Send This Video To Your School Board Members And Legislators.

Better yet, find some allies on the board and legislature and get them to play at a meeting. 

It's not the end of the discussion of education, but it is a good beginning. 

This video was consciously created for the medium.  While just listening is ok, watching AND listening is much better.    





I'm a strong supporter of public education, yet also a strong critic of how much education is done.  Kids' natural curiosity should be tapped and learning should be fun.  Kids shouldn't be forced to sit still when their bodies are jumpy.  Kids should be allowed to lead with their natural abilities and the activities that are hard for a particular kid should be pursued when the kid needs to know that knowledge/skill to answer the questions the kid has.

Too much schooling these days is for kids who have an aptitude for a particular kind of rational/logical thinking, are comfortable with reading, and can concentrate for a while on a topic.  School worked for me because I had those skills.  But for too many kids, who have other natural skills, this focus means they are told over and over again that they are dumb.  Until they believe it.  School becomes torture.

This video says all those things well. 

Alaskan Log Dream Home

When we first got to Anchorage 35 years ago, log homes were the hot item.  Genuine Alaskan.   They had character and were the image of real Alaska.

 We have good friends who live in a beautiful log home he built long ago on the hillside.  There are a couple of acres of land.  These folks owned a commercial greenhouse for a while and the grounds are beautiful.  They were having moose problems - eating some of their special trees and plants - so they built an eight foot fence around the whole property!

Their kids moved south and grandma wants to spend more time near the grandchildren.  So they've put the house on the market.

You'd think a place like this would be snapped up, but it hasn't sold.

part of yard from garaage

My theory is this:  This is a unique house.  It's not the typical cookie cutter home with  granite counters in a neighborhood full similar homes right next door.  Instead it's a one of a kind home on a secluded piece of Alaska heaven right in town.

Well, it's about ten miles out of downtown.  And people might perceive it as way out of town.  But I biked there last week (mostly uphill from near the University) in 40 minutes on Lake Otis.  Driving back a couple of weeks before took 12 minutes (I was timing it.)  So it's not really that far out.

Kitchen behind books

Back to my theory.  It's a unique and wonderful house, but not for everyone.  It's priced higher than your average Anchorage home (they lowered it to somewhat over $500,000) and probably people looking at that price range want something more luxurious.  And younger people looking for a house like this might be looking in a lower price range.


But somewhere out there is someone for whom this is the perfect home.  Someone who can afford it and can appreciate and take care of it.  But that family just doesn't know it's there.  Maybe they aren't actively looking.

It's also a lot of land with beautiful flower beds and a lot of lawn.  What I really like is that while gardens are spectacular, they don't have that  artificial look that look like someone worked hard to copy some garden magazine look.  Rather it's a more an artist's love that created flower beds and lawn that blend easily into the natural Alaskan birch habitat.  It takes work to keep things up.  So it will take a family willing to do the work or able to hire someone to help out.  I know the present owners, who put a lot of love into this property, would be willing consultants to the folks that move in.

Back of the house

Garage

Along with the house comes the two car garage,













and another building that's a studio/office on its own  (no bathroom or running water in there.)

To the left is the studio/office.  The main house is on the right.  In the middle, in the distance, is another small log cabin out in the yard. 

I was standing above the garage when I took this shot.  It was about 9:00pm at the end of July.

Just off the living room

This is one of many flower beds with hardy perennials.

This rock wall is between the house and the large circular driveway that goes around the studio/office and to the remote control gate.

 

I'm not in the real estate business, and I don't put ads up here.  I think of this more as a public service - a way to help connect the right family to a piece of Anchorage that really should be preserved. 

Some of these pictures are mine.  The better shots, mostly ones with black borders (and both interiors), were taken by Dave M. Davis Photography for a realtor.

If anyone is interested, you can email me here and I'll pass it on.
[UPDATE October 11, 2014:  As of the end of September, this house has a new owner.]

Public Meetings, Tortured Confessions, Truth, And Endings

Public Meetings
 One of Thomas Cromwell's scribes is talking about rumors he heard.

