Sunday

A beautiful sunny day and I'm a little hungover and listening to Uncle Tupelo. "Down here everybody is equally poor...Down here we don't care what happens outside the screen door..." I always liked that line. I did venture outside the literal screen door (though not the metaphorical screen door) to dig around in the dirt today. Naturally this was before it got so beautiful and sunny, so I had to suffer the elements. I planted the sunflower starts along the side of the house, and planted sunflower seeds along the front fence line. I think the sunflowers will go well with the general aesthetic of liberty street house. They are sort of friendly and homey and not too pretentious and....drunk? Fine, they are really more wholesome than the inhabitants of the house, but I still think they are a nice match. If all goes as planned I will be able to sit in my wheelchair, Sacred, on the porch and drink cheap beer and admire a nice row of sunflowers. Talk about the American dream.

I also planted our brobdignagian sweet pea starts. The peas that Povertyrich planted outside are doing so well there was hardly any room for the starts, so I planted a few of them outside the bed. They are pictured above in the pall of my ominous shadow. The black and white photo shows the peas that are growing up in the bed. Rather Soviet bloc-esque, eh? Today's homage to Eisentstein. Oh wait, wasn't I claiming that I'm not pretentious? Damn.

Sunday

It's rainy outside, and I'm supposed to be working for the Evil Empire. The Evil Cat of Hell is in her old blue bathrobe watching trashy Sunday movies on television, taking a break from her quest to know everything. I think Corneilius is listening to Wait Wait. . . Don't Tell Me in the kitchen, taking a break from hunting rats.

A few sunflowers have sprouted and are now out on the front porch, enjoying the weather. Peas, chard, spinach, and two kinds of lettuce have also sprouted. The greens need to be thinned.

Nothing has sprouted in the beds yet, other than morning glories. I dug up a bucket full of roots and planted a few in a basket and hung them in one of the dead trees in the backyard. I'm hoping I can convince the remaining morning glories to take to the fence along the north side of the yard, where they'll have to battle the sunflowers and, hopefully, leave the vegetables alone.

more from the International District

random photos

flotsam

The first flower of this spring is this daffodil I rescued from the yard waste bin on Sunday. It had found its way amid the bits of screen door, polystyrene, and other flotsam one finds when digging, and managed to poke its green and yellow bud over the rim of the bin. I planted it in a planter in the backyard next to some hothouse tulips that are already on the way out. The stalk was barely able to support its intrepid little bud, so I tied it to a stick of bamboo and, this evening it rewarded me with this flower.

The romaine has sprouted in the pots in the Liberty House dining room (no doubt looking forward to the same party as the Evil Cat), and a pea sprouted in the raised bed. Here's to hoping we can fight back the morning glories.

Here's a row of flowers next door to my place in the International District, and a row of not-yet-flowers near a sidewalk on Capitol Hill. I'll let Evil Cat identify them.

.

and so we begin.....

music: Tom Waits. Invitation to the Blues

Last year I muttered about planting some basil, but gave up in the face of summer's flood of morning glory vines and Reineer. This year, I am under Wisertime's (aka PovertyRich) good influence and have actually spent time digging in the back yard on two separate occasions. Wisertime has devoted considerably more time to the project, and the barren wasteland of our backyard now looks more like a construction zone-as Tom Waits would say, 'It's all stripped down."

We have started seedlings inside. We planted them while drinking wine and being rather merry at the dining room table, so the young plants started out in circumstances that, should all go well, will be remarkably similar to where they end up-on the dining room table to the tune of wine and laughter. By that I mean, that despite my tender administrations, I plan to drunkenly eat said seedlings one of these days. One has to appreciate the rather 'bloodthirsty' and opportunistic nature of gardening. Okay, so maybe I am just trying to rationalize my interest in a subject that remains hopelessly constructive and 'good'.

I ramble on....in more concrete terms, Povertyrich planted ginger, potatoes, horseradish and asparagus in the back yard. I was crawling around in the dirt planting a row of sun flowers along the property line when D wandered into the yard.

"I told you I had a wholesome side," I said, feeling very vindicated.

I'm inspired