Spinny and Loopy in the garden

• Since this depends on the whims and appetites of biological organisms for the chemical processes, it isn’t an exact science.
• The "Mother of vinegar" is sometimes called a SCOBY - Symbiotic Culture of Bacteria and Yeast. It forms a slimy rubbery skin on the surface, which protects the colony from invading microorganisms. Hence the name "Mother".  Cute when you think about it. Not so cute to look at.
• There are two ways to make ACV - with pre-fermented, alcoholic apple cider,  or with fresh or pasteurized apple cider or juice, as long as they do not contain preservatives. The alcoholic cider takes a little less time, but commercial stuff usually contains sulphites, which are a preservative that is meant to kill vinegar bacteria. I make my own hard cider so that hasn’t been an issue for me.
• If you cannot find anything without sulphites, day or so of prep work will get rid of enough of them to let you use it. The goal is to oxidize the sulphites by exposing the liquid to as much air as possible. Put it in a jar with a couple inches of head space and shake the dickens out of it. Let it sit for a few hours, take the lid off to let a bit of fresh air in, and repeat.  3-5 times ought to be plenty for the amount of ACV a normal human would reasonably make in a single batch. 
• The only really important things are to make sure all of your equipment is:
• Clean – as clean as you can reasonably get it - soap and water should be fine
• Non-reactive
• vinegar is acidic. Acid eats things. You will likely regret using your antique copper pot.
• Glass / Stainless steel is best. Plastic is ok for measuring, but use your own discretion. Keep in mind that some plastics will soak up the smell of the vinegar and will stink forever.

• Food poisoning bacteria like botulism and salmonella generally can’t live in the slightly alcoholic, acidic environment of homemade vinegar.  Vinegar is also ugly – it’s a colony of germs growing in liquid. HOWEVER, if it smells bad, turns grey, green, or black, or there is something else that seems to tell you that something is wrong, THROW IT AWAY. If you know somebody more experienced than you and you aren’t sure, have them take a look at it. I’ve only had one small batch that I threw out because it smelled like bad breath.
• The very first batch has the biggest risk of contamination. The nasty stuff like molds, fungus, and toxic bacteria really hate the acidity of vinegar, so it is relatively self-sterilizing once its little ecosystem is stable.
• There is a small chance that the vinegar will get contaminated with another type of bacteria that will create acetone. Again, TOSS IT. I've never had this happen, but the smell of acetone is strong enough that you will notice it right away. From what I understand, if it is going to happen, it will be noticeable right away, before there is any vinegar odour. This seems to be more prevalent in beer making than vinegar making, and even then it appears to be extremely rare.
• Unless you have the equipment to properly measure the PH of your vinegar, it is NOT SAFE FOR PICKLING. A quickie place of overnight refrigerator pickles is fine, but PLEASE don't use this to make jars of pickles intended for long-term storage.
• On the other side of the same coin, vinegar is acidic enough to cause skin irritation (probably minor), burn your eyes, and cause nasty gasses when mixed with other household chemicals. Use common sense.
• There is a trace amount of alcohol left in the finished product. By "trace", I mean you probably get more alcohol from strangers wearing too much perfume than you will from the vinegar. See "how it works" for a more in-depth explanation. Plain, unsweetened apple juice is only capable of making about 3-5% alcohol hard cider IF there is no vinegar bacteria present to convert it. I wouldn't leave it where silly children could drink it, but I'd really be more worried about the mess they'd make as they puked up when they got a mouthful of slimy mother and yeast froth. If you are concerned about the trace of alcohol, use sterile flavourless distilled vinegar, and avoid all fermented products, including bread, cheese, yogurt etc... and learn to enjoy living in the sterile bubble.

• Clean glass jar - You can get fancy vinegar jugs for this that allow you to harvest the vinegar without disturbing the mother or any sediment that forms, but it isn’t necessary.
• Mother -  can be purchased online, from some brew/wine stores, given to you by a friend, or a cup or so of organic, unpasteurized ACV(Like Braggs, not Heinz)
• A fine cotton cloth or lots of layers of cheesecloth.
• You want to keep dust and “critters” out of your vinegar while allowing it to breathe. I use a clean dishcloth.
• A rubber band or piece of string to hold the cloth on the top of the jar tightly.

