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Last updated on July 16th, 2017 at 11:57 am
Cate Blanchett and her husband, whoever he is, live it up in their movie star mansion:
Green before it was hip – she cites Al Gore and David de Rothschild as heroes and believes that leaf blowers “sum up everything that is wrong with the human race” – the couple are trying to make the ecological footprint of the home as small as possible, installing solar panels and even a filtration system that will allow them to drink their own wastewater.
Not exactly Pickfair, is it?
I think I’ll pass if she invites me over for a pot of tea…
Posted by Mr. Bingley on 2007 09 17 at 07:45 AM • permalink
Some of her male fans would’ve done that, anyway.
Posted by Rittenhouse on 2007 09 17 at 07:50 AM • permalink
she says, now in a car (a chauffeur-driven Toyota Prius, per her request) crawling along the Pacific Coast Highway
Chauffeur driven Prius!!!! Mwuhahahahahaahaha. Hang your head in shame, you the driver and you Blanchett.
By the way, what’s wrong with leaf blowers? Isn’t burning the leaves worse in the book of left?
They seriously considered the alternative of bottling it and selling it at perfume counters.
Posted by Paul Zrimsek on 2007 09 17 at 08:26 AM • permalink
The system is genius if you think about it. She can now sell her tap water on eBay.
Posted by Aging Gamer on 2007 09 17 at 08:40 AM • permalink
Someone ask them for info on the carbon footprint of the waste system and filter manufacturers.
No, waite… don’t ask them until AFTER they’ve installed it.
Then, ask them how plants and bushes are supposed to get the fertilizers in urea that they need, if all the piss is filtered and redrank in an endless loop.
Kate Blanchet hates plants and wants them to shrivel up and die from lack of ammonia and other nutrients.
Meanwhile at the Blanchett residence.
The new improved PACO model.
Posted by thefrollickingmole on 2007 09 17 at 08:49 AM • permalink
Leaf-blowers may not “sum up everything that is wrong with the human race” but they are one of the most ridiculous and useless gadgets ever invented. All they do is blow the leaves about, usually into the neighbor’s yard. Then he sends his illegal immigrant to blow the leaves back onto your yard. Also they fill the air with clouds of choking petrol smoke—without the added benefit of being able to go very fast on the highway. Talk about a waste of gasoline… People blame the high price of gas on the war and so on. I blame it on the proliferation of leaf-blowers.
Use a rake. And burn the leaves. (Or do what my dad did and put them in giant plastic bags—we had this huge tree which shed about ten thousand pounds of leaves every year—and stick ‘em on the trash.)
Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2007 09 17 at 08:51 AM • permalink
“allow them to drink their own wastewater”
Why stop there – if she goes the whole hog she’ll finally confirm what many of us think about ditsy movie stars talking about issues they have no understanding of – that they’re completely full of shit!
Posted by Vincent Gerome on 2007 09 17 at 08:55 AM • permalink
Cate: Can I offer you some tea?
Visitor: No, no! Er, a glass of wine, please, if it’s not too much trouble. First, though, may I “freshen up”?
Cate: Certainly. The bathroom is down the hall, to your right. Just leave the bucket where it is; Jenkins will empty it into the cistern later. And you’ll find a crib full of corn cobs in the bathroom closet. You know, it’s such a warm day; would you like to have a swim after lunch?
Visitor: Well, that depends. Do you have a size 42 diving suit and a size 7 1/4 helmet?
leaf blowers “sum up everything that is wrong with the human race”
My Lord, that’s profound.
even a filtration system that will allow them to drink their own wastewater.
Should your glass have bits in it…
One, you have the wrong filter OR it’s not working due to extreme amounts of bullshit passing into it.
Two, to rectify until A new working and/or the correct filter is in place, what you will have to do, is “Blanch It”, Cate…OR (should you choose, large amounts of high octane alcohol, I would suggest EITHER copious amounts of Everclear or pure heroin injections, that way you won’t give a shit, so to speak).
When, oh when will people stop making these idiots wealthy, by not seeing or hearing anything they produce?
I think I’ll pass if she invites me over for a pot of tea…
That’d be a “tot of pee”
Posted by AlburyShifton on 2007 09 17 at 09:08 AM • permalink
Its all filtered through my kidneys.
Ok I confess ive been holding back on some of the stupidist stuff on the net.
