Corn Dog Ranch

the end of the roof/pool garden

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 20:19:00 -0800

after spending all that time last night moving everything that wasn’t stepped on off the roof, i woke up this morning to see that there were workmen stripping paint off our apartment building. old housepaint, right over where i had just moved every single one of my surviving plants. basically this is the end of my apartment gardening attempt for right now. i still have the community garden and i’m not giving up on that, but i just threw out basically 2 months worth of work in the course of less than a day and i’m feeling really discouraged. the landlord says it’s my fault and she doesn’t care. that’s cool.

edit: ok, i hate the way this sounds so here’s more detail. i have some sprouts inside (1 bean, 2 tomatoes, 2 each of 5 different lettuces) but all the nearly grown/fully grown vegetables (10?), 15 lobelias, 5 tomatoes, 2 cauliflowers, and about 40 lettuce sprouts are in the dumpster now. if i had planted that much in the garden i’d expect to lose about a third of it. ITS NOT THE END OF THE WORLD, BUCK UP MCGOWAN

* is the universal symbol for BING IT

Wed, 10 Mar 2010 21:44:00 -0800

ameen: ugh, [comedian] is gonna be at the [local comedy club]
i wonder if he's funny at all
me: hm
ameen: i bet he's nice
me: i think it'll be interesting
even if he's not funny
i wonder what his crowds are like
ameen: my guess, asiany
me: hahahaha
asiany
like they're wapanese* or otakus* or something
THEY ARENT EVEN ACTUAL ASIANS
ameen: haha
me: THEY LIKE HIM BECAUSE THEY THINK REAL ASIANS ARE SUPPOSED TO LIKE HIM
ameen: hahahhahahahha

natural predators of the rooftop garden, episode 2 - landlords

Wed, 10 Mar 2010 21:14:43 -0800

ugh now i’m super pissed. i called the landlady to bitch about the cables and she turned it around on me saying i shouldn’t have been up there in the first place because the roof has, and i swear to god she said this, “structural integrity issues”. i guess that’s alright except she hasn’t told ANYONE HERE ABOUT THIS. one of my neighbors goes up there every sunday to read a book and nap on a lawn chair, and there’s also a picnic table and a patio swing up there that people like to sit in and watch the fireworks and city lights and things. the path up to the roof is completely unobstructed with not so much as a “WATCH OUT, THE ROOF IS ROTTEN AND SHITTY LIKE MY SLUMLORD HEART” post-it to let people know there’s issues.

wow, am i angry much? it just bugs me because we’ve been trying to get the laundry room and swimming pool and various lights and leaks and things fixed around here for YEARS. i’ve never even seen them paint. i have to wear knee-high rainboots every time i want to do a load of laundry because the drainage hoses are rotted through and she won’t replace them. (she comes here to empty the coin boxes for them and takes the DON’T USE THE RIGHT WASHER, IT WILL FLOOD signs out of the laundry room though) WHY ARE YOU GIVING ME CRAP ABOUT MY LETTUCES LADY WHEN YOU CANNOT EVEN FIX A LEAKY PIPE OR BROKEN LIGHT.

i moved everything off the roof and down by the pool tonight. i wasn’t originally intending on having more plants here at home, but the rooftop ones have actually been some of the best looking plants so far - you can control the conditions more than if they were buried in a garden, the cookie boxes they’re planted in are essentially mini-greenhouses when you have the lids snapped on so the sprouts won’t dry out or get blown over, and they were too high up for bugs or something because nothing up there ever had the slightest blemish on a leaf. except they did get torn up by the neighbor kids once, so i guess it wasn’t perfect. i’m a little worried they’ll all get eaten by bugs now, but that’s better than “crushed underneath the boot of the satellite guy”.

i’m looking for another space or some sort of wheeled greenhouse now, but there’s no such thing as a “u-gro-it” greenhouse rental space as far as i can tell. (it totally sounds like the most crunchy granola small business one could start though, next to like a holistic pet clinic or “macramaze! the macrame experience”, your source for knotted owl wall hangings and knotted owl doormats) the only thing i can think of is there’s like a million hydroponics shops within walking distance of here. maybe one of them wants someone to set up a window display with plants that aren’t weed? maybe?

who am i kidding, nobody ever wants to grow anything besides weed :(

natural predators of the rooftop garden, episode 1 - the directtv installation guy

Wed, 10 Mar 2010 20:42:48 -0800

i’m so glad it was dark out tonight when i went up to the roof to water my plants because i think i might have puked if i could see everything that happened up there. i guess the new neighbors are getting satellite tv put in, because there’s about 10 giant extension cables running off the roof that are plugged into the wall outside our door. i went upstairs to see what they were plugged into and to water my plants, and when i got up there i realized that THEY MOVED EVERYTHING AROUND ARGH. oh wait, they aren’t just moved around, they’re all knocked over and stepped on :( i lost like 5 lettuces, 2 tomato plants, a strawberry plant, and some marigolds. it’s nothing i can’t replace but the whole point of me being on the roof is that THEY ARE EASY TO MOVE, AND THEY ARE AWAY FROM WHERE PEOPLE WILL BOTHER THEM.

how to bore someone to death: a rebuttal

Wed, 10 Mar 2010 16:19:05 -0800

me: HEY
me: YOU'RE POSTING TUMBLERS ABOUT ME BECAUSE I'M NOT WRITING BACK FAST ENOUGH
me: HOW DARE YOU
(no time passes)
me: that's a pretty funny thing actually

whoaskedforthis: Xavier Jacob, 6 lb 9 oz, born March 10, 2010...