1. Wash and rinse your hands, jar, anything else that will touch your mix, and the counter in the general area. Yes, again. You don’t want to peek in on your vinegar and find a festering pile of green slime with fur.
2. Put your mother of vinegar into the jar.
3. Make a lame joke about putting your mother in a jar.
4. Pour in your juice/cider. Try to splash it a bit, this will add some extra air to get the culture growing quickly
5. Put the cloth over the top and fasten it with an elastic band/piece of string
6. Put it in a warm-ish area that is protected from too much light. Apparently vinegar doesn’t like much light. I don’t know why, and I don’t know what happens if it gets too much light. I imagine it screams like a Mogwai, but that could just be me. If you have one of those high cupboards above your fridge that is generally useless, that’s perfect. I keep mine on top of the fridge with a tea towel thrown over it.
7. Leave it alone for at least 2-3 weeks. Go ahead and peek now and again to see the mother forming on top.
• If it looks like a big dead jellyfish complete with tentacles, that’s perfect.
• If it looks dry-ish and grainy on top, don’t worry.  You have a tough mother who takes her job seriously
• If there’s a tiny bit of pure white little mold on top, it will still be fine.
• If you see green or black mold or mildew, throw it away.
• If you accidentally move the jar and the mother falls in, don’t worry. A new one will grow. You do want to avoid this from happening often, but it’s not a big problem. 
•  Within 2 or 3 weeks, there should be a mild to moderate vinegar smell.
• By 4-6 weeks, the smell will be getting pretty strong. You can start using it.

Harvesting
There are a couple of options here.

• Some people keep their vinegar, mother and all, in a big jug and just pour out what they need, and top it up regularly with more juice. There are wonderful big glass or ceramic vinegar vessels like this one with a spigot near the bottom that make it so easy to get some vinegar without having the mother trying to get places where you don't want her. That's on my some day list. 
• While the vinegar is "brewing", it is fairly easy to "steal" vinegar without distrubing the mother too much by using a turkey baster or syringe to suck some out. A couple tablespoons of this partially finished vinegar is FANTASTIC to add a bit of zing to homemade iced tea or infused water. If you're reading this, I probably don't have to go into the probiotic benefits.
• Strain out most of the vinegar, keep it in the fridge, and start a new batch with the mother. This is what I currently do. As long as you haven't done something silly like stir it with a dirty spoon, you do not have to clean your jar in between batches. I did after my 4th batch just because it was getting crusty bits of dry mother on the sides of the jar and it looked too awful to live with (I grew up in the shiny plastic sterile 80's - I'm slowly getting over it), but there was no sign that anything was wrong. I'm not religious about refrigeration, but since I don't know the PH of my lovely delicious vinegar, I want to avoid mold growth so I try to remember to put it in the fridge when I'm not going to be using it right away. Although the last time I left it out for a couple of days, it started growing a new mother, so I'm pretty sure it probably doesn't really need to be in the fridge.

I did not take a picture of my dirty feet. How do feet get filthy when they're enclosed in shoes that don't let AIR in?

Rick and I went to the exhibition (formerly known as Buffalo Days) today. Why the name change? I dunno, but I suspect it has something to do with opening it up for corporate branding. The Agridome is now known as Brandt Center, Taylor Field has become Mosaic stadium, I imagine Buffalo days will become Rogers Exhibition or something equally pathetic. Sigh. Rant over.

My feet hurt. Not "Oh, I wish I could have a footrub" kind of hurt. No, this is that kind of hurt where you do NOT want anything to touch your feet. Dismantling them and soaking in ice water would be nice, provided I could do it without actually touching them. I washed them, I made it back down the stairs. The only reason I haven't gone to bed already is that the thought of putting my feet between my weight and the floor is too much to bear.

3 of my teenager bands played at the ex tonight - Kick Axe, The Headpins, and Streetheart. Excellent performances by all of them. Darby can still wail like she did 30 years ago. They all can, actually (except Kick Axe. I don't think they've been around QUITE that long).

