Teresa Robeson's Blog, page 19

Start your gardening engines!

Even before the Purple Finches and Dark-eyed Juncos have migrated north, the Spousal Unit feels spring in his bones and starts plants indoors. He has a fairly simple set up of heat mats and regular fluorescent lights. And when the seedlings have grown to a certain size, he toughens them up with a slight breeze from a small fan.

Shortly after sprouting on February 26th. Less than a month later. Kids…they grow up so fast. *sniffle* This year, he decided to increase the growing space by getting a new mat and lights for another set-up in the utility room.

When the weather warms a bit more, like it has recently, if only for a few days, SU takes them out to acclimatize them.

Those onions have gotten into their rebellious long-haired teen years.

You might wonder what we grow? As I like to tell people, it’d be easier to tell you what we don’t grow because that list would be a lot shorter.

How about you? What does your garden grow?

A New STEM Picture Book From Author Laurie Wallmark + A Chance to Win a Copy

Having been an amateur astronomer since 1980, I’m always delighted to see books about astronomers and astrophysicists! Pop by Darlene’s blog to win a copy of Laurie’s newest book.

Darlene Beck-Jacobson

Today I am happy to feature the latest STEM biography from author LAURIE WALLMARK.

HER EYES ON THE STARS: Maria Mitchell, Astronomer

(Illustrated by Liz Wong)

Here is the blurb for the book:

Maria Mitchell’s curiosity about the night sky led her to spend hours studying the stars. She discovered a comet as a young woman, winning an award from the King of Denmark for being the first person to discover a new comet using a telescope.

Now famous as “the lady astronomer,” Maria went on to become a professional astronomer, an unheard of achievement for a woman in the 19th century. She was the first woman to get any kind of government job when she was hired by the United States Naval Observatory. Then as the first woman astronomy professor in the world, Maria used her position at Vassar College to teach young women to set their sights on…

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Spring beauties

One of the best things about spring, besides the allergies (KIDDING), are the wild flowers and other plants. Let me share a few of my favorites with you!

Cutleaf Toothwort (Cardamine concatenata)

The leaves of this plant are as cute as the flowers, even if the name leaves (no pun intended!) something to be desired.

Cutleaf Toothwort (Cardamine concatenata) Wild Blue Phlox (pretty sure it’s Phlox divaricata) Trout Lily (Erythronium albidum) Trillium (looks like Trillium cuneatum)

Many moons ago, the Spousal Unit dug up some of these babies (below) somewhere and put them around our house. Since them, they’ve spread a lot, bringing their ethereal blue to brighten our springs.

Virginia Bluebells (Mertensia virginica) Virginia Bluebells (Mertensia virginica)

I don’t know why some people have such a vendetta against violets but I think they’re beautiful (and edible). We get ones on our property that range from deep purple to white.

Wild Violets (Viola papilionacea)

And speaking of edible, we bought a bunch of ramps, a native wild onion, from the farmer’s market years back and planted them in the woods next to our house. They’ve taken their sweet time to spread and there is still not enough to make a meal of while leaving enough behind to keep growing. Dang it.

Ramps (Allium tricoccum) See how sparse they are still after over 10 years?

Since my post is titled “spring beauties,” I would be remiss if I didn’t actually shared a Spring Beauty. Here she is, peering out shyly.

Spring Beauty (Claytonia virginica)

Do you go wildflower hunting (with your eyes only; bag no trophies) or grow your own native edibles?

Got glasses?

I lament that I’m at times a careless reader, especially when confronted with a wall of text (I’m a huge fan of short paragraphs and bulleted/numbered lists; they work well with my short attention span). But the more I interact with people, the more I realize that many of them are even worse readers than I am.

The good news is that realizing this has made me more determined to be a better reader. The bad news is that I battle with myself daily as to whether to argue with someone over their faulty reading comprehension or to let it go because it’s, most times, not my monkey, not my circus.

So, I made this comic…mostly to get it off my chest.

Happy book birthday to meeeee!

SQUEEEE!!! In just 4 more days, my first ever biography in graphic format will be out in the world. I can’t wait for readers to see Angela Poon‘s gorgeous art!

For more information and how to order, go to Penguin Random House page.

The importance of (NOT) being earnest

The other day, the Spousal Unit referred to the Wheel of Time series as “that earnest Orcs show.”

I mean, he’s not wrong. It does remind me a lot of The Lord of the Rings minus the joyful humor of Hobbits.

That may be fine for some people, but we like a dose of humor to go along with drama. It’s not to say we’ll stop watching the show (we only just started after all), but it would be nice if there was some comedy to be found…or least a bit of levity.

Granted, not all things can have humor. There’s nothing remotely funny about the horrific Holocaust and so Schindler’s List, for example, has to be serious. But Wheel of Time is a fantasy, and if Tolkien can infuse humor in his work, I feel like WoT can, too. (Tangentially, I feel like 90% of fantasy is far too earnest.)

