Global Greenie

I am not a big fan of my lawn.  It’s actually pretty tiny, but it still seems like a waste of valuable space.  And then there’s the mowing and the watering.

Interestingly enough, here in the Pacific Northwest, where it rains most of the year, summers are dry.  I can’t recall the last measurable rain we’ve had.  Many people here let their grass die in summer and it returns when the rains begin (usually mixed with a healthy dose of moss).

We have a built-in sprinkler system in the backyard, so it’s easy to turn it on and let it go for awhile.  But how do you know how much water you’re using or what your lawn really even needs?

The Regional Water Providers Consortium offered some free rain gauges and a kit to let me know.  All I had to do, was set up the two cups they sent (and I hear you can use tuna cans too), turn on my sprinklers, set a timer, and do some simple math.

It turns out that I wasn’t watering my lawn enough.  Each week, the consortium lets you enter your zipcode and find out your water needs in inches for that week, based on rainfall.  It takes the guesswork out of watering.  So while I was underwatering, probably most people tend to overwater.  This free kit could save you money and help the environment.

If you’re outside of this area, but know of other similar programs where you live, please let me know in the comments.

Last night we attended a potluck dinner which consisted of dishes “made, picked, grown, foraged, caught, etc. by” guests. On Saturday we traveled out to Sherwood Orchards to pick filberts (aka hazelnuts) and plums. A farm cat greeted us, but not before finishing off everything but the tail of a mouse. Oddly, the cat itself had no tail.

I’ll post about the party itself soon.

So far this year, we’ve visited the King, Beaverton, and Hollywood Farmers’ Markets in the Portland, Oregon metro area.  Last weekend was our first trip to Hollywood in quite a long time.  Even though it’s fairly close to our house, we pretty much quit going because it’s like a dog park with veggies.  Last week they decided to make two hours (the two worst hours — 8 to 10) dog free.  It’s not enough to make me want to return.  Sorry, but dogs don’t belong at the farmers’ markets.  You’re barely paying attention to your kids and meanwhile your dog’s in a fight and/or crotch sniffing contest and elderly people are tripping over the leashes.  But before I leave the Hollywood forever — at least til they get with the dogless program — I’ll plug two vendors.

Buns on the Run serves up homemade sausages.  I’ve never eaten there, as I don’t consume chicken or pork.  My wife, Kathleen,  swears by the chicken ones and they only went up a modest twenty-five cents this year.  Meanwhile, TOK, a friend affectionatley known as The Other Kathleen, writes at Good Stuff Northwest about Blooming Goodies.  But TOK didn’t mention my big find last weekend: they have morning glory (the Asian variety).  I didn’t buy any from them, because I’d recently found it at a Thai grocery and cooked it up, but I did get pea shoots.  The morning glory is the slender plant in this photo I took at the Blooming Goodies booth last weekend.  I wonder what those colorful leaves to the left taste like?

To locate other Farmers’ Markets in the Portland area, visit the EcoMetro website.  They produce the Chinook Book, which is sort of an Entertainment Book for people with standards.  I picked up three this year: two I purchased and one that EcoMetro generously sent to me.

Portland has a new Farmers’ Market and it’s practically down the street from me!  We rounded up our next-door neighbors to go on the opening day.  Two other sets of neighbors from across the street got there before us.  And it’s good they did because the market was such a success that most of the produce was gone by the time we arrived.

Still, the four of us managed to pick up rapini, chilies, clams, pears, and some homemade ice cream sandwiches.  Kingsley and I had our eyes on wild-caught salmon and talked to the Native American vendor for awhile.  But then our wives reminded us that we already had some salmon in our respective homes.  So next time I’m going to buy a whole fish from the fellow and grill it.

The King Market is nice, not just for the proximity (and the noticeable diversity compared to — say — the Hollywood Market), but also because many of the vendors are favorites from the other markets.  I got my clams at good old Linda Brand.  A full list of vendors is available at the official Portland Farmers’ Market site.

If you’re in Portland, check out the King Market some Sunday morning this season.  Here’s the map.

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I hope you got a chance to do something for Earth Day. My employer had a number of cool activities going on, but I opted for the tour of the vermiculture program. Eventually the worm bins will process about 50 pounds of scraps from the cafeteria per day!

This is just one of the bins. Josh and his team have already built several from recycled wood. He thinks they’ll switch to plastic, though. Our climate is not suited for wood bins (as I recently found with my own, which I’ll describe in a future post).

Another cool thing at my campus is that these bins are located within the Learning Garden and any group can apply for a plot or get involved in some way. I’m a librarian and trying to think of a library-themed spot or some way to get the library involved. Do you have any ideas?

For 12 consecutive years, K and I (far left/far right) have attended the Salmonfest at Oxbow park.  For the past five or six, Amy and Jon (standing left of me with their son) have come along.  This year we also brought Anne and Kimberly.

