Month: July 2011

Av and I used to have a…well…’pet’ possum.  Before one of the hurricanes took our peach tree, “Jeeves” would come almost every night in the spring and summer and feast on whatever fruit was to his liking.  At other times of the year, he would visit the backyard, snooping around for who knows what:

At one of our themed parties, we recognized Jeeves in cupcake (red velvet, of course!):

Back in April when we were on vacation, we drove through Wausau, Florida where they have erected a monument to the possum:

Kudzu, brought to this country from Asia as an ornamental, was developed near here in the early part of the Twentieth Century and given to the world as a soil-saving, high-protein forage plant by Mr. and Mrs. C.E. Pleas. The fast-growing, deep-rooted leguminous vine has been widely grown in the United States as a drought-resisting, erosion-controlling plant that compares with alfalfa in pasture and hay-making values.

In the nearby cemetery are Mr. and Mrs. C.E. Pleas, with ‘Kudzu Pioneers’ on their shared monument, and each of them have a bit about their role in popularizing kudzu on each of their stones:

More about them here.

Of the many, many, many, many tamale places we’ve been to in the Delta — best goes to Hicks’ in Clarksdale.  Hicks’ forever:

Shug loves the hot tamales at Hicks’ (they were a little too spicy for Shugie) — but they both agreed that Chamoun’s Rest Haven has great coconut cream pie:

…and since it was going to be late getting back home, we picked up a few little goodies to tide us over during the night drive at Delta Donut:

Other restaurants in Clarksdale include Madidi (Morgan Freeman and Bill Luckett’s finer dining restaurant, where we had an awful experience), Ground Zero (MF & BL’s idea of a juke joint, which we’ve been to and was okay), Rust (that I really want to try next time), Abe’s (not a fan), and Ramon’s, the Ranch, and Delta Amusement (also want to try that next time).

After a day full of doing fun things with the boys, we drove over to Greenwood for supper at Lusco’s, another of our favorite places.  We thought they would get a big kick out of the private tables behind a curtain, where if you need a waiter you just ring your own buzzer.  It’s more private and somehow more fun.

Well, Lusco’s didn’t work out (we should have known: Saturday night + no reservation = one awful table in a 150db room and leaving before even ordering so as not to endure the noise).

We figured Giardina’s (love it) would be similarly busy and Crystal Grill (oooh those pies!) was too…so supper was a grilled cheese in Winona!

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An article in last month’s Chicago Tribune mentions the city’s ‘barbecue renaissance’ and attributes part of it to a style popularized in the Delta, with reference to aquarium smokers.  If you can think of someone in the Delta using an aquarium smoker, please email me.  Thanks!

Not all my family is Jewish — one line of my grandparents lived for a very long time on Sand Mountain — before Alabama was a state — and many of them are buried at a church cemetery in DeKalb County that includes a large number of folk monuments (all of my family in this cemetery have the usual, traditional ones, but these folk ones are the most interesting).

In the middle, a hand-drawn weeping willow:

A couple of these mention when people were “bornd”:

John L.A. Brown — he was a schoolteacher.  Wonderful:

The WSJ ran an article this weekend about the $20k houses the Rural Studio is designing and building:

For many people with modest incomes, trailers are the only real option for home ownership. But trailers deteriorate quickly and depreciate over time. Six years ago, the Rural Studio, a program based in western Alabama and run by Auburn University’s architecture school, launched the $20K House Project, with the goal of producing a model home for $20,000. (At that cost, the resident’s monthly payment would be about $100 under the federal Section 502 Direct Loan program.) Last month, a team of four postgraduate students completed the latest home, the 10th one developed by the project.

Slideshow here.

Found this in Collinsville, Alabama this weekend…

The residents of Phonehenge, in California’s Mohave Desert, have been told to move after twelve misdemeanor building code violations last month.  Apparently the ’70-foot tower, a replica of a Viking house and other esoteric creations the self-taught builder put together over the years out of mainly scrap materials’ is a hazard according to inspectors.

Image used courtesy BeFrank under Creative Commons license.  Thank you!

More here from the AP, and here from LA Weekly.  The builder/self-made architect/visionary of Phonehenge, Kim Fahey, has been arrested, but SPACES is going to help him with representation.

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Some things to consider in regards to shelter for the poor:
‘How can organic, self-built slums be turned into livable housing?
What might a house-for-the-poor look like?
How can world-class engineering and design capabilities be utilized to solve the problem?
What reverse-innovation lessons might be learned by the participants in such a project?
How could the poor afford to buy this house?’
Can it be done for $300 USD?  The NYT ran one opinion here, and a rebuttal was printed in the Harvard Business Review.  Well, there certainly were a lot of submissions to the team who began this project, and the winners were announced today.

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The Fawcett House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, is on the market.

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Toast embroidery, and Oreo cameos.  And the not-so-secret lives of mantises.

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(above: a Frank Fleming animal totem I saw in the RSA Building in M’ry)

It was published in 2008, but the Alabama Masters piece put out by the State Council on the Arts is wonderful.

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Cheerwine + Krispy Kreme?  Yes!  For a limited time, not in all markets.

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Lightning bugs on the rebound.

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The Kohler Foundation will be restoring S.P. Dinsmoor’s Garden of Eden art environment in Lucas, Kansas.  Much more about it here.