C.L.E.M.

2011-08-25T23:33:00.000-07:00

Come on nematodes! Hopefully you are still alive. As you can see the white moth grubs have gotten ahold of and had their way with my lawn. I waited way too long to order nematodes, first from one vendor who "had a problem with the vendor" and they wouldn't be available till mid-September. By that time I wouldn't have a lawn left!

The batch of nematodes I spread around tonight are possibly still alive. I ordered these from Home Depot online/phone and the lady who helped me on the phone was nice enough to give me free two day shipping, when normally it takes 6-8 working days, because I'd told her the state of my lawn and that we'd be leaving early Friday for the weekend. Nice! However UPS may have undone that kindness by LEAVING LIVE NEMATODES OUTSIDE THE DOOR! For over three hours. As I drove up I saw the big florescent green sticker on the side of the box which reads "Refrigerate Upon Delivery!". Guess the UPS dude didn't see that because he DID NOT RING THE BELL and the hubby and kids were home all day long.

Sigh. Fingers crossed some of those little critters made it.

Borage!

2011-08-01T11:09:00.001-07:00

Who knew! Borage will keep hornworms away if planted near tomatoes! Who knew... well, obviously thousands of other people, just not me.

Tomatoes were more successful this year than ever. Here in the desert that is a thing. They grow all year long here but I had never had more than a couple fruits on each plant. Roma tomatoes did gang busters though!

I will keep at it however and see if I can't get some winter tomatoes going!

Sugar is just as bad as booze

2011-07-06T16:13:00.001-07:00

This is a must watch if you care about your health and your weight.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM&feature=youtu.be

So much for Water Wise

2011-05-10T15:50:00.000-07:00

As summer days go (and yes, it is already summer-esque here) water conservation does not get very high on the list. Especially when one is playing. It was my daughter's 7th birthday party this past weekend and the husband activated the slip and slide - more slide than slip - and lots of water went into the already well watered lawn.

We did what we could to mitigate a lawn in the desert. I chose carefully a kind of fescue that would hold up to heat and cold and not require tons of water to survive either. We even installed the latest rotors that save tons of water from overspill and overwater.

But alas, all bets are off when it is hot and a birthday party. So much for conservation. Oh well, in 7 years it will be added to the water table.

Shallots!

2010-07-07T08:24:00.001-07:00

I have never thought to plant shallots in any garden I have ever had. I think I secretly believed that they only grew in France! But I thought, seeing seed shallots in the Pleasant Valley seed catalog, (Pleasant Valley Farm & Garden Supply, www.GrowOrganic.com) that I'd give it a shot.

Wow. Shove those little buggers in the ground and (with automatic sprinklers, which, in the desert you must have - the weather will not forgive a day or two off of watering) a few months later pull them up!

These are not the largest or the most beautifully formed but they are tasty. And the bonus, besides saving $4.99 a pound, is that my husband can tolerate them in food much better than onions.

In other news:

If you are in or around (within driving distance) the Coachella Valley and you fancy getting involved in a local farm you can partake of the Sky Valley Ranch CSA (Community Support Agreement) Program just begun last week. (http://www.sky-valley-ranch.com) We made our way on Saturday to the ranch to pick a box of vegetables, a loaf of foccacia bread and cannelloni. This is the first opportunity I have had to join a CSA program and I am happy to do it. Besides supporting local growing, which is always a good thing, we got a delicious cantelope, avocados (anyone? I can't eat them and the rest of the family won't!), the best cucumber I've ever had, some tarragon, three beefsteak tomatoes (already gone) and about a pound and a half of okra, which I've never cooked before. Another bonus of a CSA program - forced expanse of eating horizons!

2010-05-30T21:03:00.000-07:00

Adenium being impressive this year.

To the right, last year.

What a bonus it feels like to have beautiful, easy to care for plants in such a harsh climate. Too bad these blooms don't come mid-summer to make it all seem less... bloody hot!

Tiny Tidbits

2010-05-18T21:42:00.001-07:00

This salad came entirely from the garden. Finally a little tomato progress. Lettuce last year was more than I could eat and tomatoes kaput! This year the weird weather we are having (for us here weird is cool in the 70s lows in the 60s at night at this time of year) has had an effect. Lettuce a bit beefy...

I'm not prepared to declare victory over tomato season yet however. I bought an heirloom plant and it has, one, exactly one small struggling tomato. Ugh. Where the desert tomato experts?

You know, I generally do not like to use harsh chemicals. I won't in my garden and try to buy fragrance and dye free household products, and few of them. I figure the smaller number of cleaning products I use keeps the chemical cocktail a little less potent. But a few years back my mother-in-law was visiting. There was something dirty in the kitchen that was bothering her so she bought Greased Lightening. Major double degreasing action and I don't want to know what kind of petroleum products it contains! I didn't want to just chuck it in the landfill either so I just kept it.

The other night I was scrubbing the tile floors. I made the water as hot as possible, had the scratchy pad, my relatively innocuous floor cleaner in the bucket, had the scrub brush, even got down on hands and knees... nothin'. For some reason I pulled that Greased Lightening from over the stove and sprayed it on a tile and, without any grease of the elbow sort, using the backside of a scratchy sponge, the grey sticky disappeared and I had a whole new tile floor (well, one tile) again! I hate to say it, but in an effort to maintain some honesty and integrity, I have to admit, as much as I am against it I am Greased Lightening my entire tile floor in my kitchen... Maybe I will donate to the Gulf cleanup as my penance.

Surprising Potatoes

2010-05-18T21:36:00.000-07:00

Having never grown potatoes before this first round was a low-expectation experiment. I had some red potatoes that had gone all rooty so I chopped 'em up and stuck 'em in the ground in a spot that was doing nothing at the time and proceeded to ignore them.

These big bushy plants came up and I thought perhaps I'd have some success. Then the bugs chomped them so much that they all wilted and died. "Ah well," I thought, "it was worth a shot" so I pulled on plant on Sunday and low and behold this beautiful potato came up with the roots! I got out the pitch fork and ended up with more than 20 beautiful red potatoes! I roasted a few that night for dinner. That's a nice Sunday surprise!

