Early Fall Day

Today's was a quintessential New England fall day. Cool, crisp, and slightly blustery, with large clouds slowly scudding across the sky and occassionally blocking out the sun. I worked at home, and in the morning, went out to water and tend the herbs, including several salvia (azure sage, or salvia azurea) I recently purchased.

The honey bees were having a field day with the salvia, which had gone from a relatively flat to a deeply flourescent blue, just a few days ago. There were easily five or six bees buzzing about them, collecting pollen and consolidating it in those small sacks on their hind legs.


Two honey bees in the salvia (just left of center of photo); close-up of a third bee


Honey bee alighting on salvia bloom; another with his orange pollen sack

Back around early August, I purchased four additional herbs: Two basil and two marjoram. I have several round (barrel-shaped), wooden containers that I've used for various plantings the past few years, including several small conifers that decorated the front porch last winter.

Since then, the conifers moved to permanent homes in the side yard, and the containers were excessively weathered and slightly insect-damaged in spots. I repaired the damaged areas by bushing on a waterproof wood glue, and later re-stained the outside surfaces with Minwax Wood Finish (#222, Sedona Red).

Even though it's not intended for outdoor use, the Minwax is what I had on hand, and since these are fairly rough pieces, it didn't particularly bother me if they started to fade and weather again come winter.

Basil and marjoram in re-finished wooden containers; yet another bee, enjoying the basil flowers

In each container, I planted a single basil and marjoram plant. And after two months, the basil plants had grown to enormous sizes, and began flowering just a little over a week ago. The marjoram is also quite substantial compared to when it was planted, but the basil is truly prodigious, and its fragrance pervades the entry porch area where the containers sit most of the time.

Subsequently, I had repaired the three remaining containers, and during a late morning break today, completed re-staining two of them. Just about that time, UPS showed up to deliver a map chest I had ordered. It's very nicely made, and a highly utilitarian piece of furniture, with nine flat drawers for organizing flat-laying documents, drawings, designs, etc. I am going to use it to store my various architectural, restoration, and woodworking designs and plans. It found it's way into the spinning room, which I'm using as an additional reading & writing room, the southeast chamber being my main work area and computer room.


Re-staining containers in the spinning room; the newly delivered map chest

A little while later, as I was looking over the two stained containers, it struck me that perhaps tung or walnut oil might've been a better choice of finish. At least it's more environmentally friendly. So when I have another free moment, I'll give it a try on the last container and see what sort of results I get.


Recently stained containers; about 3" of gravel ought to help drainage and keep most bugs out


Blue sages in their newly finished container homes...

Butterfly in the blue salvia; BRT by the north side of the house and a lot of early afternoon sunlight filtering through the trees

Maples

Denuded of their bark, the old maple sections now repose in the shade, while the hewer hones his broad axe ... :-)

Midsummer Blooms

The green things growing whisper me, of many an earth-old mystery - Rexford

Midsummer saw many a wild and crazy thing blooming in the yard, particularly in the herb boxes. The cilantro transformed itself into coriander, almost overnight, propelling its seed pods skyward to dizzying heights -- so high, I had to stake it to keep its stalks from breaking.


Thyme blossoms and coriander; corriander seed pods

On the other side of walkway, the sage, lavendar, tarragon, and oregano all had grown considerably large, with the oregano and lavendar in particular sending off some remarkable blooms...


Oregano, lavendar, taragon and sage; a lavendar blossom


Tarragon and oregano; oregano blossoms in all their glory

Close-up of the oregano blossoms

The hasta on either side of the front walkway are likewise producing their flowers now...

Meanwhile, honey bees, wasps, and other important pollinators, daily visit these blossoms, and I am glad to see that happening.

An ant enjoying the coriander flowers

Felled Maple

There was a very old maple in my yard that once-upon-a-time had grown five separate stems. Two had been removed some years ago, while another now had considerable heart rot and seemed in danger of falling. Windy storms also caused many higher branches to drop like crazy, so it was now time to remove the tree before anyone got hurt. I asked my arborist to save any large sections of clear wood that he found, and here's what he left me:



The photo below/left shows the remains of the trunk. I am using the good sections to build a trestle-style workbench, with a thick, continuous maple slab for a top. Hopefully, there's enough wood here to complete it. Since this project is destined to be something of a background task, my immediate objective was to remove the bark and elevate the sections to keep rot and insects away.

