the trees don't grow as big. In fact, the final difference in terms of timber yield would be over 100% - the big difference being in the thickness of the trunks.

Sometimes less is more.

Rough and not-quite-ready, but what the heck!

While catching up with a pair of landscape architects on the south coast the other week, I couldn't resist the temptation to get a snap of their main worktable.

This wasn't some sort of attempt to give the studio an 'arty' edge; it was the reality of trying to get work done in the middle of a renovation.

This simple affair hadn't even been given the 'once over' prior to installation; this door which appeared to have had long exposure to the weather showed all the signs of being picked from the rubble heap and dumped on two trestles. During our meeting I discovered a rusty nail sticking up on my side of the table (next to the dead lock).

A pristine, precisely-manufactured desk is imbibed with no inherent ability to generate productivity. Conversely, some of the finest art has been produced on some fairly rough-and-ready work surfaces (if in doubt, survey the photos of famous British chair bodger, Jack Goodchild, at work in his Naphill workshop).

Chris Schwarz over at his Woodworking Magazine blog recently held a competition for the roughest workbench ('Most Pathetic Workbench') his readers could find. The photos - and his descriptions ("the thing that looks like a small mammal") - are worthy of five minutes of your time. Schwarz does make the comment that you don't need a great bench to do great work, although it probably helps.

I'm guessing that the landscape architects I met with the other week still haven't upgraded that work table; I'm sure they will one day. But in the meantime, they'll get on with churning out thoughtfully designed landscapes.

Back to front

A few weeks ago, I attended a conference up at Boomerang Beach near Forster.

The first afternoon of the conference gave participants the option of being involved in any one of several different field trips. The 'learn-to-surf' trip felt a little ambitious to me after a late night, and so I opted for the National Parks and lighthouse tour.

The Sugarloaf Point Lighthouse has been automated for several years, and so there is no active keeper onsite. Nevertheless, the keepers' huts have been restored by the NPWS and are available as holiday accommodation (bargain hunter's delight at only $4000 per week in the summer).

The huts are situated at the bottom of the headland, with the lighthouse up above. As we prepared to walk from the head keeper's hut up to the lighthouse, our guide asked, "Can you guess which side is the front of the hut?"

It was a good question. One side faces out to sea, another side faces down towards the trail by which you enter the property, another towards the cottage next door (with a trail between them), and one side up looks up the hill towards the lighthouse. Which side is the front?

This side, apparently. And if you walk into the house, you'll find that the layout reflects that.

Bumper to bumper

Why is it always so much easier to break something than it is to fix it up?

Can you think of a single thing that's easier to fix than it is to break?

Dinner for two?

I wonder when the two-place dining table was invented?

It's a great principle - especially when you've got two people to work with it.

Not quite so affirming or memorable when you're on your own ...

Ideas have consequences

So does where you park your car ...