Consumerism, stuffism or salesism?

Whatever you call it, this is the pan-planetary ethos of the day. Human acquisitiveness is choking us as more people are vigorously trained to make others buy more stuff. To this end, increasing numbers of people earn a living intruding on the privacy of strangers, and feel no shame about doing so.

Pushy consumerism has become unbelievably pervasive. So much so that we barely notice it. Worse, we allow ourselves to fall victim to its excesses. Pressure to buy takes up not only an inordinate amount of our money, but more and more of our time.

Case in point: soon after I had some car repairs done, I got a call on my cell phone. My guard was down; usually my cell is safe from rubbish calls. The lady finessed me into talking to her by giving me her first name and then telling me what work I'd had done and by whom. Before I had a chance to say a word, she launched into a lengthy questionnaire about the firm.

How would I rate the service, the speed, the professionalism, would I recommend my friends, and on and on. But this was not rocket science. Not politics. Not education. Just a new windshield.

Finally I interrupted. "Who are you?" I asked. "Who do you actually work for?" I didn't get a straight answer.

"I'm calling on behalf of (firm that did the work)." Sure, it's nice that they ask, but would it not be sufficient just to ensure that I was satisfied, and if not, why not? Who decided that imposing this lengthy questionnaire on all their customers is a good way to spend our time and their resources?

"Just a couple more questions," she insisted, burning away my initial willingness to talk by going on and on with a series of redundant questions that wasted at least five minutes of my day.

Since the telephone debacle before the last federal election, I no longer talk to political pollsters. With that telephone campaign, conservative political organizations turned a corner. From being mere phone salesmen, they turned to harassment of known supporters of other parties. The ensuing scandal was big, and it was nasty, but not surprisingly, the government denied all knowledge of wrongdoing. In effect, they got away with it.

The lesson for voters was clear. Tell nobody which political party you support. That phone debacle demonstrated how easy it is for unscrupulous people to sell this information on to who-knows-who to use for who-knows-what nefarious purposes.

I'm also fed to the teeth with the telephone sales pitches. Because of the constant stream of sales calls, of which some come from robot dialers and some from inside prisons, I no longer pick up my home phone unless I recognize the number. But today I got caught. It was Fabrice, calling on behalf of a bank that rings at least once a month. "Is there a problem, or are you selling me something?" I asked.

I guess my alternatives were to stark for him to respond to. He hung up. Perhaps he's not allowed to deviate from the sales script. Unfortunately, I can't stop such calls from coming in without spending a lot of time and effort for limited results.

It's no longer enough for purveyors of objects, credit cards and ideas to use public space and public media to pressure us to consume. Now personal time and space, which used to be private, is constantly being invaded by a full range of the proselytizers of consumerism.

Cardamom, queen of spices

Cardamom with unripe pods, Aidan Brooks Trainee Chef

For many years cardamom has been my favourite spice. I put it in everything from rice pudding and cakes to stews and stir fries. It's the secret ingredient in my best dishes.

Native to India and Sri Lanka, this plant is grown in North America in special botanical collections. I've never seen it in a commercial nursery in Canada. But it is grown in Kew Gardens, and in the Montreal Botanical Gardens.

I first tasted cardamon long ago at the Afghan Horsemen, a Vancouver restaurant now located on Granville Island. My discovery happened not at the Broadway and Cambie location, but an earlier one, further west, at Maple Street.

When I first saw the restaurant sign, I was living alone on West Fourth at Arbutus Street. Along with the pictures of the Horsemen, I noticed the interesting-looking decor, including low tables with cushions to sit on. I treated myself to solitary dinner, and found the meal delicious.

That evening, I feel head over heels in love with cardamom, which was sprinkled on top of the rice pudding, and also added to the tea. Never having tasted this wonderful spice, I asked what it was. The next day, I went off to Famous Foods to buy some.

Three common types of cardamom are green, black and Madagascar. In cooking, green cardamom pods or prepared powder are usually used, in a wide variety of dishes both sweet and savoury.

Black cardamom is quite different, with larger pods and a smoky, aromatic, camphor-like aroma. It has its own sphere of uses in certain types of Indian and Chinese cuisine.

In Middle Eastern countries, cardamom may be used to flavour coffee.This spice is also cultivated in Mexico, Guatemala, and Indonesia, and is also much appreciated in Scandinavian countries.

The plant belongs to the same family as turmeric and ginger. Cardamom is sometimes used to relieve indigestion, asthma and bronchitis, and is considered good for teeth and gums.

Lupine

Photo: wild lupine, Glacier National Park

Lupine means wolf-like, a name given because of a belief that the plant ravaged the soil. The blue wildflower grows profusely BC, often included in my childhood bouquets. Like fireweed, it spreads easily in cleared areas. Lupine likes sandy soil and needs plenty of sunlight to flower.

The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources states that lupine leaves are the only food source for the larvae of an endangered species.Thus the plant is sown in semi-wild disturbed areas in an effort to increase the habitat of the Karner blue butterfly. Lupine is also a garden plant.

Traditionally, lupine was used in fodder to fatten horses and make them spirited. The leaves were also steeped in tea by the Cherokee people to stop bleeding and vomiting. 

However, according to Sophie Johnson, some types of lupine are toxic due to their high alkaloid content. Another name for the flower is bluebonnet.

Manual dexterity applied to berry picking

Wild blackberries grow on thorny plants, so they're challenging to pick. Until I decided it was only fair to meet the berries without weapons, I used to bring a leather glove and pair of pruners. The other day, when I finally got round to going, I had only my berry pail and a water bottle to rinse the berry juice off my hands.

