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intractable fungus

Written by steve warrington on . Posted in cabinet of curiosities, plants. No Comments on intractable fungus

Two summers ago I cleared the understory in the back yard. I stacked all the long skinny maple trunks at the edge of the yard and forgot about them (after the next door neighbor bristled at my interpretation of the property line).

This summer, after months of frustrated desire for a back yard aesthetic paradigm shifter, I took a couple of the trunks from the pile and painted them (gradients of pink and blue respectively).

It was a pretty cool effect:
painted-trees

Last night I went out to wrap some lights around the blue one, and rather miraculously I think, some fungus spores had managed to either a). lodge themselves before it was painted and then poke out through the paint or b). lodge themselves into the tree through the paint and sprout out through the same holes whence they had inpoked. Either way: pretty!

blue-tree-fungus

eremurus like octopus

Written by steve warrington on . Posted in desire, gardening, plants. No Comments on eremurus like octopus

I am beginning to think that the octopus is my familiar, though I am not sure we’re supposed to enjoy our familiars as cuisine as much as I love mine.

Regardless, I like its style.  I like the cut of its jib. I like its inky defense mechanism and its stink-eyed seafloor stare. I like its sucky tentacular gelatinous reach and its super-slick swimability.

So naturally I like things that resemble the ‘pus. Exempli gratia Eremurus rhizomes. Check them:

eremurus-ruiter-cleopatra

I planted half a dozen of these bad boys when the ground thawed for a minute last week. Come spring: kapow!

the sun looking at me all cockeyed

Written by steve warrington on . Posted in navel gazing, not worth publishing, oh life. No Comments on the sun looking at me all cockeyed

several times already this year I have been gently arrested by the realization that all this cold, this snow, this bitter wind, and lack of leaves and flowers, all of this is thanks to a little teeny tilt of the earth on its axis.

But it’s not the distance from the sun that has us all bundled in fur and wool in the winter and stripped down to our skivvies in the summer like I for a long time thought. That’s only a 2 per cent distance variation from summer to winter after all, which makes for only a 4 per cent change in temperature. The real fweezing/buwning comes not from how far the sun has to travel but how it hits us.

Ya know when you’re out in the garden in July and you suddenly understand that the sun isn’t shining on you but at you and so you slather more SPF 105 over your face and raise your zinc-stained fist and swear the sun your eternal enemy?

Yeah, that’s b/c in the summer the sun is shining down and raining ultraviolet blows about your head and shoulders like Mike Tyson circa ’85. In the winter when we’re tilted away like Ali circa ’63 there are fewer hours of light and that light is hitting us all aslant so less of its punishment is absorbed. Glancing blows rather than a square wallop to the chops.

Being the übercracker that I am, I vastly prefer winter light to summer. That plus my metabolism is evolved from eons of long-cold-winter starvers. With enough fur and wool then I am ready for the winters I was born for. Verily I say unto skadi: bring it.

Cormac McCarthy’s Typewriter

Written by steve warrington on . Posted in cabinet of curiosities, desire, money, oh life, writing. No Comments on Cormac McCarthy’s Typewriter

Continuing with the spasm of materialism inhabiting this e-ournal* for the last couple of weeks (it’s the holidays, bub), consider Cormac McCarthy’s Olivetti for auction this friday at Christie’s.

cormac-mccarthys-typewriter

I begged and begged Courtney to buy it for me but no dice. I don’t know what I’d do with it anyway except look at it sitting in the corner.

And write letters to myself from him:

Steve,

What a slamming writer you have turned out to be.

– Cormac

Sigh………..

* Thank you A.H.M for lending this appellation.

twenty-four seconds of hilarity

Written by steve warrington on . Posted in oh life. No Comments on twenty-four seconds of hilarity

Flight Control: Flight 209 you’re clear for takeoff.
Clarence Oveur: Roger.
Roger Murdock: Huh?
FC: LA departure frequency 123.9.
Clarence Oveur: Roger.
Roger Murdock: Huh?
Victor Basta: Request vector, over.
Clarence Oveur: What?
FC: Flight 209 clear for vector 324.
Roger Murdock: We have clearance, Clarence.
Clarence Oveur: Roger, Roger, what’s our vector, victor?
FC: Now we’re in radio clearance, over.
Clarence Oveur: That’s Clarence Oveur, over.
Victor Basta: Roger.
Roger Murdock: Huh?
FC: Roger, over.
Clarence Oveur: What?
Roger Murdock: Huh?
Victor Basta: Who?

what do i do if a ginger kid bites me

Written by steve warrington on . Posted in oh life. 3 Comments on what do i do if a ginger kid bites me

One thing I like to do every day is check google trends to see what people are searching for. And every so often there’s a good phrase in there, right below simon malls and right above eme627 laptop that stops me in my tracks.

On Thanksgiving day 2009 at 9pm EST the thirty-first most popular search term was “what do i do if a ginger kid bites me”

As this is a question we have all pondered at one time or another, I was quite relieved to see that others were worrying it as well. Perhaps most comforting of all are the related searches. As you can see below, there are good folks out there like ourselves who worry the big questions in life and find if not solace then at least succor in google’s gentle ministrations.

what-do-i-do-if-a-ginger-kid-bites-meThough I wish this all were true, more likely the trend is the result of a random scalawag with nothing to perpetrate but mischief while he/she waits out the boredom of a family gathering. Ginger, on the other hand, is commonly English, which is not celebrating a holiday today, especially not at 11am, when the search saw it’s peak, though 11am here is 4pm there. On the third hand, ginger may be gaining ground here. Talking about Hercules the other day, Rosie asked, Wasn’t he a ginger? A ginger? Hercules?

No, but jesus was a mischievous badger.

boundless wants

Written by steve warrington on . Posted in desire. No Comments on boundless wants

continuing in the vein of posting images of pretty things I want, stuff your eyeballs full of these babies:

iwoodecodesign-wood-sunglassesiwoodecodesign makes some badaxe sunglasses outta woot!

They may set you back a pinch, but being all photosensitive like I am I think my doctor might deem them absolutely necessary! But here’s the rub: unless you live in Louisville or enjoy ordering something for your face that you can’t try on first, then you’re out of luck. Most of their bidness is overseas apparently, and these bad boys don’t retail at your local sunglasses carousel. You can order from their site, but without trying them on you’ll be ordering somewhat,ahem, blind.