Good-bye Y(MCA)

24th Street Singers

When we first joined, it was the "YMCA." Now it's simply the "Y." (And the Village People? Are they now reduced to the "VP?")

We still love the Y, but we're moving on. Blame it on the yoga. My best guy's yoga-muse, Leah (and here I thought I was the only one who made his eyes sparkle, put a swing in his step, a wiggle in his ears...), well, she has now opened her own studio, and a man must follow his whoever.

Yes, back to the Y. It's a wonderful place, and there are many, many things I will miss about it. Including the neighborhood around Telegraph and 24th Streets. And not just on First Fridays:

The group of parakeets which spend their afternoons chatting each other up. For a while there was a pair of bantam chickens in one of those cages as well, but they too have moved on.

The long row of sturdy sunflowers which someone of great faith plants each spring. (This mass planting is just down the block from a prime illegal, and very active, dump spot.) Almost all of the sunflowers last into the fall with their big, fat, seed heads intact. I'm guessing that there are simply not enough marauding squirrels around. I'd be happy to export a few from around here, if anyone is interested.

To all those lovely people at the Y who have sweated and showered along with us, and those who have picked up after us, and everyone else who has helped make the Y a great place - Thank you very much!

Sugar Snap Peas Forever

We had a lot a sugar peas this year. I am not complaining, but over the course of two months or so, we had peas most every night for dinner. Sauteed with sweet red pepper. Mixed with fava beans and drizzled with olive oil. Peas with carrots. Peas with peas.

Like I said, no complaints, but at a certain point, something different had to be done. So I froze some, and then turned another bunch into Pickled Sugar Snap Peas. Good recipe, which comes from The Joy of Pickling by Linda Ziedrich. It doesn't involve canning. In fact, you don't even have to blanch the snap peas.

Everyone who tried them, liked them. A lot. And there were quite a few "everyones." (My best guy didn't try them because he doesn't really like those pickle-y things.)

I really like pickles but, for me, these were a bit too vinegary. Kinda like taking that first sip of a gin and tonic and unexpectedly inhaling all the gin upfront. Only this time, it's not gin, but vinegar. Granted, it's also flavored with peas, hot pepper and garlic, but a little strong, nonetheless.

The brine from the snap pea pickles has been very useful for salad dressings and marinades. Next season, however, I will experiment with a bit more sugar, a little less garlic and perhaps a piece of star anise. Then I will try and coax my best guy to give them peas a chance. After first plying him with a coupla of gin and tonics, of course.

Thank you Ms. Linda, for the great idea and the great way to store up some of those delicious peas. I will be adding your book to my shelf.

Goddess of Light, Ret.

I've been talking about it and talking about it and talking about it.  And now I've gone and done it.

Yup, retirement. We'll see how well it sticks.

And just for fun - after all, isn't retirement supposed to be fun? - there will be a gathering at Sue Johnson Lamps on Saturday, June 8th, as part of the Solano Art Walk.

So if you are out and about next Saturday, please stop by:

Saturday, June 8th, 2013
6 - 8 pm
Sue Johnson Custom Lamps & Shades
1745 Solano Avenue,  Berkeley

The Best Cheap Cat Toys: #1: Egg Cartons

At three months

Cardboard Egg Cartons. Absolutely have to be cardboard, 

or chewing them is really unpleasant. Or so I've heard.

Simply throw them in the recycling bin after too much fun.

The entertainment lasts for years.

At three years

Kitchen Basics #1: Brown Sugar, Baby

It started out with an "Oops, I forgot," as well as an on-going effort to bring home fewer plastic bags. Once upon a time, it wouldn't have mattered, because brown sugar came in a paper box. Now it's a plastic bag.

In this house we use cane sugar. According to the SF Chronicle, cane sugar and sugar from sugar beets do not perform the same way, especially in baking.

White sugar still comes wrapped in paper, only - surprise! - in a Four pound package, not the once-upon-a-time standard of five. Apparently, the price of sugar has increased significantly since 2008, so we now get less while paying more.

