Shiitake

Shiitake wow I finally am growing them. Rita got me the plugs for my birthday and they arived . The logs we found cut on the side of the road last winter ready for the chipper. I knew enough to grab them early as they need to dry out a bit. That was feburary and it's June now . The logs are ready and I drilled holes in them acording to the instructions that arived with the "plug spawn" , ohoo all these new terms. This link is where mine came from, www.fungi.com also

you'l need cheese wax at www.cheesemaking.com and proably other sources.

Next the cheese wax gets dbl.boiler melted to pour or as I did dribble with a paintbrush over the spaun plugs and the ends of the logs. this keeps competing fungi from the shiitake and keeps moisture in.

The image above is of the logs in a shady, moist and foliage over top kind of place.

Who knows if it will work but you can't successfully fail if you dont try! Now I just have to foreget all about them for 6-9 months unless it becomes dry and they'l need a sprinkle of water.

The Roof Top Garden is out side for the first time. It is not finished allthough the rough form is here. It will be part of a group of others like it. They'l be positioned in another area of the garden with different types of grasses growing around them and a path to be able to visit each one. There is more too but that will have to come as a supprise and in an image only.

We (most of us) live with a roof over our heads. I also like the way alpaka's interact. These are two of the motivations for The Roof Top Garden .

One very fun thing I like to do is make believe I'm some where else while sitting at a table with ink, brush, paper and water. Adding Japan, mountains,agriculture,homes and great views equals this. A new place to visit.

Roofusbe contenti

Thinking about the real estate of things and the parts that are good about it I'm content to recognise the simlper aspects are the better ones.

These drawings have started to become sculpture. I'll enter an image soon as it becomes presentable. A big umbrella is wonderfull in the pouring rain.

Black Earth

Googling bio-char will describe better than I can the benefits of this practice. In the middle of the vegetable garden I put a barrel of steel with a lid that has a hole in the middle. All the debris from last years growth gets burned in it. The charcoal gets spread over the garden beds and dug in. When there is a lot of hot coals in the barrel

the lid goes on. The barrel has a few holes around the sides that at this point get plugged up with some loose fitting bolts.

Now it simmer burns into a pile of charcoal. When it cools down a bit I take the lid off and add snow to stop it or water. In the morning the charcoal gets spread on the beds. It's fun too.

Fininancial Crisis

My sister Sarah made this long ago and it has
FINANCIAL CRISIS
writen all over it!

OH GOD!!

Yesterday Rita and I had lunch with an old but young friend in Norwich, CT. Mushroom soup and asparagus mixed with conversation of a religious order. Catholic schools , artists, a nun beating a young girl for wearing her hair in bangs . The young girl then tore off the nuns habit in retaliation never to return to the school again. Rulers as weapons, festering wounded saints being resurrected with shovels and coming out smelling of roses. More delicious mushroom soup and for desert, tea with round weight less host like wafers made from almonds and egg white. Water ,air and blood seemed to rule the day mixed with the most famous ingredient of all LAUGHTER!!!! which leads me to......

The day before yesterday I was cleaning piles of drawings/art from 1968-80 or so and found this quote: "Seriousness seeks to exclude play, where as play can very well include seriousness." If any one knows who said this I'd love to give just attribution. Which leads me to the sumi drawing above OH GOD!! that I made of a character poking fun at GOD while in a dangerous balancing act of absurdity at that. I hope you've been entertained but now this nut has to go find a squirrel.