Addendum to Weekend Full of Life

2009-10-22T21:55:00.000-07:00

More of the other part of life from this weekend. I learned that a friend and colleague passed away on Saturday the 17th.

It's hard to reconcile that 'other' part of life when the person who's experienced it is young and full of life. When you want them to be around, to do more work, to have more friends, more experiences, it can seem senseless. The thought of a higher power, someone with a plan we just can't fathom is attractive. Or it really is all senseless and there is nothing guiding anything, just random everything. Either way you look at it, it is. And in the finality of life and death what is is what is.

Reality, what a concept.

Weekend full of life

2009-10-18T21:50:00.000-07:00

On Saturday I went to the Memorial service for the husband of a couple I do secretarial work for. He passed about a month ago. His wife, my lovely lady, as I call her charged me with transporting his ashes to the church. When I got there another service was in progress. As I was also carrying a bell, a clipboard with papers, cards and a purse it was cumbersome and heavy and I asked a lady at the door to allow me to just sneak in the back and put it all down and wait quietly.

Turned out it was a baptism for several children. Not being much of a Catholic (I literally just found out earlier in the week that I actually was baptised a Catholic and so am... on some level) I wondered as the realization hit me that this was a celebration of the beginning of life if I really should be there, hovering with the ashes of the deceased... But then I thought, "The memorial of this man's life at the end is just as important as the marking of the beginning of this young lives". It may not be a completely Catholic sentiment and however I would know anyway, but it struck me as inherently true. So there we waited, this man's ashes and I and waited and watched.

As the family and close friends and flowers filtered in for the memorial I thought maybe I should tell someone I had the ashes in the back. But no, I thought, I should do it. (Thank goodness I had on my comfortable shoes at that point and not the heels!) So I picked him up and said to myself and him "Come on Paul, let's put you up on stage". It was a solemn moment and I was honored to do it. Who knew I would be the one to put this man, a lifelong actor, on the last stage he would grace on this earth.

Today was the celebration of my birthday. I got calls from my parents - both of them - on this day, wishing me a happy birthday, for the first time in 39 years. It is a whole new kind of year for me. Reconnecting with my bio-dad has been a tremendous healing and life affirming event. It has put my faith back in the quantum possibilities of the universe. It has reminded me that there needs to be faith in life. It may not always look like it's on your side, but as long as it keeps going it is heading in the right direction.

To celebrate my birthday I wanted to go on a hike with my husband and my kids. Hubby and I always talked about how when we had kids we would go on hikes and that would be our church. So today we went to church and there we saw some beautiful awesome rocks and the greenest palm fronds. Two kids of lizards and plenty of them, a grey squirrel, a chipmunk peeking out of a hole, some wild sunflowers, river reeds and even frogs. And plenty of sky.

Round in one big circle. I've always thought experiences in life were way more important than stuff. That the accumulation of wealth was only valuable to the extent that it enhanced life, not resulted in production of more things. I guess I didn't need to have any wealth at all to experience this weekend.

It Just Occured To Me...

2009-10-09T23:28:00.000-07:00

...that one of the reasons housewives didn't go crazy en mass in the 50's (contrary to Peyton Place Popular Belief) might have been that there is a certain satisfaction in nurturing your family... now wait a minute feminists. Don't get your panties in a twist but knowing how to run a house, cook, clean, nurture children, work on homework, discipline, celebrate, have fun, vacation, COOK FROM SCRATCH (read: healthy, not fast food), grow your own food, spend time with your neighbors, go to church, serve your community (not that I particularly do those last two things, but I'm just sayin', that's a lot!) takes a lot of knowledge (that is not that easy to get by the way), patience, coordination, focus and dedication. And education, from somewhere. Not unlike a job. Funnily enough.

Look, here is what my goal is: to make sure that my family (particularly my children) feel welcomed, warm and safe in their home. Further I would like what I give to them - i.e. my time, food, attention to also be nourishing and safe.

Here is the thing: If you are stressed at work, stressed in your relationship, too busy to (really) cook then the stuff of you that inputs into your family is, OK, kinda toxic, and not so good for them.

Which brings me to my point. Some time in the 70's the babyboomers' pissed off-ness with their own parents translated into "I'm not going to learn anything that you know about anything and if I believe you were wrong about some things then I necessarily believe that you are wrong about EVER-Y-THING" (Can I just remind everyone that the people now running the world - who supposedly 'saved society' - have sold out for jobs and are now running the world - are babyboomers. Just sayin'. Take from it what you will.)

What we lost on the backs of babyboomer wholesale rejection is knowledge about how to grow food. How to clean a spot out of a sofa. How to take time to enjoy pushing a child on a swing - wait, yes, I know you DO it for 12.5 minutes and then "come on we have to get to lunch" kind of swing, I'm not talking about THAT kind of swinging, I'm talking about - as long as they wish to swing and laugh right along with their thrill of it. And numerous other things I can't even get to yet (and probably family being nearby, don't have that so try to put that out of mind). We can't remember what is in season or how to make bread. Or biscuits, for god's sake the easiest American-edible quick bread there is, biscuits!

We also lost dinner without TV, buying only what you need when you need it, knowing AND socializing with your neighbors and volunteering at your kids' school. This is not to say that the babyboomers didn't have a point (calm down bbs). My grandfather was cold and distant at times and my grandmother ineffectual in the family dynamic. I am grateful that therapy is not looked down upon any longer in most places. That we (mostly) have really stopped being so goddamned judgemental about people's 'lifestyles' (or genetic dispositions depending on your take on science), that we know more about the world because afterall we have only the one and somehow everything everyone does impacts us all. So kudos to bbs for all that (and more I am not remembering, remember, panties, calm down).

