I was trolling satellite TV the other night when I stopped to watch an NSF lecture given by Angela Belcher of MIT.

Dr. Belcher is a professor with appointments in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering and the Biological Engineering Division and has developed custom-evolved viruses to advance nanotechnology. What good is that?

Oh, my, the good is all over the place.

First, she's smart as hell and smart is hot. Second, she clearly loves what she does. She actually talked about designing experiments because they'd be "fun" and "neat." She used big words, too, but I found her enthusiasm adorable. Third, she talked about applying her research to devices like nanobatteries and semiconductors. Read more…

Happy Halloween, my little pirates.

Every year we go to the Pal's house in the Central District to scare the neighborhood. Her house was built in 1906 and is on asmall hill that rises from the sidewalk. It looms over you especially and when lit from beneath.

This year our theme is Circue du Scaree. A couple years ago, the Pal and I bought a bunch of stuff from one of those professional haunted house things---we have probably a hundred skeletons and skeleparts, dozens of cast masks and related costumage, even bollards with skulls on them to mark out the walking path. And we got the creepiest clown costumes ever. I mean, so creepy, my skin crawled carrying the headpieces to the car. And I rarely get creeped out. Read more…

Dear Santa,

I have been a very good girl. I recycle, am nice to stray animals, help old people across the street whether they want to go or not, and eat all my broccoli even though I hate it. Please bring me one of these. http://www.rockler.com/product.cfm?page=...

While your elves are handy, I'd prefer this Jet Benchtop Oscillating Spindle Sander as it's made really well (five stars on Rockler!) and will match my table saw. If this is too hard for you (or you just don't have the cash), please guilt someone reading this blog to buy one for me. Read more…

It's been a long time since we went on a ghosthunt.

The fab GF and our Pal have done several. Enough to be featured on a Discovery Channel kids' show easily debunking some true believers by replicating their "ghost" evidence and explaining what caused the phenomenon.

I am the skeptic. The fab GF is also a skeptic, but wants to believe in ghosts, while the Pal sides with the fab GF because it's funnier when they gang up on me. Those are the internal workings of our organization, The Bureau of Occult Occurences---B.O.O.

We have a woefully outdated website, a logo, and t-shirts. And we have equipment: non-contact thermometers (with and without a laser), decibel meters, video and still cameras, hidden microphones. And walkie-talkies. Read more…

Last Friday, our old septic tanks were decommissioned in a process known as pump, crush, and fill. Sorta like a certain Wall Street bail-out, only much more honest. The smell was about the same, though.

The septic guys then dug a big hole for the two new tanks. Now, before anybody starts a'wondering what's the matter with the fab GF and I that we need two 1,000 gallon tanks, let me point out that septic tanks work by separating liquid and solid waste. The liquid is pumped (or gravity fed) to a drainfield, where it is released into the soil, making some bacteria and plants very very happy. Read more…

I'm beat. Lots and lots harvested and mulched and composted today. Pounds. Anyway, looking for Green Tomato recipes today, I came across this. Simple, yet deep. I'm all for it. Michelle (cause you know the press will make you do it, and not him) what do you say? Wanna be like Eleanor in this respect? It could work, it's totally a-"fill in ideology here.

 Read more…

The New Dawn roses have produced one of the last roses this autumn, a beautiful pale pink rose, just beginning to unfold. Outside here it's already 49 and the weather service predicts lower temperatures tonight. I live in a micro-zone called "Colder than the Other Side of Town" or "the Great White North;" I often have frost when others do not. Tonight you can see your breath already.
Do I bag the rose to make sure it doesn't freeze?
With a paper or plastic bag? With a little added moisture in the bag (an old rosarian trick) or not?
Help! I'd like to see my beautiful pale pink rose fully bloom--outside.
Or should I (wince) cut it?

Nature is shouting!

Every time I open the door, even under white-gray skies, the trees show beautiful reds, bright yellows, soft oranges and roses.

The landscape is suddenly more three dimensional; you can see through your own red trees into the yellow of the next clearing.

After the recent rain storm, the ground itself is carpeted with multi-colored maple leaves. The wild asters, big clouds of white flowers, are covered by wet bees and red and gold pieces of leaf.

A veritable shitpile of photos to follow, dial up folks.

So there's a great deal going on today in the garden, color-speaking, and I guess I just went overboard. But that's the spirit of the age, isn't it? Say, I wonder what I could get for these beans...

Anyhoo, this is likely the last of the jewel weather, sunny and warm. It seemed a good day to break out the camera to get full effect. Hello there, Miss Thing. Read more…

Uplifting and motivating.

We’re making healthy food affordable to everyone.”

Growing Power started in 1993, with Allen using teens in the Silver Spring neighborhood to grow food at its retail store.

The organization grew from there, and in May, it expanded its program of selling grocery bags of fruit and vegetables for $14 — enough produce to feed a family of four for a week.

Allen and his staff buy food in bulk through a national farmer cooperative and raise produce at Growing Power’s 2-acre farm on Silver Spring and a 40-acre farm in the Town of Merton.

In addition, Growing Power and Maple Tree School and Community Garden, 6644 N. 107th St., are using 5 acres to teach young people about organic agriculture and the business of growing food.

