Old is New

The old quart canning jars I brought back from Ohio are in better shape than I expected; only one of the 36 had a chip on the rim. I haven't used a lot of quart jars in the past but I'm planning to use these to can more in the way of sauces, ragus and such. I've wiped off one layer of grime. Now I kinda wish I still had a dishwasher...

I can't help but wonder about the folks who filled these jars over the years and the meals they prepared with the contents. I think these jars are typical in that they haven't been used by the children or the grandchildren of the original owners and the details of their history are lost forever.

Peregrines 2009

On Tuesday they banded the four young Syracuse falcons: three were judged to be female, but they're uncertain about the smallest bird.

Meanwhile somewhere in or around the Cleveland Clinic, a 2005 Syracuse fledgling named Cade is tending her first brood of four.


Unfortunately the fledging I had the close contact with last year, Matilda, was euthanized after she was found badly injured earlier this year.

A Wet Week

After two months with very little rain, storms staying to the north of us, storms tracking south of us, the week I plan to set out tomatoes and such we get at least some measure of rain every single day. I feel like I'm getting further and further behind. Oh and we've spotted another groundhog in the neighborhood; lovely that is.

At least the little fringe tree is happy and its scent fills the yard.

A Long Week

Last week was a long one. It started off on Monday with the installation of an old cabinet where the dishwasher used to be, followed by the new countertop, sink and old new faucet. As with any project there was a mess to clean up before I could make a cake and head to Ohio on Thursday. And the tomato plants had to be staked and moved outside at the last minute when I realized they were going to outgrow the lights before I got back.

All went well in Ohio although my mother says that's it for birthday parties; if she has any more birthdays she says please just send a card.

Memorial Day (observed) I was home for our traditional trek to Tully's to watch the lax championship game. As it happens, this year both teams came from the homes of two members of the Iroquois Confederacy with long traditions of playing lacrosse, the Onondaga and Cayuga Nations. I was cheering for Cornell but Syracuse did it again coming from three goals down with less than four minutes left to tie it in the last few seconds and then winning in overtime, 9-10.

Me Mum

hiding her rheumatoid hands, 1984?

Today is my mother's 90th birthday. I'm driving to Ohio this morning with a homemade angel food cake per her request.

Europe, WWII

Growing

My tomatoes have taken off but I won't be able to put them outside until Monday; it's going to be interesting to see if they outgrow the lights before then.

Meanwhile there are four peregrine eyas on the State Tower Building again this year and they're also growing at the usual alarming rate.

May 16

May 20

Haxnicks Ltd

Haxnicks' Easy Net Tunnel

I've become a big fan of Haxnicks products. I got a big net tunnel from Seeds of Change a few years ago and after seeing how well the material holds up I invested in a few more this year. The netting provides protection from critters, especially the bunnies when they're small enough to squeeze through the fence, and the deer before I set out the tomatoes and such sprayed with Tree Guard ®.

We escaped the freezing temps the past two nights but one of the great things about these tunnels is that they can also support some Agribon or plastic. They're wicked easy to move and store.

Haxnicks

Note

Freeze Warning
for Onondaga County, NY
from 2 am EDT, Mon., May. 18, 2009
until 9 am EDT, Mon., May. 18, 2009

Issued by The National Weather Service
Binghamton, NY
4 am EDT, Sun., May. 17, 2009

... FREEZE WARNING IN EFFECT FROM 2 AM TO 9 AM EDT MONDAY...

THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN BINGHAMTON HAS ISSUED A FREEZE WARNING... WHICH IS IN EFFECT FROM 2 AM TO 9 AM EDT MONDAY.

TONIGHT WITH CLEAR SKIES AND LIGHT WINDS TEMPERATURES WILL FALL TO AROUND FREEZING. LOW TEMPERATURES LATE TONIGHT WILL BE IN THE LOWER 30S. SOME RURAL VALLEYS COULD BE EVEN COLDER... WHILE LOCATIONS IN URBAN AREAS AND ON THE FINGER LAKES COULD REMAIN JUST ABOVE FREEZING.

PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...

A FREEZE WARNING IS ISSUED WHEN FREEZING TEMPERATURES ARE FORECAST TO THREATEN OUTDOOR PLANTS. THOSE WITH AGRICULTURAL OR GARDENING INTERESTS IN THE WARNED AREA ARE ADVISED TO HARVEST OR PROTECT TENDER VEGETATION. POTTED PLANTS NORMALLY LEFT OUTDOORS SHOULD BE COVERED OR BROUGHT INSIDE.

Another Season Begins

http://www.voydanoff.net/albums/crane-creek-birds/c_bobolink2.sized.jpg

The bobolinks have returned to the meadows at the park and are performing another concert of sorts as they do their aerial loop de loops. In some areas it devolves into an odd battle of the bands when they try to out do their neighbors, the red winged blackbirds, but up on Farmers Hill there is one male who has a spot pretty much to himself and he put on a lovely show yesterday.

One Season Ends

The Syracuse Symphony Orchestra finished their classical season last night with an appearance by Joshua Bell. He of course was the consummate virtuoso but what we both noticed this time, in this performance of this particular piece, was the glorious sound of the violin. As Bell said, "it has a very powerful lower register" and it seems to be made for the Violin Concerto No. 3 by Saint-Saens.

Bell prefers his 1713 Gibson ex Huberman Stradivarius, with its "good balance between the sweetness, which Strads tend to have, a sort of soprano, feminine sweetness to them," he says. "But also, it has a very powerful lower register. It's very well-balanced, and it projects very well in the hall."