But maybe now that we are all fat and sick and paying too much to get well if that is even any longer possible, we might regret giving up a little bit about how to feed, nurture and spend time with our families. And maybe feel 6 hours a day spent on the internet/video games/managing the DVR might be a waste of some, if not all, of that time. I know I do. I hate it when my kids ask me "Is that in season?" and I don't know the answer. To put this in context, my grandfather was a lifelong farmer, born of a ranching/farming family and my uncle a gardener by trade... and I still don't know the answer to that question. It's not like I can hide behind we are 7th generation Detroit natives or something!

And maybe a combination of my mother's generation of exploring the human condition as though it's a valid pursuit alongside a little of requiring only one job to support a family, might have helped me when I get the question from my kids "Mama, why don't you play with us more?"

And I only work part-time... I'm just sayin'.

Final thought: Baby with the bath water. Kinda a key American philosophy.

Well Phooey!

2009-08-18T19:19:00.000-07:00

Tomatoes - an utter failure.

Now were this anywhere else in the country it would be a no brainer - start seeds inside around March or so plant them in the ground a couple months later by August you are swimming in tomatoes. But not so in the desert.

I got a couple little ones off a nursery bought plant but the last of my seedling have failed. Harumph!

It being the desert I shall try again! Very soon... in fact I already have tomato seedlings started. Fall tomatoes? Only in the desert!

Beets!

2009-06-09T22:17:00.001-07:00

A few beautiful beets and several more coming up. Lovely!

AHA!

2009-05-31T11:59:00.001-07:00

Rogue pumpkin!

Rogue Vegetables

2009-05-16T14:03:00.000-07:00

Composting has its ups and downs. On the one hand you get free, really good soil amendment; the good feeling of adding less to the landfill not to mention a less smelly trash can - and in the desert BA-LEEVE ME this is a big deal - a trash can go from zero to sixty on the stinky scale in less than a day in our heat. But you get addition flies and insects that love the compost. I suppose this is the reason many have objections - compost heap: smelly and flies. But frankly I'd rather have those outside than in my garage. Nuf said.

There is another little issue that can come up - if your compost heap does not heat up as it should. I have never been able to get mine in the right balance to make it heat up - don't ask me why a compost heap won't get to 120 degrees when it IS 120 degrees outside. The issue I am finding: rogue vegetables.

That little monster coming up out of the planter box is some sort of gourd taking over my peas, purslane and butter lettuce (I'm really pissed about the butter lettuce! It stunted the growth of my second planting and shortly it will be too damn hot here for it to grow.... rrrrrrr). When they popped up at first I was stunned. I had not yet planted anything except peas in that spot yet there they were. This picture was even taken after I yanked out a good half a dozen. And the possibility of this being some previous gardener's? Nil. This yard was a sandbox - we are the first to ever own a home on this land. Long ago trash dump? Remotely possible. The big culprit though - uncomposted seeds. Now technically seeds when cooked die. So though I have had zucchini and other small squash that have ended up in the compost probably not this many seeds. Pumpkin perhaps and very likely. Butternut squash also highly likely - though it didn't grow when I planted it back in Oct, maybe not hot enough yet. A mystery.

So I thought "Oh, I'll just leave them there and see what they are" when they were just a couple here and there. But now they are taking over. Also in that heap of vine is a rogue tomato plant. I have another pictured here that spouted up near my tarragon and we've actually gotten tomatos from it. But aside from just seeing 'what' I wanted to know why. What vegetables grow so well here that they defy my interest in them and thrive whilst I baby everything else along? It is all a big experiment in the end isn't it? And if I end up with a bushel of zucchini that neither my husband or children will eat, well then I guess all the neighbors get zucchini bread! And I a big healthy plate of them slathered in butter and freshly grated romano cheese - alone probably, so I don't have to deal with the "eeeeeeewe!" from them!

From the Enjoy More Files

2009-05-05T09:55:00.000-07:00

Consume Less, Enjoy More. That is the point of this blog (get it, CLEM?) and is my miniscule response to consummerism. Now it is easy to bat consummerism around as the evil that did us in as a society, with its evil twin greed, but that is a symptom of an underlying problem. The problem didn't just pop up over night so its hard to say when it started. It's sort of like when the doctor asks you when you first noticed that rash, or what was the first day of your last period (sorry guys, didn't mean for the gross out but... well, grow a pair, we've had to listen to your fart jokes for years). There is a dissatisfaction creep that we collectively have tried to fill up with bigger fancier cars, bigger fancier houses, bigger fancier vacations the result of which is mostly just bigger fancier stress.

But what is that dissatisfaction that sends folks wandering aimlessly around the mall? I believe it is that we have lost a sense of connection to our communities. With suburbanization came all sorts of suspicion and fear - isn't it fear that sent many fleeing cities? And with the fear came interaction between humans only when it was profitable. Now there are exceptions, of course, New Orleans famously for example. But if you could be a giant with a magnifying glass over us and look down at our movements (like a kids with ants - don't burn us! Eeeek!), you would see that we go out to work, to school, to shop and then we rapidly all retreat to our homes.

We have forgotten how to do civic life.

Obviously this phenomenom begs a larger discussion, which I hope people are having all sorts of places in all sorts of ways, and hopefully trying to figure out ways to fix.

Well here is my own little tiny participation in an attempt at a fix. Entertain Locally. Yes, eat locally, buy locally, now whats about y'all get out from in front of the TV set and entertain each other? In June some local actors and some LA folks will be putting up a couple of one acts at a local art gallery where we have been reading plays for small audiences who got to vote on which they liked the best. The votes are in and so we'll now put on a show! Hope you all can make it, or make one of your own.

More details later. Watch this space!

WORMS!

2009-04-19T23:22:00.000-07:00

I live in the desert. One of the hottest places in the United States - and it is a very hot desert, not some whimpy chapparal country like San Bernardino where if it hits 90 degrees everyone freaks out. No, we're talking 80s in May average, 90s in June and forget anything less than 3 digits until October hot. It is so hot there are certain times of year when my family will not come out to visit.