Now, we'll ignore that standing through 3 bands is what finalized my poor feet's fate. It's worth the pain, believe it or not. I confirmed my theory that no matter what I do, or what spot I choose, I will end up beside the most obnoxious person possible. If it's not the shirtless drunk who becomes a little cock-robin every time security is in the vicinity (honestly, I expected him to pull a worm out of the ground and shake it proudly to prove his dominance) it's the middle aged woman who was too shy to go see the band when she was young, and she has 30+ years of pent up screaming, singing, and general carrying on that she needs to get out of her system all at once.

The part that saddens me though, is that she was the only (sober) person doing any carrying on. You see, my generation is far to cool to show that we're having any fun. We are the most silent, nonchalant, bored-looking group since time began. We make the Amish look like party animals. It's not cool to look like you're having fun. Heck, it's not cool to let on that you have a PULSE. Compound that we're now all middle-aged and concerned that our boss might see us behaving unprofessionally, and you have a group of people that the mosquitoes don't bother, because they only suck blood from LIVING creaters.

So picture, if you can, an entire outdoor concert of what appears to be middle aged mannequins, with a few drunks thrown in for good measure. After Kick Axe and the Headpins got us all warmed up, some of us even swayed or mouthed the words to the Steetheart songs. Except chickie-poo beside me. She had enough life for all of us. ;-)

However, the general apathy of the crowd did not preclude the need for pot - and lots of it. No, not ME - but there was enough smoke to give anybody a room buzz - OUTSIDE. I'm not judging. Security conveniently became scarce when the telltale smell began wafting around. See, if people are buzzed, they don't fight. A buzzed crowd is a well-behaved crowd. Add that to being generally lifeless, and it makes security's job so easy!

Total Mullet count for the evening: 7. Two were on women. Yes, girls, if you curl it, it's still a Mullet. And guys, combining a mullet with a ballcap and receding hairline REALLY does nothing for your looks. We're all getting older. It's ok. Embrace it. At least admit that Mullets should never have happened and either grow it all out or get it all cut. Your hair is no time to be indecisive!

Speaking of curls, it's been 20+ years since I've seen that much big hair all in the same place. Wow. I really hope that the hair on those gals was for nostalgia/comedy's sake. Again, we're all getting older.... at least the hairpray didn't ignite when people were lighting their joints. That would have been sad. Or maybe it would have burned the long parts of the mullets.

As much of a PITA all the rain has been this year, I have not had to water my garden ONCE, and it's strong and lush, if somewhat weedy and completely taken over by slugs. If I get off my hiney and get some beer out there for the slugs (I know, I don't buy beer for myself, but I'll buy it for garden pests?) I should be able to get some swiss chard that doesn't look like swiss cheese. No pictures of the carnage there. It's too heartbreaking.

I pulled off the first meal's worth of snap peas this morning, Hopefully I get to eat lots of them before we go camping. Yay camping!

The rat-tail radishes are starting to be ready too.
I've got a few baggies of them for the ladies at work to try, and put a bunch in a jar with some recycled pickle juice and extra garlic.

The hairy-looking bundles between the radish seed pods (that's the edible part - neat, eh?) are flower buds from a couple of flowers that came back after winter. I've never had that happen before... it's pretty awesome! The tiny orage bit you can see near the bottom is a calendula bloom. When planting calendula, it's apparently a good idea to make sure it's going to be *taller* than the other plants around it. Lesson learned.

I tried to get a better picture of the calendula. I took dozens of pictures, but this #$%^ camera just will NOT focus on what I want it to today. I'm sure the few pictures that turned out are just flukes. I tried taking a couple of pictures of thistle and dandilion blooms too, and got the same grief. I'll have to get Twelly to figure it out later. She's the camera guru around here.

Again, it wouldn't focus on the carrot flower that's thisclose to blooming.
They look like they're going to be pink flowers, which kind of confuses me a bit. The ones in the other garden that came back look like *they* will have white flowers... I wonder if this is one of the purple carrots that didn't grow very well, and they might have coloured flowers too. That would be neat.

