Putting the Garden to Bed Zzzzzzzz

I thought I would have time to do a really good job putting my garden to bed this year.  If the Big Snow holds off,  I might get there yet. Well, except for the September date which has passed me by big time.

Ideally I would have done these things:

Planted all those perennials I potted up in preparation for moving them to the east side of the yard.

Brought my houseplants into the house in early September.

Cut back perennials and toss any leaves which look spotty or diseased in any way.

Cover everything with a nice blanket of leaves.

Brought in all garden ornaments including the smaller birdbaths.

I finally finished up on number one today, just beating forecasts of snow which luckily have not fallen yet.   I'm out shopping for potting soil which hasn't been sitting outside all summer because I'm pretty sure that is how I brought in so many annoying little bugs last year. Grr pesky things.  My houseplants including two trees await their fate in the garage.  They look happy enough.

On the Road with D.O.A.: London

We had several days in London.  Our first day started after 3 pm given travel time, arrival and packing away of our things at the hotel. 

We tried to cram as much as possible into our days in each place. Since we had been in London in 2000, we had a few places we wanted to see again.

One of mine was Kensington Gardens, and specifically the statue of Peter Pan.

I didn't remember from our previous trip the base of the statue being so elaborate.  It really is a beautiful statue in a lovely setting.  Our hotel was near Hyde park and we spent quite a bit of time on foot traversing Hyde Park to get to this spot.  Good exercise and since I usually suffer jet lag like crazy, I was determined to follow the tip that you should get outside in the sunshine (or a cloudy approximation thereof) in order to fight it.

Viewed through the fence: the Princess Diana memorial playground for children in Hyde Park.

Kensington Palace and the Queen Victoria Statue



It never occurred to me before, but my spouse who is always drawn to any body of water could be of Selkie ancestry!  See him here with his mysterious cohort the "Swanky Swan".

Signs kept pointing to the Diana Memorial Fountains.  We never located them.  We did come upon these lovely fountains near Pan.

On the way back to the hotel we were looking for potential places to eat.  After our notorious KFC every single day in 2000, I determined that this time we would try to find some traditional English foods that we might like.

 

 

A small bakery provided a bit of the sweets I was looking for.  I love all the little cakes that are small works of art.

 

 

Larger intriguing cakes, oh, doesn't anything with strawberries seem appealing?

And meringues!  I never did try these but they live in my imagination.

Also, I thought that we should explore the "English Pub Experience" the travel guides write about.  Somewhat inspired by a coworker who has been touring local MN breweries, I thought I could try a local brew in each place we visited. 

We found that London and England generally are very much in love with foods from foreign lands and you find every cuisine from the near and far east up and down every street.  No traditional English food.  NOT going to allow that Burger King!

In the evening, we met Mr. D.O.A.'s longtime online Bridge partner, the wonderfully named Utensil at a local pub.  Our First pub! I had cleverly brought along the Snoopy deck of playing cards from my last year's Christmas stocking, thinking we might actually play a hand or two.  I haven't played in say 15 years.  That I could play at all was miraculous.  Under the circumstances nobody cared, as you may surmise.

 

 

 

Our brew du jour was Fullers, recommended by our local host.  I chose a dark brew in every case because if you are only going to drink one, maybe two tops, you don't want some puny weak stuff, right?

 

 

 

 

I had also teased that I would "interview" Utensil regarding the origin of his name.  He graciously allowed me to use my beloved iPod for a few words of wisdom and after viewing it, said I could post it here.   He and my husband are really a fine match for each other I must say, and now I know why my husband is always calling out to me for spellings of fancy words and the names of obscure songs while he is playing and laughing uproariously all the while.

 

 

 

 

We told Utensil of my plan to try interesting local brews everywhere we went, and it was his long ago trip to Belgium (in the 80s) which led us to seek out Kwak, the topic of another post.   I have no clue how to turn the clip upright.  Just turn your head and enjoy.

