June 2009

June! June! What a wonderful month, the feeling in the air of thunderclouds and green! June is a month of bounty and growth.


Rhubarb




Rhubard Custard Kuchen!





Harvest



We expect a good crop of pineapple from the pineapple tree this year.






Labels



Really, the best part is that this is in a large hole, the crater of a building under construction.





Bard



This is my facebook husband, Joey. He sang songs as we weeded the garden. Everyone plays a part.





Pastoral Bliss



Sometimes things look perfect, or rather, contain the seeming perfection of old paintings.





Radishes



I planted these radishes on May 3rd, and picked them, and ate them a month later.






Brontosaurus



This is my second picture of a coffee-cup lid, but this one has a dinosaur on it, not a face. I was once told that I am brave in my imaginings.





Perspective



Before I started biking, I had never seen this (green)way before.





Streets 1 & 2








The street was closed one night, so we had a party. The streets belong to the people!





Vegetarians Beware




Huck realized that suddenly, bacon was lurking, ready to spring.





Watermelon 2




Another picture of watermelon, this one brighter and more summery. The month begins and ends with rich bounty.

May 2009

Seedlings




This month we planted the garden. Life begins.





Parade



Minneapolis holds an annual May Day parade. It is part labor-focused and part community-focused. This year the theme was government rot and waste giving way to new life. This giant spider seed was full of hope.






Cooperation



A students' co-op meeting/barbeque.






Watermelon



This contains the hint of the summer to come.





Campfire



An indoor, pretend fire at the Bedlam theater in Minneapolis. Mostly weirdos go there, and the particular brand of Minneapolis hipster/gutter-punks. They're somewhere in between those two, like people from the 1890s carrying Ipods. There is a faded look about them, like hipsters who have lived through winter.





Whiskey Well



At this point, whiskey really was walking on our brains. Later we fell asleep on the kitchen table.







Bridges/Mirrors



The very next day, very hung-over, we took a walk through the spring streets to the Guthrie theater. Which makes no sense even when not really hung-over.






Flags/Flowers



Luckily the world is gorgeous.






Big Sky Country




At the end of May we hit the road, taking 94 all the way out across Montana to Washington. 24 hour drive, anyone?







Chicory



Drinking coffee out-doors makes me think about the civil war, where soldiers used chicory root as a coffee substitute. According to the website I just looked at, the pros include the fact that it is naturally decaffeinated, and the cons include unpleasant taste. But "anything is better than going without!"





Ritzville, Washington



The west has the best abandoned buildings.






North Dakota



I guess I was wrong in thinking that North Dakota is flat and atrociously boring. Ok, I was wrong about the first part.






Red River



Why do people insist on living in flood-plains?





Minneapolis



There is little that makes me more fond of a place than overlooking it from a height. In this case, the wind blew across the sky and the city looked like a forested kingdom.

April 2009

April marches on.




Twine




Darwin Minnesota is the home of the largest ball of twine constructed by one person. Its worth seeing.





Road



Being on the road makes one almost completely anonymous. If you have enough sandwiches with you, you can just keep going without encountering another soul. All those waitresses who pour you cups of coffee won't remember your face, and you're utterly free.





Lake Maria




Every day in spring when its slightly warmer than the day before feels like winning a thousand dollars.





Thaw



Different lake, more reflections, more oak leaves.





Texture



Burned wood!





Birchbark



Maybe sentimental feelings are simply when we put meaning on objects and actions that don't have much of any underlying meaning. For example, when we're absent from someone we focus on objects they've given us or left behind. Wearing someone's sunglasses becomes a way to feel close, or maybe even see the world through a lens that they once used.





Garters



Fun fact: Garter snakes are the most wide ranging genus of snake in North America.
This particular snake was pretty chill, but when threatened they spew out a stinky musk that you cannot wash out of your hands especially if your job involves participating in a snake survey, ie grabbing as many snakes as you can and holding them while they thrash around and musk everywhere. Fortunately, their teeth are tiny and their bites harmless.





Heliotropism



Plants press toward the sun.





Willow




A friend of mine started taking antihistamines in February to ward off his horrific symptoms. When I see buds and pollen, I get more excited than afraid. Lucky lack of allergies.





Calvin



Even if cats don't have emotions, they sure look like it!




Andrew Bird




I didn't buy a ticket for this concert because I was unemployed when they went on sale. I was with friends before they went to the show, and while we were standing outside the venue, they started digging in their pockets and throwing money at me until I had enough to buy one from a scalper. Such joy.




Anya



As I've said before, beautiful women make cool pictures even better.




Home



This man perfectly embodies the welcoming atmosphere of my house. People make a home.

March 2009

March: a month of hope and despair. Light returns and birds fly over, but it snows and is miserably cold too. No one really knows what to do.



Through the Kitchen Window



Sure, there was snow, but February ended at last.




Broomball



"Say, fellows, what say we hit a ball around on that frozen lake? We don't have skates, so we'll fall down all the time, but it will be great!"

Broomball is such a dumb sport, its important to wear costumes. Go Team LeVar Burton!




Still Life 2



Do we launch garbage into the sun?




Hiring Freeze



Minnesota has an unemployment rate of 8.2%.




Bread



The dough rises, the dough falls.



March Snow



Rosemary needles, staples, ice crystals.




Neighbor



This is my next door neighbor, Tim. He majored in math.




Light



Vertical lines. The paper lanterns were made by a sixth grade class that I taught one day. It was one of my worst days of work, because the kids would not shut up the entire time. They were constantly in each others business and tattling on each other. At the end of the day they made me cards to thank me for being such a great teacher. I was really touched. And wanted to get the hell out.


Sort of like March, eh?