kareina

Out my front window I can see:

* White flowers from the potato vine in the backyard
* Dark pink of the flowering crabapple
* Fresh pale green growth on the podocarpus
* Several fruit in different stages of ripening on the limequat tree
* Fresh growth and some flowers on the redcurrants bushes
* Fresh growth on the rosebush and fig tree
* Fresh growth on the dwarf pomegranate that we've decided is coming out this year. 😢

Of the plants that we're going to remove I'm saddest about the pomegranate.
We're also going to take out two Chinese Fringe bushes because they're crowding the citrus trees, and two shrubs at the end of the patio that aren't thriving at all.

My plan is to cut down the foliage and ask Sergio to take out the stumps, and maybe dig them out a little bit so we could try and plant something else in their spots.

Current Mood: busy

unicornduke

Hey all, if you'd like to join the crafting hangout, it is tonight from 6-8pm ET!

Video encouraged but not required!

Topic: Crafting Hangout

Time: Mondays 6:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting

Link

Meeting ID: 973 2674 2763

hrj

I sometimes say that I live and die by routines. If I have a routine for doing something, then it gets done. If I don't have a routine (or I depart from one) then anything could happen. This means there are things I do more often than I need to (like checking blood pressure or recording weight) because if I don't fit them into a daily routine, I don't get around to it. But it means that things that need a less frequent routine are sometimes tricky (like theoretically once-a-month housekeeping tasks, such as cleaning the cat waterer).

The daily bike-coffeeshop-write-bike routine is solid (even though there are two days when it's coffeeshop-write-gym instead), but if I need to do something substantial before biking--especially if it involves putting on normal clothes--then it's hard for me to shift myself back to it later in the day.

So on a day like today when I started off with an online podcast interview to record, I probably won't get the bike out. Knowing that, I plan to do yardwork and housecleaning. But there's always the temptation to say, "I make my own rules; I could just take a day off." Except I bought some Alpine strawberry sets a few days ago and they really need to get in the ground...

unicornduke

As expected, the time change has absolutely fucked up my sleep schedule. Not helped by a skunk spraying something in the front yard at 4:30am this morning so my bedroom smelled intensely of skunk while I was laying there awake for no reason and the house still smells faintly. We are going to have to trap it if it's living under the porch. And also not helped by covering the boiling for an hour until 10:30pm last night.

We have successfully started boiling sap although I'm not super involved in it. I don't know what I'm doing, never really have done it, so I panic a lot about it while taking over for my dad so he gets a break. Like last night, the sap started drawing off but the container with the filters nearly overflowed because the filters were ??? and there was some panicking. My dad said it probably wasn't going to draw off at all in the hour he went inside. So you know. Normal stuff. My sister is in town for a couple of days to help with it at least. Once I get some better idea on how it all works, I'll make a post about it. Currently, we are producing delicate grade, which my sister called cotton candy tasting. That changes over the tapping season as the microbes change.

I finished splitting all the basswood on the ground, just need to stack it. Not sure we have quite enough wood for the season, but I think it'll be a bit shorter anyway. I have started shifting focus to the field season, it is time to start outside work. Blueberry pruning is up first since that needs to be done dormant. I should crank through that quick. Then moving and mulching with woodchips. I need to order grow lights for our starts, I need to get peppers started in the next two weeks or so, figure out pumpkin orders, etc etc.

There's some health stuff going on with my parents that we are waiting to hear on, so I am scaling back farm stuff that was going to be a bit of a stretch to complete. The weird fruits like currants and expanding the elderberries.

I am working on sidejob stuff and need to bill that client. Need to nap and eat more food. I made chocolate cake and pizza the other night. Also split three loads of wood for the burner once I got the bobcat tire fixed. I took the bobcat tire to the tire place to get fixed on the day we had freezing rain, not my best move and there was only one hairy moment on a backroad until I kicked it into 4 wheel and slowed way down. Skipped that road on the way back. Main roads were fine. The bobcat had to come back to the main farm to pick up the sap totes because of where we put them for good gravity feeding since regular tractor forks can't lift high enough.

Also went to a grower meeting about christmas trees, looks like a really good enterprise, don't have the capacity this year, but should next year if all goes well. Interesting thing, a lot of the christmas tree farms have been in business for 50-100 years. Wildly long time.

