This mushroom photo is just a bit of a hook to get you interested in reading. It is also one of the reasons I had such a difficult time getting out a post this summer while in Tennessee. I took a lot of photos on my land, but I was overwhelmed about how to present them. The options available to me as a non-techie, non-designer person were pretty limited without upping my game or paying big bucks to someone to do it for me.
Jillian told me about this free graphic design program called GIMP, so I worked hard to learn how to make photo grids. The mushroom one was really difficult and if you look closely you will see that the lines aren’t even. I think it’s pretty good for my first grid and if I ever do one again I’ll have to reteach myself since it’s been over two months, but hopefully the pathways will be slightly less obscure.
I’m at the ending stages of my back patio renovation. I’m currently painting. I may have mentioned in an earlier post that my mom had an indoor apartment painting business for a while. One of the tricks she taught me was that you don’t always need to clean your brush at the end of the day. You can just wrap it in a plastic bag and stick it in the refrigerator. Well, I’ve taken this practice to a whole new level. I’ve been using the same paint brush for over a month now. (Before I entered this serious painting phase I was priming new plywood and lumber as well as painting Presto Patch and other fillers I used to repair rotted wood.) I use Purdy paint brushes which are perhaps the best in the business. And no I’m not fishing for sponsors (but if you work for Purdy or Presto Patch do get in touch).
The paint brushes (I’ve got a small and large) fit nicely in a Dave’s Bread bag. I put the bag of brushes behind my half gallon of milk which I’ve started putting on the door of the fridge because it’s so annoying to try to dig it out from behind bottles of juice and pickles that make their way in front. (I use the milk every day for tea and often cereal, but sometimes go a whole week without juice or a pickle.) Which reminds me—I was recently talking casually to a nurse practitioner friend about my milk intake and she asked what kind I drink and I told her “regular”, not having “whole” immediately available in my word bucket. She dropped her chin, looked at me sideways and said a little incredulously “You mean red top”?
I’d never really thought of that—how whole milk has that color coding—but yeah, even my cardboard boxed Organic Clover Milk uses red in its type to denote whole milk. Two percent is blue. Skim (which I don’t consider milk at all but just cloudy water) is usually pink or lavender. Milk is interesting. There is also coding on every milk container that can tell you all kinds of stuff about where it originates from.
One more side step before I get to some of the pictures I took this summer.
When I paint–and I’ve actually done quite a bit of it in my life–I don’t tend to listen to the radio or anything. Having sound isn’t my go-to. Quiet is my go-to. Jillian and I are pretty compatible as housemates this way.
At some point during a big painting job though I usually get tired of the quiet and when that happens, more often than not, I turn on NPR and listen to talk radio/news. But the other day I’d had enough of that and turned on KCSM, “the bay area jazz station“. That bought a little more time with Jillian who was also working outside and who would have gone in if I’d turned on news. She said as much and, anyway, I was tired of listening to all that pompous, feel-good-cheery-corporate-sponsored-stuff with the sudden lower-register-voice-drop meant to signal an appropriate change for reporting tragedies. I could have turned the dial to KPFA where I can count on cynicism, but I was just tired of talk. Talk, talk, talk. Elephant talk.
Anyway, KCSM was quite enjoyable and I realized how long it had been since I listened to this station when I heard the DJ introduce himself and didn’t recognize his name.
After about an hour the light started to fade. I was working after work. Soon it was almost completely dark and I turned on a clip-on work-light. A new radio segment started and the DJ was playing Brazilian jazz. A song came on and towards the end, I started to recognize it, but it was being sung in Portuguese and I couldn’t figure out where I’d heard the tune. I probably would have given up trying, but as soon as it ended another version of the song started up, also in Portuguese. It was nice music. Very pleasant, but by the end of the second one I was bothered. What the hell was this tune?
Oh well, it was time to quit. I dropped my paintbrush in the Dave’s bag, turned off the radio, went inside and showered.
I warmed up some beans and rice from the fridge and went to my nesting place in bed with my computer. I was still thinking about that song and the name Bruno Mars wormed its way into my brain and I googled Bruno Mars songs on my computer. BAM! The wonders of the internet. “Locked Out of Heaven”.
It was that eight beat refrain that I kept hearing that was making me say I know it! But here’s the kicker. I didn’t.
The refrain is, “Your sex takes me to paradise, your sex takes me to paradise.” I laughed to myself. I had thought it was “You sex-text me to paradise, you sex-text me to paradise.” I’ve never really done sex texting and I always thought, hearing this song, that going to paradise over sex-texting might be an overstatement, but hey, I could see it happening. What I thought was really funny was that it took listening to a song in Portuguese for me to find out what the lyrics were in English.
Okay, right angle change back to my summer trip and some of the photos.
Spicebush Butterfly were everywhere in the forest. I often saw them at different adult ages. As sippers, not munchers, they only live a few weeks and toward the end the black color has turned dusky grey and they often have holes or chunks missing from their wings.
There was a very popular milkweed plant on the side of Poor Valley road bordering the land and I often saw these first three species there. I only saw one example of the Zebra Swallowtail. In the close-up it is sitting on the shoulder of Stewart’s daughter, Jennifer. I went on a morning canoe trip for a mile or so down the Holston River with her family and friends. We stopped for a lunch break on a sandbar and this butterfly was very attracted to Jennifer. It stayed there on her shoulder for ten minutes or so. I learned from Stewart that I likely saw this species there because Pawpaw trees grow in the fertile soil next to the river and they are host to the butterfly’s caterpillar. Pawpaw trees produce the largest native fruit in the United States. To quote this website, “When ripe, the flesh is soft and custard-like, with a flavor that has been described as a blend of banana, mango, and pineapple.” They become ripe in the fall which may be why I’ve yet to find the fruit or (knowingly) even seen a tree. I’m imagining the fruit is something like the Cherimoya which I have had, but I won’t know until I try it.
Next time on SpottyWestGoesEast…the continued pondering of cabin building and, perhaps, what’s up with this blog that claims, ostensibly, to be about race?
It’s well for me to remember that all this land I enjoy walking and exploring was formerly the domain of Cherokee and the land I now live on, that of the Ohlone.
Also, if you go right now to your Google web browser and type in “bay area radio stations”, KPFA will NOT show up on that list.
Does anyone still want to sponsor me? Dave’s Bread? Clover?
Spotty West Goes East 