Good morning. Hello. How are you? #634
Gardening, podcast, Sabbathday Shaker counting, oversized ablution byproducts.
Good morning! Hello, there. How are you this fine Monday? Considering I’m staring down the barrel of the gun of a five-day workweek, I am doing okay. I’ve got some energy, I am recharged, maybe this will last two, even three days. Normally I keep things pretty light on Mondays but I have three meetings today, that seems excessive. But who knows maybe I have been doing things wrong all this time and the secret isn’t to dip your toes into the week but to dive right in. Anything’s possible. I am listening to the new Spiritualized for the 15th time or so. It is great. Side B, especially (Mainline Song onwards) is just fantastic. It is comparable in style and tone to Ladies and Gentlemen but it is, alas, too short, and missing a swampy blues number akin to Cop Shoot Cop. But still. Just great. Best outing in quite some time. I am sad I gotta wait till September to see them, with them being in the US right now and people seeing them and the set being, according to my sources, solid.
Anyway. Great weekend of gardening, got a ton done. Planted the peppers and the basils and some more tomatoes and catnip and thyme and rosemary and two beds of flowers and a row of sunflowers along the walkway between Janet’s house and ours. Took apart the area where the potatoes are (which are sprouting!) and re-formed the ground, making a drainage ditch and building up both sides of it, in order to get rid of the inadvertant swamp I made when I removed all that gravel back at the beginning of the hoop house project. The cucumbers looked pretty shell-shocked from the last freeze, and I learned that i put them out too early, so they are probably toast, good for me, so I planted new cucumber seeds right next to the old ones, we’ll do a bit of an A/B test. I did this with a roma tomato too, which was kind of sad when I transplanted it. James Prigioni always swears there’s no use transplanting tomatoes just stick the seeds right into the ground after the last frost, so we will see. The radishes are sprouting already, and one beet, but no sign of the carrot, celery, shallot, onion, corn or bush bean sprouts yet. Fingers crossed. Lettuce and spinach is going gangbusters, so are the grapes, and all my apple trees and pear trees save one have rebounded and are leafing up, which is just a miracle. I’m gonna have to figure out where to plant them by fall, and I should probably figure out where I want to put the grapes. Might make a trellis. Still debating where. I have some ideas.
Anyway, here is the video if you’re into that sort of thing:
Some real solid footage of Jane in this one I am very much enjoying the “Cinematic” setting on the camera on the iPhone 13 pro. It only works in perfect sunny conditions outdoors, with a kid, cuz that is probably the one and only use case it was tested on, but that works for me.
Also got my podcast done, where I was in a super bad mood when I started, but doing the podcadt and rambling to my imaginary friends really cheered me right up, kind of like talk therapy, only free, so that is nice.
The Webb Chatham Report media empire is in any and all media formats that you prefer. We aim to please.
IMPORTANT SHAKER UPDATES, courtesy of Briana: Eater has a story about a new Shaker-inspired restaurant in the West Village, which talks about Brother Arnold and the last shaker community at Sabbathday village. Not to be outdone, the New York Times is on it, with an entire, extensive trend piece that combines an overview of all things Shaker going on in the various art and crafts communities, including the aforementioned Commerce In, a large expansion of the Shaker Museum, and several furniture makers and the like who are making Shaker furniture. It combines this with a history of the Shakers and a visit to and interview with Brother Arnold, who pretty much says the four things he always says in interviews. BUT the big news is there are only two shakers now. Of course we knew that Brother Wayne had left for love in 2010. That left Brother Arnold, Sister June and Sister Frances. Sister June then passed away, leaving two, but they picked up Brother John, leaving three, which is where we left things last year. Now the Times tells us:
“The appeal of Shakerism is not an easy sell,” said Brother Arnold Hadd, 65, [oh Arbnold you always use that quote, you media imp] one of two [emphasis added] practicing congregants at Sabbathday Lake Shaker Village in New Gloucester, Maine. Established in 1783, it is the sole active Shaker community in existence. Its other resident, Sister June Carpenter, is 84.
Two! Two! What happened to Brother John? Did he fall in love and leave to?? Jesus. It won’t be long until Brother Arnold is the only Shaker in the world. I wonder if maybe he’s just not a nice guy and now people are equating an entire religion with “well then I’d have to hang out with this guy.”
I hope Brother Arnold doesn’t use the internet he is probably lovely. Weird talking about someone who is simultaneously a totally mundane private citizen but also the equivalent of the Pope of his religion.
This Tweet really resonated with me:
Emma keeps two.. maybe three half full cans of Wife Water on her nightstand at all times.
Speaking of Tweets, this weekend Elon Musk tweeted “Moving on…” which everyone took to mean he was over his buying Twitter whimsy and I was so relieved. Except then this weekend the Wall Street Journal posted that the board of Twitter was now seriously considering his offer and this might actually happen after all and I am right back to worrying again. Except I think it probably won’t because either a) Elon doesn’t want to spend all that money and mortgage his shares in his other companies to the hilt, or b) he figured out the China problem and is trying to gracefully exit. We shall see, we shall see.
Also I feel the need to inform you that I dropped a deuce this weekend that was so solid, so epic that it clogged the toilet on its own. Just Herculean. A shit of the gods. Never been anything like it in the history of mankind. We will speak not of the epic pain with which this stinker was birthed. With the departure of this behemoth log, I began to feel less sick, the nausea and headaches I’d been experiencing for days subsequently lessening. Coincidence? Mayhaps. Emma’s PCR test was negative, all my seven daily tests were negative, things are returning to normal around here. Emma kindly watched Jane for three nights to make up for my run covering for her, I feel some balance again and ready to do Daddy Bedtime tonight.
Oh and after three weeks, CVS texted me and said “oh hey we have Azelastine back in stock come get it” and I’m like “bitch what? You’re a pharmacy and you didn’t have a drug I needed for three weeks. A drug that was widely available elsewhere. A drug who’s being out of stock for you had nothing to do with supply chain issues. Did you think I was just going to stop taking needed medication for three weeks because you couldn’t be bothered to manage your supply chain? What kind of clown car are you running over there? Really is stunning.
All right, a country mix for you today, inspired by the music of Outer Range, which is not country and is very, very good, they had Scott Walker and Kate Bush in the last episiode, but they did have one country song, and I was like “Oh I like this song but I can’t remember who it’s by it’s not Colter Wall it’s that other guy” but it was, in fact, Colter Wall, thus simultaneously being impressive I remembered his name but also getting zero credit for it since I said it wasn’t him. Like when Emma asks “do you want to take this laundry basket upstairs for me?” And I say “I don’t want to, but I will,” thus accomplishing a lose-lose, where I end up doing the core and not getting credit for it. Pro spousing, right there.
Okay talk to you soon. Jane is at Grammy’s and after I do my country flashcards I gotta go out and drop off some packages and buy that Diet Coke I literally had a dream about last night. Ta.