He will play the "very operatic, very dramatic" Saint-Saens concerto on his Stradivarius. Bell also describes the piece as underrated, but definitely a showpiece that he finds captivating.

"The slow movement is one of the most beautiful of all the violin repertoire and sort of magical ...," says the 41-year-old violinist. "Then the last movement is sort of Gypsy flair, kind of brings the house down. It's got everything. It's got the flash. It's got the beauty."
Melinda Johnson, The Post Standard

A Taste Of Spring

A good year for the rhubarb. I've sacrificed color for an old, early variety, Victoria. I'd like to add another variety with more color but these plants have done so well and have such good flavor that I doubt I ever will...

A Passing

My mother-in-law died on Monday. Her last years were exactly what everyone fears, a slow neurological deterioration affecting her mentally and physically. My father-in-law did a heroic job of caring for her at home, with considerable risk to his own health, until the last couple of months.

She was a very emotionally distant woman. If I were to write her epitaph I would simply quote something she often said, even to her younger son who was clinically depressed and eventually committed suicide: "I shouldn't have to say that I love you; you should be able to tell how I feel from what I do." She never saw the irony.

22

The evening of August 31, 2004, I was driving home from a lecture at Le Moyne. The moonrise was so spectacular that I didn't think to turn on the Yankees' game until I was halfway home. I still remember sitting on route 92 waiting to turn left onto Hunt Lane when John Sterling gave the score: Indians 19, Yankees 0. I was sure I'd heard it wrong and I think I missed a couple of breaks in the traffic waiting to hear the score repeated.

In all the insanity surrounding the new Yankee monument to excess I've found comfort in fact that it was my hometown team, the Cleveland Indians, that gave the Yankees their worst home shutout in the old stadium, final score: 22-0.

Given that fact, I thought it was odd karma that the Indians were the first team scheduled to play the Yankees in the new stadium. I'd planned to listen to the game on Thursday but didn't realize it was a day game until it was too late. Yesterday the game was on Fox so I made it a point to take a break from the garden to watch the beginning.

I don't think this new record will hold. It seems like this $1.5 billion obscenity "plays small" and may host many more home run derbies.

Hellebores

Not all my Niger develop this color so I'm happy to see more and more seedlings that do.

Thank You Salter

My old Salter kitchen scales (an older version of this model) had been behaving erratically for some time when I finally tried to beat it into submission. After that, all it displayed was "E".

I still had the box and the instructions but no receipt to determine if it was still covered by the ten year warranty. Regardless I was willing to pay to have it repaired rather than throw it away so I called Taylor/Salter in Las Cruces, New Mexico, of all places.

A lovely woman assured me that I could send my old scales to Las Cruces and they would send me a replacement. She told me they were no longer making my model and they would send whatever model I wanted if I put a note in with the old scales.

So now I have a fabulous new set of scales with several advantages over the old one, primarily sealed buttons where dust and dirt can't collect.

Thank you, thank you Salter. Friends and family should be warned they will getting Salter scales whenever the occasion merits.

Yes!

I can coexist with deer, rabbits, skunks, foxes, snakes or just about any critter that comes around but not groundhogs. They are just too destructive and can do too much damage in no time at all. We've relocated a lot of nasty, messy, smelly groundhogs over the years but this one was by far the most mild mannered of them all, a perfect passenger on the trip out to one of the more remote canal parks.

NO!

Spring Tonic

A lovely box of fresh ramps from a friend in West Virgina arrived yesterday and I cooked some right away. Delish. Thank you C.

Il Orto

MAIN SEASON 2009

LATE PLANTING 2009

Even I can manage a bit of optimism in spring, plotting three plantings for the fenced garden, il orto, with the garden hogs, the melons and the winter squash, in another area. I rarely get everything in as I plan but I doubt I would do as much as I do if I didn't have all the options laid out early on.

And So It Begins

1ST PLANTING 2009

I got the tomato, pepper & eggplant seeds sown yesterday. I've seen a lot of photos of lovely seedlings posted in various blogs the past week or so but here I wait until April 1 to open the porch and set up the nursery.

I used to start the season earlier but the tomatoes would grow into trees until our nighttime temps finally got over 50º/10º and the fruit would set. It just made for a lot of extra pruning.

With a heat mat and florescent lights the seeds take off quickly and are ready to move outside by the end of May. The cherry tomatoes that grow in pots on the stone patio on the south side of the house usually have ripe fruit by the end of July.

Tomato: Brandywine, Black Krim, Costoluto Fiorentino & Carmello (slicing), Bella Rosa & Lyn's Mahogany Garnet (two new determinate varieties), San Marzano 3 & Golden Mama (paste), Sugar Sweetie, Mirabelle, Black Pearl, Super Snow White, Italian Ice, Green Grape,
Sundrop & Isis Candy (cherry)
Eggplant: Nadia, Biatrice, Rosa Bianca, Purple Rain
Sweet Pepper: California Wonder, Islander
Cardoon: Pieno Inerme

The first rows of mesclun and radish have been sown in the orto but I'm holding off on the fava & rapa for another week since they took so long to germinate last year. Flats of escarole (Mentoponto, Cornetto di Bordeaux, Sugarloaf & Broadleaf Batavian), onion (Rossa Lunga di Firenze & Italian Torpedo), Baby Lincoln leeks and pots of podding radish have been sown outdoors on the patio along with a variety of perennials.