Heres the motherlode
Posted by thefrollickingmole on 2007 09 17 at 09:09 AM • permalink
On the prettiest beach in Malibu, sprawled atop a sand dune built especially for her W photo shoot,
The average yob is not allowed to rearrange anything in their garden, farm, budgie cage etc, lest they incur the wrath of Gaia.
Yet this scrag, can have a whole beach rearranged to be photographed doing something that generations of aussie girls have been doing in pubs on Friday nights. All THEY needed was a white T shirt and a jug of water, (or beer, depending on how late in the evening it was).
Leaf blower users are inwardly focussed. They are obsessed with their backyards.
Wanna come to my place in October, Cate?
Help with the fucking raking?
Posted by Jack from Montreal on 2007 09 17 at 09:10 AM • permalink
#19. Andrea, you could do what my dad did – which was to hand me the rake and a box of matches.
We had an incinerator in the backyard (illegal now) and I used to have a ball setting fire to several square metres of leaves per week.
Dad also let me “recycle” his empty shaving cream cans, which meant throwing them in the incinerator when it was going full blast.
The explosion used to hurl a cloud of burning leaves and smoke high into the stratosphere.
Ah, the good old days…
Posted by mr creosote on 2007 09 17 at 09:55 AM • permalink
That should have been cubic metres of leaves.
Posted by mr creosote on 2007 09 17 at 09:56 AM • permalink
Although they sound like two LARGE corrections to me!!!
Well, yes and no…as is said, everything over a mouth full…well you know… I mean they don’t have to obscure the sight of the holdER nor the holdEE, or be back breakers…:).
As it was said that Dolly Parton stated to an audience…“if this thing snaps, I’d take out the first three rows”.
Well I don’t have my own back yard these days. My balcony does look over the tree-grown courtyard of my apartment complex. Which is currently being tended to by maintenance workers using… leaf blowers. This will blow the leaves into random piles, which will moulder and provide homes for more snakes and roaches. It’s the circle of life!
Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2007 09 17 at 10:20 AM • permalink
Just a thought. Why is it that mediocre actors, the type pumped up by hype and studio PR, along with the local “they are Australian” are the ones embracing this cult/fad? Is it a substitute for a lack talent? Really, a Cate Blanchett movie is not in the league of some of the greats in the past. Lord knows what it will be like when Al ‘boost my check account’ Gore arrives in Melbourne. Already the New Zealand government has flagged increase costs in electricity and so forth. Hell, he is only in Melbourne. Well, I suppose that is the ‘Al Gore’ effect, spreading its tentacles. One hundred and sixty little adherents will be given their ‘badges of honour’ to on-sell this pyramid scheme. What scares me, is our State government and media will have a real ‘on the knees’ fawning session, which will probably mean another financial impasse on the taxpayers of Victoria, ergo; the real ‘Gore Effect.’
…and even a filtration system that will allow them to drink their own wastewater.
Note to self: decline dinner invitation.
That’s about as stupid as Kevin Costner recycling his own urine in the middle of the ocean in Waterworld…
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2007 09 17 at 10:45 AM • permalink
“…I smell it in the water.”—CB, intro to Fellowship of the Ring
Posted by Paul Zrimsek on 2007 09 17 at 11:05 AM • permalink
I don’t blame her for not liking leaf blowers. Eventually, she will switch to a vibrator.
If she has a composting toilet, she can consume that too. I suspect it tastes like tofu, but more tangy.
In the meantime, Cate should avoid Cameroon.
What’s the big deal about drinking pee?
The Chinese have treated themselves with urine both externally and internally for centuries; a more recent advocate, the British actress Sarah Miles swears by its health-enhancing properties…Morarji Desai, the Indian prime minister from 1977 to 1979 who lived to the age of 99, drank a pint of his own urine every day.
Posted by Mystery Meat on 2007 09 17 at 11:11 AM • permalink
Yo, #40 – BJM. WTF you mean by only in Melbourne????
Only in the city of my birth?? ONLY IN THE BEST CITY IN THE WORLD???
Posted by Jack from Montreal on 2007 09 17 at 11:12 AM • permalink
Clam dwon, you dyslexic itiod.
Dyslexics of the world, untie!
Posted by Jack from Montreal on 2007 09 17 at 11:15 AM • permalink
- #46. Jack from Montreal.
Yes, on November 16th, we will be inundated with the ‘Gore Effect’ along with the Nurnberg type media love feast and fawning politicians. Mind you, when the ‘great one’ has spoken, what will it cost us? On the positive though, due to his past record, we may have a drought breaking event as well.
