New Glowing Mushrooms Found in Brazil

I think I ate one of these back when I was in college in Santa Cruz.

Link.

I popped an old mix CD on the player before I got on the exercise bike tonight. About 20 minutes in, right at the bottom of my energy levels (yeah, I know), on came the Emmylou Harris song "Deeper Well" from her brilliant 1995 album Wrecking Ball.

1995! There on the bike, it hit me how much has happened in my life since that album ruled my world in 1995. I finished college, went to grad school, found my life partner and settled down, bought a house, worked 7 seven years in the local biotech industry, took a year off to re-tool my career, lost my grandmother, lost some friends, lost my cat, planted an awesome garden...all of it, in the blink of an eye.

Here are the lyrics that blew my mind in 1995 and got me through the rest of my cardio workout in 2006:

The sun burned hot, it burned my eyes
Burned so hot I thought I'd died
Thought I'd died and gone to hell
Lookin' for the water from a deeper well
I went to the river but the river was dry
I fell to my knees an I looked to the sky
I looked to the sky and the spring rain fell
I saw the water from a deeper well

Well...lookin for the water from a deeper well
Well...lookin for the water from a deeper well

I was ready for love I was ready for the money
Ready for the blood and ready for the honey
Ready for the winnin', ready for the bell
Lookin' for the water from a deeper well
I found some love and I found some money
Found that blood would drip from the honey
Found I had a thirst that I could not quell
Lookin' for the water from a deeper well

Well...lookin for the water from a deeper well
Well...lookin for the water from a deeper well

Well I did it for kicks and I did it for faith
I did it for lust and I did it for hate
I did it for need and I did it for love
Addiction stayed on tight like a glove
So I ran with the moon and I ran with the night
And the three of us were a terrible sight
Nipple to the bottle to the gun to the cell
To the bottom of a hole of a deeper well

Well...lookin for the water from a deeper well
Well...lookin for the water from a deeper well

I rocked with the cradle and I rolled with the rage
I shook those walls and I rattled that cage
I took my trouble down a deadend trail
Reachin' out a hand for a holier grail
Hey there mama did you carry that load
Did you tell your baby 'bout the bend in the road
'Bout the rebel yell 'bout the one that fell
Lookin' for the water from a deeper well

Well...lookin for the water from a deeper well
Well...lookin for the water from a deeper well

(Harris/Lanois/Olney)

The funny thing is, about an hour before I got on the bike, I had a scotch and soda. Who exercises after a scotch and soda?

Color

Go talk about color in the garden here. I want to hear what everyone has to say. Or read it.

Germination progress

The following represents how an organic chemist (me) would document and monitor the progress of his seed sowing experiments.

All seed was purchased from well-regarded commercial suppliers, or collected by me acting under the appropriate authority.

Salvia spathacea.

18-Oct-06: Fresh seeds were collected from dried pods (Nature Trail, Strybing Arboretum) and dropped in a pint of fresh tap water. All floaters were discarded. Sinkers were divided into three groups of 6-9 seeds each. Group A seeds were soaked overnight (o/n) in 2-3 cups room temperature (RT) tap water. Group B: soaked o/n in dilute RT bleach (NaClO, household preparation, approx 1-2 tsp diluted with 2-3 cups tap water). Group C: soaked in dilute RT hydrogen peroxide (H2O2, household preparation, same dilution as bleach).

19-Oct-06. All seeds were observed to have a thin, slightly slimy coating. Seeds were sown without drying in moistened sterile seedling mix, and packed in the usual manner in appropriately labeled containers.

Per Emery (Emery, Dara. Seed Propagation of Native California Plants. Santa Barbara: Santa Barbara Botanic Garden, 1988), "Germination may be poor if diurnal fluctuation inusfficient." To promote strong diurnal fluctuation, potted seeds were placed on a heating pad indoors during the day, and moved outside at night.

6-Nov-06. The first germination was observed in seed from Group C on 3-Nov-06. Since then, 8 of 23 seeds have germinated with representatives from each group.

Plan: Continue diurnal fluctuation. Watch for true leaf formation. Put under fluorescent lights when 12 seeds have germinated.

