Merry Christmas

Via Ugly Renaissance Babies

Turnip Prize

Last year's winner was the (then) topical 'Chilli'n'Minors' (pictured below) by Doug Pitt.

Group Of Seven

We went today with a few friends to see 'Painting Canada' - a good selection of Tom Thompson and the Group of Seven's output on show at the Dulwich Picture Gallery. It's made me a little homesick which is good as I'm heading back for a visit on Tuesday. However the fall colours are long gone and the predicted weather for Fredericton is 1° and snow flurries. Urghh!

'Wineskins of Brown Morbidity'

I harvested medlars today and set 125 of them, bottoms uppermost, in the greenhouse to blett. And then? Another round of sticky brown glorps?

Another Ho Hum Harvest

For pottage and puddings and custard and pies,
Our pumpkins and parsnips are common supplies,
We have pumpkins at morning and pumpkins at noon,
If it were not for pumpkins we should be undoon.

Pilgrim verse circa 1630

TPS No.16 & 25

No.16 French Fingerling x Magic Molly and No.25 Thumbertime x wild species

TPS No.11

Bolivian landraces Pirampo x Khuchi Akita

TPS No.6

F2 Pam Wagner

Women With Cows

I've just been to see a great film - Women With Cows. Don't miss it!

Teapots of Note - No.1

"The first cup moistens my lips and throat, the second cup breaks my loneliness, the third cup searches my barren entrail but to find therein some five thousand volumes of odd ideographs. The fourth cup raises a slight perspiration, - all the wrong of life passes away through my pores. At the fifth cup I am purified; the sixth cup calls me to the realms of immortals. The seventh cup - ah, but I could take no more! I only feel the breath of cool wind that rises in my sleeves. Where is Horaisan? Let me ride on this sweet breeze and waft away thither."
Lotung Tang poet


The ingenious patented SYP (Simple Yet Perfect) teapot - with a little perforated shelf for the leaves and two little teats that allow for steeping in a supine position. Once the required strength is reached, the pot is righted and the leaves are held on the shelf out of the brew.

A Green Sort of Complete White

'I saw colours often on eggs,' I observed, 'colours which have no names. Some birds lay eggs that are shaded in a way too delicate to be noticeable to any instrument but the eye, the tongue could not be troubled to find a noise for anything so nearly not-there. What I would call a green sort of complete white. Now would that be the colour?'
The Third Policeman Flann O'Brien


Alice laid her first egg today (middle), Brunhilde (right) started last week!

Phew!

Henry II R.I.P.

Yesterday's alarm clock... tomorrow's Coq Au Vin.

The Treachery of Vegetables

Red, White and Blue

Last year I saved all of the tubers that I grew from true seed. This year I get to taste them. I dug a couple that were just starting to die back - No.16 French Fingerling x Magic Molly - and cut and cooked the ones that got damaged with the fork. The white fleshed ones are much more floury and prone to fall apart than the ones with coloured flesh, but all taste superb. Most of the plants are huge, still very green, some still flowering and I will leave them in as long as I can stand the suspense.
Carol Deppe has posted about living on a steady diet of potatoes here.

Adventures with Potato Seed Continued

I've selected some fruits from the potato plants growing from last year's TPS harvest from which to save seed to grow on next year. Coloured yarn kept with the seed corresponds to bits that are tied around each of the plants so that once dug, I can record the colour and qualities of the mother potatoes. As the bee hive is right next to the experimental potato plot, the results will be anyone's guess. Maybe as quirky as those pictured on Home of the Potato (via ABW)

"Autumn is Near..."

"... Autumn is here. Sing shed sing."
Listen here to this seasonal song. (You might have to put up with an ad first)

Saint Fiacre's Day

... Patron saint of gardeners. And taxi drivers. And sufferers of fistula and venereal disease.

More Peppers

A Mammal's Notebook

"My only nourishment consists of food that is white: eggs, sugar, shredded bones, the fat of dead animals, veal, salt, coco-nuts, chicken cooked in white water, mouldy fruit, rice, turnips, sausages in camphor, pastry, cheese (white varieties), cotton salad, and certain kinds of fish (without their skin).
I breathe carefully (a little at a time) and dance very rarely. When walking I hold my ribs and look steadily behind me.
I sleep with only one eye closed, very profoundly."

Erik Satie 'A Mammal's Notebook'