 "[Wriothesley] says, 'I hear that in council the king declared he will see to marry Lady Mary to a subject.'
Surely that's not what the meeting concluded?  In a moment, he feels like himself again:  hears himself laughing and saying,  'Oh for Christ's sake . . .Who told you that?  Sometimes,' he says, 'I think it would save time and work if all the interested parties came to the council, including foreign ambassadors.  The proceedings leak out anyway, and to save them mishearing and misconstruing they might as well hear everything first hand.'"

I've finished Hilary Mantel's Bring Up the Bodies, her second award winning book on Thomas Cromwell.   It takes place between the Fall of 1535 and Summer 1536. These are works of fiction written today, so there is danger in thinking these are lessons from another era.  While Mantel has done a great deal of research and has attempted to think as Cromwell thought, she is a modern woman and that consciously or unconsciously affects how she interprets Cromwell.  Nevertheless,   these topics are timely and worth considering and she writes well.  So I offer them as food for thought and perhaps to entice a few to read the books (Wolf Hall was the first one.)  Variety, among others, reports that the BBC and HBO are working on a six part mini-series of the two books.


Getting Confessions Through Torture

Cromwell is attempting to get Mark Smeaton, one of the queen's courtiers, to confess to adultery.

"Tell us now about your adultery with the queen and what you know of her dealings with other men, and then if your confession is prompt and full, clear and unsparing, it is possible that the king will show mercy.'
Mark is hardly hearing hi.  His limbs are trembling and his breathing is short, he is beginning to cry and to stumble over his words.  Simplicity is best now, brisk questions requiring easy answers.  Richard [Cromwell's nephew] asks him, "You see this person here?" Christophe points to himself, in cae Mark is in doubt.  'Do you take him for a pleasant fellow?' Richard asks.  'Would you like to spend ten minutes alone with him?'
'Five would do it,' Christophe predicts.
He [Cromwell[  says, "I explained to you, Mark, that Mr. Wriothesley will write down what you say.  But he will not necessarily write down what we do.  You follow me?  That will be just between us.'
Mark says, "Mother Mary, help me.'
Mr. Wriothesley says, 'We can take you to the Tower where there is a rack.'
'Wriothesley, may I have a word with you aside?'  He waves [Wriothesley] out of the room and on the threshold speaks in an undertone.  'It is better not to specify the nature of the pain.  As Juvenal says, the mind is its own best torturer.  Besides, you should not make empty threats.  I will not rack him.  I do not want him carried to his trial in a chair.  And if I needed to rack a sad little fellow like this  . . . what next?  Stamping on dormice?'
'I am reproved,' Mr. Wriothesley says.
He puts his hand on Wriothesley's arm.  'Never Mind.  You are doing very well.'

This is a business that tries the most experienced.  He remembers that day in the forge when a hot iron had seared his skin.  There was no choice of resisting the pain.  His mouth dropped open and a scream flew out and hit the wall.  His father ran to hm and said 'Cross your hands,' and helped him to water and to salve, but afterwards Walter said to him, 'It's happened to us all.  It's how you learn.  You learn to do things the way your father taught you, and not by some foolish method you hit upon yourself half and hour ago.'
He thinks of ths:  re-entering the room, he asks Mark, "Do you know you can learn from pain?'

But, he explains, the circumstances must be right.  To learn you must have a future:  what if someone has chosen this pain for you and they are going to inflict it for as long as they like, and only stop once you're dead?  You can make sense of your suffering, perhaps.  You can offer it up for the struggling souls in Purgatory, if you believe in Purgatory.  That might work for saints, whose souls are shining white.  But not for Mark Smeaton, who is in mortal sin, a self confessed adulterer.  He says, "No one wants your pain, Mark.  It's no good to anyone, no one's interested in it.  Not even God himself and certainly not me.  I have no use for your screams.  I want words that make sense.  Words I can transcribe.  You have already spoken them and it will be easy enough to speak them again.  So now what you do is your choice.  It is your responsibility.  You have done enough, by your own account, to damn you.  Do not make sinners of us all.

