From the category archives:

cabinet of curiosities

orchid keiki: my phalaenopsis had a baby!

February 2, 2011

Though it is nothing to brag about apparently. I thought it was a good thing until I read that it was the orchid’s response to stress. I also read some orchids just do it, stress or no, as a way to propagate. I also read more than one expert recommend cutting it and tossing it [...]

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nutmeg and mace: myristica fragrans

September 9, 2010

I just learned what fresh nutmeg looks like. Here are some visuals to aid in blowing your mind: What you buy in the store – if it isn’t ground – is the dried seed (which is inside the brown part inside the red web). But I don’t care about the spice any more. I just [...]

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how to dry a dead snake

September 3, 2010

I found a little serpent in the driveway of the farm last time we went out to walk the paths. The Catholic lawyers ran him over, and he was good and dead by the time I discovered his carcass lying still in the dirt. No more than nine inches total, just a baby probably, a [...]

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the impossible mangosteen (garcinia mangostana)

September 3, 2010

My two new mangosteen trees arrived from Hawaii today, looking wonderful. I had pretty low expectations for the size and health of the plants after all my searching and researching. Not only are they nigh-impossible to grow in the US, it seems they’re also pretty hard to come by. Most of the tropical fruit tree [...]

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not all right

July 11, 2010

Everything, it turned out, is not all right. In fact, if you can believe it, my thumbnail fell off. I really thought it wouldn’t. Then I thought it would. Then I didn’t. Then I knew it would. I updated Courtney periodically, the forecast ponging back and forth every few days, “I think it’ll stay” one [...]

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die antwoord – zef side

July 10, 2010

I think the whole Internet memed the F$@! out of this like all 2009 and $*#t, but I just got hepped to it, and can’t resist passing it on to all you other squares out there.

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the birds

July 10, 2010
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lightstik

May 16, 2010
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intractable fungus

December 15, 2009

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 [...]

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Cormac McCarthy’s Typewriter

December 4, 2009

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. 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 [...]

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