Urgent Evoke

A crash course in changing the world.



Yesterday, I was feeling quite a bit more of a human, and had enough energy to go out twice. Bright and early, I headed out to do some trashpicking (a more modern version of foraging, I guess) and found some wonderful structures for a garden I've helping create down at the awesome and unique Sprouts space down the hill from me. I found a large bamboo papasan chair seat and a small wire garden fence to provide a little bit of protection for the plants, as the space tends to be full of all kinds of humans, and even more piles of bikes in various condition, along with other random geek cruft, and both piles and people tend to end up sprawling all over the place, including into the garden space. So I brought my freshly picked structures down and installed them, and did some more garden work and socializing before heading back to where I'm staying for some rest before the afternoon's work. All the way down to the garden and back I was nibbling on more dandelion flowers and greens, and violets, and Japanese knotweed shoots, which just popped up over the past couple of days. The inside of the stem of the very young knotweed (which people often confuse with bamboo) is very edible and tastes a lot like rhubarb, making it a very delicious addition to my diet, and I'm hoping to find somewhere with more of it coming up, as it takes a lot of the stuff to make much of a snack, since the shoots are pretty small to begin with, and even smaller once you peel the bitter skin off.

Then in the evening, I lugged more structural garden stuff I'd made, a small trellis out of trashpicked wood and a small geodesic dome I'd made out of trashpicked hose, and some seedlings, and some pretty copper wire for making decorations with, and went down for more gardening as well as their monthly community art performance. (Which, this month, delightfully happened to feature a group my awol husband is in, and I got the pleasure of offering him a very small but meaningful and joyful gift.) And while others were enjoying their community spaghetti dinner offered by the group Food Not Bombs, I ate some of the "weeds" from the garden, and shared my story of this wild and free week with the very friendly folks sitting at the table with me. One of them asked me if there was any wild food I'd tasted and just couldn't eat, and I immediately replied "Garlic Mustard!" which was just too much for me to eat fresh. Though it might be ok dried and used as a seasoning on something really bland, but having so many wild chives available right now, it's not really worth it, since I really love the chives. Garlic mustard (that's the slightly evil thing in the photo up there) is a close relative to other wild mustards, which are definitely more tasty, this one just doesn't cut it, in my opinion.

And then, after a gardening, art, activism, and husband filled night, I made my way slowly up the hill with my bike and trailer. I ended the night happy and exhausted and starving. So for a midnight snack, I had a few bites of a sunchoke. I'd have eaten more, but tooth issues turned eating such a crunchy creature into a very long process, and I really just wanted to sleep.

And now, this morning is sunny and beautiful and promises to be a good day for some exploring in a different part of my city, as I have to go to the Somerville library, to pick up the book Wild Foods I Have Known and Eaten, by Russ Cohen, a guy who lives in the next town over from Somerville, who I'm hoping to get a short interview with soon, if we can agree on a communication form (he likes phones, and I don't have one :-) So I'm planning on checking out the parks and some wooded areas over by Somerville's most exciting historical monument, the Prospect Hill tower (a cool castle-like thing built in honor of the fort that was on the hill during the Revolutionary War). And I'm hoping to do a little research into tapping maple trees for sap, to see if it's even worth doing now, since it's suddenly so unseasonably warm. I was fortunate to have a very cool neighbor who happened to have a tap and bucket kit that she wasn't using and kindly loaned to me, so I do hope the tree is willing to share at least a small amount of it's sweet water with me, to gustatorily liven up my week.

It's definitely been a very meaningful and fun learning adventure so far, and I'm happy that it's still continuing, because I still have so much to learn and try!

Views: 11

Comment

You need to be a member of Urgent Evoke to add comments!

Join Urgent Evoke

Latest Activity

Ning Admin is now a member of Urgent Evoke
May 17, 2023
N updated their profile
Sep 25, 2020
Sophie C. commented on Asger Jon Vistisen's blog post Stinging Nettle
"I love that you've brought this to attention. An extensive database of uncommon but resistant and hardy plants/foods could be developed and organized by climate. Ease of growth and processing should also be taken in to account. I will try to…"
Aug 19, 2020
Meghan Mulvey posted a blog post

Fourth of July on the Lake

This past weekend was the annual celebration at the lake house in Connecticut. It is amazing that the lake is still so clear and beautiful after all these years. The watershed association has done a wonderful job protecting these waters from the damaging effects of development.The wood grill was finally ready to cook on, so we didn't miss the propane tank fueled grill anymore. The food actually tasted fresher than in the past and was easy to keep fueled.Dad was very proud of the solar hybrid…See More
Jul 6, 2020
Asger Jon Vistisen posted a blog post

Stinging Nettle

In this blog post I will focus on a plant that is abundant in our nature, and which is immensely nutritious. It's of course the Stinging Nettle. Let's start with the chemical constituents of this plant:37 % Non-Nitrogen-Extracts19 - 29 % Ash9 - 21 % Fiber4 % Fat22 % ProteinOnce the leaves are drid, their protein content can reach an astounding 40 %, which is much higher than beef, which even under the best of circ**stances can never exceed 31 % protein. In addition the Stinging Nettle consists…See More
Apr 13, 2020
Jonathon McCallum posted a blog post

The meal

It is 7'oclock, I was late home from work due to an assignment that i wanted to get ahead on. By the time I get home I am feeling extremley tired and I cannot be bothered to make a proper meal. I walk to the fridge and open it to see what there is for me to eat. All of the out of date foodstuffs have been automaticaly thrown away by the fridge, they will be recycled tomorrow as animal feed or something. I see i have organic local eggs and some local cheese. Foods are vacc** sealded for easy…See More
Mar 10, 2020
Jean Paul Galea shared a profile on Facebook
Mar 1, 2020
Kevin posted a blog post

Future

FutureToday is 2020/1/1. It is just like yesterday. The war is still continuing. It has started since 2010. In 2010, that year was a horrible year. Almost every energy ran out. Every country’s governments were crushed down at the same time. There were riots everywhere. All of the big company’s bosses were killed xdeadx in the riots. Troops fought each other everywhere. Food was bought up xawayx at once. There were no more food supplies in any shops. The economy was all crushed down. All the…See More
Jan 1, 2020
Namwaka Mooto posted blog posts
Jan 13, 2016
T D updated their profile
Sep 3, 2015
Brook Warner posted blog posts
Aug 25, 2015
Santiago Vega posted blog posts
May 5, 2015
Santiago Vega commented on Santiago Vega's blog post Act 8
May 5, 2015
Santiago Vega posted photos
May 5, 2015
Rico Angel Rodriguez posted blog posts
May 2, 2015
Rico Angel Rodriguez posted a photo

public servants

The exchange works directly for state and public workers and servants. It gives them credit in exchange for the amount of public work they contribute to the community. The more constructive they are based off a base rate the more credit they recieve.
May 2, 2015

Follow EVOKE on Twitter




Official EVOKE Facebook Page




EVOKE RSS Activity Feed










© 2024   Created by Alchemy.   Powered by

Badges  |  Report an Issue  |  Terms of Service