(We also eat a ton more sugar these days. Well, maybe not a ton, but estimates are that Americans now consume anywhere from 70-140 lbs. of sugar each year, as compared to 5-10 lbs. or so, 150 years ago. I'm sure, though, that back then they pigged out on honey, molasses and rum instead.)

Before Mixing

But we were out of brown sugar, a necessary ingredient for the homemade granola that is served here almost every morning (hell is a place where granola is served every morning, no exceptions...). So, since it was my "oops," I had to make some:

       Brown Sugar

* One cup white sugar

* Two Tablespoons Molasses (for dark brown sugar)

Place both ingredients in a bowl and mix with a fork. It should take about 4 minutes - faster than a trip to the grocery store. Yeah, I know, it looks pretty unpromising to start, but trust me on this one, it really does work.

And because I am a fiend for vanilla, I store my sugar in a container with one vanilla bean tucked inside, a nice touch I learned from Patricia Wells' Bistro Cooking.

Ready to Use

Volunteers of Oakland #2

Spring 2012

I didn't plant it. My best guy didn't plant it. But it was there last year, shoving its way through impossibly thicky-icky clay, from who-knows-where. I wasn't really sure what it was aiming to be, but I waited long enough (not usually a strength of mine) and got the reward.

Dutch iris (iris hollandica), most likely either the Casa Blanca or the White Excelsior variety.  Obviously, easy to grow, though, as far as I know, someone has to plant the rhizomes in the fall. And the squirrels that I am acquainted with are not that thoughtful.

Just for good measure, a second reward this spring, too.

Spring 2013

Learning a Language: A Lesson in Geography

I wasn't the only one who was intrigued with my niece Tamzin's antics with writing lyrics in her invented language, Ingaaric. My friend Mary wrote:

"Checked out your recent blog about Tamzin - brought to mind the country that my daughter and a couple of her friends "invented", starting in middle school, named Tamyeva- with a geography, history, language, culture, and cuisine (I remember that there was no wheat in Tamyeva, and the kids spent lots of time trying to grind rice into flour!)."

Now I've spent plenty of time in fantasy land, staring out the window and gathering wool. Apparently I even had some imagination when I was a kid. But I was more concerned with what streetlights were going to be when they grew up than I was with creating new countries and languages.

So with the rice grinders in mind, I wasted more time looking up what other, better informed people had to say about invented languages. Which led me to Arika Okrent's book, In the Land of Invented Languages. She's been trained as a linguist, so she's thought about these kinds of concerns more than most people.

I had fun with this book. So did my best guy. It pushed me to think about "real" languages - specifically, which languages are considered worthy of being taught today.

Ahhh yes, so I goofed off a bit longer to look at what both Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone had on offer.  The usual suspects, as it turns out, except that Pimsleur also offers a language - Twi - which I had never heard of. Turns out it is a language spoken in southern Ghana. Where most of the country's petroleum can be found. That little clue helped explain why Pimsleur, in addition to the expected oil-producers' languages, also lists two separate versions of Armenian: Caspian Sea oil.

But Objiwe? Why that one North American language when there are so many? It took me a while to do the geography... How do you say "Alberta Tar Sands" in Objibwe? I have no idea, but somewhere out there, at least a few non-native speakers are learning.

So imagine if the Iroquois had stayed on top in New York - just think how many languages the hydraulic fracturing people would have to learn. Provided that the Iroquois would even be sufficiently shortsighted to allow fracking...

Rosetta Stone, instead, offers lessons in Latin, describing it thus:  Develop the Latin language skills to enjoy social interaction and learn to share your ideas and opinions. 

Now I just want to know, I really want to know, where I could possibly "enjoy social interaction" in Latin, short of time-travel. Travel to Rome, perhaps, to hobnob with the new Pope? Time-travel seems more plausible, and certainly a lot more entertaining. In the meanwhile, I'll just stick with Italian, Spanish, or maybe even Ingaaric.