I keep focusing on farm stuff because the world is such a shitshow. My local rep emailed me some propaganda so I sent back a little rant on how immoral bombing Iran is. I don't think it will do anything.

But yesterday instead of going to spinning group, I drove an hour and a half to an event put on by the regional trans org which was performances and a makers market and I felt like such shit driving down, but afterwards I was so happy. It was so nice to just see all the queer folks, and so many! And bought some weird art. And saw some performances. What a delight. Did get to talk to someone who is localish to me and they said they are trying to get some more folks together up our way at various places, so I'm excited to keep an eye out for that.

conuly

And there's an increase in mortality with every change of the clocks.

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( Read more... )

madbaker

This week's Resolution Recipe: Pork and Peanut Butter Stew... For Science!
"This stew has a West African flavor profile - although it's made with pork shoulder, which is not exactly traditional in the area."
( Read more... )

Current Mood: awake

conuly

I'm worried I lost my kindle when I misplaced my red bag in which everything is. Well, not everything, but perhaps my kindle. Or maybe not. My kindle might be under my bed. If it's not under my bed, I'll have to replace it sooner or later. I'm a bit wary of looking and finding out one way or another.

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( Read more... )

hrj

I prefer not to duplicate content on multiple platforms, largely through laziness. And I tend to assume that if people are interested in the content I post on a particular platform, they'll follow me on that platform.

That said, I'm posting a couple of multi-part long-form essays over at my Alpennia.com blog that people might possibly be interested in.

One is an 8-part series presenting and analyzing the primary source material on 18th century pirates Anne Bonny and Mary Read, in addition to presenting and analyzing the narratives about them in the General History of the Pirates. This is part of my usual Lesbian Historic Motif Project blog.

The other will be a 16-part series entitled The Theory of Related-ivity: A History and Analysis of the Best Related Work Hugo Category. If you were the sort of fannish data nerd who enjoy the article Charting the Cliff that Camestros Felapton and I wrote a couple years ago, this may also be your thing. Related-ivity will also be mirrored on File 770. (I haven't started posting this one yet.)

So you have several ways of reading, if that's something you want to do. I'd love it if you read (and commented) at the Alpennia.com blog. The blog also has a RSS feed here at Dreamwidth but I have no way of being notified about comments on it. And, as noted, Related-ivity will also appear on File 770 (where you can also comment) but obviously the LHMP series won't appear there. It occurs to me that, given that the RSS feed on Dreamwidth doesn't like image files, it's probably a poor choice for Related-ivity, since you won't be able to see the figures and tables.

Why is life so complicated?

anais_pf posting in

thefridayfive

These questions were suggested by

dray.

1. Do you know of any other words for snow? What's your favourite and why?

2. What's your ideal temperature range for winter?

3. Favourite winter activity? What about it makes it your favourite?

4. What are three things you can't do without when winter arrives?

5. Do you have favourite winter holiday activities?

Copy and paste to your own journal, then reply to this post with a link to your answers. If your journal is private or friends-only, you can post your full answers in the comments below.

If you'd like to suggest questions for a future Friday Five, then do so on DreamWidth or LiveJournal. Old sets that were used have been deleted, so we encourage you to suggest some more!

**Remember that we rely on you, our members, to help keep the community going. Also, please remember to play nice. We are all here to answer the questions and have fun each week. We repost the questions exactly as the original posters submitted them and request that all questions be checked for spelling and grammatical errors before they're submitted. Comments re: the spelling and grammatical nature of the questions are not necessary. Honestly, any hostile, rude, petty, or unnecessary comments need not be posted, either.**

conuly

(or ever) but I also don't want to not do it, so here we are I guess?

In order to make this a normal post, let me say that my Robert Moses counter is incrementing up again. It has now been 0 hours since the last time somebody brought up Robert Moses, but it's my fault for reading an article about walkable cities and then scrolling to the comments.

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redbird

The trip to New Orleans was very good for

cattitude, who had an easier tiee finding food he could eat and enjoy than Adrian and I, but the few days of warm weather did us good as well. (And then the trip home was physically difficult and painful for Adrian, unfortunately.)

I did more walking each day, including but not only the travel days, than I expected or planned, and found it less difficult than I would have predicted.

Saturday afternoon we met my brother at House of Blues, because they had outdoor music and a performer he liked. That was fun, and Adrian enjoyed dancing with an enthusiastic stranger. I think that was the day we took a streetcar downtown in search of lunch, only to find lines for the relatively small number of places with outdoor seating. But I'd wanted to ride a streetcar--streetcars are part of the New Orleans transit network, not just a tourist attraction, so we could get one a couple of blocks from our hotel.

