Burra Maluca

I love mountains and fruit trees, he's a trainspotter.

No back door as the house is built right up against the terrace wall with the mountain behind us.

Front door reveals - fruit trees , mountains and trains!

I don't think we'll be moving house in a hurry...

My favorite is the "Gaze of Death". Everyone stands in a circle, looks down, then on a cue everyone looks at one other person's face. If any people make eye contact they both must act out horrible deaths, and they fall out of the circle. The game continues until everyone dies or one person is left standing.

I would approach one of these groups of people and introduce myself.

Then I would go to the next group, introduce myself and then ask if they have met ... (pick someone from the 1st group).

The few attempts I've made at games during gatherings didn't work because of poor participation. Maybe I need to be more assertive, with "we're going to do this" instead of "who wants to do this."

"Everybody round up, it's time for an activity so that we can all get to know each other a little better. TRUST ME! It's going to be fun."  

text everyone a word which connects you two. Then, you print a list with all the names, and distribute it. Everyone must find out the word connecting you with each one. But: the people can only reply "yes" or "no" to the questions.

Hmmm. These have just consolidated my intention to never, ever attend any kind of party ever again as long as I live.

Terrifying. Totally, utterly terrifying...

It's a lovely book too.

Not just for urban gardeners but very good information for anyone either just starting out or with a smallish area to grow fruit trees on.

I can heartily recommend it!

Maybe use it Ruth Stout style and use it as an under-layer with a heavier mulch, like cut grass, on top.

I think this cartoon was my introduction to the therapeutic use of plants...

I was born and raised in the UK.

To me the tree is elder. The flowers are elder flowers. And the berries are elderberries. And no I can't quite explain why there is space before 'flower' but not before 'berry'. But then if it's in a recipe, like elderflower fritters or elderflower champagne, I take the space out again.

I think that the other side of the pond it gets called elderberry. And the flowers are elderberry flowers. Which feels a bit long-winded to me...

Something similar happens with blackberries. To me, blackberries grow on brambles. I think in the US they grow on blackberry vines.

And then there's Chenopodium album. I have always called it fat hen. It's a name I learned as a child, from someone telling me out loud what it was called. Then from hanging out on permies I learned to write it as lamb's quarters. But I'd never quite realised that I always called it fat hen if I spoke even if I automatically typed it as lamb's quarters.

Which caused great confusion when I went to visit Wheaton labs and called it fat hen, because I was speaking, not typing.

I've also heard that they make good rootstock for grafting cucumbers and watermelons and maybe other cucurbits on to as they have such a vigorous root system.

They are quite popular here, where they are known as Gila.

I first encountered them in the form of a filled pastry in the supermarket, labelled pasteis de gila and had absolutely no idea what it was but bought some anyway in the hope that they weren't actually made of gila-monsters.

Turns out they take the stringy flesh and cook it up with sugar to make a very sweet but to my mind not very flavourful pastry filling. In Spain they refer to the same sort of thing as Cabell d'àngel, or angel hair



You can also buy gila jam, aka doce de gila, in the supermarkets.



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Maybe it's time to invest in a copy of Clean with Cleaners you can Eat by Raven Ranson...

That son of mine asked in a different place today if they had aparas. I'd told him to bring what he could from anywhere he found it available so I could compare quality and price.

This bag was smaller than the ones we usually get, with plenty of fatty skin, less meat and more bone.

But then, instead of 89c a kilo, this was completely free. And that's my kind of price!