compost tatties!

i had a few organic potatoes with loads of eyes so i just smooshed ‘em down into the compost heap.  they look like they might do really well.  yay and yum. 

for mother’s day I tortured Drew and Sion with another annual pilgrimage to a garden, this year it was Longwood up in PA.  the weather was lovely and the 1,050 acres seemed never-ending (especially since we left the snacks in the car).  the flower gardens dissapointingly lacked any imagination (coreopsis, snapdragons, and daisies.  oh my!) but the massive conservatory was fabulous.  they spent all their dosh on that.  I could move in there tomorrow, especially into the kid’s statue garden:

Longwood has loads and loads of fountains (including a massive one with a “water show”), the veg garden had some nice art, the wooded walk was nice (if too short), and the treehouses were amazing.  nice way to spend a day ‘eh?

 

today was my fa-a-aaa-vorite kind of day…all day in the garden.  aw yeah.  drew did the hard labor- dug up a new bed for the excess of cabbage, amended it with dirt and peat moss, and filled the sandbox under the swingset with dirt (soon it will be a flowerbox!).  we got all the toms planted- cherry, roma, tolstoi, big beef, cold set, beefsteak, rainbow, amana orange.  next up, planting the coral bells that I got at the Amish last weekend ($5!), basil, rosemary, mint, thyme, thinning the cabbages, direct sowing squash, melon, cucumbers, and zucchini.  and oh so soon tomatillas and chiles!  hurrah.  and the best thing after a day in the garden- shower, shandy, and Buffy.  Willow just did a teleportation spell that involved throwing glitter on Glory’s head…oh, Willow, my twin. 

for the S…O…Veeeeeeeee!

after an hour waiting outside (apparently the SOV was 2 hours late) and 3 opening acts (the first hilariously entertaining, the second a really good rapper from Chicago, and the 3rd a pain inducing band from LA), SOV’s female DJ took the stage and kicked ass!  it was great dancing, especially with Creeping Myrtle, Flo Shizzle, and Just Carol there to crack me up (these girls know how to have fun!).  and then out popped the biggest midget in the game!  she was fantastic and so cute (a little pocket grime singer) but I think she got a bit frustrated with the crappy sound system and ended early.  she loves to throw beer on the crowd, so I came home beer soaked and smudgy eyed.  but SOV wrote a song for me (OK, not really), so it’s all good:

“You like monkeys, I like monkeys.  You like funk, I like it funky…I’m weird and you’re weird, let’s be mates!  I like that smile you wear, oh yeah, let’s be mates.”

turns out the new cat is a mouser.  I came downstairs after putting Sion to bed last Friday and the cat meowed at me.  he talks a lot and I don’t really speak cat, so I thought he wanted me to pet him.  that wasn’t it.  he runs to the corner and stares at the back of a cabinet.  he’d found a baby mouse.  he chased it and tossed it and carried it around for almost an hour before losing it.  a few hours later, he caught it again.  once I noticed blood on the floor, I decided it was time to intervene (anything to avoid mopping!).  a hilarious scene followed wherein I try to scoop the mouse into a cup, Neville reaches in and takes it out, I drop a cup on it when he lets it go…and so on.  I finally got him and had to flush the poor bugger.   

Jesse told me that last Saturday she entered her husky puppy in a pie eating contest.  An owner also had to participate, but they had to eat the pie like a dog would.  So Dakota, the husky, attacks and devours his chicken and rice pie in less than 10 seconds while my poor brother-in-law is left to try and eat a vanilla pie by bending down, face in pie, chomping away.  Jesse’s understatement of the year: “it was funny.”  

and just for fun…a blue tongued boy:

 

…is National Association of Letter Carriers Stamp Out Hunger food drive!  it’s easy as pie: put some non-perishable food in a bag, put it by the mailbox and your postman (or woman) will pick it up!  every little counts…even if you only have a few spare jars of soup, or can skip the latte Friday morning and spend it on a box of pasta instead…no one should go hungry.    

