Remembering Harry

Harry B. Paulson, Sr. died on Wednesday, January 6.

Harry lived in the house behind mine. His obituary ends with this line:

Harry will be missed for many things but most notably his feistiness and zest for life.

Sounds about right.

Not long after we moved here, when Harry was a spry fellow in his early eighties, he locked himself out of his house. There was no getting in the first floor without breaking a window. But perhaps one of the second-story windows was open, if just a little. We put a ladder against the porch roof, and I climbed up to check the windows.

To my surprise, Harry climbed up right behind me. All the windows were closed. We tried to slip a thin piece of metal through the meeting rails of a bedroom window, hoping to open the clamshell sash lock. No luck.

We ended up using my cordless drill to drill a hole through the lower rail of the top sash, and then used a bent coat hanger to unfasten the clamshell. The window slid open easily, and Harry climbed in.

Rest in Peace.

Learning from the Masters

One of these years, I'm going to sign up for the Master Gardener program at the U. Until then, I think I've found a pretty good alternative. I've been volunteering to help Master Gardeners with their community gardening projects in my neighborhood.

It started a couple of years ago when I agreed to help clear a ditch to make way for a raingarden. Working alongside a couple of Master Gardeners, I learned to identify buckthorn and some other weedy trees. Better yet, I got my hands on a Weed Wrench. It's a great tool -- very effective, and fun to use. It's a bit pricey for something I need for a few hours, once or twice a year, but one the local Master Gardeners has one that she loans to people in the neighborhood.

Since then, I've helped with three or four other ongoing projects. For a little sweat and time, I've learned a lot about container gardening, native prairie plants, trees, insect pests, rain gardens, and edible weeds.

If you are free at noon on Sunday, September 13 and you want to learn about natives, consider helping with the Friends of Horton Park as they work on their native wildflower gardens.

Tap Roots

Tap Roots, a raingarden initiative, kicks off Monday, June 8, with a gathering at the Hamline United Methodist Church raingarden, at the corner of Minnehaha Avenue and Simpson Avenue. Directions

Snacks will be provided, ideas will be exchanged, and we'll see what a ragtag bunch of neighbors/gardeners can do to promote raingardens and native plants.

Natives, with their deep root structures, are ideal for raingardens. Jonathan Dregni, the spark behind this meeting, has more to say about the benefits of natives in home gardens.

Raingardens don't have to be elaborate. I've found that there are some simple things we can do when designing a boulevard garden to capture rainwater and slow runoff.

Free Dirt

The sign did its job. I had about a cubic yard of dirt on the boulevard, and now all that remains are a few shovelfuls. Got to meet a few nice people when they came by to fill their buckets.

Borrowing Babies

Last night, at our National Night Out block party, I got to hold a six-week old baby while his mother chased after his two-year old brother and his father played cello. Fussy at first, he settled down as we swayed to the music of The Spaghetti Western String Co.

Such tiny feet and such skinny legs on such a small body. It seems hard to believe that my kids were ever that size.

This summer, my kids have been following the reality TV show, The Baby Borrowers. The premise was simple enough, but the real drama was watching teen romances fold under pressure.

Whatever.

Using children -- both the babies and the teens -- on a reality TV show is one of those ideas that's so wrong, I find myself stammering instead of voicing an objection.

Tonight's show was "Lessons Learned." Among the guests in the studio audience was a critic of the program, Dr. Kyle Pruett. He nailed it.

Pruett pointed out that the various safeguards that the producers put in place -- the parents watching on CCTV, nannies standing by, psychological screenings for the teenagers -- all of that was to assure the adults that everything would be okay. None of those precautions could have assured the babies that everything would be okay. From their perspective, they were thrust into an unfamiliar setting with unfamiliar caregivers, for an unusually long time.

Do I think the children were harmed? Not really. I'm not going to brush it off with a quick "Kids are resilient." Yes, they are, but we shouldn't take advantage of that remarkable quality. If there's any potential for harm, it's more likely to be from the publicity surrounding the show and the effect it might have on the families.

Though I stayed home with my kids, I'm not against childcare. I don't think that the debate over the ethics of "The Baby Borrowers" should turn into a chapter of The Mommy Wars. But it doesn't take an expert to realize that a couple of stressed out teenagers on a reality TV show set might not be the best childcare option.

While searching for commentary on the show, I found this wry summation of an NBC press release on Salon's Broadsheet:

Watch our show! Four out of five psychiatrists agree -- it's harmful to children!

One might think that "The Baby Borrowers" would have caught the attention of the pundits at the Institute for Marriage and Public Policy, but if so, I haven't noticed. Hmm. They were all over Big Love.

I spy

I spotted this SUV driving around my neighborhood. It was not just passing through. It had some sort of multi-directional camera mounted on the roof, and it appeared to be turning up and down every street.

Last year, Google used a similar vehicle to take pictures for StreetView. Could it be that they are updating the Twin Cities StreetView so soon, or is some other company gathering these photos?

What will happen to the earlier photos once Google updates StreetView? Perhaps the most interesting photos from last summer's StreetView are the series of photos taken as the Google vehicle crossed the ill-fated 35W Bridge. I hope that these are archived in some manner.

Livin' la Vida Local

Saturday morning, a second annual pot-luck breakfast on the boulevard, one block away. Waffles, crepes, scrambled eggs that were from a coop 6 houses down the block. And several delicious baked goodies. Lots of catching up with old neighbors and meeting new ones.