It may, even now, be necessary to impress on the boy's imagination the stageson the route ahead:  the walk from the room of confinement to the place of suffering:  the wait, as the rope is uncoiled or the guiltless iron is set to heat.  In that space, every thought that occupies the mind is taken out and replaced by blind terror.   .  .

It continues discussing the relationship between the victims mind and the terror.

But Mark will be spared this;  for now he looks up:  'Master Secretary, will you tell me again what my confession must be? 

What Makes A Good Man?

Wriothesley is a young man who works for Cromwell.  But Cromwell also assumes that he is also a spy for Cromwell's enemy Stephen Gardiner, whom Cromwell has had sent to France on errands for the King.  Cromwell tolerates Wriothesley for several reasons.  It seems that one is he thinks he might bring him over to his side.  He also knows he's in contact with Gardiner.

 "One can never be sure what Wriothesley is reporting to Gardiner.  Hopefully, matter that will cause Gardiner to scratch his head in puzzlement, and quiver in alarm."

In this passage, Wriothesley is trying to understand why Cromwell is trying to protect Thomas Wyatt, one of the courtiers around Anne Boleyn and King Henry VII, while he's setting up the other courtiers for execution.

"It is not easy to explain to a young man like Wriothesley why he values Wyatt.  He wants to say, because, good fellows though you are, he is not like you or Richard Riche.  He does not talk simply to hear his own voice, or pick arguments just to win them.  He is not like George Boleyn:  he does not write verses to sexi women in the hope of bundling one of them into a dark corner where he can slip his cock into her.  He writes to warn and to chastise, and not to confess his need but to conceal it.  He understands honour but does not boast of his own.  He is perfectly equipped as a courtier, but he knows the small value of that.  He has studied the world without despising it.  He understands the world without rejecting it.  He has no illusions but he has hopes.  He does not sleepwalk through his life.  His eyes are open, and his ears for sounds others miss." (p. 476*)

 
Truth

This immediately follows the paragraph above:

"But he decides to give Wriothesley an explanation he can follow.  'It is not Wyatt,' he says, 'who stands in my way with the king.  It is not Wyatt who turns me out of the privy chamber when I need the king's signature.  It is not he who is continually dropping slander against me like poison into Henry's ear.'
Mr. Wriothesley looks at him speculatively.  'I see. It is not so much, who is guilty, as whose guilt is of service to you.'  He smiles.  'I admire you, sir.  You are deft in these matters, and without false compunction.'
He is not sure he wants Wriothesley to admire him.  Not on those grounds.  He says, ' It may be that any of these gentlemen who are named could disarm suspicion.  Or if suspicion remained, they could by some appeal stay the king's hand.  [Wriothelsey], we are not priests.  We don't want their sort of confession  We are lawyers.  We want the truth little by little and only those parts of it we can use." (pp. 476-7*)

There Are No Endings

Here are the last four sentences of the book:

"There are no endings.  If you think so you are deceived as to their nature.  They are all beginnings.  This is one."

The first book, Wolf Hall, ended as they were on the road to Wolf Hall.  They were never there in the book.  The second book, Bring Up The Bodies, begins in Wolf Hall.  It's not until page 605* of the book's 673 pages, that we read:

"The order goes to the Tower, 'Bring up the bodies.'  Deliver, that is, the accused men, by name Weston, Brereton, Smeaton and Norris, to Westminster Hall for trial."

A third novel is in the works.  One in which, presumably, it will be Cromwell's turn to lose his head.  

*I have the large print copy from the library so the pages will be different from the regular print versions.

Men With Needles And Yarn

I grew up with my mom knitting whenever she was watching tv or doing other activities that left her hands free.  So it's not a complete surprise that my son has started knitting.  In Bainbridge he took me to Churchmouse Yarn and Tea shop while he was looking for some needles. And I had my camera.  (The pictures were all taken at the shop.)