As for what we find funny, we don’t care for comedy that involves yelling or being mean for no reason (I’m looking at you, Fawlty Towers and The Honeymooners). The more subtle, deadpan, or verbally clever the humor, the better.

It’s interesting to me that this wasn’t something that the Spousal Unit and I talked about when we were dating, but in retrospect, it should have been! Married life for me would be a lot less fun if he didn’t also like humorous shows and movies (and sci-fi and superheroes stuff).

What about you? Do you and your partner have similar tastes in entertainment? What’s your favorite genre?

Author and Illustrator Q&A on Debbie Ohi’s Blog!

WHO IS TIBET’S EXILED LEADER? THE 14TH DALAI LAMA releases in less than a month and so now is the time for blog tours!

Our first stop is at Debbie Ohi’s blog. Debbie is one of those incredibly kind and super talented people who has made it huge in the world of children’s literature and has been giving back to the community ever since. Illustrator Angela Poon and I are thrilled to be featured in her blog to talk about the creation of our upcoming book.

Pop on over to read the post and to feast your eyes on Angela’s gorgeous art!

A Zoom with a view

I had been wanting to do this comic for a while because after 3 years of Zoom meetings, it’s hard not to think about it. And it was such a big hit over at IG, I thought you might want to see it, too. Allow me to present to you…The Zoom Face Bunch (and you have to sing The Brady Bunch theme song in your head)!

From top to bottom, and left to right:

The turtle – half the head is better than one

The profile – having two computers means one has the camera and you’re looking at the other

The spewer – sometimes you just have to eat and chew with your mouth wide open…not

The wanderer – just another lost soul

The abyss – hello darkness, my old friend

The starlet – professionally photographed profile pic that look nothing like the actual person

The nostrils a.k.a. abyss 2 – the view from your laptop

The poke-an-eye-out – the Lilliputan view of Gulliver’s fingers

Which one are you?

We’ll have bun, fun bun, till daddy takes the oven away

Pardon the ancient reference to The Beach Boys.

I thank the universe on a daily basis for not smiting me with gluten intolerance (yet…there’s always a chance it’ll happen) because I could eat bread every single meal and for snacks in between. One of my favorite types of breads is a good, pillowy bun. I’ve been making my own hot dog and burger buns for a close to 3 decades now. We refuse to entertain the idea of buying them from a store.

They’re particularly easy to make when you have a bread machine to knead the dough. And the dough…is that not one of the most beautiful things you’ve laid eyes on? Okay, it is if you’re me…and I have been known to be odd.

Europeans have it right by using weight instead of volume when baking. I’m obsessed with the kitchen scale now. I wouldn’t go anywhere where I had to bake without it.

And here they are, fresh out of the oven. I over-proofed them a bit but they’re still delicious. And there’s only 2 tablespoons of butter in these babies!

And it’s nearly March, so the Spousal Unit has started some of the summer crop’s seedlings! Such precious little things. Little do they know the big bad voles are out there waiting for them. Ack.

What’s your favorite type of bread?

See oh, too?

In case you’ve missed the news reports, and it seems like a lot of people actually have missed the memo, gas stoves are bad for you and the environment. But being married to a climatologist means I get to hear about these things and I’ve mentioned to some friends that the Spousal Unit is monitoring the carbon levels in the house.

If you’re thinking, oh, I’ve already got a carbon monitor in the house, you might be thinking of this:

This nifty device is a carbon monoxide detector and is a must-have in any house because CO is dangerous in even tiny amounts. According to the Iowa State University site, “High concentrations of carbon monoxide kill in less than five minutes. At low concentrations it will require a longer period of time to affect the body. Exceeding the EPA concentration of 9 ppm for more than 8 hours is suspected to produce adverse health affects in persons at risk.”

But it was my bad. When I was talking to those friends, I should have been more specific and said carbon dioxide monitoring because CO2 is a much different beast than CO. CO2 isn’t nearly as deadly in the short term and it takes a huge amount for you to notice it. After exposure to levels above 5,000 ppm for many hours, you might experience headache, dizziness, and nausea. CO2 can cause asphyxiation as it replaces oxygen in the blood-exposure to concentrations around 40,000 ppm and, at that point, is dangerous to life and health.

Buuuuut, CO2 levels serves as an indicator of the other things that comes off of a gas stove…the other things being carcinogenic or lung irritants. So the Spousal Unit monitors it in our house.

Plus, CO2 is a major greenhouse gas and cooking with gas contributes to the amount that’s already trapped in the atmosphere. So, now that we know, we’ll be shopping for an induction or electric range in the next couple of months. For the sake of your own health, especially if you have someone who’s prone to asthma, you might want to do likewise.