Sunday afternoon, Market Days, five blocks away. An initiative of a local environmental group, the idea is that neighbors can bring their excess produce, crafts, or other vaguely related stuff to swap. I took a dozen potted perennials, mostly from divisions. Ten of them found new homes. For my efforts, I received a head of lettuce, a bunch of beet greens, two bars of hand-made soap, a few IOUs, and a dollar.

Some things were given freely, such as the serviceberries that Diane picked at a not-to-be-disclosed location, and lots of tips on edible weeds, such as Lamb's Quarters, Purselane, and Amaranth.

The group is going to try to make a weekly event out of this. Here's hoping it succeeds.

4th of July

It was a fabulous Fourth. The weather was warm and sunny, with low humidity.

I got to work in my garden nearly the whole day. Divided, potted, uprooted, created a new bed, planted, weeded, watered, and turned compost. The pursuit of happiness, as I see it.

Sometime in the late morning, I waved to my neighbor as he drove past. A few hours later, I saw him again. He called out, "When I left, you were working in the garden, and when I came back you're still working in the garden. I played 18 holes of golf. I sure hope you are having as much fun as I did."

Yep. I sure did.

I took a break in the evening for brats on the grill and baseball on the radio. The kids each went with friends to see fireworks. I got to garden into the twilight, listening to all the neighborhood fireworks going off. Maybe it was just my imagination, but it seemed that I could see a little haze in the streetlights from all the smoke. Small fireworks are okay, until you compare them to the big ones. We live about a mile from the St. Paul Saints stadium, and they put on a nice fireworks show that makes the small stuff seem really small.

I didn't finish putting my tools away until 10:30.

Snow Bound

A glimmer of orange under the snow.

One of my neighbor's has a thing for putting little plastic animals on dowels, and sticking them in her lawn. It's her way to commit random acts of public art, or something like that.

Go Ahead and JUMP

One of my neighbors engages in small scale public art, with a touch of whimsy.

JUMP features audience participation.

More paintthepavement

Neighbors at Blair and Albert painted their intersection on Saturday, September 22. Designs evoking the four seasons grace swirls that flow from a boldy patterned circle.

More photos in my picasa album.

UPDATE: Here's a Flickr photoset with 70 photos.

The canna's as tall as an elephant's eye

I tend to avoid tropicals, preferring to put my money into perennials. A couple years ago, a neighbor stopped by with a bag of canna rhizomes, and now I'm hooked. I might even buy some different varieties next spring.

With their dramatic size, these make a great border plant. The tallest of mine have topped 8 feet.

Given the vagaries of our climate, they start to bloom just about the time we get our first frost. And then I face the uneviable chore of digging up their rhizomes in the cold October soil. It's extra fun if it's raining and dark, too.

But when it's all done, I'll have double or more the rhizomes I put in. Next spring, I'll be cruising the neighborhood, looking to give away a bunch of these.

Turtle Invasion

Paint the Pavement, this time with turtles. Neighbors painted two more intersections, and added five turtles in the connecting street. It was nice just to help out this time. Great potluck afterwards. Steve's smoked brisket. Mmm. Wish I could have had a third helping. And turtle cheesecake from Muddy Paws for dessert. Another Mmmm.

"Thanks for the Weed!"

A year ago, I was introduced to purslane. Well, I've been pulling the weed for a long time, but I didn't have a name for it, and I had no idea that it was edible. A gardening friend clued me in. It's a flavorful green, but hard to describe. I like it. Apparently, it's good for me, too. High in Omega-3s, among other nutrients.

Greengirls posted about purslane yesterday. This evening, I took a little to share with a neighbor. She liked it, and offered some to her 4 year old son. He really liked it. I suggested that they come to my garden to see the plant in the ground, and to get a larger helping. The boy was excited when I pulled an entire plant up for him. I wish I could bottle up that joie de vivre.

As we left the garden, he turned and gave me a hearty, "Thanks for the weed!"

Repainting the Pavement

Was a sunny day. Storms threatened, but kept their distance until the paint dried. And then it poured and hailed. Our 5:00 potluck had to be moved indoors, and our "Circus on the Circle" had to be cancelled, but we got the painting done.

Sunny Saturday

Morning showers put a quick damper on our neighborhood yard sale, but they passed quickly, and we went on to raise a nice sum for our paint the pavement project. One neighbor potted up some of her perennials for the sale. They sold before I could buy one. Not to worry, as Linda will give me some divisions later.

I got to know a couple more of the neighborhood gardeners. One cleared up a plant mystery for me. (Thanks, Jo!) And I shared some perennials, some of which I had recieved from other neighbors. What comes around goes around.

We ended the sale around 3:00 in the afternoon, and with my wife's tacit approval, I spent the next six hours working in the garden until I couldn't see any more. I know that she'd rather I work at clearing out the basement, but I'll save that chore for a rainy day. Or a humid day. Just not on a day like this one.

Paint the Pavement

Paint the Pavement is now up and running. The banner photo on the main page is of our intersection.

So much depends . . .

. . . on a red wheelbarrow.

Okay, this one's not wet, and there are no white chickens.

I've been dividing and moving plants. This load of "leftovers" is ready for delivery to one of my neighbors.

Growing Community

While not abandonded, my garden has taken a back seat to a community building effort that some neighbors and I have been working on since Spring. Paint the Pavement is the brainchild of Andrea Erickson, who was inspired by the work of City Repair in Portland.

After months of neighborhood meetings and brainstorming and getting all our ducks in a row, we painted our intersection on Saturday, September 9th. About 200 people turned out. Nobody thought to keep an exact count of the number of people who painted, but I'm guessing that at least 100 people took a turn painting.

All told, we covered 2,500 square feet of intersection with traffic marking paint to make our design.

Local blogger Kevin Hendricks put up some photos on Flickr.