Front Yard Update: Welcome to Crazy Town

May 20, 2016

Back to the Garden, front yard series, Gardening

...f should just be the right size for the space. Trimming is just a waste of energy for you and the plant. But I’ll leave it for now, and if I decide to give the slope over to the golden yarrow, I’ll let the Mexican sage and the purple sage go, too, and see who comes out on top. It would be like botanical cage fighting. Speaking of cage fighting, at the very top of the slope we have a cardoon plant. You can see it in the top left of the top picture....

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Sorting Family Photos

Mr. Homegrown

October 28, 2019

Domesticus, Tidying up

16 Comments

...tional history of photography lesson What played out as I went through over 150 years worth of photos was a short history of photography. I have just a few Victorian era photos consisting of studio portraits as well as shots of my paternal great-grandparent’s general store in Stockton, California. With the advent of snapshot photography in the early 20th century there’s more photos, but I suspect photography was still relatively expensive. The ear...

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Free Qigong via Zoom

Mr. Homegrown

March 26, 2020

Events

2 Comments

...0AM orientation and session. See you there?! FREE! Qigong! Ancient Chinese energy practice, involving gentle, meditative movement and breathwork. Daily, online sessions through Wednesday, April 1, but at different times. An optional, half-hour orientation for newcomers to Qigong will precede each session. Schedule appears below (subject to change). * Thursday, 3/26, 10:30AM orientation / 11AM Qigong. https://zoom.us/j/832068559 * Friday, 3/27, 10:...

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Natural Cooling: The Fresh Air Bed

Mr. Homegrown

June 19, 2017

Appropriate Technology, Design, Water and Power

12 Comments

...t the window. The idea lives on, but only for cats, in the form of the Cat Solarium and in many homebrew kitty window solutions. But enough about cats, what we really need is to bring back the California Fresh Air Bed Company’s clever indoor/outdoor bed. As many consider downsizing to smaller houses, space and energy saving furniture such as this make more sense than the oversized sofa sectionals that plague our modern mega-houses. Save Save Save...

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Who Needs Windows?

Mr. Homegrown

November 23, 2021

Design

5 Comments

...ded me of this issue. If ever there was an example of the over-reliance on energy intensive HVAC systems it’s the idea that buildings don’t need windows. I can’t possibly, in a short blog post, round up all the windowless buildings such as phone company switching facilities (like the famous brutalist AT&T switching center in New York above), all those Amazon warehouses, or Los Angeles’ hidden and still functioning urban oil wells. Our window free...

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