Apparently, knitting is relatively new. 


From Knitty.com:
"A quick cruise of the Oxford Unabridged English Dictionary also reveals that the term 'to knit' wasn't added to English until the 1400s. Further poking around will reveal that any term meaning 'to knit', specifically make loops with two long, straight needles, wasn't in any European language before the Renaissance. Other than the Middle East, and Spain, other places in the world were even later in their assigning words for knitting. It's pretty obvious; knitting hasn't been around that long. Most of what we're left with in terms of physical evidence is a tiny pile of knitted fragments, and a lot of speculation. And did I mention the knit fragments are really hard to interpret? Before the development of knitting, a craft called nalbinding was used to make stretchy fabrics. [original link didn't work so I put a new one in] for a quickie lesson on how nalbinding is done. The drawbacks are obvious immediately.) Termed 'one needle knitting' by some museums, it is similar to knitting in structure, but stronger, less stretchy, and a lot more difficult to create. The resulting fabric would look very sloppy unless done by a master, and it wasn't something you could have the kids do while tending the sheep -- unlike knitting."

Somehow, knitting has come to be thought of as a woman's activity.  But Yarn Boy sets us straight:

Since there was money to be made from knitting (and we already know the history of how men feel about women making money), it was initially a male-dominated craft. It is generally believed that sailors and traders from Arabia, as well as Catholic missionaries,were responsible for spreading the craft of knitting around the world. Knitting didn't become the female-associated activity that it is today until cheaper and faster methods for making clothing were developed, and men moved on to other forms of world domination. By the beginning of the 20th century, it was highly unusual for a man to knit.

I didn't know that Catholic/Muslim link. 

I found a number of men's knitting blogs. 

(Almost) Eternal Bliss

There are moments in a knitters life that are without match. Usually they are relatively fleeting- a finished project, a mother’s joy at her new shawl or the admiration of others as they see skilled fingers producing intricate lace. I’d hardly imagined that it was possible to string a series of these moments together to create something akin to Nirvana, but this past weekend proved me wrong.
My dear friend Matthew had pestered me for years to attend a Men’s Knitting Retreat. For one reason or another, I’d never been able to go. This year, Matthew took matters into his own hands and essentially signed me up whether I wanted to go or not. I acquiesced, requested a few days off and packed my bags. .  .

With Icelandic Air flying non-stop to Anchorage this summer, here's a link to an Icelandic knitter on video.  Here's the description:

Halló, this is Iceland. It is true that my men are very manly, and sometimes have names that are hard for you to say. This is Þórgnýr Thoroddsen, whose name is very hard to say, but he makes up for it by being a very good (and manly) knitter. If you see him on one of my streets, and would like him to give you some advice on how to do knitting like an Icelandic man, just call out “Halló, Icelandic man with a difficult name who knits! Stop and show me how!” He will not mind at all.

From the House of Humble blog:  (nice picture of him sitting on a huge, colorful, crocheted, I think, quilt)

"In the Winter of 2010, I was on a train crossing the Hawkesbury river on the way to my job in Sydney. I had my headphones blaring (I would have been listening to either Neil Young’s Comes a Time or Hold Time by M. Ward, as those were my train riding albums) and I was knitting an iPod cover in the shape of a crocodile. Every now and then I’d look up from my work to check on the journey’s progress and enjoy the scenery out the window. Once when I looked up, the old lady sitting across from me mouthed something and smiled. I’m a terrible lip reader so the headphones came out to sit on my lap. She was saying something along the lines of “It’s so lovely to see a young man knitting.” Sadly her husband continued to stare out the window and didn’t add to the ensuing conversation.
One of our awesome bloggy neighbours, Raynor from The Shy Lion, was in the paper over the weekend. It was an article all about people who do things that defy gender stereotypes. They interviewed Raynor because, like me, he is a man who knits and crochets. Reading the article got me thinking about being a man and a crafter, and it reminded me of the friendly old lady and her less friendly husband.

