Rubbish gathered on a walk around the block.

Lets take bags with us, she said. There's SO much rubbish accumulated on the grass verges. I want to pick it up. So we walked and stooped and walked and stooped our way around, what we call, the block. When we leave the monastery either by car or on foot we sign out with our destination and time of leaving. That way if there is a fire (not happened yet) everybody can be quickly accounted for. Such is community living, involving a high level of consideration for others.

I guess our walk 'n stoop walk was about consideration for others in a certain way, as well as just simple civic mindedness. So we walked up the road towards the T junction, left towards Allendale going gradually up hill then left over a gate into the monastery property and down to the main buildings. That's our country block and it takes just under an hour, walking briskly, to get around. Two of us collected two large shopping bags of rubbish. All sorts of rubbish however, as I recall, no Tetra Pak cartons.

There's Tetra Pak getting a mention again. Opening the fridge to day and pulling out a smoothie carton I saw on the package that Tetra has a website. Impressive site, impressive company.

And now confession time. The rubbish we collected...went directly into the rubbish bin, unsorted. Shame on us. However like everything that is good to do one can get a tad over-the-top obsessive. And worse - virtuous in an externalised kind of way.