It's been a good year for wild blackberries: the June rain made them plump and the sun and heat of the past two months have made them sweet as ambrosia. As I gingerly pulled back a branch to gather some berries that were hiding behind it, I remembered something good that happened to me in Grade 4. (On the whole, fourth grade was not my stellar year: I was trying to adapt to life in a new province, my teacher was not nice, and I failed handwriting.)

My triumph occurred on sports day. I was no good at sports, but one contest involved taking clothes pins off a line with one hand and keeping hold of them. The person who ended up with the largest handful was the winner. I won hands down -- or should I say hands full? While the other kids pottered away with three or four, I captured and held seven.

Manual dexterity is a skill I still have, and it stands me in good stead in the berry patch. Using one hand to hold back the thorny branches the plump berries hide behind, I use the other to pull them gently off the stem one by one.

I got a good haul the other day, picking that way. Didn't squash a single one.

The Way I Found Her, by Rose Tremain

Book cover photo from Goodreads

The Way I Found Her (1997, Sinclair-Stevenson) is a brilliant novel of suspense by the talented Rose Tremain.

Lewis Little, the teenage protagonist, is the son of a conservative school teacher father whom he considers rather boring, and a beautiful and willful mother. After reading a certain French novel, he has begun to call his parents Hugh and Alice. During summer vacation, Alice takes Lewis to Paris for the summer.

The plan is that while Alice works on a simultaneous translation of the latest novel by the Russian Valentina Gavril, Lewis will enjoy a Paris holiday, improve his French and mind Valentina's dog, Sergei. But things go wrong, beginning when Lewis gets yelled at by a gendarme for taking Sergei into a dog-free park.

The voice of Lewis, the intelligent young teenage narrator, rings clear and true, from his Action Hero doll to his predictable infatuation with the volatile Valentina. Aware of his frustration at his own immaturity, he is surprisingly able to express this to his mother, even as he tries to distance himself from her parental dominion. "For about two and a half minutes a day," he tells Alice, he is a child, while at other times he feels and behaves like a mature seventeen-year-old.

Clouds soon gather over Lewis's blissful interlude in the Huitieme Arrondisement. In spite of his round-windowed room in the attic and his friendship with the existentialist Parisian roofer Didier, in spite of his explorations of Paris with his mother and Sergei, his blissful summer begins to go downhill. First, Alice and Valentina stop getting along; soon his mother becomes preoccupied and shuts him out. Then Valentina's ex-lover, another Russian writer, turns up and they quarrel.

Troubles that at first seem minor turn increasingly sinister. Lewis must think things through and figure out what is happening. He makes notes in his Concorde notebook. Can plagiarism lead to violence? Is Lewis's theory right? Can "everything" really "hinge on the lack of a definite article?"

And why, the reader wonders, does Lewis keep dwelling on the story of Didier's father falling from the roof dome of  l'Hopital de la Salpetriere? Tremain keeps her readers guessing till the last. Even though in retrospect the ending of this gripping tale seems inevitable, the author delivers a satisfying surprise.

Rose Tremain won the 2008 Orange Prize for The Road Home (2007, Chatto and Windus). Her latest novel, Restoration, published this year, was recently reviewed in the Guardian.

Farriers demonstrate ancient craft at PNE

Photo by eHow

Every year at the PNE, the animal barns are our first stop. We always learn new things. This year, as we wandered through the Agrodome, we saw a sign that read "Baa Baa Blacksmith." A couple of members of the Western Canadian Farrier's Association were making horseshoes in the traditional way. The first step was using tongs to remove a piece of red-hot rebar from the forge and lay it on an anvil for shaping.

Pounding their mallets in tandem, they sounded out a rhythm like that of percussion players in the same band. More heating, more hammering. As the cycle repeated, the metal was slowly transformed into a horse shoe. Besides chaps, neither used protective clothing or gloves, although both wore glasses. "You get used to the heat," said the woman.

Horseshoes are made of different materials in a variety of styles and types, according to purpose. Race horses are shod with light aluminum shoes that promote speed but wear out quickly. Work horses wear thick heavy steel shoes with anti-skid shaping front and back. Shoes for draft horses can weigh from 3 to 6 pounds each. "Horses like these." The farrier pointed to the nearby team of Clydes, eating in their stalls after a workout.

Specialties don't end there. In situations where horses are supposed to slip, the shoe can be designed to work "like a skateboard," the demonstrator explained. And various kinds of therapeutic shoes can be created to provide relief for horses with foot pain.

Today a wide range of horseshoes are factory-made, and many of the older styles are no longer in use. Still, even the most arcane traditional skills of horse-shoe making are kept alive by farrier competitions. In Canada, these are held at the Calgary Stampede. Those wanting to train as farriers can earn their diplomas at Olds College in Alberta.

According to Equisearch, the history of shoeing horses goes back almost as far as domesticating them. On the steppes of Asia, riders wrapped leather coverings around the hooves of their animals, and Roman hoses were fitted with sandals similar to those worn by their owners.

European horses began wearing with nailed-on metal shoes in the sixth or seventh century. In the UK, the Worshipful Company of Farriers descends from a Guild formed in the Middle Ages. It dates back to 1356.

Buffalo beans

Photo taken in RAM Natural History gallery 2012

According to the legend beside the picture, the pods of this poisonous plant produces a dye, used by Ukrainian settlers to colour Easter eggs.

Also called false lupine, this plant does resemble yellow lupine. It belongs to Leguminosae, the pea family. According to Alberta Plant Watch, the name buffalo bean is a reference to the first nations' name of the plant. Its time of blooming coincided with the appropriate time for the spring buffalo hunt.

In Borden, Saskatchewan, Buffalo Beans is the name of a shop that sells baby gear.