hurray for rain!  this is the first time in weeks I can smell…of course, I figured this out because the bathroom is stanky…

so, naive as it may be, i’m still amazed when i meet someone resilient.  before i headed south, my sister forewarned me that someone is living with them.  someone removed from her home because of domestic violence.  i met her friday.  i got her story saturday.  mother died when she was 8, stepfather beat her, lived with foster parents until she was 11 when the foster parents died and she was sent back to the stepfather.  he would leave her alone all day so she would knock on the neighbor’s doors and offer to clean their homes in exchange for lunch.  that’s how she survived until she left home at 16.  married an abuser, had a child, he got custody, moved away again.  left an abusive fiance in florida and moved to maryland with a divorcee with 2 kids.  the ex-wife moves in with her girlfriend and…it’s saturday.  social services paid for 2 days at a hotel.  she just started work (with my sister) so, no money.  and no place to go but back to the boyfriend.  she’s staying with my sister for now.  she’s been knocked down a few times in life and she gets back up.  got a bus schedule, asked for food stamps, rode over to the firehouse she’s been volunteering at.  after a 6 week volunteer period she hopes to move in and learn to be an EMT.  never sat around feeling bad for herself; it’s too cool. 

in addition to cool stories and cars full of flowers, we got to spend part of our trip down south at the beach (the Js and Sion and I, while mikey and drew were at the scottish festival)!  salty and sweet snacks, kayak rides, and sandy butts.  whee!

   

now that we’ve gone from winter to summer in less than 60 seconds, I want to be outside all the time (well, not in the mid-day boil).  but the inch thick layer of pollen on everything is successfully penetrating the bloodstream full of Claritin I’ve been building up since March and I’m ready to scratch my eyes out and stuff my swollen nasal passages with ice cubes.  heh, complaints aside, I am loving the sun and the short sleeves and the plants plants plants.  picked up my way-backfull of annuals at the Amish in So. MD last Saturday and will plant ‘em today so they can soak up the next few days of rain.  which will also offer everyone some relief as it washes the pollen away. 

I read a fantastic article in Mother Earth News yesterday while eating my afternoon apple and trail mix snack (I’m just gloating because I managed to pass up the Doritos).  Jenna Woginrich decided to try her hand at self sufficiency and she’s doing a damn good job.  A modest (rented, no less) homestead of 3 chickens, 2 ewes, and a backyard garden.  Her writing is wry and descriptive and luscious.  And having just left Target with an armful of consumer-licious veggie burgers, I was feeling a bit underscored by my reliance on product.  I don’t think we’ll ever get to a point (or have the time) where we’ll be 100% self sufficient (and I don’t know that I want to- Ben and Jerry’s does a damn fine job), but with our impending farmstead I suppose we both hope for a little more.  Jenna gave me a bit of perspective and I feel better about what we try to do:

“I think the real trick to finding that sense of satisfaction is to realize you don’t need much to attain it. A window-box salad garden and a mandolin hanging on the back of the door can be all the freedom you need. If it isn’t everything you want for the future, let it be enough for tonight.  Living the way you want has nothing to do with how much land you have or how much you can afford to spend on a new house. It has to do with the way you choose to live every day and how content you are with what you have.  If a few things on your plate every season came from the work of your own hands, you are creating food for your body, and that is enough. Accepting where you are today — and working toward what’s ahead — is the best you can do.”

lately I have seen such fun stuff:  Cirque du Soleil’s Kooza was (as usual) inspiring and amazing.  Not only have these people pushed their bodies to outrageous limits, they manage to do these astounding acrobatics while in costume, makeup, moving in time to music, and acting out the central story.  I always leave there feeling as if I’ve taken a creative shower. 

and I always leave there wanting to start my career as an acrobat (so did the guy who leapt the fence and landed on his package- ouch!)….after last Saturday, I am now set to embark on my career as a rollergirl…

First time I’d been to the roller derby.  There’s just as much makeup and costumes as at Cirque, maybe a bit less acrobatics.  But loads of coordination and hard work and zooming skaters…it’s exhilarating!  confusing rules and random scoring, though an army nurse who is a jammer for the Pikes Peak Roller Derby tried to explain the scoring to me.  Her rollergirl name is Clitty Clitty Bang Bang…best name ever!  So if you haven’t had the pleasure, get out there and support the Charm City Rollergirls: ten bucks a game, yummy samosas, baked goods galore, Flying Dog beers, and girls who kick butt!  One of the refs. (Justice Feelgood Marshall) also plays for the Baltimore men’s roller derby team Harm City Homicide- check them out too!

in J news, Jesse’s hair just gets better and bigger…I am so jealous…

rockin’ freakin’ awesomein’ TOMS shoes: vegan canvas shoes and the *best* part, my peeps: their ONE for ONE program.  For every pair you buy, a pair is donated to a child in need.  rock on with your bad self TOMS!