It was an unusually nice day for this time of year.  We didn’t have rain, and though it was cool, it certainly wasn’t cold.

The salmon have a wider run now that one of the dams is gone.  There’s a great video of the dam removal available at OPB.

One of my favorite parts of the event (besides eating salmon prepared by Native Americans) is watching the salmon nests with polarized glasses.  It’s amazing to be able to see them spawn and die just below the water’s surface.

Here’s a list of 25 things you can do to protect salmon.  And always remember to ask if the salmon you buy in groceries or at restaurants has been farmed or caught wild.

I have an unfair disadvantage when it comes to the annual Bike Commute Challenge: I don’t work in early September, so I can’t get in as many rides as the poor saps my colleagues who work year-round.  Still, I’m proud to say I made nine half-commutes.

You see, I cheat a little.  I put my bike on the bus and get driven to work and then I ride the whole way home.  I could probably ride to work, but it would mean showers, clothes changes, etc.  It’s more hassle than I can deal with each morning.

Still, my commute ends up at about 13 miles a day, which makes me proud, even though some of my coworkers remind me that it’s all downhill from the volcano where we work.  That’s not entirely accurate; I do break a sweat and my legs are tired each day.

Andy and I rode home together twice.  At only thirty, he’s much faster than I am, but he was patient with me.  And though the companionship was great, the highlight was still the day last week when I saw a snake.  There’s nothing like nature in the city.

My final stats:

Total Miles 117.0
Calories burned 5,733
CO2 saved (lbs) 115

Via Lelo.

Note: I have been a pescetarian for more than a decade and would never consider eating some of the things I once consumed. I’ve italicized the ones I’ve tried.

1. Venison (My college friend killed the deer and made hamburger patties.  I found it pretty gross.)
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros (among my favorites)
4. Steak tartare (French class, high school)
5. Crocodile (no, but we served alligator at our rehearsal dinner)
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue (as recently as a week and a half ago)
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush (even make it)
11. Calamari (love it)
12. Pho
13. Peanut butter and jelly sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle (white? yes.)
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns (was expecting a dessert — yuck)
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries (I “pick” them with my mouth because K likes to see me eat like a bear.)
23. Foie gras (bless me Goosey, for I have sinned)
24. Rice and beans (so many ways)
25. Brawn or head cheese (again, ick)
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper (my tolerance is HIGH)
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda (I will eat this now that I know about it)
31. Wasabi peas (Curse you Trader Joes for discontinuing the peanuts)
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi (mango lassi and sweet lassi)
34. Sauerkraut (love)
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly
39. Gumbo (make it)
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects
43. Phaal
44. Goat’s milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
46. Fugu (but I’ve seen light fixtures made from them)
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut (I’m from the South.  We sold them to raise money for the prom.)
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal (so incredibly gross on so many levels)
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV (as in — only one?)
59. Poutine (I was afraid to google this).
60. Carob chips (disappointing)
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads (ew)
63. Kaolin (rocks?)
64. Currywurst
65. Durian (on my list)
66. Frogs’ legs (I’ve heard it tastes like . . . )
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake (all of the above, including a crab beignet)
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain (I am an expert cooking these)
70. Chitterlings or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini (overrated)
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill (one of my colleagues in NC brought in a possum dish, dyed green for St. Patrick’s.  I passed.)
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky (my favorite is Man Pocky!)
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
89. Horse
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam (also my Halloween costume one year)
92. Soft shell crab
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish (I like my catfish like I like . . . )
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake
101. Pie at the Portland Pie-Off (oh okay, Lelo added this one, but it should be on the list — I’ll be there!)

We harvested our garlics!  These pungent friends have been in our raised bed since last fall.  We finally got to lift them.  It’s our second year growing garlic and I’m still not entirely clear when they’re done.  Most sites recommend a few dead leaves on the stalk.  One person scared me, saying that you have a 3-5 day window to harvest.  We have three or four different varieties and not enough patience to figure out what’s what, so we just gently dug below them and lifted.  Some are fairly small, but I’m telling myself they’ll make up for it with flava!

K cut the tops and beardlike-roots from each bulb and I tied a dried bamboo leaf around each cluster of three or four.  An hour later we were sipping Oregon wine and eating pasta with olive oil, and homegrown basil and garlic.  Lots of garlic.

We stringed the clusters up in our basement to cure.  Hopefully they’ll last us through most of the year.  I believe we planted about four times as much, so we’ll see.

Coming soon, we’re lifting our eight elephant garlics, but first I’ll let the hummingbirds drink from the flowers for awhile longer.

Have you ever wondered where vermicomposters live?  Now you can glimpse into the bins of your fellow worm fanatics with the map at Vermicomposters.com.  I’m embarrassed to say that I started getting hungry when I read the forum thread about what scraps worms like to eat.