Two Words

Van fire.



Porter night.



Manny, Quynh.



Local drunks.



Pharmaceutical weapon.



Falafel truck.



Outdoor movie.



Fantagraphics kid.



Georgetown Records.



Calamity Jane's!



G-town Sandwich.



Cranky neighbor.



And again.

Those Backyard Photos I Promised to Bore You With

Happy heather.



Sad heather.



Despondent heather.





I can't tell if this is going to look cool-weird (like the Cryptomeria) or shitty-weird, this planting-grasses-in-rocks thing.



I guess we'll find out.



That Euphorbia had self-seeded in the front.



The spouse wanted this zebra miscanthus. In general, I'm not crazy about variegation on leaves.



I can't get enough of the Autumn Joy type sedums right now. The unseasonal colors, the weird leathery texture. They seem primordial.







This Point Reyes Ceanothus has had no complaints yet.



I'll spare you from individual portraits of the Cryptomeria this time.



OK, just one.



A lot of plum crisps have gone unmade this year.



I want these Julia Phelps Ceanothuses to grow into a hedge-type barrier. Should I try to move them father apart or let them be this close? They're already touching, and they're only to about 3 feet of their eventual 7 feet.



Wow. Look how little they were just 6 months ago. You can barely even see them in this photo.



May I show you a couple more photos from back in March?

My Red Dragon on March 18:



My Red Dragon on March 21:



My Red Dragon in mid-September:



I know real gardeners are probably all done freaking out how much plants can grow in one season, but me, I'm still astounded. If these things that we take to our homes can grow 100 times their original size in 6 months, what the hell else might they do when we're not looking?

Another thing that happened when I wasn't paying attention. Bars started projecting pro-drinking messages on the walls. Last night at Chop Suey.



I was there to see Editors, my second-favorite band from Birmingham, England. (DD 4-EVER!)



I'll sign off with a couple of photos of things for sale at the Columbia City Farmers' Market today. (I bought 5 pounds of heirloom tomatoes, 8 Skagit Valley Farms pork chops, and some goat cheese from Bainbridge Island.)

Nine Pound Porter

From Manny of Georgetown Brewing:

Beer People -

Some of you have heard that we are brewing a porter this year. It is
ready! When? This Thursday. That's right, two days from today we are
debuting the Nine Pound Porter at the Nine Pound Hammer in
Georgetown. Beer goes on tap at 6:30PM. Come and say hello to the
Georgetown Brewing crew...you may even get a Nine Pound Hammer shirt.

I know this is incredibly short notice but the fact is... brewing is
not an exact science -- there is an art to it. In other words, we got
lucky. Usually when we brew a new beer, we brew it once, taste, make
adjustments, brew it again, taste, make adjustments, and then wah-
lah! We have our beer. This time... we brewed a new beer, tasted,
tasted again, poured a pint, tasted some more, then called Scott at
the Nine Pound and said "Hey Scott, when do you want your keg?" Now
I'm typing this email. burp. Mmmm.... porter.

Join us at the Nine Pound Hammer 6009 Airport Way S. Seattle at 6:30PM
this Thursday.

If you can't make it to the Nine Pound, we'll be pouring Nine Pound
Porter at the Fremont Oktoberfest this weekend and also at our retail
shop at the brewery.

Cheers!

-Manny

Blurry Photos of Our Weedy Front Yard

The reason I hardly ever post photos of my yard, even though this blog is supposed to be about "snapshots of plants," is that it's so not there yet. This year in the front we did nothing except build a small wood screen, and the back, well, the back is something we're just beginning to tackle. The lot is basically 10,500 square feet of neglect. Well, OK, maybe only 10,000 square feet of neglect and 500 square feet of somewhat gardened space. Anyway, you were warned.

The smoke tree that I will always love.



Barberry, cannas, the clematis I hate.



At some point I'm going to have to dig up these cannas in favor of the bird's nest spruce.



Japanese maple, blue oat grass, the viburnum whose growth I've stunted by never giving it any compost.



Feather grass, mondo grass. Clearly we need more ground cover.



Look -- we bought some.



The parahebe that Chuck told me was too small for its huge container (which I recently took it out of). He was right.



Yeah, not only do we have plastic lawn furniture in the front yard -- we have two totally different, totally ugly colors of it. There goes the neighborhood! There's an off chance that I'll give these unicorn plants enough water to live.



The echeverias were a container success story this year.



Raspberries in a container? Why not? They're happy enough -- they're berrying right now.



I like this little fir way better than my miniature pine.



This rosemary would probably be a lot bigger is I gave it some nice compost. Everyone else in Seattle has monster rosemary.



The little parking strip planting, post fennel massacre.



This is a happy little plant, whatever it is.



When we planted this ground cover, I don't think we realized it would turn into a fluffy pink cloud. I have to say, I sort of love it, though. Not there, but somewhere else.



The monster red dragon.





The new smoke tree. I love little purple smoke trees on top of piles of rocks.



The black elderberry, which you can hardly see but which I have high hopes for.



It's a work in progress. Gardens take a while.



I'll show you the backyard tomorrow.