So, needless to say when I attended a compost class and they assured me that eventually there would be worm in my compost I scoffed. Dig down 5 feet and not a worm will you find in the native soil/sand. I thought the Master Composter (yes, its a real title) was just engaging in some wishful thinking.

But yesterday I was doing some compost maintenance. Mine has never heated up despite outside temps even. I always thought I was sort of doing something wrong, it was out of balance and therefore worms were a pipedream. But as I turned the advanced one over (I have two, one advanced and one I'm adding to) there those squiggily little red suckers were. Wow. Ain't nature wonderful? Who knows where they come from!? Waaaaay underneath the earth... but how do they know? Some tell tale taste must trickle down and they decide to make their way up. My compost bins have been active almost two years now. Wow, worms, I'm so proud.

We Are Not Consummers

2009-03-30T09:30:00.000-07:00

I just signd up for a blog email list called Theatre Ideas. Here is my response to the latest posting.

I worked with a theatre owner on a project just recently in LA and he said be believed LA people were too self absorbed to be interested in what other people are doing. That is probably very much a factor in that transient, goal oriented town. And remember being responsive to one's community means having to actually pay attention and care about what is going on in it - it means getting off your ass and into the community and talking to people!

I recently went on a brief websearch for funding for a tour for a play I am involved in. If one were a visual artist, painter, sculptor, mixed-media whathaveyou, it could become a full time job applying for grant after opportunity after design our logo request. And it got me to thinking, what about visual art is so much more compelling than theatre or other performing arts? And the answer lies, I believe, in the systemic problems of our country and culture as a whole. We have bitten the apple as it were. We are a nation of consummers, which means we are far more comfortable with art we might be able to own (read: stuff) than experience which is what performing arts offers. We currently like our experience impersonal, detached. We like our TV and our movies and our Internet - because they involve relatively little actual human interaction (theoretical human interaction sure). But we are all hungry for human experience, for interaction. Why else would we have gotten ourselves into such a consumming frenzy over the last few decades? We have been involved in addictive behavior, trying to fill a whole. This is evidenced in any mall in America - watch the 'shoppers' wander around aimless, looking side to side, alone amongst many, searching for something to fill up the hole, something to feed themselves with. Why go to a mall? Why facebook? Because we want something we have gotten so far away from to understand any longer.

We have lost for a time - because I don't believe it will be forever - the ability to entertain ourselves and what's more, to be entertained. Entertain locally. This should be right on the heels of Shop Locally, Eat Locally movements. But we have to keep waving our hands in the air, jumping up and down shouting "over here, over here!" - and more theatre artists need to start doing it too - until we get our people back.

Regards,Daniela Ryan---

On Sun, 3/29/09, Theatre Ideas wrote:
From: Theatre Ideas
Subject: Theatre Ideas

Theatre Ideas
Mick Montgomery on Mike Daisey
Posted: 28 Mar 2009 12:59 PM PDT
(Big h/t to Dennis Baker)In a blog post nearly entitled "My Disillusionment," Mick Montgomery of Art of Function writes about the "Post Show Roundtable" that followed a performance of How
Theatre Failed America in Los Angeles. Montgomery writes:

I listened to someone from the Odyssey say the words that spell the down fall of all theaters in this country... "I don't want to do Children's Theater, I want to do the Art I want to do."My message to those folks running theater in this town is... "Guess what? That's not your job." The job of the theater is to support it's audience and community, not exist soley for the purpose of indulging the creative proclivities of the artists entrusted with running the stage. Artistcally, I may want to do a season filled with "True West" and "End Game" and the like, where I could star in or direct them all, but that's not my job as the steward of the theater. My job is to embrace my community for who they are, and then go from there. I'm not saying this is soley doing Children's Theater, but it's about engaging your audience where they are at, not asking the audience to engage you where you are at. Theater is about people, audiences and artists sharing things together. Theater is not about a building or a 'great space' or subscriptions. The theater is the product of the people coming to it, not the other way around. We don't understand that here in Los Angeles........................

I found it ironic that Mike Daisey railed against theaters trying to 'get more money' to solve all their problems with paying artists in his piece, and then comedically, 10 minutes after the show when he asked his panel, what would you need to make big changes to the theater culture in L.A. the first answer out of someone's mouth was... "We need more money."I sat in my chair and hung my head. Did they not listen to the show?It's not the money that is the issue. It's our model. Maybe theater needs to be less capitalized and more socialized. Maybe the City should figure out how to support the Theater Arts in L.A. like they support the visual arts. Maybe we do need $5 dollar theater Wednesdays. Maybe we need A Theater Alliance that truly correlates resources and marketing stragies. We have a city with a School District crying out for subsidized arts education, yet no one is there to help that process along. And here I sit asking myself, "What the Fuck is everyone doing? Why doesn't anyone understand how to make this work?" How come people in Portland or San Diego get it, but the place I live, where some of the most talented people in the world are living, can't figure it out?Los Angeles Theater is the great disconnect. The Theater Community fails to understand the audience, and thus it fails to understand itself. Everyone is just scrambling for crumbs, no one is building relationships with each other through the art. The solutions are so simple. That's probably why I'm so frustrated. [ital mine]As has been the case for the past two years, Mike Daisey continues to provoke long-overdue reflection and questioning on the part of artists. Theatre artists have a single kneejerk response to every problem: give us more money. Or, in lieu of that, the other knee jerks "we need better marketing." When i reality, we need to do a Cartesian rethinking of the whole thing from the ground up. Peter Brook gave us a good starting point with the first lines of The Empty Space: "I can take any empty space and call it a bare stage. A man walks across this empty space whilst someone is watching him, and this is all that is needed for an act of theatre to be engaged." Three elements: a place, an actor, and an audience. What Brook fails to mention is the relationship between the three, which is what we need to be doing right now.I would argue that the connection needs to be ongoing, committed, and interactive. As Wendell Berry says in an interview in Conversations with Wendell Berry, ""I think art comes about in answer to a need. At least, mine does. The community needs to talk about itself, needs to remember itself. It needs to recall significant things that have happened, and to mull them over and figure out what the significance is." In this case, "itself" embraces the three points of Brook's triangle: place, artist, audience. It is a three-way conversation that takes place over time. Berry sees the artist not as "an isolated, preeminent genius who materializes ideas from thin air, but as a person who has been in a community a long time, has been attentive to its voices...and who is prepared to pass on what has been heard. There are two things the artist must do: pass on all this is involved -- the art, the memory, the knowledge. And take responsibility for his or her own work -- that is the reason the work is signed, and that should be the only reason." Responsibility, not credit; humility, not self-aggrandizement.Mick Montgomery made this realization, and it made him hang his head. That is the first step. The next step is to raise your head, look around, and start listening to the people around you.