Our hotel had a courtyard, which was part of why Cattitude chose it. The courtyard had an unexpected, charming cat. The drum circle I mentioned in the previous post was in the park across the street from our hotel, which is part of why Mark recommended it.

Also, the New Orleans airport terminal plays music, not very loudly, over the PA system, which is entirely fitting for an airport named after Louis Armstrong, and much better than what comes over the PA at most airports.

madbaker

This week's Resolution Recipe: Salmon en Papillote with Cabbage.
"en papillote is Fronch for "in paper". However fancy this sounds, the technique is actually quite simple."
( Read more... )

adrian_turtle

I don't usually travel to a place for the place, as such. I've left home a lot, but in all but one case I've been going to visit a person or going to an event like a con. But Cattitude was having a hard time coping with winter, and then we had a blizzard, and it all got to be too much. So Redbird and Cattitude and I picked up and went to New Orleans for a few days, because it wasn't snowing there.

One of many challenging things about winter is that we still don't want to eat in company indoors. It has been SIX YEARS, and sometimes it feels like we are the only people in the country who care about public health and it is just so exhausting. (There were a few other people wearing masks in the airport, which felt good.) But the general frustration is still wearing, especially in winter. We were informed that New Orleans has lots of restaurants with patios that are open, even in February. The crowds recede after Mardi Gras, and the weather forecast was glorious.

New Orleans is a great city for dining. Unfortunately, it's a terrible city for ME to dine. I keep kosher in a very haphazard way (I won't eat pork or shellfish, but I don't care how the chicken was slaughtered), and I can't eat dairy products at all. Everything had shellfish or dairy or both. I went down there thinking most restaurants would have have at least one vegan item on the menu, but the places with outdoor dining or takeout generally did not.

The music was good. I need more music in my life.

redbird

[Ny is gravely ill, unconscious, and unlikely to recover:]

Update: Ny is gone. As of a couple of hours ago, she no longer has brain function, and will be moved off life support after evaluation for organ transplant, and allowed to die peacefully, not necessarily immediately.

[my earlier info was via princessofgeeks, who linked to

goss's post]

Current Mood: upset and sad

kareina

Spring is certainly already here—when I got on the bus this morning, the entire front window upstairs was covered in a thick sheet of ice, from melting snow hitting the window and freezing again, as temps were just under freezing.

However, by the time we were in Umeå, and hour and a half later, the temps were above freezing, and the action of the windshield wipers had taken away all of the slush so I could see out the window again.

conuly

And, incidentally, freaked the fuck out of my sister

I did tell her there was a fox!

conuly

and on the packaging it says:

"This product is not a toy and is intended for collection or use by individuals aged 14 or above"

They're superhero stickers! 14 and above! What do they think kids are doing, eating them!?

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( Read more... )

conuly

But not for the East Coast, not really. So whatever.

kareina

After work today we started a banner for Camp Northern Lights. We already have the entrance banner, which says "Camp Northern Lights, Everyone Always Welcome", and this time Keldor wanted to communicate that without any text. This might do it: A Sea Reindeer, sharing a drink with a Unicorn, followed by a trumpet-playing rabbit serenading a dragon, with the help of a bagpipe playing cat, followed by a flaming fox-duck chasing a snail, wearing a sombrero. The Unicorn's rainbow tail will continue behind the rest of the creatures, and, overhead, a dark blue sky with Northern Lights. It will be interesting to see if we can pull this off.

unicornduke

Hey all, if you'd like to join the crafting hangout, it is tonight from 6-8pm ET!

Video encouraged but not required!

Topic: Crafting Hangout

Time: Mondays 6:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting

Link

Meeting ID: 973 2674 2763

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Spring and gardening

Crafting hangout

I love a routine

(no subject)

Daylight Savings is such a waste of time

(no subject)

As one of life's petty problems goes

Pointer to items of potential interest

The Friday Five for 6 March 2026

I don't really want to make a regular post now

more about the New Orleans trip

Parched Fish

New Orleans

bad news about @minoanmiss

Spring in the north

Fox went out on a chilly night, prayed to the moon to give him light

I ordered some stickers

The blood moon rises once again

A new banner started

crafties

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March 2026

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