Wed, 10 Mar 2010 10:36:30 -0800

whoaskedforthis:

Xavier Jacob, 6 lb 9 oz, born March 10, 2010 (and Momma)

ah, so that’s what life doth

the garden, day 125! (march 6, 2010)

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 10:48:49 -0800

the garden, day 125! (march 6, 2010)

march 6, 2010

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 10:47:00 -0800

march 6, 2010

liezlwashere: Clay of the Day | 03.08.10 Meen Bellpeppers the...

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 13:27:31 -0800

liezlwashere:

Clay of the Day | 03.08.10

Meen Bellpeppers the Carrot Farmer Edition

This is my clay tribute to my buddy, Ameen.
The man of a billion doppelgangers.
The lover of burritos.
The wearer of fez hats.

legend has it that where ameen steps, plants sprout. oh wait, that isn’t a legend, it really happened.

folia - like myspace for friendsters

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 12:07:34 -0800

folia - like myspace for friendsters:

there’s a new social networking site just for gardeners. it also looks like everyone within 50 miles of me logged into this site once and never used it again, but hopefully i can use this to keep track of what i’m planting. the excel spreadsheets were abandoned months ago.

(via drowsybutcher) probably the best thing ever

Sun, 07 Mar 2010 20:30:10 -0800

(via drowsybutcher)

probably the best thing ever

how to pick peas (a long article written solely to support one terrible joke)

Fri, 05 Mar 2010 14:06:00 -0800

first, grow some peas. they’ll be flowers before they’ll be pea pods, but they’ll still taste like peas. (they do! try them on salad! don’t eat sweet pea flowers or peas though. those look like peas but are actually poisonous.)

when your peas are ready, use scissors to cut them off the plant. (don’t pull them off the stem, the plants are too delicate.) shell them, steam/boil/scatter on salad/put them in a bowl/etc and eat them. but what does a pea pod that’s ready to eat look like?

would you go with the left or right pods? the ones on the right are nice and plump, and when i asked my boyfriend last night which ones he’d eat he chose the ones on the right. these are not the peas you want to eat! you want the ones on the left. when your peas look like the ones on the right, they’re really only good for saving to plant or for drying and using in soup. they’re starchy, dry, and sometimes even a little bitter. the ones on the left are juicy, sweet, and taste like concentrated springtime.

so remember…

don’t eat these peas!

eat these ones! they are delicious, good for you, and full of green pea-ness. they will fill your mouth with a peanessy flavor. you’ll have their pea-ness on the brain for days after! in fact, some people might call you pea-ness obssessed. JESUS CHRIST WHY DO PEOPLE STILL LET ME ON THE INTERNET

the first peas of the year. tiny, but delicious. 2 rows of the...

Fri, 05 Mar 2010 13:14:55 -0800

the first peas of the year. tiny, but delicious. 2 rows of the pea plants are completely covered in pods, and in 2 weeks the other plants should be ready too. hopefully it’s nice and warm today and tomorrow so more peas are ready to pick on sunday.

pizzwizzler: In honor of a special day. Try to spot all 37 of...

Thu, 04 Mar 2010 16:45:11 -0800

pizzwizzler:

In honor of a special day. Try to spot all 37 of the dicks Dante’s girlfriend, Veronica has sucked in this photo.

some of them are even in a row

liezlwashere: Angel’s Point at Elysian Park | Los Angeles, CA |...

Wed, 03 Mar 2010 19:20:07 -0800

liezlwashere:

Angel’s Point at Elysian Park | Los Angeles, CA | 02.28.10

(via heather)

i got a delicious breakfast with liezl on sunday morning courtesy monsieur egg (KNEEL BEFORE MONSIEUR EGG), and i got to indulge my heritage by taking pictures of someone taking pictures. (i swear i saw japanese people do this in hawaii all the time when i lived there. i also lived there from 1990-1993. jesus god that was a long ass time ago)

recent harvests

Wed, 03 Mar 2010 11:39:00 -0800

here’s some stuff i grew!

a baby watermelon radish and mignon/purple haze baby carrots. the purple haze ones have an orange core but the outsides turn purple as they get bigger. did you know wild carrots were purple? the dutch domesticated them and turned them orange in the 15th century as a tribute to the king, because orange is their national color. i told my boyfriend this when i showed him my carrots. he was silent for a second and went “that’s a really weird random thing to know”. this is a guy who will enter and win trivia contests with me, who doesn’t blink an eye when i can answer every single question in a round of jeopardy, who i have dated for 4 YEARS and all of a sudden he’s realizing that holy shit, his girlfriend knows a lot of weird stuff about various topics? i think i said HEY SHUT UP and fake-stomped away. i love you andrew. 4 MORE YEARS 4 MORE YEARS

the most ocd salad.