Knitting With A Y: The Accounts of A Male Knitter  

 "25 year old clarinetist living in Minnesota. Began knitting summer '07 and can't seem to put the needles down! Ravelry name: yarndude"

Mad Man Knitting is a blog by a man who's knitting Teddy Bears for a living.  His book page gives a quick summary:

I was the head server at one of Savannahs most successful and popular restaurants, The Firefly Cafe, catering to the best of this citys blue-bloods. But, once the restaurant was sold, everything changed. The new owners were running the business into the ground, my partner left, my father was diagnosed with a terminal illness, and my weight dropped to a 115 pounds. And while most people find themselves escaping into drugs and alcohol, I became obsessed with knitting. I spent long hours chugging beer after beer and working on any pattern I could come across, developing a psychotic routine of mindless action while life around me was crumbling.

These next two blogs' titles reflect male knitter sensitivity to their image:
The Straight Male Knitter

We walk unseen among you. We possess both “Y” chromosomes and knitting needles. We’re equally at home in a yarn shop and a gentleman’s club. When admiring exceptional décolletage, we may find ourselves distracted by the softness of a mohair sweater as it clings to the complex curves of your bust. If we ask to touch that delicate fabric, rest assured we do want to experience the fabric. But that probably isn’t all we want to touch. We are men. We love women. And we knit.

It Takes Balls To Knit: A big-balled, bald man with sharp sticks -

 On July 25, I was lucky enough to be one of the 3,000 or so knitters in attendance a the 9th Annual Stitch ‘N’ Pitch event at the Seattle mariners baseball game! What a blast we had – and Seattle won the game 8-2, due in large part to a barrage of runs in the 2nd inning. 6 runs as a matter of fact. In that 6th inning Nick Franklin went yard, I mean went yarn for a 3 run blast!

It turns out we were in close proximity last week because my son took me to the Stitch 'N' Pitch night Seattle Mariners baseball game too.  



Men Who Knit has blogs, forums, even a store.


There's an ABC News video at this website on male inmates learning to knit.

"I'm arrested for armed kidnapping and I love knitting."
Every Thursday around dusk, a group of men, hardened criminals sentenced for a variety of violent crimes and incarcerated at the Pre-Release Unit in Jessup, Md., can be found with knitting needles in hand and balls of yarn in their laps.

Yarn Boy (the history quote above) also has original patterns and is one of the smartest looking male knitting blogs I saw.   He lives in San Francisco and I guess the young twins he mentions are taking up a lot of time because the most recent post on his blog is April 2012.


This post was supposed to be a short, quick photo post from the yarn shop.  A quick post while I finish some longer posts that need more thinking.  But I'm finding all sorts of websites on this topic.  But I need to stop and go to bed.   But here's one more link - to Knit Vienna - that has lots of pictures of knitted and crocheted decorations in urban settings as well as a section on men knitters (middle of the page) that includes pictures from some of the websites I'd found - including the picture I liked at House of Humble and the Icelandic video. 


My son gave me a baby hat he'd knitted to bring back to Anchorage as a gift for a friend's new addition.  

West Coast Weather

These are the weather reports I have on my computer dashboard.  It's almost 11pm in Anchorage right now, but this is what the spread looked like (but a little warmer) all day. 

These locations are where my immediate family reside these days. 

Walk and Sleep, Autism on Campus, Left Brain Meet Right, Plus Sheryl Gordon McCloud

In the USC alumni magazine for this summer, there was a letter that caught my attention. 

"The latest issue proposed that there is a "Medical Mystery" (Trojan Beat, Spring 2013, p. 6*)as to why Americans die earlier than people from other high-income democracies.  I disagree with the perspective.  Without the benefit of knowing which 17 countries were examined in the research, two very likely reasons behind the earlier deaths are surely that Americans, on the whole, walk less and sleep less than the people living in the other countries studied.  Walking is not expensive.  Sleeping - generally speaking - is not expensive  Wealth and access to medical technology can't undo the negative effects of a sedenatry, sleep-deprived lifestyle." [emphasis added]

I don't know how much walking and sleeping would improve people's health, but it seems reasonable.  Many people tend to want shortcuts - cholesterol lowering drugs so they can eat high cholesterol food - or when they do exercise, they often drive to the gym to do it. 