Desert Winter Garden Update

2009-02-09T19:16:00.000-08:00

My vegetable garden beds are against a south wall so in the winter time they get almost no sun at all. But because it is very hot here I figured that would be kind of ideal for some winter vegetables. Here are my winter garden results:

Cabbage: Warm weeks in January caused them to bolt - at least I think that is why they bolted. Not enough direct sun means no heads.

Lettuces and Endive: Stellar, thriving.

Radish: Pretty good growing but planted too close and didn't thin enough.

Carrots: Still waiting from an October sowing which can't be good.

Beets: Same as carrots!

Parsnips: I read now in my Desert Vegetable Gardening book (from Arizona, relevant but Coachella Valley is a much drier and hotter and much different desert so not always helpful) that parsnips not well adapted. This seems to be bearing out. But the greens are so pretty!

Peas: Come to find out I have planted the wrong variety! I had not shelling peas as I was looking forward to but drying peas. They are doing great but I feel so silly!

Spinach: Beautiful and tasty. The lack of direct sun is keeping them quite small in the leaves, nice.

Pole Beans: Hmmmm... rot on the bottom leaves, too much watering I suspect. Just as I was ready to rip the whole thing out there have sprung up some flowers, so we shall see.

Butternut Squash: Rotted leaves, same as above. I noticed some new leaf growth but the cold weather we are now having may do them in.

And my attempt to start strawberry seeds proved as difficult as mentioned in above mentioned book. Started with about 25 seedlings but one day of neglect left them dry and dead. My attempt to revive them only lead to 4 odd sprouts. I'm holding on to see if these are maybe runners. I will buy plants in April and though normal weather says that is too late for planting in our desert I will hold my breath for mild temperatures!

Ah the Economy... And the Angry White Men Who Control It

2008-11-25T15:08:00.000-08:00

Bye, bye. Thanks for all the prosperity/crash. You've got yours so, really, don't bother about us. Us working class - lower middle class they used to say - well, we don't need much. And by much I mean, food, shelter, clothing, etc. We won't mind working well into our 70s despite how much we save. That is if we can maintain the healthcare to stay alive into our 70s! Hahahahahahahaha.... awwwww, shucks. Well, you all take care now. No, no, I'm serious, you go on a holiday or something. Have you been to Rome? It is a great city. Naw, naw, you've done enough. And when you think about it, you've really been thorough. In fact, we'll still be feeling the residual effects of your 'economy' for years to come. You deserve to float around on a yacht in the Mediterranian Sea with a beautiful girl (who's with you only for the money and yes that orgasm was faked) - ooop! Did I say that out loud? It was just a bit of fun. Like that funny thing you all did, tapping the phones, yeah yeah like a reverse crank call... yeah, good fun that....

Ah well, see ya. Oh you're around through the end of the year... you could leave a little early, I'm sure no one would mind... you have what? Oh, a few other things to destroy first, the enviornment, last few banks want to make sure they've.... right, totally under.

OK. Oh and angry white men who've been running our lives (into the ground) my name is Citizen, not consummer. You never got that right.

Lawn saga

2008-11-14T20:45:00.000-08:00

Here it is, the cool season in the desert. Well, cool-ish. Compared to the rest of the country this is spring. Great for vegetable gardening - I've got peas coming and beets, cabbage, lettuces, parsnips, even strawberries from seed coming up. But the lawn saga is what I really wanted to update.

This morning I went to a desert landscaping seminar hosted by the Water District. I had the chance to speak with someone in the landscaping department from my city and he told me there is "no alternative to the bermuda/rye grass overseed cunundrum". What I have is cool weather drought resistent fescue - not, as he pointed out, heat resistent. "It is sure to look awful in the height of summer" he said categorically. Well, true, but not that bad. As I pointed out there is no one actually on the grass in the summer and so the need for it dwindles as the heat rises. So, the fact that it looks bad becomes solely an aesthetic concern. And frankly, even the Bermuda summer grass looks bad, patchy, brown, whereas the tall fescue I have actually goes bald in spots. Not the most attractive but it was a far sight easier to reseed than having to kill off another type of grass and then coax new grass up. The hoops I went through to get the lush green water conserving grass I now have - which was basically fertilizing, manureur and some nitrogen addition, throw on some seeds and water like heck - is a lot less than what my own gardener and gardeners went through around town to 'overseed'.

By the time September and the end to the drastic heat came about I had a lot of bald spots in the lawn but I must say the middle - where we have the graded gully (for flood reasons - doesn't happen often but better safe than sorry) and the rotor sprinklers overlap was thick, lush and deep green all summer no matter what the heat. This grass loves company. There more there is the more there will be. If it starts to give in to the desert it goes rapidly until the balding meets a densly packed patch of thick blades, then it will stop.

So the idea this year is to reseed the cuss out of my lawn until I can get it as densly packed as the soil will stand... and then when summer comes, hang on.

Consumption Begins

2008-11-01T21:50:00.000-07:00

Last evening commenced what is the official start of the consumption/candy/overeating season in America. I was heartened to know that my son's school teaches a little something about day of the dead - I think it's important to know why holidays came about as much as it is to celebrate them earnestly. But I was a little taken aback at the renewed emphasis on candy.

