more green.

pumpkin flowers


wildflowers

Although the vines suffered a bit from my being out of town last weekend (and unable to water them- they were shriveled when I returned!), they are still going strong, and several pumpkin flowers have appeared! So exciting. I thin by autumn there will be no room for me out there at all; I've had to bring them back from hanging over the edge before they become too large and inflexible.

the green monster

The pumpkin vines have been busy converting rain into massive leaves this past week, and have climbed over the edge of their own accord. I shall have to restrain them once the pumpkins themselves begin to appear. Imagine the lawsuits I could be subjected to were one of the gourds to fall on the head of an unexpected passerby.



view from below

Cthulu

So. I looked up this Cthulu on the (incredibly erudite) world wide web, and he was a sort of octopus-looking thing; an evil god. (I knew he was some bizarre confection from the mind of H.P. Lovecraft, but that's about it). As it happens, in the dream he was a man; an extremely diminutive man (around ten inches tall), in a brown suit.

rain.

I've been out walking, and have gotten thoroughly, pleasantly soaked. A circuitous route around the Slope, some of it through the park on this wet blue evening, and it felt so great to ignore the rain and be drenched. Even my hat, whose office it is to keep my head dry, was soaked clean though like that day back in the winter, freezing in lower Manhattan. The rain this day reminded me of Edinburgh, though, beginning as a mist, then effecting a long slanted crescendo.

The pumpkin vines are creeping over the edge; flirting with gravity, testing their limits.

There was a dark biological thing in a dream this morning, inside of which resided a tiny living Cthulu (?). The thing had the power to latch onto living things (it was a beast of some unfamiliar sort in the dream)- sort of latch on and insert a rigid tentacle into the spine of the beast, thus becoming a controlling parasitic addition, like a pilot or a puppeteer.

I told Ben about it and he said, "There's an interpretation for that dream... what was it? Oh, yeah-- it means you're a FREAK." I'm pretty sure he's right about that.

first flowers!

First wildflowers have just appeared since yesterday! Very exciting. Basil is gorwing nicely, if slowl ( little does it know it will one day be delicious pesto...) And, of course, the pumkin vines are monsters. When first they began growing, there were nine of them! I uprooted some, but the rest continued to grow ravenously. Last week I cut away all but these two. They must battle it out to see who will be the remaining vine, as there isn't room for two in this town.

month of may.

Today and yesterday had beautiful weather, and me stuck in front of a computer. Work.

Memorial Day weekend has arrived.
I've begun work on a new book. Book number two. A book is a more interesting project than a calendar, but much more challenging, to say the least. This one shall have more writing than A Collection of Surmised Grotesques did.

I have also done some work toward the end of redesigning the electrofork site. Much preparation must be done though- there is a lot to do, really, as it will be nearly completely new.

I've really nothing much to type about right now. Not in the mood.

so fast

Now, with furniture! In the large planter little pumpkin leaves can be spied coming through the dirt...!


green onions growing

So here we are arriving at the end of another month- madness! The sproutlings out on the veranda are doing nicely, and finally the pumpkin vines have made an entrance. *yay*

eloquent surrealism.

Spam, on the whole, is one of the more irritating aspects of being digitally connected, but this is pretty entertaining (especially as it wasn't pushing knockoff pharmaceuticals or cheap software):

"Now and then, the secretly overpriced particle accelerator requires assistance from a lazily temporal skyscraper. When you see a grizzly bear defined by an eggplant, it means that a spider takes a coffee break. A cantankerous sandwich has a change of heart about the globule about an anomaly, but the deficit of a chestnut tries to seduce a mastadon. Some ball bearing self-flagellates, and the tattered parking lot rejoices; however, an infected apartment building brainwashes the polar bear."

green things growing

wheat grass


wildflowers


green onions

Front garden at five storeys. You should see it at sunset.

tenth april

Monday again. Yesterday during the newly extended sunshine hours, I spent some time on the "veranda" (read: the roof of the bay window belonging to the apartment on the floor below), planting things in window boxes and wee terra cotta pots. The roster of hopefuls: one window box wildflowers, one pot basil, a handful of small pots of green onions, and the piece de resistance: one large box planted with what shall hopefully grow into a mad pumpkin vine. The wildflowers are largely non-native (tsk tsk), so perhaps they shall become cuttings for vases before allowed to go to seed and spread their insidious foreignness amongst the foliage in the park... And lastly, one window box wheat grass; by this evening the lazy seeds had finally exerted enough strength to muster sprouts, so they went into the soil as well.

Whilst out on said precipice yestereve, I washed the exteriors of the windows, greatly enhancing the view at sunset. Unfortunately, being an impatient 'tard, I pulled one of the screens down to get at the top glass -down too far!- thus locking me out of my own living room. Brilliant. The screen had to suffer some damage (bent frame) in order for me to get back in.

As things begin to show green tendrils, I will begin collecting photographic evidence of progress.

flaky weather

April Showers

Yesterday's morning: bright sun and pleasant. Sky, at length, darkened and unleashed a half-hearted sort of rain. Then, in an instant, the rain (having become bored of its own properties perhaps) turned to snow-- BIG SNOW. Lasting only a couple of hours, by afternoon it was seemingly Springtime again: sunny and dry.

escape from digital

Overpass in rain

Catharsis. A charcoal drawing, 18"x24". Haven't used the medium in over a decade; forgotten how blackened the hands get. My eraser is indistinguishable from the bits of charcoal now as well, save by its shape.

here it is.

The Table

Buncha' stuff; two type cabinet drawers; 5.5 gallons of resin. Voila! Just add pedestal base (conveniently found on a curb in Park Slope a few years back). A table to vindicate years of insane pack-rat behavior.

Cartography of Time.

time, quantified.

This afternoon I have been largely absorbed in the interpretation of three weeks' worth of collected data into a visual key. It represents [my] time, (which can be a slippery thing when one works as a freelancer), and how it is spent. The goal of this exercise was to find where the largest chunks of ill-used time tend to exist, with the hopes of repurposing said chunks into more creative (non-client oriented) time. Basically, it has been a quest in search of an answer to the question, "Where does all the time go?" Damn interesting experiment, and I think I shall continue it for a time. Namely becuase this small cross-section is not enough data to really answer the question, but also becuase I'd like to see a whole year of it charted. (In fact I wish now I'd begun it on 01.01) More time, larger patterns; and intricate ones within those. Cycles and cirles. But I should like to add some more categories, or markers perhaps; signifiers of things like time indoors v. time outdoors; health issues (eg: a mark for days when one has a cold, or when the knee is acting up!); good days v. bad days (as relates to emotions, productivity, etc). Possibly add in the moon cycle as well-- why not?

Of course, the answer this day to the question posed is: I've used up many hours charting hours. (I think that may categorically fall under the heading "Irony")

Notes on the language: Each morning begins at the bottom of the column, and the day works its way up from there. Mornings were begun at 07:00, as it's extremely unlikely for me to wake earlier than that, save by sheer accident. Anything less than 15 minutes gets rounded ("less or up!") for the purposes of this experiment. Part billable/part social basically implies either (A) a meeting that ran long by meandering into a non-work-related discussion, or (B) a work-related meeting with a client who also happens to be a friend. Many hours of walking have been absorbed into "free time, elsewhere" due the fact that this is extremely unscientific.