But anyone who doesn't walk (or move some other way) at least 30 minutes a day and doesn't get at least seven hours of sleep a night, might set some goals.  Starting with two days a week and adding one more day each week until they're walking and sleeping well at least six days a week.  I bet it makes a difference in how you feel. 


I've found that alumni magazines from good universities can cover very interesting stories as they highlight what their students, faculty, and alumni are doing.  Here's a list of the feature articles:

• Dinosaur Depicter 

  A talented USC Roski alumna brings the prehistoric Mesozoic Era to life.
  

• Neurodiversity and the University 

  Students, alumni and faculty on the autism spectrum show they have a place in the university.
  

• Meeting of the Minds 

  Right Brain, this is Left Brain. Scott Fraser’s happy to make the introduction.
  

• Number Crunchers 

  Ninety percent of the world’s data was created in the last two years. What we do with it will change the future.
  

• Designs on Social Change 

  Creativity can combine with business principles to solve societal challenges—and turn a profit.
  

• Busy Signals 

  The National Medal of Science recognizes Solomon Golomb’s many contributions to communications technology.
  

• Fresh Air 

  Targeted therapies and other advances create new hope for lung cancer patients.

The Summer 2013 edition also has a profile of USC law school graduate Sheryl Gordon McCloud who was appointed to the Washington State Supreme Court in January.   She's of interest to Alaskans because she was in Anchorage in 2009 to representing former Rep. Pete Kott, not in the original trial, but later, trying to get him released from his convictions
because the prosecution withheld exculpatory evidence.   She was very impressive in court and talking to the press afterward. Knew her stuff, no nonsense.

It seems ironic, reading her profile. I suspect as Republican Kott's constituent, her ideas probably would have been ignored (she fought for women's rights issues including protection for pregnant employees), but he paid good money for her to defend him.  (Actually, I don't know Kott's record on women's rights, I could be wrong on this.)


*The online version doesn't have page numbers but it appears that that section isn't in the online version.  Nor are the letters - this one is copied from the print version.

Daniel Ellsberg On Bradley Manning Verdict

From an interview with Scott Horton July 30, 2013.

Daniel Ellsberg: I’m doing okay. We’ll tell your listeners that you just informed me 30 seconds ago that Bradley Manning was found not guilty of aiding the enemy. That’s very, very important, and good news, because the alternative would have been extremely bad news. It would have been very close to being a death knell over time to investigative journalism in this country, which means a free press, which means ultimately democracy or any possibility of democratic control of our foreign policy, our defense policy, totally, if the prosecutor’s argument that his simply giving information to the internet and thereby making it available to the world, including whatever enemies we had, if that is enough to earn a death sentence or life in prison, without any attempt even to prove or indicate intent to harm the United States or to help an enemy – that’s the argument the prosecutor was making and the charges they’ve pursued ever since Bradley Manning pled guilty to 10 military offenses, which could still keep him in prison for 20 years, and I haven’t seen the full verdict here so it may well be that she has added some other offenses to that which may add up to a life sentence.

In my case, I didn’t face a single, one single count that carried a death sentence, such as the aiding the enemy charge in this case did, but I had 12 felony counts which added up to 115 years in prison, so the effect was much the same. That could still be the case here.

The truth is that he did not deserve a day in prison for informing the public here as he did. He certainly does not deserve an additional day after the abusive treatment he’s received here of three years awaiting trial, 10½ months in solitary confinement, part of that nude, a treatment which was described by the UN Rapporteur for Torture as, if not being torture – and he didn’t have all the facts there because he hadn’t been allowed to speak to Manning alone – but he said at the very least it was cruel, inhumane and degrading punishment, which is the definition of a crime under the Geneva Conventions we’ve signed and under domestic law. So he should have been released on the grounds of governmental misconduct, as was the case in my trial, but wasn’t. .  .