With the help of his daughter, Erika, he has also expanded operations to Chicago.

Growing Power also uses workshops to teach aspiring urban farmers and focuses on low-cost technologies.

In awarding the fellowship, the MacArthur Foundation noted that Allen’s efforts are guided by the knowledge that a healthy diet can help fight problems such as diabetes and obesity — problems that can be exacerbated by limited access to fresh and affordable fruits and vegetables. Read more…

What's fall like now where you are?

Areas are going to be lightly frosting over tonight, in places in the North.

What should be brought in?

-Fragile or tropical things in pots (including amaryllis)
-herbs like basil
-some vegetables (toms?)
-currently flowering plants
-avocado or other tropical trees

Other suggestions in the face of a light frost?
Should any garden plants be dug up?

Hi, all.

Since gardeners are thick on the ground in this place, I figured this would be a good place to ask for some advice re: my weensy little NYC garden space, a/k/a my window boxes.

I have three, approximately 1' x 2', full south-facing sunlight. Right now there are a lot of weeds in them, and it's too late to do much with them in terms of food-producing plants, but it's not too late to plan ahead for next year, right?

So: if I want to plant bulbs for next year, do I just stick them in the dirt, forget about them and then enjoy the daffodils when they come up in the spring? Can I plant other things when the daffs are gone without crowding them out? Read more…

After three days of rain, my tomatoes are fat sweet prizes in a wet wilderness. My fingers, questing gently, encounter . . . ugh. Slugs like tomatoes. Ugh.

700 entries. Blue ribbon in Open Class baking, the pink is second place in Best of Class, Heritage Recipe.

The final recipe: Read more…

Back at ya. Read more…

I have some samples of wood pre- and post-planing, just to give an idea of what a planer can do. The first two photos are angles of the same stack of wood: Rough sawn yellow cedar from our tree, oak from a pallet, rough sawn maple from our trees, and some salvaged western red cedar.

and

 Read more…

Indoors and out?

Out: lettuce, onions, radishes...is it too late for snow peas?

In: herbs? Maybe lettuce?
Do you need grow lights?

...Was it worth while to lay--
with infinite exertion--
a roof I can't live under?
--All those blueprints,
closings of gaps 20
measurings, calculations?
A life I didn't choose
chose me: even
my tools are the wrong ones
for what I have to do...

This is the kind of poem that makes me believe in poetry the way I believe in hammers. Read more…

Anyone have any great recipes for tomato sauce? Or other tomato recipes?

If you still have too many tomatoes, try the Tomatina, a tomato-throwing festival. (Picture 20 made me laugh the hardest--maybe because it looks like eager pickers?)

The Impossible Dream has been realized. Welcome, Northwest Passage. buffy character voice "It's here!"

By Geoffrey Lean, Environment Editor
Sunday, 31 August 2008

Open water now stretches all the way round the Arctic, making it possible for the first time in human history to circumnavigate the North Pole, The Independent on Sunday can reveal. New satellite images, taken only two days ago, show that melting ice last week opened up both the fabled North-west and North-east passages, in the most important geographical landmark to date to signal the unexpectedly rapid progress of global warming.

Again, with the whole "without comment" stuff.

So, sadly, the growing season is winding down and harvest time will soon be here. I expect many of us will be very busy. But after the last of the cans and dried herbs have been put up, it'll be time for me to return to the indoor project list. This year's first job: putting a proper floor on a 10x12 concrete basement surface. It's my office, and it's damn cold in the winter. I'd like to change that.

Consider this an open flooring thread, I want to hear any stories and suggestions and environmental correctness concerns you have, as well as ideas about how to do it cheaply. Let's assume I've got a budget of $500. Read more…

Because of this:

Obama’s a helluva lot more human than the botox domme Queen Cindy and her gigilo soldier of fortune John Sidney McCain. You all have a helluva lot of a greater chance surviving the next four years with an Obama preznitcy than with a McCain-Cheneyburton oligarchy. If you vote “Mc$ame” like Rove wants, or you simply sit out this $election on your hands in petulance, you, personally, are making one of the biggest mistakes of your life.

And this

you whiners need to just register (R) and send in your KKK membership dues. Now that the Alaskan lady is running you have a reason to vote for McCain. (I kid of course, but seriously, get over it as Lord Cheeto is fond of saying)

And this Read more…

So The Exorcist III was a horrible movie, but I liked it anyway. Especially for Brad Dourif's portrayal of a madman inhabiting the priest's body; they morphed his voice and it was tres creepy. My favorite line is when he gets going in his glorious evil, and finishes with "and it will.not.end!!1! That's sort of how I feel about having all this blooming color so late in the season. You can feel fall in the air here, but my flowers are denying it. And I'm glad. Food and blooms to follow, with the usual warning for dial-up peeples.

Glory! I've got a bunch. I totally grok why people grow them; when almost everything else is finished blooming, they are coming on, and just go and go and go. Read more…

Cocoon House offers transitional housing for homeless kids and kids booted out of foster care after turning 18. It’s a small organization, but they help a lot of kids finish high school and get some skills so they can make good choices for themselves throughout their lives. (Bet there are similar places near you, if you’re inclined to give them a hand.) Read more…