Gardening, Misfits and podcasts, Mutts

Thursday, another cool sunny day, was fine for a bit of garden cleanup. I pulled out the sorrel and dayflowers, which will come back next year, and since the morning glories are fading and setting seed, I removed the supports and pushed the plant down, hoping the seeds will be protected there and we'll get them next year.  

They were a definite success 

Not so successful were the potatoes which never flowered, though they had plenty of foliage. So there was no harvest when I pulled them from the container. That's a first.

In the other hand, a little potato which evidently planted itself among the dayflowers emerged 

That one hadn't flowered either. Strange year.  I'll try again next year.

Misfits arrived early, Kareem's morning shift.

Interesting couple of surprises. The gala apples weren't there, already credited for them, and that drink, not ordered, was. I tried it, pretty good, various juices and a milky base, probably oat.

Coconut milk for the food pantry, it's on the list of items there. When people qualify, income, residence,  etc, they fill out forms where they alert the pantry about food allergies, religious rules, and general preferences based on availability. I think that's where Erum, the manager, derives her list for the website. So this week I checked and found coconut milk is requested. Fine. Done. I do canned fruit and veggies too.

The large size surplus spinach is excellent, very glad I got it again. Maybe a spinach pie, not sure. And baby broccoli, also beautiful leeks.

This time I chopped the leeks keeping the green part and white separate in case I get fancy. I usually don't bother.

I made the hot spicy plant-based roll into patties which I froze on parchment paper, easy to separate out one as needed. And the whole dates, favorite Medjool, will be a snack replacing the apple I usually have.

By the time I've washed and prepped and frozen or fridged or bowled what's needed, swept the floor and broken down the box for recycle, I'm ready to sit down.  Another week's food on its way.

I did try mixing yogurt with fresh chives, cut short, and a sprinkle of dried basil and spices, on potato bread, with afternoon tea on the deck. That was worth doing again. Maybe I'll make crackers for this purpose, too, good savory snack.

About podcasts, I've started following Shedunnit, about crime fiction, very good discussions, ranging all over the last hundred years, very knowledgeable, and easy to listen to while you knit or go to sleep.

I've also found the podcast version of Lucy Worsley, her Lady Killers series about real life female murderers. She's just as interesting without the historic buildings and costumes, she does love to dress up. But her presentation doesn't need dressing up, really interesting and well researched.

I get my podcasts on the free version of Spotify, which comes with ads, but not in the middle of the podcast. 

Happy day everyone, and if you have recommendations of podcasts, not the political ones like Daily Beans, Daily Fail, Meidas Touch, etc, we know them. More literary or historic ones is what I'm looking for just now. Thank you kindly.

April showers

 I expect the daffodils are liking this. The people not so much.

A couple of people have been wondering recently about online places for or by older women, where the news is not always front and center.

I like YouTube channels Sixty and Me, The Last Homely House, and Silver and Solo. They're calm, interesting and happy women, all very different, one in Switzerland, one in northern England, one in BC.

I do like media literacy, also funny younger women, so for that  there's Meredith Constant on YouTube and Tiktok, and I follow podcasts, such as Rachel Maddow, The Daily Fail, also hilarious self help, not the news, in How to be Fine.

There's also a lovely new YouTube channel by craftsman Anthony White, Ants Country Life, so peaceful watching a woodworker and craftsman rebuilding dry stone walls, and things like building sheds in his country location in Northumberland, UK. 

He also works on Kate's place, building a cabin in Last Homely Garden, another lovely channel, offshoot of the Last Homely House. There she works on all kinds of fiber crafts and quiet domestic occupations.

And there's always Atomic Shrimp, endlessly enterprising, making, gardening, experimenting, foraging, beach walking, cooking.

So there's some nice alternatives to gloom and doom and fear mongering. You're welcome!

Winter is icumen in, and Car Talk

This was yesterday morning, first snow of the season. My walk later was brisk, icy wind, happy to get home and warm.

Today's in the thirties, tops. Oh. 

And here's my latest podcast find. I used to love NPR's Click and Clack, long gone now,  and found out yesterday that there's a podcast to accompany my knitting.

This and The Daily Fail, and How to be Fine will complete my podcast requirements.

And here's yesterday's Textiles and Tea with a rugweaver who loves upcycling old cotton and linen fabrics. He's a beloved teacher, judging from the masses of wishes and memories in the comments, working in the building you see below. He's also written several well loved books.

It was a cheerful episode, and he's clearly a good teacher, refraining from the thicket of technicalities many guests plunge into. They assume they're speaking to experts, and forget that it's intimidating to the eager beginners in the audience to blind them with terminology, and might put them off completely. 

He didn't do this, translating weaverspeak into everyday language as he went. He's also a spinner, and promised to come back and talk about that, since it never got into this session.

Happy day, everyone, weave on, spin on, knit on! Metaphorically for most of us.

Mood swings, big plans for cool weather

Your exciting update on the mood swings in the sky. Thunderstorms, threatened tornadoes which blessedly didn't happen, high winds 

And note the humidity and dewpoint

Special weather warning almost literally in my back yard

My only casualty was the zinnias flattened into the deck and now staked upright again

It's so much cooler and I'm feeling more cheerful already.

Yesterday's stitching involved the negatives from earlier positive cutouts. Just as stencils give you a positive and a negative, so do the fabric pieces I used, and from which I saved the leftovers.

These will be reverse appliqued and go from there with a third color yet to be decided, shape also to be decided. 

This interesting project checks a lot of boxes, modular, flexible, colorful, manageable, frugal!

Today is full of plans now that it's cooler. At home I'm making granola, yogurt, and roast chicken. Abroad I'm off to pick up more Suits and return the current season.

And what helped get me through housebound hot days are a couple of great podcasts: Lady Audacitea on YouTube, and The Daily Fail which I catch on Google.  They're both  teams of two hilariously funny and astute young women journalists commenting on the follies in the media. They've also been guests on each others' podcasts, this being a small world. 

One, Meredith Constant,  also has her own YouTube and tiktok channels, very funny, very well researched, very accurate, penetrating questions, mostly about the msm's wildly inaccurate takes on Meghan and Harry.  I personally owe Meghan for bringing shakshuka into my life, and Suits, so I'm a fan.

And, if all the weather isn't enough NJ content, here's the place where the Big Bang was first detected

Just sayin. Jersey Strong.

Happy day, everyone, I hope your big bang is less dramatic, also your weather. Unless it's a military necessity