 



 

DOA on the Road

Before I left home I thought adding pictures and a travelogue here would be the easiest thing to do. Ha! Nothing but problems logging in, changing information, verifying and reverifying. Gack! Slow Internet connections, photos don't upload here. Sheesh. I can only write in HTML mode. Maybe it is this cursed Mac. Shouldn't whine since it is doing the job. Lots of pictures to post when I return, with speedy Internet. We flew Iceland Air for the first time. Nice flight, tv screens on the back of each seat so you can watch a movie from a wide selection. No food or drink served that wasn't pay on the spot. Fair enough though I always appreciate when they give you a nice cool can of 7 UP. The staff really speak all in Icelandic with a few tidbits of English tossed in, the very briefest information. Off to London. We had a list of must see places and got those in then went to a few others. Only 3 days here so it was packed. We met my spouse's longtime Online Bridge Partner and he was really nice, lots of fun and a good sport when I pulled out my new Snoopy playing cards so we could play a few hands. We were unable to find a fourth. Free looow speed Internet in the lobby and suddenly some wierdo popped up next to me trying to make conversation and get a gander at my iPod screen. You know how they say in the movies don't sit with your back to the door? Don't cruise the net in front of a big window, either. We rented a car out of London and drove to Bath. Really a lovely lovely city, very relaxed but bustling. All for now. I'll have to solve the problem of the photos.

Revolution Season 2 Premier

Just a quickie post before I fall behind   :)

The bombs hit Philadelphia and Atlanta and there seems to be some interaction between the fallout from that and the nanites that are everywhere.

The lights were on for 4 minutes.  This gave people hope that they could be turned on again permanently.

The President of the US who has been hiding out has made his way to the White House by mule cart.  One of his followers/staff arrived by ship to the place where Neville and his son are looking for the mom (aka Piece of Toast Lady) to rally everyone to the cause of the good ol' USA.  Neville is reinvigorated by hatred and he plans to get  revenge on the "patriots".

Charlie has gone off alone to find and presumably kill Monroe.  Her hair finally looks straggly as it should.

Rachel has gone all wimpy and self obsessed with guilt.  However she seems ready to openly be in love with Miles.  He is dodgey but hovers protectively nearby.

Aaron has found a nice woman and is in a relationship till her ex bursts in and slices him in two. Oops.  We see Aaron at the end of the show breathing in a deep lively breath though so, yo, nanites?

War Bands of total skag guys are raiding and killing people.  The Plains Nation isn't the snuggliest place on earth.

Person of Interest

A new night and time for Person of Interest. 

They are taking a team approach to the show, and annoying Shaw wasn't quite as annoying as usual,  She just isn't a likeable character.  They're taking a bit of a lighthearted humorous approach to everyone and their abilities though so maybe I'll get used to her.

Carter has been busted to street cop.  Poor Carter.  On the plus side when not in uniform they're playing up how gorgeous she is, as well as being loyal and smart.  Don't open her closet.

Fusco remains a detective with a new partner who is "a bag of rocks" or something similar.  Fusco gets to be in disguise and defuse a bomb, a step up for him.

Finch and Bear are actively out on the streets, showing up just when needed.

Reese coordinates everyone and is the natural leader. For such a lonely man, he seems very happy to be leading this merry group.

Root is in an asylum with the most idiotic psychiatrist on the planet.  In every scene I just kept looking at the pencils on the desk and was expecting her to grab one and stick it in his throat.  When she finally did unleash on him, it was in a far more damaging way, since she knew (of course) all of his secrets and had made friends with his young daughter online as well.

The main case this week of a sailor in trouble with some bad guys over stolen uncut diamonds, meh, not very good at all though the actor who played the sailor was really cool and I wanted to see him added to the team.

 

 

http://www.cbs.com/shows/person_of_interest/

 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Person_of_Interest_(TV_series)

 

 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1839578/

 

 

http://www.person-of-interest.net/

Marvel: Agents of Shield

ABC's new series is off to an interesting start. 

A common but likeable man who is having some tough times turns out to have taken part in an experiment to augment his body.  He has super strength which allows him to save a woman from a burning building. 

Everyone in the area is filming the fire with their cell phones.  That certainly is realistic, that's what everyone does in a disaster situation now, right, get out their cell and start filming it for the news and social media?

One of those documenting the incident sees Mike drop from a high window to the street with a woman in his arms, both totally unharmed by the fall.  She stalks him in a very giddy and I thought creepy way, wanting him to come forward as a hero. 

Her name is Skye and she is a computer whiz living in a van who can hack into anything.  SHIELD turns out to be one of her main targets.

SHIELD of course, is all over her with a newly assembled team whose job it is to try to shield the public from knowing too much or having too many encounters with the mutants now among us.

The show takes just the right tone of humor, whiz bang action, high tech amazements while grounding the episode in very human stories like innocent Mike trying to take care of his young son and doing desperate things to keep everything together.


http://www.agentsofshield.com/home

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Marvels-Agents-of-Shield/114401492091023?directed_target_id=0

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agents_of_S.H.I.E.L.D.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2364582/

Sleepy Hollow: Blood Moon

While not so frenetic as the pilot, the first episode of Sleepy Hollow was excellent and scarier by far!  Ichabod dreams of the Four Horsemen and his wife Katrina. 