I have a huge mass of leaves on the front lawn with are arranged to spell THE HOUSE OF SATAN. Keeping the letters straight is time consuming, but it keeps those pesky doorknockers away.
Posted by SwinishCapitalist on 2007 09 17 at 11:39 AM • permalink
And she wants more kids. More kids, more wee-wee to drink!
Posted by Jim Treacher on 2007 09 17 at 11:51 AM • permalink
What about this use of a leaf blower?
Not you’re cup of coffee?
leaf blower powered coffee roaster
Posted by joe bagadonuts on 2007 09 17 at 11:54 AM • permalink
I meant your not you’re. As you can see I haven’t had my cup of Joe this morning either.
Posted by joe bagadonuts on 2007 09 17 at 11:56 AM • permalink
Use a rake. And burn the leaves. (Or do what my dad did and put them in giant plastic bags—we had this huge tree which shed about ten thousand pounds of leaves every year—and stick ‘em on the trash.)
Screw that—it’s way too much work. Just grab a chainsaw and kill the damn trees. Leaf problem solved!
Well, I don’t know about the benefits of drinking urine. But I know for centuries men have helpfully informed their wives, girlfriends, various MILF’s, etc., of the prodigious benefits of consuming other, um, well, you know, things. Scientists are so close, so very very close, to verifying that consuming certain, er, liquids can help women lose weight, stop the effects of aging and actually look younger, balance their check book. You name it!
Our goal is to be begged by women into helping them. A nice home cooked breakfast afterwards would be nice too.
Posted by wronwright on 2007 09 17 at 12:25 PM • permalink
#54 sundog. LOL!!! I live in Rhode Island (we have trees up the ying yang) and EVERY fall I tell the wife that I’m going to do just what you suggest.
Posted by Mark Razak on 2007 09 17 at 12:28 PM • permalink
But I know for centuries men have helpfully informed their wives … of the prodigious benefits of consuming other, um, well, you know, things. Scientists are so close, so very very close, to verifying that consuming certain, er, liquids can help women lose weight, stop the effects of aging and actually look younger, balance their check book.
If “My ex-girlfriend in college used to do it” doesn’t work, then nothing will, Wron. Sigh.
I don’t know about this urine stuff. People who drink their own urine seldom live too long.
Um, I think they’re probably talking about re-using gray water. Gray water is frequently recycled for landscaping needs, but isn’t potable. Unless, of course, she has the money and notion to build her own waste-water treatment plant. However, you can never tell what brilliant idea will next come out of Hollywood.
We do need to be grateful that she didn’t encourage us to limit ourselves to one square of paper.
“Any water that has been used in the home, except water from toilets, is called grey water. Dish, shower, sink, and laundry water comprise 50-80% of residential “waste” water. This may be reused for other purposes, especially landscape irrigation.”
that will allow them to drink their own wastewater
From the way most Hollyweird “celebrities” behave, I thought they already did.
Posted by Barbara Skolaut on 2007 09 17 at 02:18 PM • permalink
Sorry but I don’t buy it for one minute.
No way she’s going to give up bottled water.
Posted by memomachine on 2007 09 17 at 02:28 PM • permalink
Re #14, yup, Parker, that’s exactly right. In fact, rain can be described as “naturally distilled water”.
Hmmmmmmm…….there’s a marketing angle there, something the envirotards will snap up. Mayhaps the Purified Aquatic Collection Organization™ can come up with some applications.
For a suitable fee, of course.
Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2007 09 17 at 03:01 PM • permalink
Seriously, though, fresca* in #60 probably has it right. Unless Kate is putting in a full fledged mechanical waste water treatment plant, some specially designed system, or has the acreage to set up a “natural” water filtration system, the sights have to be set lower.
Sewage treatment takes a lot of effort to get reasonably clean water…..and even then, drinking water is treated before use.
Part of the problem is that you need to maintain a steady flow of, er, “stuff” at a minimum level for the plant to operate at all. Even sewage ponds (one of the simplest forms of waste water treatment) need to be sized for the expected amount of “output”.
And even the cretins in Hollywood, for as much shit as they pump out, would have a hard time maintaining the volume necessary for home use.
It’s likely that Kate has no idea as to what she is talking about. I’ll bet if someone asked her consultant, you’d get an answer along the lines of fresca’s comment.