Hall Chamber in Detail

The hall chamber is quite an interesting room in the sense that it exhibits a number of constructions from several different periods in the history of the house. Here are some photos and commentary.

Above: The southwest corner of the hall chamber with the exterior post and tie-beam of bent #4, and 9/6 windows at the front of the house.

Above left: 12/8 window on south side. Above right: The door leading out to the second floor landing and the post-and-beam assembly of bent #3 just above the door. Doors such as this one were used in earlier times (and are still used today) to prevent cold drafts from coming into heated rooms. This particular door is quite old (perhaps late nineteenth century), but relatively modern compared to other doors in the house.

Above left: Door and interior partition wall. The original chimney was located just on the other side of this partition, and a fireplace was once situated mostly to the left of (and including) the modern register. A vague outline of the fireplace is visible in the plaster (though not necessarily visible in this particular photograph), as well as a plastered-over stove pipe hole. Above right: Doorway to the hall chamber closet area, and a view of the southeast chamber just beyond, with light streaming in from the setting sun. The relative differences in the sizes of the original floor planks of the southeast chamber and those of the hall chamber are apparent in this photo.

Above left: Another view of the hall chamber and closet area entrance, with the spinning room just beyond. Above right: The floor of the hall chamber is very old, but of a more recent vintage than the original (seventeenth century) floor. It is comprised of milled, tongue-and-groove planks 5" in width and twelve feet in length (only a few planks are less than twelve feet long). The floor is consistently higher than both the adjacent southeast chamber and landing floors, suggesting that the original floor planks are just underneath. My guess is that this is an overlay floor that was added to level the surface and thereby make the room more comfortable.

Above left: A close-up view of the hall chamber floor reveals a well-worn surface and a significant historical record. One wonders whether these planks were newly cut when first layed-down, or if they had been taken from somewhere else. When I first bought the house, I thought this floor might be a good candidate for fine finishing, but not now -- it will be preserved in its current state, just like the seventeenth century planks in the other rooms. Above right: The junction of the hall chamber and landing floors. Tongue-and-groove millwork is plainly visible, as well as the relative elevation of the hall chamber floor. The landing floor appears to be of the same construction and vintage as that of the hall chamber, but there is no sub-floor beneath it.

Above: Two 2.5" square-cut nails extracted from the hall chamber floor are shown on the left side of the photo. They are clearly machine-made, as they are tapered on only two opposing sides, and exhibit small striations on the tapered edges. Their heads also appear to be machine-cut, or perhaps hammer-shaped. On the right of the photo are three modern square nails: A concrete nail, a (not quite, but almost) rose-head nail, and a headless brad.

Today in History: New England's Dark Day

Over the fresh earth and the heaven of noon, a horror of great darkness, like the night...
- Whittier

On that day, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give her light
- Isaiah 13:10

Two hundred and twenty eight years ago today (May 19, 1780), New Englanders experienced a near-total darkness at noontime that lasted until the next day's evening. Many thought the biblical end of the world was upon them. Recently, scientists discovered evidence of a massive forest fire in eastern Canada at the time, whose intense smoke, traveling southwestwardly, was responsible for blotting out the sun. Wired magazine today published an article about this terrifying event, and its rational explanation.

Abraham Davenport confers with Connecticut Governor Jonathan Trumbull, in the mural "Dark Day" by Stamford artist Delos Palmer (photo by Steve Castagneto). From a Stamford Historical Society article.

Container Herb Garden

This weekend, I planted a small herb garden in the same wooden containers I had used for holly plants this past winter.




The inherent utilitity in not having certain things in fixed locations is something that I am only now starting to truly appreciate (I call such objects "floaters"). For example, the herb containers can easily be moved for maximum exposure to sunlight or rainfall, or brought onto the porch in severe weather or when there's a frost threat. Inside the house, I have a few pieces of light furniture (i.e., a quilt rack and some windsor chairs) that likewise have no particular place. They tend to just drift about and land wherever they might be needed at any given time.