He learns that the leader of the evil coven which inhabits Sleepy Hollow, Serilda of Abaddon seeks to return to life.

She has help from that hapless Pawn of Evil, John Cho's Andy Dunn.  Andy awakens from death with his head still impossibly bent down his back, and boy does he have trouble seeing where to walk!  Yikes!  The Smoky looking Beast snaps his head back into place and Andy heads off to do his bidding, muttering about some people being ungrateful and not being sooo helpful all the way.

 

He finds and names the victims for the witch, as she needs ashes from the ancestors of those who weakened her so she could be burnt at the stake. 

Serilda is one one scary woman in life and in death.  In life, her eyes were black slates, and in death, she is a lithe, ragged, burnt creature who transports from spot to spot closing in on, then burning her victim to turn them to ash.  I had my shirt ready to put over my eyes as she stalked a little boy in a darkened house.

Andy Dunn is not the only dead character who comes back to life.  In an interview I read, Ichabod aka Tom Mison says you can never tell who will die and who will return to life in Sleepy Hollow.

We have two covens then:  Serilda's and the Sisterhood of the Radiant Heart which I think must have been lead by Ichabod's beloved Katrina, now trapped "between worlds".   Good to know she isn't just helpful, but powerful, though her powers are limited if she can only appear in dreams.

We briefly meet Abby's sister Jenny at the end of the episode.  While Abby has dealt with her childhood brush with evil by burying the memory, her sister fully embraced the encounter with evil and has been in an asylum ever since.  She seems completely sane when we see her, doing pushups and pullups in her room to stay buff and ready to fight.  She reminds me of Linda Hamilton from Terminator 2: Judgement Day.  She also sees the Beast in a reflection in her window.  We don't know if he is a regular visitor or if he is coming now because things are heating up in Sleepy Hollow.

I enjoyed the episode.  Ichabod Crane is an intelligent man in an impossible situation.  The fact that he is a soldier and a spy who was investigating possibly supernatural events in his own time for someone like George Washington helps him adjust to his new circumstances more quickly than someone else would.  I enjoy the scenes from Revolutionary times.  It is very cool that he can know about the network of underground tunnels under Sleepy Hollow and secret rooms in buildings because he used them himself in his duties.

Abby is just the right mix of hard cop and wounded inner person who wants to believe and wants to do the right thing.  She is determined to do what is right no matter what that involves personally or professionally.  Her big heart serves her and us well.




http://www.fox.com/sleepy-hollow/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleepy_Hollow_(TV_series)

http://www.visitsleepyhollow.com/

http://www.buddytv.com/articles/sleepy-hollow/sleepy-hollow-recap-ichabod-an-51287.aspx

Banned Books Week

Every year we look at the books which have been banned, removed or requested for removal from libraries everywhere. 

We often put up displays of these books and everyone is fascinated, and can't believe that the very books they enjoy reading and that their kids love are the most targeted by someone, someplace who wants to have a say in what others read.

One year I put up a display of the books and decorated it with a roll of that Do not cross: police line tape.  Someone was offended by that! 

Read read read, everyone!  Let your children read what engages their hearts, minds and imaginations and don't personally ban them from enriching themselves.


Read More about it!

http://www.bannedbooksweek.org/

http://www.ala.org/bbooks/bannedbooksweek

http://www.nypl.org/blog/2013/09/09/banned-book-list

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/15/banned-books-2013-captain_n_3083933.html

Sleepy Hollow Premier: Awakened

Official Site   http://www.fox.com/sleepy-hollow/


Yo ho! Off to a swashbuckling, head rolling good start! 

Ichabod Crane, still lanky but handsome as anything with a British accent is helping a most cryptic and mysterious George Washington track down a man in the Hudson Valley of 1781.  The man finds him, riding right for Crane on a monstrous white horse, a mask over his face, an enormous axe in hand.

Failing to kill him by shooting the man as he closes in, Crane desperately beheads him with his sword.  The killer takes a swing at Crane, slicing his abdomen open and both fall to the ground.  Semi-conscious, Crane sees the massive fellow get up, headless, and mount his horse to ride away.

Crane awakens in a dank cave, partially buried but he's alive.  He's in modern day Sleepy Hollow.  A local policeman has been beheaded and Crane's story of Revolutionary War times and working for George Washington make him an immediate and convenient suspect.

