1. Reply to this post requesting a letter, and I will assign you one.
2. List (and upload, if you want) 10 songs that start with that particular letter.
3. Post them in your journal with these instructions.

lisaofdoom posted this and I figured what the hell, it's been a while since I've done a lemming... thusly did I get the letter T.

01. Lambchop - This Corrosion (Cover of the Sisters of Mercy song, obviously.)
02. Barenaked Ladies - These Apples
03. Berlin - Take My Breath Away
04. Christopher Franke (Babylon 5) - Toward Z'Ha'Dum
05. Depeche Mode - Things You Said
06. Cruxshadows - Täuschung
07. Disturbed - Ten Thousand Fists
08. Evanescence - Thoughtless (Korn cover)
09. Eric Clapton - Tears In Heaven
10. Krishna Das - Three Rivers Hare Krishna

... I think that gives a good example of the varied styles of music I keep.

If you want to go with band/artist names, which wasn't in the original lemming, we have:

Teena Marie - Lead Me On
Trapt - Headstrong
Tricky - Excess
Twilight Sol - Alaska (This is my friend's brother's band.)
Type O Negative - Black No. 1
Team Sleep - The Passportal (from the Matrix Reloaded, Disc 1)
The Crystal Method - Name of the Game
The Cure - Us Or Them
The Eagles - Seven Bridges Road
The Tragically Hip - Hockey Song

I honestly didn't have enough bands that didn't start with 'The', so I guess I had to cheat. *shrug*

Waaagh. Someone go to this site ( http://www.divaknitting.com/store/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=157 ) and get me these.

Feb 09, 870, Dec 08, 877, 809, maybe 853...

$9.99 each, free shipping over $50. Have I mentioned that a) this is my favorite sock yarn, b) IT'S PURPLE, and c) my birthday's coming up <.<

Unrelated: My seed-saving and root cellaring books showed up. Wheeee! I'm probably going to end up with a million notes and highlights in the seed saving book...

http://www.timesdispatch.com/rtd/lifestyles/home_garden/article/H-CLOT26_20090625-185602/276372/

From the article:

Bridgforth recently showed a beautifully restored historic property on Church Hill that was listed in the $700,000 price range. "I had such a hard time selling it because the people next door always had laundry hanging from their second-story back porch," she said. "It was just an eyesore." The house went to foreclosure and eventually to auction, Bridgforth thinks, because of the negative appearance around the house.

I don't know. Did you consider that the housing market has tanked and that people aren't looking at hideously expensive houses that cost seven hundred thousand dollars? Or that people don't necessarily want to live under the restriction of a 'historic property', which frequently means restrictions on what colors the exterior can be painted, and what home improvements may be done on the house?

The fact that people have such a huge negative opinion of drying their clothes outdoors these days irritates the hell out of me. In the winter, yes, you generally want to dry your clothes indoors. Even then there's ways around that; my father has an awesome clothes-drying rack that we used all the time. But restricting and even banning drying your clothes outdoors is just ridiculous to me. We've considered putting in a clothesline here at the house for a while, but haven't because we don't have anywhere to hang the lines. We did it all the time when I was growing up.

I find it slightly heartening that it passed in at least the Senate; I may have to look and see who voted for it and let them know my opinion on the matter. Now that I'm actually a voter (only took me four years to get registered, for fuck's sake) I'm actually someone they might consider listening to. (Or they might not. I don't know. I don't really care, either; at worst I'm out the cost of an envelope and a stamp, oooh.)

Wherever we end up next year, I'm putting a clothesline in the yard. Even if I don't dry everything on a clothesline, it'll still be nice to have. More people need to start doing this again! Just clicking on Amazon, I found an indoor drying rack for thirty bucks. Sixteen if you want a wooden one. I could probably find even better if I actually did a bit of digging. :D

Heresy the First!
90% wool, 10% mohair.
~183 yards, 109g.
And I made it myself.
Second hank will be plied tonight. ^.^

If I'm judging this right, I'll probably have enough yarn to make a shrug, possibly a shirt or something. If I can find another yarn with similar enough gauge, I might do something with stripes or somesuch.

I am so happy with how it looks.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/blog/2009/jun/14/naked-rugby-new-zealand

Nakie rugby match interrupted by fully-clothed streaker.

There's a (mostly NSFW) pic. I thought of you. :D

Yeah, I'm thinking ahead just a bit on what I want to put in the garden for next year already. It can't hurt, and if we get it started a lot sooner, we can get into things such as crop rotations and successive planting to make sure we use all the space we have all the time. I'm looking more at staple crops now, enough to feed say four or five people.

Corn! Yes, corn. Possibly less for the fresh and more for the preserved, particularly corn flour (no, not corn starch, you imperialistic British fools!). There's plenty of time to figure out if making corn flour is even something I really want to do. If not, there are a bunch of really NEAT varieties that could be grown in small-scale crops for decoration and the like, mundane and ritual.

Gourds -- I looooove those little miniature pumpkin thingies, and SeedSavers has them! I need to have a plant in the garden for these, because they're just too damn cute. Other kinds of gourds could come in successive years, if we want them as decoration.

Beans. Not just the green string beans, but like dried beans. I hadn't even thought of that idea, but if I'm not going to be working I may well be willing to put up with the manual labor required for getting beans processed.