Here's the thing. Everyone wants to feel generous, that they've given a little something, been festive and lightened someone's day but when everyone is doing it, and to such an extreme it becomes too much... and meaningless... and worse for children, expected.

When I was a child I walked through miles of snow... just kidding, hate to bring up that old device but I think it may be relevant... when I was a child you went door to door on Halloween - that was the only way to get candy - and you got exactly one piece of candy per house. One. Uno. Not even dos... maybe if you happened to hit a house late and they had too much left over they didn't wish to themselves consumme. But one. If you wanted more candy you had to hit more doors, walk farther... and be costumed!

But this year there and for many years I have noticed, since having my own children, that there is candy everywhere. Not only can you get candy at the mall, the museum, the store, everywhere you happen to land at on or about Halloween, but you also get a handfull of candy at each door when trick or treating! We hit exactly our block, roughly 20 houses, and the kids could no longer hold their buckets so full of the stuff were they. And then when they took over the answering the door and doling out the treats they were giving great handfuls to the kids at the door (not to mention many, many uncostumed teens! oi). I had to stop them and tell them to give only two per kid - which I thought, my age showing here no doubt, was pretty generous - to their confused and 'if you say so, mama' looks.

And then today there was candy offered up at every stop. At school there were treats given, several to a bag so that the ancillary take alone was probably as much at the trick or treating portion. In kindergarten last year my son was as likely to get a pencil or eraser as candy bar which I thought pretty responsible. And whatever happened to the cupcake? Is an on the spot treat not enough anymore? Why does there have to be a takeaway prize too to the school party?

And all this consumption and giving, what does it do really? Fills our colons and bloodstreams with excess sugar (oh come on parents, you know you're in your kids' stash), our landfills with wrappers and plastic, our dollar bins with discounted more the days and weeks after, our fat cells with stored energy, too much to burn off in one day. But what in terms of goodwill or connection is it giving us? Our lives are still lived on the surface, we still know very little about our neighbors, we spend lives in private little familial cliques in front of TVs. It's 'fun' for the kids, but what is the message in the final analysis, to expect gifts?

And Christmas is right around the corner.

An Update

2008-09-11T23:19:00.000-07:00

OK, so admittedly, I was told by several gardening professionals that I would "not be happy" with my choice of grass... And now, of course, I see why. There are patches of bleak brownness giving way back to the desert and growing, just as the edged of clearcut rainforest give way to desert. But that part that is well watered and dense looks just lovely. And true enough it has taken quite a lot of water to keep it going during the torrid hot days of summer here in the desert. I suspect the proponents of the rotator type watering system somewhat exaggerated their wetting power. The patches that succumbed first to the desert were those that are on the edges of the rotators and probably do not get the volume of water the lovely green middle does. But I am still committed to my thick blades of deep green grass, even if I have to baby them along! I mean, seriously, can a kid pick up a bug with a wimpy thin yellowish-green blade of Bermuda grass or the fussy rye grass that gets reseeded come fall out here? I bought a 15lb bag of seed and have started to experiment with timing and temperature.

I did get a chance to use some of my compost on my reseeding experimentation. I is nice and black, just like northern soil. Note to self: Be careful not to shred those fake credit cards that come in the mail with credit offers - they don't biodegrade! At least not in months in the compost bin. I have several strips here and there in my grass! Nor do pistashio shells, peanut shells ace but pistachio, nope. And even though all the books suggest one put egg shells in one's bin they do not totally disappear. They are like little smiling teeth all over the reseeding patches of lawn. They'll keep feeding the soil - plants need calcium too come to find out - but if you are an aesthetic gardener maybe you should just bury them. Me, I kind of like the messy. Particularly since I live in the land of perfection - paradise - beauty - pick your adjective. The neat, tidy, sunshiny, paradisey goodness of this desert does get a little relentless. Seriously, 350 days of sunshine is just a little bit of crazy-making. I know why people want to move to the rough hewn hi-desert....

I digress. But I have many plantings that are really loving this climate - a thriving scilla violacea (that our baby-gal picked out herself), pachypodiums doing fine though a little sunburnt, adenium droopy but haven't figured out why yet, even the orange tree that isn't supposed to like this weather is pretty lush. I right killed a fockea edulis though. Perhaps I'll try again when I have some sort of bushy tree or shrub to put it under. Oh and I got a tiny little palo borracho tree - only 12 inches high - which I thought I killed which is doing really well. Jose, the gardener who does all the things I cannot, like putting in irrigation and trees - said "Isn't it going to be messy when it gets big and push up the wall with its roots" "Yeah, but I won't be around in 50 years, so why should I care!" Seriously, it will get too big for the yard and I promise that when we move I'll have it removed... but I am soooooooo looking forward to its butter colored flowers... in 4, 5, 6 years maybe!

Grass Update

2008-07-09T16:10:00.000-07:00

Last weekend the kids and I took our first batch of compost, mixed it in with some topsoil and spread it on the brown spots on the lawn. Fingers crossed.

I've been told that this is a 'self-healing' type of fescue and I have seen evidence of that. The thing is the ground needs to stay moist for the grass to thrive. This happens naturally (and as I found out yesterday too well when humidity is high) by letting the grass stay a bit longish, 2 1/2 to 3 inches in the hot season. But once a dead patch develops it can spread because, of course, there is nothing covering the soil any longer to keep it moist. You could cover it with mulch or soil amendment (as we did with our compost) and hope that at the very least it won't spread. I'm seeing a few little stalks of green so I remain hopeful that this grass that everyone looked at me funny and swore they didn't think it could be grown in the desert (because no one they knew had done it before) will eventually thrive.

Add to the Annals of WTF??!!

2008-06-30T23:22:00.001-07:00

We went to the great outdoors this weekend. Took advantage of the 20 degrees cooler temps in our local mountains.

