I don’t make brownies very often, because I like this recipe so much: I think it’s spoiled me on other brownies, and it calls for top-quality chocolate, which is (as it should be) really expensive. It also calls for some patience, which I do not always have.
The recipe originated in the Farm Vegetarian Cookbook but has since seen some major modifications.
Early on in our gardening here, we would find huge slugs in the garden, and lots of ‘em. They’d eat our seedlings (until we figured out to put paper collars around the especially tender seedlings) and in exchange, we would pick them up with sticks and fling them into the alley behind our house to shrivel and die. We did the beer trick for a few years, and now we rarely see the big’uns. What we do see are these tiny guys, mostly just in the strawberry bed. They can eat a lot of berry, but we wind up growing so many that it’s not a huge deal if they eat some.
But I just read recently that slugs hate coffee, right around the time I’d asked our pals at the Morning Glory Coffeehouse to save some grounds for us, for mulching the acid-loving blueberries and rhododendron. So I put a small layer of coffee ground mulch around the perimeter of the strawberry bed yesterday. We’ll see what comes of it.
Today, a friend shared these building plans for a living wall, which is basically a fence made of a bunch of connected window boxes. Now my gears are churning, and the thought of expanding our growing space vertically seems so obvious! Why have I never thought of this??
Our yard is currently surrounded by a plank fence in pretty crappy shape, evidenced by this photo from about two years ago (it’s even more beat up now):
Our yard has so many more things in it now! Two blueberry bushes, another raised bed, a huge peony ….
Yes, we have neglected this here blog for awhile, but both of us are going to make a valiant effort to renew posting. Things are just starting to take off in the garden for the season, so i’m sure there will be much to talk about there. Yesterday we ate the first strawberries from our garden. There were only two ripe ones — and both had chunks taken out by the slugs already — but they were divine. There are two more today. I ate one and I nearly began speaking in tongues. So good. Had to resist not eating the second one, so I could leave that for Emma.
So yeh, what have I been up to? Well, last I left you on this blog, I had just finished my new silkscreen table/workbench/desk. So far its been really nice to have an upstairs work area. I’ve since created one other silkscreen and am working on another.
Here’s the newest one — titled “King Corn #1″, the first in a series of corn related prints:
I’ve recently decided to see if I could sell these through Etsy, so I set up a shop. Right now I just have my 2 main prints up, but hopefully more to come. Check me out here.
That’s all for now. More garden and house updates here in the coming days, along with info about the upcoming 3rd annual (ANGRY) Gorilla Torley Folk + Blues Fest on July 11th. Stay tuned!!
Fred and Helen lived in the house next door when we first moved in. We were really fond of them, and they were pretty fond of us. They were great gardeners, despite having a poured concrete yard: Fred grew parsley in five gallon buckets. Helen died in 2005, and Fred moved in with his daughter in the suburbs shortly afterward. I learned last summer that he died a few years ago also.
The rose bush they left in their little strip of garden is still there, although it has not been pruned in five years and a lot of it is just dead cane. In memory of our dearly departed neighbors, I decided that the time has come to take care of plants that are not technically on our property. And so, my first ever pruning experience:
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Let’s make a list, to catch up:
My new silkscreen station/workbench/desk is now complete and operational. Earlier in the week I did the final painting of the top of the desk using black spraypraint. Not the best idea to do that much spraypainting inside in the winter in a house without any additional ventilation. I had to open up a window and the backdoor (despite the freezing temps to make sure that neither Emma or I suffered any permanent brain damage. The result turned out nice though.
Here are some shots:
Photo from below showing off its snazzy lime green undercarriage
The worktop in action — note the new large squeegee that Emma got me for xmas!
Other exciting news is that I was asked by one of the members of the Just Seeds collective to have my OBTAIN A YIELD print sold through Just Seeds. This is really exciting as Just Seeds is a great bunch of artists and i’m honored for the chance distribute one of my prints along side their art. Today I finished up a batch of prints to send their way. Exciting stuff!!
Oh, i’ve been ignoring my Fun-A-Day project, but I may get back into it this week. We’ll see.
DAY EIGHT
Friday I didn’t have to go to work. Not because of the snow, but rather due to a lack of warm spaces at my work. Dirty Pete (my boss) needed a warm space to spraypaint some stuff and the office/showroom area was the only area warm enough to make this happen. Sooo, he told me not to bother to come in (lest I inhale too many paint fumes and become useless to the company).
So I slept in and then got up and shoveled the walk, ate some breakfast, and decided to brave driving to go to a cafe for my Fun-A-Day project. I opted to check out Enrico’s Tazzo D’Oro in Highland Park. Over the years I’ve only ever gone there about 4 or 5 times. Its a nice cafe, but for whatever reason, we just never go there. Its a bit strange because as avid tea drinkers, you would think that a cafe with an extensive loose tea selection to choose from would warrant more visits.
Braving the icy roads
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Monday afternoon after leaving work in Millvale, I headed over to Lawrenceville to hit up the Dozen Bakeshop. On the way there, I saw Emma walking down the street — she had been checking out some of the Butler Street stores on her day off. I stopped and picked her up and we hit up Dozen together.