Hyenas in Berkeley?

The first time I heard the hyenas' call was years ago, on a damp and misty winter's afternoon on the Fire Trail above the Berkeley campus. I almost sat down in the middle of the path.

Who (what?) in the world could be making that sound? And a very unearthly sound it is. So strange and unfamiliar for this part of the planet that even the dogs being walked there don't prick up their ears. And now this most unusual feature of a weekend hike is unlikely to be heard much longer.

Budget cuts. Yup, after nearly 30 years of useful scientific study, researchers of the largest captive colony of spotted hyenas have been unable to secure future funding. They have been trying various means to resolve the budgetary issues - from launching a fundraising campaign to moving the animals along to the local zoo - but the deadline ain't going away.

I don't know if hyenas have guardian angels, and can't really imagine what a hyena-angel might look like, but this bunch surely needs one, and soon.

Updates: #2

In the thangka room

Some people have all the luck. Our Brazilian friends Marilia and Marco get to hang out at the lovely Ratna Ling Retreat Center. Yeah, yeah, they are on a work-study assignment so they do have to put in some time on the job, but when we went to visit them, it just seemed completely restful and idyllic.

Fun, but hardly idyllic, was the afternoon I spent in the AFSC basement, helping afghans for Afghans prepare those lovely handmade items for shipping to Afghanistan. For a laugh, I even modeled a few of the garments (while disguised behind a borrowed pair of pink glasses). The scarf is mine, though. Thank you Michele!

Annelise practicing the hula
at the Discovery Museum

Once again, we "discovered and went". This time our library cards took us and some favorite friends to the Bay Area Discovery Museum (all for free).

Be aware that a few institutions which were participating in the Discover and Go program in Oakland and Berkeley are no longer on the list - most notably the Academy of Sciences. Nonetheless, there still are loads of wonderful places to visit (for free!).


Two members of Pauline Autet's fun little ceramic project have a new home. On my front porch. They also got a small redesign, and a stronger hanging system, but can go back to their original forms any time. And if someone tries to take them, I too hope that s/he leaves a note. (And an address, so that I can hunt 'em down...)

Peas and carrots. Carrots and peas. Yes, lucky us, we have peas once again. We had carrots, but they were early, and the peas are late, so they never got properly introduced. I am (slowly, very slowly) learning that carrots are probably not the wisest thing to grow in a tiny urban backyard. But I find them to be the absolutely most fun vegetable to harvest. Just that perfect measure of resistance against your steady tug. And if you grew up, as I did, with The Carrot Seed record, then you may just understand.

Noisy Tenants, Nosy Landlady

We have new tenants. They hang out year round in the 'hood, but each spring, when they decide to have another go at child rearing, they take advantage of any local vacancy in the real estate market and move in.

I love it. I try and lure them to my spare unit by making sure that it is all clean and ready. This means fluffing up the dryer lint (don't look at me - they moved it all in there themselves) and evicting the over-wintering wasps. And if the previous tenants left a mess (unhatched eggs, one year), I tidy it all up. Finally, I never require first, last or a deposit.

So just who are these neighbors? Why the oak titmouse, of course, who's call is loud enough to chase away all those who might want to elbow (yup, birds have elbows, too) their way into a great rental space - other titmice, chickadees and wrens.

The box was a lovely gift (lucky me) from Sue Johnson who also made the wood burned image of the chickadee on its side. That was in 2004.

Since then, we have helped "raise" numerous generations of birds. At first, the chickadees had control of the unit. In recent years, the titmice have outmaneuvered the other contenders (they are just a little bit bigger, I think). I keep hoping for a wren to move into the box, but heck, they only moved into this neighborhood a few years ago.

Princess, the other interested, would-be ornithologist on the property, is not so discriminating. As long as there is someone with feathers going in and out of the box, she will perch on the composting bin and purr. Don't know what's going to happen when the babies start to peep...