We like this campground, only about 30 miles from the desert and have been there several times for day trips, once before to camp. When we arrived there were apparently several groups taking advantage of the 100 plus spaces, group spaces and the trailhead to a mountain biking loop. We were pretty lucky to get there early on Friday and get a spot. Pretty crowded but still not full.

As we set up though we began to notice the big daddies of camping arriving - Trailersaurus. Or in the plural, Trailersauri.

So here is the question: If you need to have lighting, a bed to sleep on, a kitchen to cook in, a TV, a VERY loud stereo system, a roll up door in the back with plenty of storage for your ATV and/or ALL of your children's bikes and motorized scooters and probably a full bathroom with shower while you are IN the woods, what are you in the woods for again? Isn't there a very lovely bed and breakfast just up the road that you could drive the car you are towing behind your Trailersaurus to and save thousands of gallons of gas in the process? And can you give the generator a rest for christs sake! That thing is loud.

Peace. That is what we are here in nature for! Not to listen to your generator running all day and to the country and western you just can't live without for one flipping day! We're in the wilderness people! For God's sake put the iPod down and smell the pine trees!!!

So Far, So Good

2008-06-08T14:01:00.000-07:00

Lawn Implementation 2008 is, so far, going fine. We have had patches of brown and a few large chunks that completely died. But Jose came by to see what was going on, adjusted the pressure of the sprinklers, and the time. That, along with about a week of spring-like temperatures, and the lawn took off. Not all brown completely gone but green is starting to peek through in most of the problem patches. But apparently most of it was doing great because we even got mushrooms! Backed off on watering a bit and we seem to have reached a happy medium for this time of year. In 3 weeks or so we will adjust again.

So, 3 weeks in. We thought it would struggle, so skeptical were so many garden experts I'd asked out here about this particular kind of sod. But in fact, we had to buy a lawn mower weeks ahead of when we planned and have cut it twice!

And you know, it looks very pretty. It is a deep, dark green with beefy blades - unlike the almost translucent, skinny blades that most summer lawns in the desert sport. I am wondering why no one had tried this before? I seem to be met with skepticism and surprise by every garden enthusiast and professional I talk to about my lawn. "What kind of grass again? Never heard of it. Who sells it?" Even the lady at the sod company when I made my order had to double check that I was calling the right office and ordering the right product. It is so unheard of here, that of the dozen or so people I have spoken to about it, not one has heard of growing this type of sod in the desert.

Perhaps more accomplished gardeners than I have tried and failed and everyone knows something I don't. We have, afterall, only just reached 100 degree temps for days in a row. The brutality of summer is not yet here. But then if they have never heard of it...? Maybe I am a trailblazer. Maybe I will see my foolish ways when the 120s arrive. Who knows. But so far, so good!

Green Gardening

2008-05-20T10:32:00.000-07:00

I know, I know. It sounds like an oxymoron. But it really is a goal of mine. Thus the composting, thus the multiple visits to local nurseries to pick brains, ask questions, etc.

But right now we are on Lawn Implementation 2008 - which is the culmination of Lawn Quest 2008. I was searching for a grass that would grow under our wild temperature extremes - 40s to 120s. We don't get many cold temperatures, certainly not for weeks in a row. But we do get hot temperatures for weeks, months in a row. What other climates call summer we call Spring. The only area in the country that is hotter is Death Valley! But lawn we must because children need. So, what I gathered during Lawn Quest 2008 was that in order to have an efficient water use lawn is that you need several things: a deep root system; and efficient watering system whereby you can water without waste for longer periods thus encouraging the deep rooting; thick blade that can withstand the heat and will grow longer in summer to protect the root; and - here's the kicker - I DID NOT want to lawn scalp or as some people say 'reseeding'. But it is really not as lovely a process as 'reseeding; sounds.

Let me describe: In September or early October you stop watering your grass for about a week to ten days. Then, once it is completely dead, your gardener or yourself puts your lawn mower on the lowest setting, set to dig if possible, and you lop off the head and shallow root of the entire grass system, kicking up the worst possible dust cloud you can imagine and all the pollen, fertilizer you have put on the lawn all year and (if you garden really evil) herbicide to kill the grass before this process. Thus the term 'scalping'. It is really awful, what the hubby and I call Migraine Season. Worse than Spring, worse than pollen alone. Imagine pollen, mixed with the finest of sand - whioh our 'dirt' really is here in the desert - mixed with chemicals and whatever desicated bug juice and parts got swept up in the process. Now just imagine this fine particulate floating around the Coachella Valley that is shaped like a giant bowl - kind of like Mexico City - catching and holding in all this particulate. It gets everywhere, your car, your clothes, in your house, in your lungs! Indeed awful.

So, even though I only have 900 sq ft of grass I did not want to add to this process. (BTW just FYI there are over 120 golf courses in this valley ALL scalping, so when I say I am making a small impact I am exaggerating really, I am making a minute impact) I found what, hopefully, will be the best, albeit not prettiest, solution. See, my theory is that everyone here wants their lawn to look like the golf course. But you pay the scalping price. I just want lawn that will thrive during Fall, Winter and most of Spring, and survive the summer - because really in 110 degree heat the kids are not romping on the lawn.

We went to Earth Day at our local zoo and spoke to the water district and they told us about the most efficient sprinklers on the market. We asked our gardener, Jose, to put them in. It was the first time he had used them, they are so new. So impressed with their efficiency he says he wants to put them in his own lawn! Then this weekend we sent Jose's son off to collect the sod on Saturday. Saturday afternoon, temperatures reaching 113 degrees in Palm Springs Airport where they measure, Jose and his guys install. Not the best time to lay down sod on the hottest of days but what are ya gonna do. The weather often does not cooperate.

So far it is still more green than brown although there are patches that are failing, not getting enough water. The hubby is home babysitting it since he is currently jobless and making sure it gets added water as needed. The meteorologists promise temps will fall to the 80s in the next seven days.

Hang on grass!

