Archive for June, 2006
June 20th, 2006
We want to thank Skagit Gardens for throwin this Callalilypalooza and invitin the Band here to throw in. It’s pretty generous of em, considerin half the Band works day jobs at the South End Nursery and Botanicals. We’re about the size Skagit was back in the early ‘80’s. They got a 25 year head start on us, but we got a Secret Weapon.
Our team of geneticists has decided to Specialize. We can’t compete with all those generic geraniums and perfect posies so we decided to corner the niche market with what we know BEST on the equatorial South End. That’s right: NETTLES. Urtica Dioica for you Roman gardeners. At least til the English as first language bill passes.
We been hybridizing, cross pollinatin, stylizin, irradiatin, nano-inoculatin, heirloom seedin, free rangin, molecular manipulatin, and other cutting edge techniques we can’t divulge, to engineer strains of nettles no other nursery ever dreamed of, much less developed. We got red bark nettle, climbin nettle, ornamental nettle, herbal nettle, variegated nettle, double blossom nettle, ouchless nettle, tree nettle, vine nettle, creepin nettle, dwarf nettle, blue nettle, singin nettle, carnivorous nettle, hi protein nettle and nettle that’ll cure cancer. We got a bonsai nettle over a 100 years old with splintered bark and teeny weeny splinters under leathery leaves tended by whole generations of nettle lovin South Enders.
We got a nettle for every gardenin strategy. You need a hedge, say, to keep the rich neighbors from walkin their pedigree dog on your land, leavin those unwelcome compost offerins, we got a nettle crossed with a thorny rose and hybridized with poison ivy. They won’t trespass twice —- we guarantee it! Course the Dep’t of Agriculture wants to declare it a noxious weed, so I advise you to hurry before the regulators do…
South End Nursery and Botanicals. We’re your full service nettle dealers. We might be new, but you can tell by checkin at the local nurseries we’ve cornered the market already. Look around. Not one measley 4” pot of nettles to be found. Tells you how the competition withered in the face of bio-technological supremacy. So next time you got nettles on your shoppin list, head straight down. “We’ll scratch the itch right off your list.” Catchy motto, too, ain’t it????
June 20th, 2006
I know a lot of you are worried about Global Warming. And I know some of you don’t believe it’s true. I know some folks are worried about the next Ice Age. And others think we’re still in it.
We got El Nina years and La Nina years. We got ozone depletion, greenhouse gas accretion, we got soft tundra and oozing glaciers, we got more hurricanes and record settin cold weather. We got record setting hot weather and jet streams hoppin north and south so fast it’s like a bi-polar meteorological condition.
It’s getting hard to know how to dress. Layers, I guess. Gortex layers. It’s that or Biospheric Domes. Put the cities under Pyrex. Big thermostat the City Council can fight over. Yell at each other for forgetting to turn it down at night.
Personally I think all this weather talk is good. You can’t talk politics anymore everybody’s so polarized. I just worry when we blame the other party for the weather. What’re we gonna talk about then? Republican caused monsoons? Hurricane Hilary? The Bush Blizzard of 2007? The Democratic Killer Heat Wave?
I don’t know about all of you, but I think that will have some serious global consequences. Shrinkin dialogues, frozen conversations, stormy relationships and violent domestic ventings. Fox Weather might predict calm sunny days every day of the week, but for the rest of us, it means no more conversational crutches. No more, ‘Hot enuff for ya?’ instead of ‘How about that War in Iraq?’ No more ‘I’m ready for it to quit rainin any decade now’ instead of ‘You got an opinion on that gov’t surveillance spyin.’
So if you’re complacent about the global warmin debate, imagine a Weather Channel that looks like Chechnya. Maybe you’ll rethink it.
June 20th, 2006
Now the Band was a little reluctant to take this gig: Dad’s Day in the Garden. It sounded suspiciously like one of those STING operations for deadbeat dad’s delinquent on child support payments. Get us all down here, then throw the net. We could see the headlines in the Conway Chronicler: South End String Band nabbed at Skagit Sting.