===========================
*: Ironic, given this thread and your comment, that your screen name is the same as a diet soda! 😀Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2007 09 17 at 03:10 PM • permalink
BJM—Free your ass. That ‘free’ event is being paid for out of your tax dollars. Little short AUS dollars, but still…
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2007 09 17 at 03:14 PM • permalink
Just what is the carbon footprint of an average movie shoot these days?
Good point, Hanyu. I was once involved in a day’s shooting for The Young Doctors.
They needed to write a young doctor out of the plot because the actor playing the part wanted too much money. They arranged the character’s demise by shooting some footage of the young doctor falling off a cliff into water.
The shoot involved two twin-diesel cruisers, three dinghies with outboards and 28 assorted crew and “talent”.
The movie-makers were all picked up at the wharf at first light, spent the whole day on location and delivered back to the wharf at last light.
This effort produced a running time of 4 minutes in one episode of the show.
- And I’ve got no doubt that the neighbours would appreciate Cate bunging in a mini-sewage plant next door. Not mention the council appreciating her sole efforts to unburden the septic treating infrastructure of a city of 3 million plus. There’s only so many ways to turn piss into Evian, legally, and none of them are either cheap or 100% effective.
Treating her piss will only kill bacterial components, and not remove hormonal elements. The high levels of oestrogen she excretes on a regular basis would be passed via drinking to her two young sons.
This would be the equivalent of putting a two year old male on a course of high-dose female contraceptives. If she wants her boys to have shrivelled man-tackle, reduced growth rates and sexually confused development, go right ahead. Pig ignorant jackass.
Are they going to wear stilsuits? (That’s a Dune reference, for those of you non-sci fi folks).
Posted by rightwingprof on 2007 09 17 at 04:05 PM • permalink
Sundog: actually, that just makes the problem worse, because then you have entire trees to discard instead of just the leaves. We found that out here in Florida after several hurricanes ended our two-decade storm-free party, starting with Hurricane Andrew. Two years later the piles of dead trees next to the airport (along my route to work) were still smoldering.
And then there is the fact that in Florida it’s difficult, if not impossible, to entirely kill a tree. Unless you dig up every single rootlet, they grow back.
Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2007 09 17 at 04:12 PM • permalink
If she wants her boys to have shrivelled man-tackle, reduced growth rates and sexually confused development
That’s how they make metrosexuals.
Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2007 09 17 at 04:15 PM • permalink
Re #67, the hormone problem alone would cause me to take up arms. But you’re spot on, the local government would likely take a very dim view of Kate processing her own waste; in most parts of the United States, that’s a government monopoly.
;-P
Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2007 09 17 at 04:59 PM • permalink
Always thought there was something too “languid” about those Blanchett peepers for them to belong to anyone but a tree-hugger. She’s a pretty lass, probably as intelligent as she looks, but most of her films suck big time (LOTR and Hot Fuzz excepted).
Maybe Cate can open up Blanchett’s, the restaurant that offers you “The Taste of the Stars”. Here, come try a sip of our 2003 bottled Vin de Collette. Barrymore Bordeaux, anyone? How about a Dry Ditsy-Diaz for you, sir?
Skeeter: that’s what I tried to tell my dad, but he didn’t listen.
Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2007 09 17 at 06:33 PM • permalink
- Whatever happened to Cate’s plan, as director of the Sydney Theatre Company to take the whole theatre ‘green’?
“We intend to initiate discussions with companies with the aim of making the building self-sufficient, to green the building. We are talking solar panels, rainwater, the works,” Upton said. “This would ideally generate enough power to do a whole season off the grid. This would be the first theatre company in the world to do that.”Not a lot, I’m betting. But still a good idea to stay away from the ‘organic mineral water’ at the bar at interval.
leaf blowers “sum up everything that is wrong with the human race”
Hmmm. Hey Cate, what about Hitler’s ovens at Auchwitz? Do they rate?
How about Pol Pot’s extermination squads? Stalin’s gulags. Mao’s long march which killed 20 million people.
Do any of them rate in terms of what’s wrong with the human race? Any of them Cate? Or just leaf blowers.
Silly shallow woman.
AH, Mary Pickford, the well know Canadian.
Posted by Wimpy Canadian on 2007 09 17 at 08:31 PM • permalink
That would be something like this bloke.