2 heads of “4 seasons” butter lettuce and 1 of “tom thumb” butter lettuce. the left head of 4 seasons grew in the shade, and the right one grew in the sun. so the more light it gets, the redder it turns! as it warms up, apparently the green color changes to more of a yellow-green. it’s like a time-lapse thermometer sort of.

i had a little extra time on lunch one day, so i went to the garden and picked a handful of lettuce and took it back to the office for lunch. no dressing. it tasted just as good as it looks. (the tomatoes are from trader joes. mine aren’t ready yet)

lolla rossa “majesty” lettuce. the outside leaves are frilly and red and the interiors are lime green.

back to business: The Best Ghostbuster

Mon, 01 Mar 2010 19:10:29 -0800

Me: QUICK WHO'S YOUR FAVORITE GHOSTBUSTERS
Me: DON'T THINK, JUST SAY IT
Heather: WHAT DO YOU MEAN MEMBER OR WHICH CARTOON I LIKE BETTER
Heather: I LIKE THE ONE WITH THE MONKEY
Me: NO
Heather: FAILING THAT I LIKE THE ONE THAT IS BILL MURRAY
Me: REAL DUDES
Heather: IS THAT RAY
Me: THE REAL REAL GHOSTBUSTERS
Heather: i cant remember his name
Heather: its bill murray
Me: ah, Howard Zeddemore
Heather: howard!
Heather: crap
(Time Passes)
Me: heather, I have a confession

rob delaney gets it/i get semi-serious

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 15:52:12 -0800

rob delaney gets it/i get semi-serious:

The passing of Andrew Koenig prompted me to write this, but it’s something that will apply to plenty of people.

I have dealt with suicidal, unipolar depression and I take medication daily to treat it. On two separate occasions over the past seven years, I’ve had two episodes that were severe…

Rob Delaney is a good guy and a good comic who lives here in LA. we talk sometimes, mostly about hobo-themed repetitive stress injuries. (long story) recently a mutual friend/acquaintance named Andrew Koenig disappeared and committed suicide in Vancouver BC. this has shocked and saddened so many people around here. Rob wrote a lovely piece on depression and i wanted to add my thoughts to it. so here they are, reposted from “a special internet message board dot net”

—-

i didn’t want to post this but if it helps someone out there then i feel like i really should say it. i lost my dad to suicide, brought on in part by bipolar disorder, in 2001. he was 45 and i was 16. even after being hospitalized twice to deal with the aftereffects of grief, trauma, depression, all that whiny crap etc., i still refused to take my own medication consistently or be under a doctor’s care for about 8 years. a lot of it was ridiculously awful, and there were days and weeks where i couldn’t get out of bed or leave the house. a lot of days, the only talking i could do was to my friends on AST. last year i decided i had finally had enough, or i got enough of a kick in the ass from my friends/family to take care of myself, or i got tired of feeling like a hypocrite - maybe all 3 - anyway, i’ve been back under a doctor’s care since november. i feel like i kind of robbed myself of almost 10 years of my life for not really any good reason.

i’m saying this because i also had the realization in january that if i only live to be as old as my dad, then that means i have less than 20 years to kick ass and be awesome. one of the things about suicide is it will absolutely mess up your friends and family for a long time. but the other thing is it will also remind your friends and family in the most horrible way possible that they also have a limited time on this planet, and they need to make the most of it, especially because their loved one can’t make the most of it anymore. in a way it was almost like some sort of sick gift. i don’t know how to explain it without sounding like some sort of macabre motherfucker. if there’s two things you learn when someone close to you commits suicide, it’s that EVERYONE that person was close to is affected, and that a lot more people will be hurt by it than the person ever could have realized.

basically, everything rob said in his thing, you should really take to heart. depression can be dealt with. you’re not going to feel like this forever. also, writing all this down made me kind of want to puke, but whatever. i hope it helps someone.

i can't believe someone thought it was a good idea to let me on the radio again

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 14:02:24 -0800

dailyclaw:

Radio Jerks is free from it’s 90s grips, but loses someone in its wake. Luke Maxwell will no longer being doing the show, but I have a fantastic guest co-host in Heather to replace him. If it goes well I might make her permanent, so let’s hope for the best! I have complete confidence in her. Gives us a second shot!

the closest thing i have to an arranged planting - i tried to...

Tue, 16 Feb 2010 10:08:53 -0800

the closest thing i have to an arranged planting - i tried to make the lettuce planting in curves and rows here. little gem (romaine), tom thumb (butterhead), 4 seasons (butterhead), majesty (red looseleaf) and a bed of more 4 seasons in back. also 2 chinese cabbages that are slowly getting cabbage-like. (february 14, 2010)