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Summer means fun
A garden preview
The Long Branch by the Lake Garden Tour will take place next Saturday, 10-4, rain or shine. Here’s a sneak peak at our crazy Twenty Seventh Street gardens. They’re loaded with surprises, with lots of mosaics and garden sculpture, places to sit and relax or sit and play music. The back is a paradise for the local bird community, with 8 mature spruce trees, a big old silver maple and an old apple tree. We have veggie gardens and a canoe garden – oh and our share of weeds as a bonus.
Visit the website to see where you can pick up your free map (close to 140 locations).
Each year we have various garden projects going on. With the increased sun after the house construction next door, we’re growing some veggies out front – in the back there isn’t enough sun for tomatoes or peppers.
This year, I’ve added a seating area, reclaiming part of what has been a dense shrubby woodland garden way out back. I think of the gardens as an improvisational adventure. We try all sorts of things and some of them stick.
If you have a chance to visit Long Branch for the garden tour next Saturday, you will see 37 gardens, each with its own personal touch. There will also be two free presentations as well as a planting activity for kids. If you come by, please say hi and let me know you heard about it on this blog.
Matt ‘Guitar’ Murphy RIP
912 Greens
Ramblin’ Jack’s masterpiece.
I’ve heard a few versions and they’re all quite different and at the same time all about the same, if you know what I mean.
I love rivers
Or as Ramblin’ Jack said:
Did you ever…..stand and shiver….just because, just because….you’re lookin’….at a ri-ver?
I have to hand it to my friend Bill. He wasn’t discouraged after last week’s day on the Grand River, and yesterday afternoon he showed his determination. Bill’s casting is vastly improved and he’s started to pay attention to the bugs. The whole fly fishing game isn’t easy. There are a lot of problems to deal with, and it’s easy to give up.
It was a beautiful afternoon casting to rising trout. Grey foxes, Cahills, and two varieties of caddis were coming off the water. The trout were difficult, but we caught a few and had a delightful afternoon. 
Who says there’s no free lunch?
As some of you are aware (it isn’t something I usually write about here), I’ve been trying to shed some pounds. I was doing ok until I broke my ankle a couple years ago, then spent a few months getting not nearly enough exercise and eating way too much good food, packing on more than a few pounds in no time flat. I figured it was time finally to get rid of it, and I’ve been doing pretty well, having lost close to 40 pounds in the last 3 months. Of course losing weight has never been nearly as difficult for me as keeping it off. You know that story.
Anyway, losing weight doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy food, really. It just means making sounder choices along the way, and I’ve learned that I have to find a way to occasionally treat myself to something I really like. About once each week I trundle off to one of our local Pho joints for either a big bowl of pho or some bun cha. That was today, and I totally enjoyed my soup.
Next stop was that really nice fish store on Vansco Road, where I bought a haddock fillet, then off to the No Frills for cat litter and a few other things. Our local No Frills is one of those stores where you have to insert a loonie to release a shopping cart, which you get back when you return it. I inserted the coin and pulled out the shopping cart, and what did I see? Somebody left their iphone in the shopping cart.
I held it up. Anybody leave their phone in their cart? No response. In the store, I took it to the cashier at the express aisle. I figured whoever misplaced it would be back. Then I wandered through the store doing my shopping. I was in the produce section, looking at some remarkably good shiitakes, when I heard, “excuse me, did you by chance find an iphone?” “I did indeed. You can pick it up at the express aisle.” Off he went, and I assumed that was the last I’d see of him.
A few minutes later, I’m at the cashier, my wallet is in my hand, and I’m pulling out my debit card, when the fellow who lost then found the phone comes through the line-up. I didn’t notice him until I felt something and realized he just stuffed a $20 bill in my hand. “Buy yourself a couple beers on me.” “Hey wait, you didn’t have to do that.” Obviously in his mind it was the right thing to do, so I just said “Cheers!” and he was off.
I didn’t need any reward for securing the fellow’s phone. I’m just happy he was able to retrieve it. I appreciate the gesture though, and I understand where he was coming from. Losing a phone has got to be a huge problem, and possibly an expensive one too.
Ruby’s first swim since knee surgery
Ruby has healed up very well since her knee surgery. She still has to strengthen her muscles over the next few months but she has the green light for fun stuff like swimming.
She was so excited when she saw the water and jumped right in. What great doggie joy.
The Preacher Picked the Guitar
Here’s Roy Book Binder, talking about his days learning from and traveling with Rev. Gary Davis, and performing The Preacher Picked the Guitar…
This is from the GtrWorkShp channel on YouTube.
Garden lettuce, kale, bok choi and loads of fresh herbs
The greens in our garden have been growing with a vengeance the past couple weeks. Today I picked lots of lettuce, kale, bok choi as well as 3 varieties of basil, some mint, parsley and some Vietnamese cilantro. I shared the wealth with some neighbours who were handy when I realized there was a lot more produce maturing than we could eat.
Tonight I steamed some kale and bok choi along with some broccoli in the bamboo steamer, grilled up some squid and proceeded to make the tastiest salad. I added some cherry tomatoes – not from the garden but pretty good none-the-less (I’ll have lots and lots of tomatoes later in the summer), English cucumber, half a red onion, lots of herbs, a handful of roasted, salted peanuts, and a commercial “Asian” sesame oil-based dressing.
I didn’t have fresh squid, but I did have some “pineapple-cut” frozen squid from Grant’s market. I skewered up the pieces, drizzled them with sesame oil and soy sauce, got some charcoal going on the bbq and grilled the squid for about a minute and a half on each side on a very very hot grill.
Delicious summer dinner.
Tomorrow I’ll make another big salad, and this time dig into the pile of lettuce I transferred from garden to refrigerator today.
The Mayor of MacDougal Street
The cover of my copy of Dave Van Ronk’s memoirs, The Mayor of MacDougal Street, proclaims: “The life story that inspired the Coen Brothers Movie Inside Llewyn Davis”. That wasn’t enough to stop me from reading the book. Sure, Inside Llewyn Davis was an OK period piece, in a melancholy, over-rated sort of way, but if it was about Dave Van Ronk, it missed the mark, and certainly missed Van Ronk’s wicked sense of humour.
The book is a memoir, but it’s also a recollection of the “The Great Folk Scare”, a term Van Ronk borrowed from his friend U. Utah Phillips. I particularly enjoyed the chapters about the 50s in Greenwich Village – we don’t hear much about those days in that place because discussions about the folk scene tend to revolve around Bob Dylan, as he broke away from that scene to become a rock star.
One surprise to me was Van Ronk’s comments about Andy Warhol. “You could tell where things were headed when Andy Warhol and his “beautiful people” showed up at the Gaslight. That towhead was like a vulture – when he appeared, you knew the fun was over.” That’s a pretty strong opinion, I’d say.
Dave Van Ronk recorded quite a few collections of songs, and he was well enough known that I was aware of his music even in high school in the 70s in Toronto (although by the time I was in high school, I was actively searching for some musical nourishment in the form of some kind of antidote to radio pablum like The Eagles and Fleetwood Mac). He was a stalwart in the Village scene before there was a scene and he stuck around for the long haul. He was a great song interpreter, a fine guitarist, and he sure could deliver a song.
I enjoyed reading about Van Ronk’s adventures, his activism, and his perspective on the period when the Folk Scare exploded. I also really appreciated his recollections of his jazz days, before he started playing so-called “folk music.”
Excellent read.
27th Street 