A Great Day at the Garden

The birds were singing, the breeze was blowing and you could smell the rosemary in the garden the other day. I've been all over the place the past few weeks and had finally a chance to drop by my patch to tend the plants.

That's McRorie community gardener Nick in the photo above. He and I chatted and I hope you all get a chance to meet him virtually here at the Zoobird community. I wrote about this latest Great Day in the Garden on Elephant Journal. You can read the article here: http://www.elephantjournal.com/2009/12/a-great-day-at-the-garden/



I saw this prayer in the Haight, I think, and it reminded me of Janis Joplin, who I grew up paying lots of attention to partially because my next door neighbor's name was Janet Joplin, so the 60's had two for me. Sh'mal's been blogging some amazing reminiscences, as has Flash, so if you want to take a ride in their wayback machines, be sure to click the links. Shmal mentioned something interesting to me about the real Janis Joplin so maybe if you ask him, he'll tell us all the story...I swear, I feel like a little kid here with you. I read your stories and sometimes it's like "Tell me the story about Woodstock again, please, tell me about Mt Ranier!"

Jennifer added these paintings she did to her Zoobird album. And, Jennifer, we want you to know how much we enjoy your art! Truly amazing art, stunning photography, and wonderful reminiscences of fun times.




This is Mary and Asher's patch. Now look below and see how it looked on October 13th. It was this "Great Day at the Garden".

Those cardboard walkers are a cool idea. I think I'll try that.



Look at this produce. Doesn't that just call out to you? It must taste so good. I can remember a super memorable dish I cooked up one afternoon from fresh, happy, greens just like these from mainly collard greens in my patch...yep, not too hard to find in my photo album here on Zoobird:

You know that tasted good. I'm dying...gotta make a run for the kitchen...BRB!

===



Just an aside, but as I write, I put links in the blog posts. Some of you know that you have to follow these links to understand the whole idea I am trying to convey. But, some of you don't click the links. Hey, links are what the web is all about, so please PLEASE click the links. Here's a trick you'll appreciate. First, many of you use browsers that allow tabbed viewing. So, just click on the link using a right click in Windows or a CTRL-click in Mac, or however you get a popup and open the tab separately. That way, you won't lose your train of thought as bad. Yeah, easier said than done. I am the worst about free associating and just going far from the original link because it's all just so interesting! But, I've heard people say they didn't follow the link when I put "Like what you've read? Then read the rest here, in the Bike Zoo..." Man, you miss the whole thing if you don't follow the link!



So, here are some red, red peppers in the garden. Can you just imagine the zing they add to your dish, like perhaps some Kung Po stir fry? I get hungry just thinking about it.

If you get a chance, could you all update your profile with a real photo? One of the most fun things you can do is pick people in Zoobird you find interesting and connect with them by "friending" them. That lets you share things with your "friends", which is quite satisfying. Also, at the bottom of most pages in Zoobird, you'll see a share link. Try posting to your Facebook account, or to StumbleUpon, which rocks and gets us lots of attention. Try posting a blog post if you haven't yet. Have you joined any groups? Please, look around and find some you like. Then, look at the discussions. Add your two bits. Answer some questions or add comments. Post your own discussions. It makes for so much more interesting reading when we contribute. I know it's scary to commit with comments. But, you can start out by being generic and just build up to really saying what you think. The water is warmer than you imagine...

Zoobird is a community with so many interesting members. The more content we create, the more interesting it gets. Do you know some people that might enjoy Zoobird? Try using the Invite feature on the top menu and send them an invitation to join.

While I'm walking you around, let me mention the Reading List. On the homepage, the reading list changes daily. There are keywords that put new items in each group very frequently, too. So, if you like Veggie cooking, then you can pop into the group and see how the reading list changes with new things to check out.