Tomatoes -- we have only four different kinds of tomato in the ground now, and a couple of those may not survive (sigh, we waited too long -.-) but next year it's on. Romas are definitely a must, ouranophobedigs on yellow pears, cherry tomatoes; there are also a few other varieties of tomato I saw on SeedSavers that I wouldn't mind trying out, namely Amish Paste and Brandywine. If I can find someone local who has a plant so I could sample one first, that would be even better. I don't suppose anyone still reading this far has a particular homegrown variety they like? (:

Peppers -- oh my god, SeedSavers has miniature bell peppers. I absolutely HAVE TO HAVE THEM. Red, yellow, and chocolate bells that are only two inches big, and the plants get to be around 16". Tiny and cute and I want them. I didn't see banana, jalapeno, or poblano peppers on SeedSavers, but if they're commonly enough found I can possibly just use what I have or find someone who's saving seeds from their crops and could send me some. Other hot peppers aren't outside the realm of possibility either.

Onions -- We're only going for one variety of large onion this year, but next I'll want to do more. Red onions in addition to the yellow and white would be nice. The plants (if you didn't know) only produce one onion per, so keeping a dozen or so of each variety (plus extra to save seeds) might actually take up a bit of space. Green onions could still grow in the little pot we have; depending on how well they do this year I'll consider packing them in even tighter!

Other root veg like carrots, parsnips (omfg, parsnips), and beets -- I need to find a good variety or two of carrot that I like, the parsnip beds are probably going to be a little large, and the beets (at least in MY opinion) are pretty much just for yarn dye.

And all the other ones that are still just half a thought -- broccoli, leeks (YUM), cucumbers, lettuce, spinach, squash, zucchini, etc...

If we end up with a place we can have a root cellar, that'll influence the varieties of root-type veg we get. Some varieties preserve better than others, after all, and no sense in growing a huge crop of onions (for example) if they're not going to last.

As soon as I get my damn Amazon code (why did they have to snailmail the gift-card code, anyway?) I'll be ordering Root Cellaring by Bubel and Seed to Seed by Ashworth, which will hopefully teach me a ridiculous amount about planting, growing, harvesting, and storing all this damned food.

The garden is officially started. All these plants are now in the ground or in planters:

Both cherry tomatoes are a couple inches tall.

All six roma tomatoes are up!! Like the cherries, they're only a couple inches tall.

Two 'health kick' tomatoes that we bought as starter plants are in. Those are about a foot tall; they got a bit shocked and have a little fruit already, poor things.

One yellow tomato of some kind, a starter plant a foot tall, that I'm looking forward to seeing how it turns out.

Two red bell peppers, a couple inches tall.

An orange bell, a couple inches tall.

A yellow bell, a couple inches tall.

two green bell -- the couple that we were trying to grow have died off, so we're replacing them with two starter plants that are about a foot and change tall.

two purple bell, also starter plants about a foot and change tall. Yes, purple bell peppers exist, and when they fruit I'll take pictures!

Two of the random bells are in the ground now, a couple inches tall. No idea what they'll turn into!

Two jalapeno peppers, a couple inches tall.

Two banana peppers, a couple inches tall.

Two cucumbers, about six inches tall.

Two pickle cucumbers, about six inches tall.

Pumpkin, which is about a foot 'tall' and happily growing along the ground.

white squash of about six inches.

The mixed greens lettuce and spinach planter is quite happy and growing SO WELL!!</i>

Some of the green onions aren't doing so hot, but others are coming up so it should be okay. Whatever doesn't make it, I'll just replant the seeds and they'll stagger.

the lemon balm, mint, and cinnamon basil starters we bought and planted a while back are all doing well.

The acorn and butternut squash we planted in the ground didn't make it. We replanted seeds and aren't going to worry too much about it.

I'm not pleased with the Ferry Morse starter pellets, and I'm going to avoid them in the future; they're developing a lot of mold of various kinds,and that doesn't make me very happy. The other brand seemed to do just fine, so I'll stick with them. All of the pole beans rotted before they could sprout. The tarragon died, as well as a couple of the onions and bell peppers, one of the dill plants may not make it, and the sage is gone. Not pleased.

I am going to want more planters, oh yes...

Carrots (narrow rows and deep)

Onions (near rows and mid-depth)

Parsnips (mid-narrow rows and deep)

Beets (narrow rows and semi shallow)

Radish (narrow rows and shallow)

We already have a planter for some of the herbs, but we may want another just in case.

---

For next year, a starter greenhouse wouldn't hurt, so the seedlings can grow with less worry about them dying from heavy rains pelting down on them. Also if we get a good enough start on the season, a larger, more spaced-out garden would be nice. We'll have to get a roto-tiller or something, this manual labor crap is for the birds.

My heresy yarn is three-quarters done. I just have the second half of the purple stuff to spin, and then I ply it, set it, and figure out what I've got so I can knit with it.

If the way I tested it holds true, it should end up being about worsted weight. I am so very happy with this stuff...

No, seriously, we're adding bagged soil to our crappy backyard dirt.

We have a rosemary sprout -- SO HAPPY -- and eight of the random peppers are coming up. We may have a green pepper, and possibly a poblano and jalapeno, and the other red pepper.

I might spend some time mixing in dirt for the kitchen herbs after we're done in the yard.

Also need to check up on the lettuce and green onions.