the blanching hour

i spent an hour working on the first step in making what my carpatho-rusyn granny would call holubci...you can call it stuffed cabbage or whatever non-authentic name you want to apply...i will stick with what i grew up with..one head of cabbage in the pot blanching...another on the counter waiting...peeled off with tongs and into a bath of cold water to stop the cooking...then into a colander to drain..forty leaves in the first head...forty-seven in the second...the last two photos are the largest and the smallest leaf from the second head...my work is done here...the rest of the project is in other hands...i am free to ponder whether this qualifies as a post-modern "death of the real" since the generation that brought this to my family is long gone...or if my inclusion of this post in the blog carries on my tradition of satirizing the whole bogus theme of post-modern claptrap...i lean towards the latter...we need g.e. moore now like never before.

just another grifter whore

my garbage can isn't real anymore...it has become a simulacrum...a mere shadow of a real garbage can...you can tell because it says old keith soderquist is mayor and he isn't anymore...statutes enacted in, i believe, 2008, stripped him of his office as soon as his conviction on all counts ( including taking money from the food bank account to spend gambling..up in michigan so he wouldn't be recognized as easily i suppose ) and rendered my garbage can fallacious...the times of northwest indiana says his conviction "casts a pall" over the city...how? a whore is a whore...some political grifters are bigger than others...too big to fail...others not so big...still...cut from the same cloth...let the light in...recognize where we find ourselves for what it is...a free-for-all at the public trough...fuck these people.

bureaucratic blowback

have we ever discussed the nearly criminal mayor's ( trial starts next month...the maw of justice grinds slowly...but it surely grinds ) decision to move trash and recycling collection curbside because scrappers were cutting into the city's revenue stream ( much like the mayor has allegedly done )and, in the process put his name on every damn garbage can in town? well...when he did that he decommissioned the alleys and made individual homeowners responsible for their maintenance where they abutted their property...it is widely ignored and i was cited for having "weeds and rank vegetation over 12" in height.." behind my house ( photos two and three )can't really argue that but so do my neighbors ( photo four ...and i have more )...to cut to the chase...i took the lawnmower back there and scalped it ( photo five ) and lopped off a bunch of overhanging branches as well as cutting down a couple of small trees...i bagged a bunch of "waste" per the citation's instructions ( sixth photo ) but the citation also said , " any cut branches or limbs that cannot be paper bagged can also be placed on the easement for pickup."...never one to deny city workers work i did so ( last photo )...i had until sunday to do this..i expect credit for doing it early...i expect my neighbors to clean theirs up too...one wonders if those expectations will be met in this half-assed town...one wonders if the next mayor will be less of a political whore...hoping so since he was pretty much elected in the primary and i voted for him.

carboniferous detrivores*

at the moment much of my yard is taken up either by plants i aim to eventually eat ( top photo ) or green manures i am letting go to seed ( second photo ) so i can continue the process of adding nitrogen to the soil naturally a bit more cheaply ( i have some alfalfa and a few more goodies like illinois bundleflower to add to the mix )...the bulk of the rest of it is made of a bit of grass and a lot of weird ground cover and moss..but the stuff grows...and for all my pretensions to organic gardening, natural fertilizers, compost ( there is a bin out back too ), and a healthy disrespect for the social conventions of my neighbors, there are still expectations that seemingly have to be met..like mowing the stuff...if i don't someone will call code enforcement and they will tell me to mow it on pain of a fine and anything else the powers that be can throw my way...it is expected...so i load up my lawn mower with 89 octane gasoline and cut away...i am using the remains of the carboniferous epoch of geological history to cut my alleged lawn...and to go to work...and to post this blog...and to heat and cool my home...and buy food to eat that is produced with an abundance of petrochemical...the culture ( ha! ) i live in is universally ( almost ) dependent on these remains...a scavenger society that searches high and low for new sources and is prepared to go to war over them...even trying to live on the fringes sucks me back in...even going "off the grid" entails using technology that is manufactured with carboniferous waste...no fucking way out seemingly until it all crashes from entropy and sky high oil prices....like bugs headed towards a zapper we just keep going...how long can i fool myself? how long can we fool ourselves as a species? "denial runs strong in these...how can we use it?" *from william cattons' book "overshoot"