ADDED: 3-Dec-06 The seeds in the hydrogen peroxide group worked best--all of them came up. About half of the pure water-soaked seeds came up, and only two of the bleach-soaked seeds came up. Everything looks good so far. All the seedlings were cultivated 4" under fluorescent lights for two weeks until the first set of true leaves developed. They were then potted up to 5" clay pots in fresh planting mix and moved outside into part sun.

Calliandra eriophylla.

Seeds were purchased Sep-06 from J.L. Hudson, Seedsman.

25-Oct-06. The treatment was modified from Emery (Ibid., page 42; "Scarify or soak in tap water 12-24 hours.") Hot tap water several minutes past boiling was added to 12 seeds, leaving them to soak o/n while slowly cooling to RT.

26-Oct-06. The water was poured off and replaced with fresh RT tap water. The seeds were left to soak a few more hours. The water was poured off, leaving seeds with a slightly slimy coating. All were sown in sterile seedling mix and placed on hot pad.

30-Oct-06. One seedling up!

4-Nov-06. Second seedling up. First set of true leaves (feathery) observed on first seedling up. Alternating now between hot pad during the day and fluorescent lights (RT) at night.

6-Nov-06. True leaves noted on second seedling up. Continue as above, and monitor for more germination.

UPDATE: 3-Dec-06. Only two germinations. Seedlings were potted up a few days ago and moved outdoors.

Updates as events warrant. Other seeds currently under, ahem, investigation: Comarostaphylis diversifolia, Eriogonum arborescens, Lilium pardilinum, Rhamnus californica, Trichostema lanatum.

Non-native: Echium wildpretii

Spring in November

"Point is, the replenishing of soil moisture is beginning, the little green seedlings have begun to appear in unwatered places. Soon the hills of California will be the sweetest shade of green, and the greens in our vegetable gardens will be tender and sweet. Our glorious second spring! Our mediterranean paradox of spring in fall. As the sun retreats, the rain gets things going again."

Link.

Help buy laptops for soldiers

who came home wounded (after they got stuck n Irak).

You can donate here.

"Oct. 3, 11 a.m. I met with my therapist, Dr. Debra Marks. The night before I had left her a message, asking her to ask me about the lollipops, a fail-safe so that if I lost my nerve to confess, I'd be trapped into telling her. I didn't need to outsmart myself; I walked into her office and immediately told her that the lollipops 'have become a problem.'"

Link.

Repressed [Republican] sexuality: a 2006 trifecta.

Andrew Sullivan: "After compassion, there must be an accounting, and a deep one. In my view, the entire Christianist project that Haggard helped build must also be torn down. Christianity must be taken back from these power-grabbers and fear-mongers. Just as true conservatism must be rescued from this White House and Congress."

He's talking about the "massage"-getting, meth-buying Christian minister lately in the news.*

Compassion? Really? I should be compassionate? Sorry, I gave at the office. The jerk deserves all the shame and ridicule he gets. I pity his wife and I feel sorry for his kids, especially if they're not adults. I suppose that's compassion. It doesn't reach very far. Call me limited, but I think people need to toughen up.

I'm not religious and I don't want to be and yet I manage to treat people with the same decency and respect I would like in return. The message you get in this culture if you're an athiest agnostic is that it's impossible to live a moral life. Fuck that. Like living a moral life only becomes possible if you do believe in god. Whatever!

If I lied to my lover, bought meth from a prostitute massage therapist, and pretended to be something I wasn't, I personally know I would be wholly unable to accept any compassion when it all came crashing down. That's how it works in my moral universe.


*That's what the guy's admitted to; the allegations go farther. I don't disbelieve either party at this point.

Night gardening

I started my new job this week. That, and the arrival of Daylight Savings Time means I only get to see my garden in daylight in the morning before I leave. It's dark when I get home. And tonight it was raining. Whatever! I'm out there anyway, pruning this, inspecting that, moving seedlings around.

Were you here when I sorted the Cineraria seeds? These are the seedlings!



Other seedlings I'm excited about: Fuchsia boliviana v. alba.



Also growing, and much more dramatically: Dahlia imperialis.