Toy Season

2008-05-07T23:09:00.000-07:00

It is our toy season number 1. Our second toy season of the year is, of course, Christmas. But come May and June we have two birthdays. The upside of birthdays a month apart is that you get them (i.e. party planning) over with and don't have to dread for months another one approaching. The downside is that because they are so close together there tends to be (and don't ask me why because I would have to admit to my bad parenting skills) more toy purchases. And we all know that with toy purchases comes trash.

So, what to do with cardboard that is covered with pieces of tape and plastic bits? It is the juice box dilemma all over. Technically, not recycleable. But practically, come on, shouldn't it be? But who wants to sit on the kitchen floor and peel all the tape off cardboard? I understand that packaging is now meant to be theft proof (and rough sea journey from China proof as well, no doubt) but do they really need THAT much tape and invisible rubberbands, and plastic covered wire holding pieces in, and plastic anchors? Each toy brings along 20 pieces of trash!

Who wants to write a letter to China asking if they can make all those pieces recyleable with me?

How it works the wrong way

2008-04-20T19:41:00.000-07:00

When we think of consumming less we naturally think of consumming less bad for you things, like beer and ice cream, or always buying the latest fashions in shoes and clothing and tossing last year's wear in the trash...

But apparently Americans - at least those here in our area - are consumming less knowledge. I suppose that is conservation of a sort.

My excellent hubby is a geography buff and had been enjoying teaching our 5 year old son countries on his little globe. Having practically mastered all the 'big' (geographically speaking) countries he wanted to get him a bigger globe. He had seen one that was half way in between our small one and the regulation sized at Target. But when we got there it was no where to be found. Hubby asked an 'associate' who at first did not know what he meant.

"What is this globe you speak of? What does it represent? Oh, you say an orb that is a map of the earth! How novel!" his perplexed look seemed to say.

So clearly there is a problem... but then we ran into another associate who said that globes were 'seasonal' items. Clearly Target places an emphasis on geography comprehension only at certain times of the year...

Undaunted we drove across the street to Mervyns. They had no globes. Our daughter did get a nice new Hello Kitty backpack for when she starts school. I know, I know, consumption. We could have just as easily gone to the thrift store or passed down her brothers backpack. She doesn't actually need one, it is all part of my scheme to get to her learn to use the potty - part of the bribery and cohersion part - no potty, no school. Hello Kitty backpack = enthusiasm for going to school. With our son school was enough. But either she is very clever or not as interested...

I digress. So hubby leaves us at Mervyns to browse and goes over alone to the dreaded Toys R Us. No one in their right mind actually takes children there! But there is one shoddy little talking globe without even all the countries and questionable scale and mapping.

Still undaunted he drove back across the street to Office Depot. There, was one, lonely globe on the shelf... which we now own.

So the question is, don't people own globes anymore? I owned a globe for years even after school just to look at and ponder! I highly doubt if all the available globes had been hungrily snapped up before we got there...

Yes, Jay Leno pokes fun at Americans for not being able to find their own country on a map and other global ignorances. I used to always think they tossed out the smart people to the editing room floor and kept the numbskulls. But what if I am wrong about that and actually most people are ignorant of their world. Scary thought.

So while I normally say Consumme Less, in this regard I have to say we all need to consumme more. More knowledge, more information, more understanding. Afterall the world is always in style... although it could possibly go the way of last year's pumps... yikes.

Composting, negative 101

2008-04-08T12:19:00.000-07:00

In an effort to try to do more to save the earth from mounds of trash, (I'm super keen to see one) I decided when we moved into a house (with solar by the way, it's something at least) with a backyard, that I would compost. I could have done the under the sink composting - with worms - that's right live worms under your sink! Or as the Master Composter who taught the class indicated, dead worms, at least until you figured out how not to kill them... But I don't love the earth that much! Hey, wasn't putting up with cockroaches and mice (or could have just been really large cockroaches, possible, it is the desert) in my walls for years enough?

So, anyways... we now have a compost bin in our backyard so nothing goes in the trash that could go in the compost bin. I finally seperated out the almost there stuff (looking good by the way and our future tomato plants will love it) and started a new mound as we are getting ready to put in our irrigation and backyard lawn. OOOOOOHHHH! Blast! Lawn... that's right... in the desert. If it makes you feel better it will be terribly small and actually played on by a couple of happy children. Unlike the lawns that line the streets here in the desert, the lawns that no one walks on, that get watered incessantly so they look like golf courses, the lawns that get scalped every fall shoving dust with plant, chemical and probably animal particulate into the air for all passersby and local residents to breathe.

My search continues for a type of lawn that will withstand the heat and not need to be reseeded! They can put a man on the moon but they can't find a grass that can withstand the sun and the cold???

Title

2008-04-08T12:18:00.001-07:00

Consume Less Enjoy More (C.L.E.M.)

Just to be clear...

CLEM #1

2008-04-03T23:52:00.000-07:00

I have for years not worn a watch. Something about being prego and then having babies makes you NOT WANT TO KNOW what time it is. But now, 3 and a half years after the second - and no new life on the horizon - I need a watch. For a time I resurrected my favorite watch which my Hubby bought for me when we were dating, a Swatch from the late 90s. But then the watch band broke and I was afraid I would lose it if I kept wearing it. My oldest, a boy, now 5 - almost 6 - decided that all my running, hiking and sports watches belonged to him. I did manage to borrow one back for a time, but the battery ran out.

So, in order to attempt to live more, use less stuff, be less of a negative impact, be less responsible for the overflowing landfills of trash - I decided to, instead of the typical American consummer impulse of just going to the mall and buying a new watch, to get a new watch band for my Swatch. I've never loved a watch before, so that takes care of the 'enjoy more' part. I have no idea how much packaging the new band will come in from Swatchonline.com. I may have to eat my 'consume less' words. I'll let you know. (And I won't buy a new jogging watch either. I promise to pick the cat hair out of the Velcro and just get a new battery for it, while wresting it from a five year old. The jogging that might go along with just may fit into the 'consume less' part, provided I can get the chocolate and white wine out of my house.)