Planting a Mini-Orchard

Ignore the bucket in this illustration! See update below. Update 3/13/2011: I met Brad Lancaster last night and he told me that he and Art Ludwig no longer use the upside down bucket described in this post. The reason is that detergents can build up in the hole. In my experience the bucket was also an unnecessary step. While I have a clay soil, the hillside drains fairly well. A properly sized mulch basin should suffice to allow greywater to infi...

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We Went to Japan

...the Tokyo area and our visit coincided with the March 11 anniversary of the 2011 earthquake, tsunami and subsequent nuclear disaster. Near our hotel was the headquarters of the Japanese Communist Party which is more of a progressive party not a Stalinist type org. These two posters say Yes to higher wages and No to military expansion. On the other end of the political spectrum we also got to watch a bizarre and loud caravan of Japanese Qanon enthu...

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Parkway Plantings

...is is a pole bean with a brilliant red color that, sadly, disappears after cooking. One of the nice things about planting the seeds in our street garden this afternoon was chatting with the folks who come by. Sadly, we found out that one neighbor is breaking up with his wife and needs to find an apartment. But on a happier note, another neighbor reminisced about his Italian grandfather who grew lots of vegetables and even made his own wine in the...

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Dwelling Portably

...r two with incredibly small type, so as to save paper. Content ranges from cooking and bathing out of your car, to edible weeds, to improvised bicycle pannier bags, to musings on 12 volt microfiche readers and the practicalities of nudism. The advice, written in a consistent and factual manor, is interspersed with letters from readers who are also living the portable life. These stories offer a glimpse into a lifestyle most of us have not lead, an...

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Cichorium intybus a.k.a. Italian Dandelion

...some time to get used to the first time we tasted this plant. Changing the cooking water a few times if you boil Italian dandelion is one way to deal with the bitterness, but we prefer to just throw it together with some fat in a frying pan, such as olive oil and/or pancetta. We also add some hot pepper flakes for a nice hot counter-punch. Italian dandelion makes a good companion to balsamic vinegar marinated pork or game (squirrels perhaps–they’v...

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