You can read (or hear) the whole interview here.  

Videotaping US Police versus Videotaping Swedish Police [Updated]

From a June 2012 post I wrote:

[Following up Anon's comment,   I found where it moved to and changed the link.]

- Photography is Not a Crime - which is full of stories about people having problems when they photograph or video tape cops in action or just in public places.  Here are links to some of his recent posts:

[I took out the links, but if you go to the main site, you'll find lots of similar posts.]

• NYPD Publishes Poster of "Professional Agitators," aka Citizens who Record Cops

• LAPD Tell Photog Not to Listen in on Their Private Conversation on a Public Sidewalk

• Introducing TapIn, an iPhone App Essential for Citizen Journalists

• Albuquerque Police Officer Chases Away News Videographer From Investigation 

• Austin Man Facing 10 Years in Prison After Photographing Cops Making Arrest 

It doesn't have to be this way.  Wimp.com describes this video as:


This is what happens when you attempt to take video of police in Sweden.

I couldn't find a way to embed the video, so you can click the link above or on the screenshot from the video to the right.


Of course, this is just one unverified example.  Take it as a piece of evidence, not a conclusion. 

What's 97 X 96? Quick. In Your Head.

For when the electricity goes out and you have to know. 

This is the most cerebral of 100 lifehacker tricks presented in poster form.  Like putting a rubber band across the top of an open paint can to wipe your brush on or using frozen grapes to chill wine.  The whole 100 tips list is here.

Garden Tour, Lavatera, Spenard, and Corn

Sunday was the Anchorage Garden Club's Annual City Garden Tour.  This is always a delightful affair, a chance to discover hidden neighborhoods, and  wander through people's gardens, ask questions, and dream about the possibilities of your own garden. 


[NOTE:  Click to enlarge and sharpen any photo.]



The first garden we saw was in the heart of Spenard.  I have to give the Garden Club credit.  Snootier clubs would have never chosen this garden.  But it was the quintessential Spenard garden - flowers and junk.  A plastic flamingo and a bald eagle on top of a metal flag pole.   Of course, junk is a subjective term.  But how many garden clubs do you think would include a garden that had this next to the driveway?

But this is so Spenard.















Since four of the five gardens (seemed a low number this year) were close to Turnagain Road, we biked over there in the beautiful, warm sunshine.

This was the back yard of one of the Turnagain gardens.  They had bright pink flowers that looked something like hibiscus and I learned they were lavatera.

Here's more detail from malvaceae.info:

"Lavatera is a genus within the family Malvaceae, which also includes, inter alia, Althaea, Abutilon, Gossypium, Hibiscus, Malva and Sidalcea, and is particularly close to Malva. The 20-25 species of Lavatera have a broadly Mediterranean distribution, stretching to southwest Britain, the Canary Is., Abyssinia, Central Asia and Kashmir, with outlying species in Australia (Lavatera plebeia), California (Lavatera assurgentiflora, Lavatera insularis, Lavatera lindsayi, Lavatera occidentalis and Lavatera venosa), and eastern Siberia.

Lavateras are annual, biennial or short-lived perennial herbs and sub-shrubs. The flowers are pink to purple, or white, or yellow in some forms of Lavatera triloba. The stems and foliage are typically downy or hairy. The fruits consist of a divided capsule containing a ring of nutlets."

 

This window box of flowers nearby was probably my favorite spot on the tour.  It just worked beautifully.  

The last house was near the Coastal trail, which we got off at Arctic to find some dinner.  

 



These corn plants were growing in the two inch crack between the asphalt and the building.  Corn is usually iffy in Anchorage, but this is an exceptionally warm summer and this south facing wall is probably five or ten degrees warmer yet.  There were a few big ears getting close to ripe.   This wasn't part of the garden tour, but it should have been.

There was one more garden on the tour, but it was in South Anchorage and we started late.