Some people have a problem with Dozen. I believe the warcry was “Fuck a motherfuckin’ $2.50 cupcake.” Honestly I think their vegan cupcakes are decent and have been known on occasion to throw down the required $2.50 to acquire one. However, on Monday I had my mind set on a different sweet — their vegan molasses ginger cookie. $1.50 for a cookie might also be questionable, but damn are they good. A nice crisp outside, yet very chewy, coated in big grains of sugar. So damn good. To go with my cookie, I got a cup of Earl Grey. Dozen carries teas by Intelligentsia who not only make a delicious tea, but who work to do a great deal of direct trade with growers. Their Early Grey is mild, yet pleasant. It comes loose leaf and Dozen offers packets for sale at the bakeshop.
Emma got a veggie sandwich and some Sencha tea. Chomp!
Afterwards we took an excursion to Shadyside to stop by Kards Unlimited so Emma could buy a 2010 planner. Mission accomplished we began to walk back to the card when we both asked “What’s that weird smell?” I noted that it smelled like someone burned up their car’s engine. As we turned the corner and looked in the adjacent parking lot, we saw what appeared to be a vehicle on fire and say “ohhhhh — that’s what’s making that smell.” I stopped long enough to take a photo and then we determined it was probably best to move along. Fire engine sirens were heard, so no need to call 911.
And thus ended that day’s Fun-A-Day adventure.
UPDATE 1-8-09 — Somehow when I typed this up last night I totally had my days messed up. Monday’s cafe visit was missing from my equation. I’ll write about that later. Oh how winter fucks with the mind!!
We’ve been having some trouble staying excited for Fun-A-Day this year. Emma has abandoned her project as an actual Fun-A-Day project (tho’ she is still working on elements of her project). After skipping out on going to a cafe on day three, I had plans to attend cafes for other events the following two days, so it made keeping my Fun-A-Day going much easier.
DAY FIVE
Since early November, Morning Glory Coffeehouse has been hosting Twin Peaks nights every Tuesday night. One episode each week projected on a “big screen.” As Emma has never watched Twin Peaks and i’ve only seen some of it, we’ve been going each week to watch. Cherry pie is served. Tuesday was the beginning of Season Two. Its been a really fun time.
As our time there was spent watching an episode of Twin Peaks, I didn’t get a chance to do any of my writing work, but we did partake of some hot beverages and pie. The tea selection at MoGlo isn’t great — only about 8 varieties — i think they might just have Bigelow teas. Long ago the owner Jeffery talked about getting some loose teas, but it hasn’t happened yet. Regardless of the mediocre tea selection, MoGlo does, as I said previously, have cherry pie for the Twin Peaks nights and also offers vegan sweets from My Goodies. In addition, MoGlo has a great relaxed atmosphere, Jeffery (and the rest of the MoGlo staff) are super cool, and they host cool art shows and music events. For these reasons MoGlo ranks among my top cafes in the city.
Morningside will be hosting a show featuring ex-Lungfish frontman Daniel Higgs on January 30th. Last year’s Daniel Higgs show at MoGlo was one of the best shows I attended last year. Get there early if you’re going cuz it got packed last time.
DAY SIX
Yesterday I had a meeting scheduled for the Kiva Han at the corner of Craig Street and Forbes Avenue. Kiva Han is a pretty standard cafe when it comes to their tea selection. Where Kiva Han excels is in its location — its a great place for people watching. Located between Pitt and Carnegie Mellon and across the street from the Carnegie Museums and main library, there tends to be a interesting selection of people flowing both through the cafe itself and the streets outside. I’ll often take walks into Oakland to go to the main library, pick up a new book, and spend awhile reading at Kiva Han, all the while checking out the people flowing through.
Yesterday I ended up showing up for my meeting about 15 minutes late. This was on account of a frozen water meter at work. It had frozen over the long weekend. On monday we worked on thawing it out but it turns out that the meter and the backflow preventer both cracked. The water company fixed the meter on Tuesday but Wednesday was the earliest we could get a plumber in to fix the backflow preventer. The plumber ended up getting delayed due to some other emergency issue, so he didn’t get to us until mid-afternoon rather than the morning. Anyway, this means I didn’t get out of work until 4:00, got to the meeting at 4:15 and slid directly into my meeting without getting any tea. Also once again, no writing was accomplished.
I forgot to take photo documentation of either my Day 5 or Day 6 cafe excursions.
DAY SEVEN
It seems that every third day I may fail to get a cafe. I could have hit up a cafe after work but it seemed like investing in some groceries would be a better thing for the household. Hit up the co-op and got some food, picked Emma up from work and we came home and hung out. At this point the snow had started coming down pretty good, so I opted to just stay home. Tonight is TV night (Parks and Recreation, The Office, 30 Rock) — reruns, yes — but it seemed like a better option that trudging out to the Crazy Mocha just to drink some tea.
Anyway, it looks like I probably don’t actually have to go into work tomorrow, so I should get a chance to venture out to a new cafe tomorrow. I’ll keep you posted.