This is my dog Amie.
She figures she's hunting something in the weeds. She got bored and ate the tops of the dandilions. She's awesome that way, I just wish she would be hungrier and eat more dandilion flowers. I could get used to cleaning up yellow dog poop if I didn't have a yellow yard for half the summer.

Another plant that came back after winter.
Nope, it's not dill, it's a parsnip. There are 4 parsnips that overwintered, so I'm going to have TONS of parsnip seeds next year. Each plant has about 20 of these umbrellas, and they're each the size of my face. They stand about 4 feet tall. Kind of cool looking until the wind and hail made them lean over like they're drunk. I really need to get the back fence moved so I have room for root vegetables. they don't get very good roots in a raised bed. Last year the parsnips were only about 4" long. The carrots were just pathetic. I'm surprised either one had enough root to make it through the winter.

The squash are starting to bloom too.
This year I grew dandilion squash, as you can see by the closed flower. Just kidding. They're Table Queen green squash. I like them because they're not really stringy. I'm only growing 6 squash plants this year, and 4 zucchini plants. No pics of the zucs, but they look pretty much like the squash. You can see some oriental mustard on the right. Just a little bit of slug damage on them in that bed. It's a little drier than the other beds so there aren't as many of the little sleazeballs. You can't see it in the pic, but the squash leaves are totally shiny with dried slug slime. The bean plants in the other garden are shiny enough to counteract the albido effect. What's left of them after the slugs chowed down, that is. grumble

It's interesting how our best shade trees are also some of our worst weeds.
In case you haven't seen these before, they're box elders, closely related to maple trees. We just call them maples around here, because there are very few true maples that can handle Saskatchewan winters. They grow HUGE, and have a ton of leaves that make awesome deep cool shade. They also seed profusely, and baby maple trees pop up in gardens, between patio blocks, in planters, pretty much anywhere they can fit a root. If you don't catch them fast, they're nearly impossible to pull. Also, when you cut a tree down, it suckers big time out of the stump. That's what these are. When we moved in we had to cut down a small tree (the trunk was only about 3" diameter) because it was pushing on the wall of the garage (remember those seeds I just mentioned?) Now it grows a 5 foot diameter clump of little green branches and lots of leaves. Lots of shade for the slugs to hide in. As you can tell by the sickly looking leaves, they aren't enjoying all the rain this year. My heart bleeds for them.

As well lined up as they are, I did NOT plant the sunflowers. The best we can figure is that the birds were sloppy eaters from the suet feeder Twelly put out last winter, or maybe they brought them over from the neighbour's yard (they had a couple of sunflowers last year). We can't come up with another explanation. They add to the hickness of my yard, I think. I'm mostly ok with having a hillbilly yard. It's comfortable, it invites all kind of birds, bees, and butterflies (although there's a sad shortage of bees this year - I blame the rain) and it makes me feel like maybe I'm NOT in a city and only 3 blocks away from a 6-lane road. My neighbour's girlfriend says it reminds her of a movie set - there are all kinds of stories if you look around. If I had just a little more ego, I think that might bruise it, but my yard is full of stories, and it's someplace that children and pets can explore without worrying about them eating something that is either toxic or covered in something toxic. It's mostly safe, as long as they stay out of the garage. We won't talk about the gar"bage". It blocks the wind from blowing into the yard, so I guess it's not completely useless.

Speaking of volunteer plants and movie sets...
I found these nastly little things creeping around in the corner I never seem to get to (as you can tell by the huge thistle plants, which are about actual size in this picture). Cleavers... nature's velcro (and the seeds look like tiny bums). If you've never had the opportunity to touch them, I do totally recommend it at least once for creep value. You can't see it, not even when you're right there beside the plant, but it's totally covered in little hooky hairs. Teeny weeny itty bitty hairs with hooks on them, and the plant uses them to stick to anything in the vicinity, and it climbs all over, branching and sticking and climbing. It's got seeds already, which means it would have been blooming in June... June Cleaver! (if you don't get it, you're obviously younger than I am) We've all heard the Beaver Cleaver references... but June - that's gotta make you wonder. Were they really portraying her as something pretty yet clingy that can't stand up on its own, yet still takes over everything? Hmmm....