I had intended to try and find somthing a bit more hunky looking for the ladies but…(note to self, never search google whith the “safe search” off and type in Pool boys)
if anyone needs me ill be scrubbing my brain with alcohol.Posted by thefrollickingmole on 2007 09 17 at 08:52 PM • permalink
The sad fact is that recycling your grey water is anti-social in the extreme.
Modern reticulated sewerage systems need grey water waste in order to operate properly, with flow rates, material density and so-on.
If everybody started recycling their grey water from sinks, showers and washing machines, I’m afraid that the jobbies are going to get clogged up through lack of flow, with unmentionable consequences to society.
Drinking recycled pee naturally brings to mind one of my favorite scenes in Blackadder.
Queen:[with quill pen at the ready] Oh. Good. Any news of Edmund?
Melchett:[smugly] Well, Madam, if they’re on course, they should be
nearing the urine-drinking stage by now.Queen:Don’t be horrid, Melchy. Edmund would rather die!
Melchett:I fear that may be wishful thinking, Majesty. [He blows
the ink dry on Raleigh’s death warrant]——————————
[scene change to a floundering ship, lost somewhere in the south Atlantic, with water supplies down to a few drops; Edmund is passed out or sleeping at the galley table. A knock comes at the door] Edmund:Enter. [Baldrick and Percy come in, carrying bottles. Edmund
sits up and we see he that his face is tired and drawn] So soon?Percy:You said today. [They set the bottles on the table]
Edmund:Yes, well, I’m not feeling very thirsty at the moment. I had an egg-cup full of stagnant water three weeks ago…
Oh all right, come on, let’s get on with it. [He stands up]Baldrick:Should we drink each other’s or stick to our own?
Edmund:Is Captain Rum joining us for this bring-a-sample party, or is he going to sit this one out?
Percy:Oh no, he’s been swigging his for ages. He says he likes it. Actually, come to think of it, he started before the water
ran out.Posted by wronwright on 2007 09 17 at 09:16 PM • permalink
Kinda brings a whole new twist to that scene where she pours a pot of water into that birdbath and shoves Frodo’s head into it…
Posted by Shaky Barnes on 2007 09 17 at 09:32 PM • permalink
Good on her – she sees a problem and attempts to fix her own corner of the world. All (solar) power to her!
I can’t stand leaf-blowers. Every time I see someone (usually a guy) chasing leaves with one of these petrol-powered, one-eyed trouser-snake wannabes in his hand, ears firmly insulated against the awful noise it makes, I just ooze contempt for them and their tools.
They’re just another, more unpleasant way of foisting their own rubbish into areas not their own, and making their rubbish other people’s problem.Posted by carpefraise on 2007 09 17 at 10:15 PM • permalink
Gulags, Anti-Semitism and concentration camps notwithstanding…
Posted by carpefraise on 2007 09 17 at 10:27 PM • permalink
Cate Blanchett hates Kim Beazley? forshame- he’s such a cuddly big roly-poly munchkin, who unfortunately has a carbon footprint like a dragline, but it’s glandular.
Personally I reckon she’s been drinking her own bathwater for years, and the day I start taking lifestyle advice from thespians and musicians is the day I start a career blowing walruses for the entertainment of bored Innuit perverts.
Blanchett is another Al Gore all right. her house in Hunters Hill cost $10 million and occupies 4000sq metres, more than 8 standard home sites in a city that has issues with infrastructure for its ever expanding suburbia. Only four people will rattle around in the huge mansion. She is building a swimming pool, despite the proxmity of the harbour, in a city that faces permanent water restrictions. her “green” efforts are merely token when compared to the carbon cost of the massive renovations that have extended over years, such as ripping out the interior of the heritage building simply to satisfy the whim of the actor.
Read about it:
http://www.smh.com.au/news/people/cates-green-house/2007/07/07/1183351513267.html
One last word on this nearly defunct thread about leaf blowers.
Where I live, you can pile your leaves in the street, and the garbage man comes and takes them away. My neighbors are expert leaf drovers, and manage to heard the things into neat piles. I, myself, have a leaf blower. I have a very narrow backyard that is heavily mulched and wooded; no way you can rake leaves there without making a mess of the mulch. I find the leaf blower to be extremely helpful in whisking the leaves onto tarps which I then drag to the street.
The only way you’ll get my leaf blower is by prying it from my cold, dead fingers.
Pickfair is so old that when bought by some starry eyed romantics in the modern era (some time in the last twenty years) I recall them saying that there were few if any powerpoints in the place.