What I learned from the opening episode:

Don't lose your head over any character because they're likely to be dead by episode's end.

There are two covens of witches in Sleepy Hollow and beyond.  One is good and one is evil.

Two witnesses will work over a period of seven years to keep the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse from entering the world.

Abbie's partner has secret files he had been keeping trying to piece together of unexplained events over time in Sleepy Hollow.

The Headless Horseman has an agenda, more than just getting his shrinky glowing head back.

As in any really good scary tale, you can't tell who the good guys and bad guys are.

The episode went really fast and I can't wait for next week's episode!  Scary, great characters, fast paced!  Abbie Mills, the tough female cop and Ichabod Crane, professor of history and adventurer are a great pair.

Map of Sleepy Hollow

About the Show from the Official Site:

Welcome to SLEEPY HOLLOW, the thrilling new mystery-adventure drama from co-creators/executive producers Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci (the “Star Trek” and “Transformers” franchises, “Fringe”).

In this modern-day twist on Washington Irving's classic, ICHABOD CRANE (Tom Mison, “Salmon Fishing in the Yemen”) is resurrected and pulled two and a half centuries through time to unravel a mystery that dates all the way back to the founding fathers. Revived alongside Ichabod is the infamous Headless Horseman who is on a murderous rampage in present-day Sleepy Hollow. Ichabod quickly realizes that stopping Headless is just the beginning, as the resurrected rider is but the first of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and only one of the many formidable foes that Ichabod must face to protect not only Sleepy Hollow, but the world.

As Ichabod finds himself in 2013's Sleepy Hollow, he discovers a town he no longer recognizes and grapples to understand. Teaming up with Lt. ABBIE MILLS (Nicole Beharie, “42,” “The Good Wife,” “Shame”), a young cop who has her own supernatural experiences, the two embark on a mission to stop the evil that has awoken along with Ichabod and that now is seeping into this once-sleepy town.

Clues from the past enlighten mysteries in the present, as each episode features a flashback to Ichabod's life in 1776. Ripe with untold stories from American history and cloaked in mythology, the divide between present and past becomes dangerously blurred. Lives are in the balance, including that of Ichabod's late wife, KATRINA (Katia Winter, “Dexter”), who is trapped in a mysterious netherworld. In his pursuit to save her, Ichabod uncovers secrets about her, leaving him with countless questions.

Not everyone believes Ichabod's tales of 1776 and supernatural evils, especially the new head of Abbie's police precinct, Captain FRANK IRVING (Orlando Jones, “The Chicago 8,” “Drumline”). When faced with bizarre events he can't explain, Capt. Irving reluctantly turns to Ichabod and Abbie to investigate.

Ichabod's extensive first-hand knowledge of our country's hidden history, coupled with Abbie's superior profiling and modern threat assessment skills, make them a formidable duo. The complex pasts of the pair, from Ichabod's inclusion in the powerful and secretive Freemasons Society to Abbie's childhood visions, will help them solve the intricate puzzles of Sleepy Hollow in order to protect its – and the world's – future. As history repeats itself, the oddly-linked pair will draw on the real stories and secrets this nation was founded on in their quest to stop an increasingly vicious cycle of evil.

How to Snuggle Down for the Duration: Householding

A post from Susan Wittig Albert on Facebook sharing a site on how to make Homemade Extracts reminded me of a post I've been meaning to put up. 

How to make Homemade Extracts  from the Commonsense Homesteading blog illustrates the thinking that you can and should return to the idea of a household which operates organically with your garden and the community resources that allow you to live simply and in a better way.  That is my explanation.

If you're a gardener, this opens up all sorts of possibilities for you to be creative beyond the practical aspects of growing and preserving foods.  You can use what you grow in so many ways. 

I haven't had time to dig in and read all about it myself yet, but the long cool winter this year can be spent planning my garden for next year with some added dimensions and possibilities.  These are some of the books I jotted down to read:

Householders Guide to the Universe by Harriet Fasenfest

Homeward Bound: why women are embracing the new domesticity by Emily Matchar

Backyard Winter gardening Vegetables by Caleb Warner

Barnheart the incredible longing for a farm by  Jenna Woginrich

The Dirty life: a memoir of farming, food and love by Kristin Kimball

Made from scratch discovering the pleasures of a handmade life by Jenna Woginrich

I'm sure there are plenty more, and I could be a fiend and request the old Foxfire series from my library.

Since my ancestors were farmers, this will tie in nicely with my family history scrapbooks and help me appreciate the lives those folks led so that I can bring them to life.