It's like the beanstalk in Jack and the Beanstalk. I don't know when it's going to stop. It's over 12 feet tall now. Here it was back in April of this year:



Taking digital pictures at night is fun.

Bartlettina sordida.



Beaucarnia recurvata.



Besides moving the seedlings in to the garage for some love under the fluorescent lights, I sowed some seeds of Datura wrightii. Next year, I'll have this:



I can't use all the seeds that came in the packet I ordered from Theodore Payne. I sowed several in my garden, gave half to a friend, and I still have many left over. I feel an urge to sow them in one of the wilder parks in my neighborhood. But it's a poisonous plant, and dogs and kids use that park. So what do you think?

"African dust storms have been suspected of causing fish-killing red tide in the Caribbean, but also of mitigating the effect of hurricanes. Now analysis of images from NASA's MODIS satellite have revealed the Bodélé, a region of the Sahara not far from Lake Chad, as the source of more than half the material that fertilizes the Amazon rainforest."

Link.

Happy Halloween!

We have two pumpkins this year.

My boyfriend carved this one:

This one's mine:

You know we have best candy.

(You knew that without me having to tell you, right?)

UPDATE: So far the costumes are boring and not cute. The kids are more courteous than last year tho'. Lots of "thank you" and such. My boyfriend has amusingly awkward interactions with the trick-or-treators. He says "Hello, how are you?" to each one. (He did this last year too, and I know doesn't like to be teased about it, but I can tell you because he doesn't read the blog.)

UPDATE: Still boring costumes. About half aren't even wearing costumes. And there have been no slutty little girl costumes I've been reading about. The bf reminds me the peak comes between 7:30 and 8, and it's only 6:40 right now. We're waiting for some friends to come over, then we're ordering pizza.

And I'm up to my usual lameness with the camera, but this one's cool. Plus, the 'rents complimented my plants.

And this one's cool too.

UPDATE: Updates suspended. I have to socialize now. More later.

Final update: We live a few blocks away from a little business district that apparently organized a *huuuge* Halloween party (we weren't invited), so this year was kind of a dud for us. We actually had to stand on our front steps to unload the candy.

Last year here. Due to better planning we have way better pumpkins this year. Oh, I made a comment about the plants in that planter:

What's growing in that planter? Purple lantana, a native Ceanothus ("Diamond Heights"), and a very young climbing hydrangea (hydrangea petiolaris).

The Ceanothus and lantana are still there, but the climbing hydrangea is long gone. That plant was a dud. I bought two more of better stock, but put them both in the backyard. It's too hot and sunny on my front steps for any hydrangea. And climbing hydrangea in a container? WTF was I thinking? I wasn't. I didn't know. I replaced it with a sturdy manzanita, Arctostaphylos rudis var. Vandenberg.

The freaks come out at night.

Altars to the dead lined the basketball court at Kezar Pavilion: One was a shrine to pets, another memorialized fetuses that didn't come to term, and a third, with photographs of the first thousand U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq, mourned the war dead.

They set the stage for a ceremony where a thousand witches, druids and pagans prepared to meet the dead. It opened with a procession of goddesses, including the Virgin of Guadalupe and Demeter, the Greek goddess of fertility, who wore a mask decorated with wheat. A procession of six gods played out a cycle of death and reincarnation.

With emotions building, those in the crowd shook their bodies, flapped their arms and stomped their feet in an ecstatic, pulsing release of energy.

"We feel the ancestors longing for us," trance leader Beverly Frederick told the gathering in San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district.

Link.

About that displeasing truck commercial...

"When it comes to selling bars, trucks or even politicians, you can wave the flag or you can drape one over a coffin. You can’t do both."

Says David Carr in his NYT column The Media Equation. This is an interesting little article full of revealing little observations. And you don't have to agree or disagree with Karr to be interested in his observations.

He's upset about the new commercial for GM trucks featuring John Mellencamp singing "Our Country". Apparently, so are a lot of other people. I've only seen the commercial once, and I thought, "So maudlin. Does this really work?" (Karr reacts much more elaborately.)

Truck commercials aren't known for subtlety or, ahem, nuance. But it seems experts feel this one has a lot of particularly offensive nuance, ranging from John Mellencamp to Rosa Parks and somehow sweeping up Rudy Giuliani too.