The plant is skinny enough that you don't notice it until it's everywhere, and then the seeds fall off when you try to pull it, which you can't because it's brittle and the stems just break off. Then you can't drop the handful that you have, because it's stuck to your hand. Seriously, the hairs make it so grippy it feels like it's covered in duct tape glue, except there's nothing gooey or sticky, it's all the little hairs. If you ever find this in your garden, KILL IT. Don't do like I did and think "it's kind of pretty, one won't hurt", because it WILL hurt. One plant gets HUGE, and I think every seed that falls germinates, because in a single year it goes from one pretty plant to filling an entire corner of your yard. I mean FILLING - those skinny branches grow up and down and back and forth til its packed in there like a hay bale, with about 10 seeds every 2 inches up the stem. Worse than dandilions, at least the rabbits like them. Nothing eats these things.

Late this afternoon I planted the Salvia and grape vines I picked up the other day. No pictures, they look like a mint plant and a couple of sticks with leaves. Hopefully the grapes grow well. They're supposed to be zone 3 hardy, so they should be ok.

The cashmere arrived today. Colour: cream. Texture: cream. I came home from work with a killer migraine, and in my mailbox was two ounces of dreamy, fluffy, cashmere from WC Mercantile. I ordered it what feels like forever ago. It wasn't really that long, but it takes stuff awhile to get across the border at this time of year. I don't understand why it's called Cashmere, though. Cashfabulous or Cashmighty would be much more fitting.

Anyway, I couldn't bear to look at it when I get the wrapper off. Too bright for my throbbing brain to deal with. However, a nice long nap, painkiller, and a cup of tea later (not in that order) I spun up several yards of cobweb. No spinning wheel for this stuff. Not yet, anyways. It's getting the homemade spindle treatment. I must say, I like my little toy wheel spindle much better than any of the commercial ones I've checked out. Bottom whorl of course... less stress on the yarn to keep the air inside while I'm spinning it.

The darling below is Zinc, my DD's bearded dragon. Dignity isn't his thing when he's soakin' up the rays.
And I still need to take the tree down.

I have my 2 year review tomorrow. Ok, it's two months late, but that's the way things work around there. The retro pay from my raise should be pretty saweet, even if I get the insulting minimal BS they gave me last year. I'm not holding a grudge though. Good thing, right? ;-)

Am I nervous? Damn skippy!

Logic says I shouldn't be. I have not had as much as a hint of complaint from my teamlead since I switched to this team a year ago. She's always asking if she's told me recently that I'm awesome etc. She's the best supervisor-type person I've had in eons. (no, I don't think she'll be reading this)

But the paranoid codependent ACOA in me keeps thinking about how she has a knack of pointing out problem areas when I least expect it. I'll have my newest pet project all spit-shined and be all new-parent proud of it, and she'll say "but what about this?" or "Did you mean to leave out that?" and my pride goes phhhhttttt around the room like a deflating balloon. Not the round ones that deflate quickly and quietly, either. No, this is one of those long skinny ones that clowns make balloon giraffes from.

Yeah, it's all constructive criticism to bring out the good in me that she knows is there, but.... well, my yearly review is not when I want constructive criticism, THAT is when I want the smoochy compliments!

Simple instructions to avoid making me want to flog you publicly.

1. Starting at the beginning of the question, read all the way to the end of the question.
2. Think about what the question is asking. Note any options it asks for, and whether it is a simple yes or no question.
3. Formulate an answer.
4. Before answering the question, read the question again and check if the answer actually FITS the question. If it does, go to step 6.
5. Reformat the answer to fit the question. Repeat Step 4.
6. Answer the question.

It's not that hard. There is no 90 minute explanation needed before saying "Yes" or "No". Nor will "Yes" or "No" work for a request for an explanation or an either/or type question. Why is that so hard for people to understand?

I left the house at 7:17 this morning.

The sky was lighter than the clouds it was dotted with.