shelter

life is transitory and so is "home"...this was home for seven months...and with its drafts and uneven floors and low ceilings and impossibly small kitchen that seemed to be added as an after thought it felt like "home"...now we are really home...have been for twelve days...i can tell...the neighbors haven't budged and there's an internet connection...the cat has reclaimed her territory and resumed her feral ways killing whatever comes to hand...i look out the front window down the alley that's been there since 1987 ( the reason the front drapes stayed closed for twenty-five years )...but it doesn't feel like "home"...it's too new and nothing is as it was...the kitchen is impossibly large...aside from the cabinetry and a few appliances it is empty...there have never been children there asking for cereal or a drink of water...there have never been children there at all...there aren't even ghosts of what was here...i suppose i could look at it as a clean slate to write new history on...but i am weary of history...it could be home one day...and since i own it it will have to be...but that will be some time in coming...i still wake up feeling like i am a guest in someone else's house....still asking "where am i?" _______________13 september 2015...there has been a child here...many times now...she has been in the kitchen...she doesn't ask for much but she's comfortable here...she knows she belongs...home again.

where am i ?

It’s weird to be standing in the house you’ve lived in for twenty-five years and be able to look through the bathroom from the bedroom and see the kitchen…that’s what a gutted house will do for you…distort your perceptions…the geography isn’t the same…and won’t be again…what was, isn’t and it’s not coming back…well…that is the way of things…and it’s not a great loss either…it was a form of stasis and that probably isn’t the best way to live, humans being creatures of habit non-withstanding…so it’s a step towards a new form of reality…a genuine deconstruction…not some post-modernist claptrap…more like some good old g.e.moore “get a grip on all this dualist bullshit, it’s change that I can see”…derrida and his overblown imagination can go fuck off…but i am digressing ( digression is the structure of human thought )…still…seeing a set of familiar visuals so radically changed can be a bit disorienting and lead one to ponder the transitory nature of anthropogenic structures and artifacts…there is no permanence here…or anywhere for that matter…life is short and the rest is unseen…what’s in store for tomorrow? more of the same? where’s my copy of principia ethica ?

do i own the cat?

daisy the cat has been retrieved and installed…and she is not a happy cat…this will be much more comfortable for a ten year old cat than spending the winter outside…but she is not convinced…like the rest of us she senses that this is not home…it is a foreign place and they do things differently here…how this particular facet of this adventure pans out is as uncertain as any other…we have had cats disappear before and that could happen again…or as the winter sets in she may find a place to set up shop and stay warm…it won’t be the basement she has used over the last decade or so but it may do for the nonce…one would hope she’d find a more inviting place than wedging herself between an outside wall and a couch while complaining vociferously…these are peculiar circumstances…it is a domicile of our own but we actually possess almost nothing beyond two beds and some clothing…right now even the bath towels are a rental…and in a culture where possession and ownership are first principles ( watch some television sometime and then dispute that with me…i’ll hand you your head in that debate ) it is a strange place to be…unnerved and liberated at the same time…I don’t own this stuff so I don’t have to worry about it…a taste of what wealth might be like except i don’t have to worry about someone taking my wealth…any wealth i hold is pretty much intangible and that is the liberating part…i foresee an austere sort of life in the future…the material past has been put into the dumpster…a desk…a chair… a lamp…a bed…a few books…and a backyard to garden in…i begin to see a less worrisome retirement than i had imagined. since this was written last night the cat has moved out from behind the couch to explore and claim territory…a bit of a return to normality…but then she let me pet her…obviously still a disturbed feline