NOT that I’m sayin I’m a deadbeat dad. I know bein a banjo picker sorta don’t help the image, but we all been down on our luck. Little Jimmy understands that. His mom’s a little less forgivin, but when the CD sales start rollin, she’ll change her tune.
Fatherhood on the South End has taken on new meaning in these modern times we live in. DNA tests take all the romance out of relationships, you ask me. The old family tree’s got tighter branches now. And I guess that’s good, but it sure takes some of the mystery away from sparkin and courting. Personally I don’t care to find out half the Band here is related. But it IS father’s day tomorrow. Won’t be long before old dad is just a Test Tube in some sterile lab. Old # 74 Double X. I think I got more to offer than a Petri dish. Altho, Little Jimmy’s mom might not agree.
The Band was thinking of maybe lobbyin for Father’s Day bein a day of amnesty. You know, Give a Dad a Break Day. Or even a whole month. NOT that I’m sayin the boys here are lookin for a way to skip the June payments. We were just thinking a little breathin room ….. you know, til the CD sales pick up.
June 20th, 2006
Us South Ender’s got to drive farther than the rest of the island to get to work, to buy groceries, to take the kids to school. We got to drive further just to get to the nearest gas station. And maybe you folks have noticed — like we have – the price of gas seems to be goin UP since we won the war in Iraq. Well, since the oil companies won the war in Iraq.
Us South Enders plan to do a little more than WHINE about it. And I don’t mean we’re gonna call for another Congressional investigation into the Camano Plaza Texaco’s price gougin. Or scream and yell to put drillin platforms off Utsaladdy and Madrona. Or blame it on the folks who think they need a Hummer Fightin Vehicle to pick up groceries in war-torn Stanwood.
South Enders know what’s got to be done and by god, we’re gonna do it. It’s time to end dependence on foreign oil. Don’t need a PhD. Don’t even need a G.E.D. What we need is Bio Fuel. Course, we don’t have vats of bubblin fryer grease from McDonalds or Burger King. We don’t have fields of corn or switchgrass or sugar cane. And anyway, we’re not gonna use dinner to power our SUV’s. We tried burnin wood, but drivin AND stokin the engine was dangerous, not to mention the emission controls clogged in about 10 seconds.
So we turned to our most abundant resource, put our best scientists on it and VOILA — Nettle Power. Vast forests of 8 foot old growth stands that practically regenerate overnight. 200 itchpower per cu in of nettle diesel so supercharged the trip to town’ll take half the time for half the price. Course, the downside is Daddle Distilleries is retoolin from 100 proof moonshine to 90 octane bio-nettle. Upside is we’ll probably have sober drivers once again. Bio-Nettle. The Green Gasoline. Comin soon to a South End pump near you!!
June 20th, 2006
Ma brought home a bag of some kind of snack food the other day — and bein the literary sort, I got to reading the warnin label and ingredient list on the packaging. This one said it had no transfats, no artificial preservatives, no cholesterol, no genetically engineered sweeteners, no antibiotics, no irradiated parts and was NOT known by the State of California to cause cancer.
I was reassured, of course, but oddly enuff my appetite had completely gone away.
On the South End we still grow our food. We still catch some of it. And we raise the rest. Oh, we use a lot of manure and lord knows where those crabs have been partying and acid rain’s probably in the raspberries and the clams are layin where the neighbors drainfield heads.
It worries me, tho, what the so-called food industry is dreamin up. Fake fats and phony sugar. They make us obese then they figure out the diet remedy. Pretty soon we’ll get potato chips with beta blockers, candy bars with acne medications, coca-cola with Ritalin. The food industry and the pharmaceuticals and the geneticists, they’re a match made in heaven.
I told Ma don’t buy any more of that pure stuff, all unadulterated and lackin flavor. I want organic I’ll go back in the woods and gnaw on nettles. Course when the food boys figure out an anti-itch additive, we’ll all be eatin the tickly little taste treats. No transfats. No greasy aftertaste. Just 100% natural goodness processed and packaged for your culinary pleasure. Mmm mmm good….. Can’t wait for the poison ivy chip dip…..
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