National travail obviously touches the heartstrings and it’s hardly surprising that Sept. 11 became a theme in political advertising. At the Republican National Convention in 2004, Rudolph W. Giuliani, whose finest hour occurred during those attacks, recalled in his speech that he confided to Bernard B. Kerik as the towers fell, “Thank God George Bush is our president.”

I expect we'll be reminded of that statement often next year. Will Giuliani have to live it down, or let it ride?

Whitney Houston

It was the singer's first step back into the spotlight since seeking treatment for substance abuse and leaving longtime husband Bobby Brown.

"I feel great," said a blond Houston, wearing diamonds and black Armani. Sounding more calm and focused than she has in years, Houston clearly was touched by the outpouring of love.

"She's looking at the light, instead of darkness," said Houston's pal and the evening's honoree, Quincy Jones, who has known the singer since she was 16.

Link and link. Via Drudge.

I'll be interested to hear what Houston's music sounds like after her long day's journey into night, and back. I have no history as a Whitney Houston fan, but I'm a big admirer of the black divas of yore, like Dinah Washington and Billie Holiday, even going back to Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith. I think Houston's part of a rich American tradition, even if her work so far feels too polished and over-produced for my taste. Perhaps she will take this opportunity to step outside the pop context of her Top 40 hits and tap into some deeper currents.

Another visit to Golden Gate Park

My plant ID class got a special tour of the Conservatory of Flowers this morning. I parked across the street, next to the AIDS Memorial Grove.

I really like the white yarrow in front of the redwoods.



Another shot of the same thing.











I've never taken a good picture of the Conservatory itself. Visit the official site, or (better) look at some Flickr sets.

When California land baron and philanthropist James Lick died, they found the building itself packed in crates in his estate. Noone really knows where it came from. It could have been built in England with redwood sent from California and then sent back to California.

It looks like this inside:





(That philodendron high up in the background is over a 100 years old.)

An epiphytic rhododendron (is there a plant family with more variation than the Ericaceae?)



Lots of other kinds of ephiphytes.





And tropical flowers.



Hmmm, hibiscus anyone?



Anyone?



I love this heptagonal travertine planter.



See the flower on top?



It's spiny and apparently smells terrible. I managed to refrain from smelling it myself.



Caudex of the famous yam, Dioscorea macrostachya.



The docent related the story about how scientists discovered progeterone in yams and used it for birth control pills. False! Scientists found an inexpensive synthetic precursor of progesterone in yams called diosgenin. She even lamented how everything is synthetic now when natural alternatives exist. Oi.

Diosgenin:


Progesterone:

'Lavinia Maggi'

"To import plants [to the USA], you need three documents: an import permit, shipping labels and a phytosanitary certificate. A phone call or letter to the U.S. Department of Agriculture in Riverdale, Md., or a download from its Web site will generate the 'Import Permit for Plants and Plant Products,' also known as PPQ Form 597."

This lady went to a lot of trouble for a camellia hedge. Good for her!

Link.

Whoreticulture as an HTML-visualized graph:



Thanks, Xris!

More information here.

Okay, making up for yesterday.

Some pictures of my friend's garden in Menlo Park.





Arctostaphylos pajaroensis (Pajaro Manzanita). There are three cultivars that I know of, but I don't know how to identify any of them (Lester Rountree, Brett's Beauty, Roger's Bronze):



The Phormium was sold to her as a dwarf variety. Ha!



Some people hate hibiscus.





Coreopsis gigantea together with Eriogonum arborescens. I just bought E. arborescens seed. I gave her the Coreopsis.



And we went to Roger Reynolds Nursery in Atherton to look at Japanese maples for me; they've got this kiwi vine going on:



With just a few kiwis growing on it.



(The maples in one gallon pots had already dropped their leaves, so no deal.)

My friend showed me some guerilla gardening, Menlo Park-style











And we went to see the redwoods on Teague Hill.





Looking uphill at a drainage. This would be a scary place to be during a heavy rain.





And these are from today, at the San Francisco Botanical Garden.

The entry garden:



Geese:



Plectranthus, my favorite low shrub for shade. Not really a shrub, I guess. A perennial.