PUBLIC  SERVICE  ANNOUNCEMENT

Aimed at my  fellow frigid-blooded friends who, like me,  are always cold…

A cozy house just is not enough.

If there is happiness in a material thing, especially one as simple as a pair of well-fitting, warm fleecy tights, then I have found Nirvana. Mind you, these are not  Yoga pants  or running pants -- so they don’t have  annoying floppy wide legs or even worse, an elastic band at the ankle…nor do they have any messages printed on them anywhere.  They are just simple warm and comforting.

If my website, The Best @ Dianne B can bring the same happiness to you that these toasty tights from Blue Ice Clothing  have brought to me, I am happy.
WARM  WINTER  READING

Long before Patti Smith’s great little book , Just Kids about her juicy sixties life in New York with Robert Mapplethorpe received a National Book Award, I recommended it here in Volume 10 of DIRTIER when first published, and now in the throes of winter I would like to point you toward another small tome from Patti called  - delightfully and snuggly –Woolgathering.

In this hardcover book, a reprise of a small volume she made in the 90’s for the charmingly diminutive Hannuman Press. 

(If you don’t know these tiny 2 x 4 inch books printed in India by Raymond Foye and Francesco Clemente, well, then you should).

…anyway in this new edition of Woolgathering, available in your bookstores now, she covers and photographs all sorts of topics from our forefathers to what’s on Johnny Depp’s desk. Snug and charming.

Best of this…best of that…Best movie of the year, best book, best plant, best buy, best best best.  Well, who knows these days what is best anyway with such an abundance of choices, but I particularly like the idea of Best Word of the Year as chosen by the American Dialect Society (in cahoots with the Linguistic Society) and they have chosen:

OCCUPY

Nothing like bringing new life to a seemingly 

tired old word.

Since Brain Pickings dreamed up a logo similar to mine (I won’t pile on the hosannas  by alluding that they might have been influenced, but I think mine came first), I have taken interest in this website and you might too.  It is sometimes nerdy and too new-agey – and never about gardening -- but mostly has great images and things of cultural interest .

First 2012 Issue: DIRTIER  The Savvy Gardener's Must-Read

David LaChapelle
Death leaves a heartache no one can heal, Love leaves a memory no one can steal, 2009
Chromogenic color print
Image size: 16 x16 inches
Paper size: 24 x 20 inches
© 2011 David LaChapelle

Ed Ruscha
Twig, 2011
Photographic image produced using large format color negative film, drum scanned and digitally output with a Gretag/Cymbolic LightJet printer onto Fujiflex Crystal Archive Supergloss Paper
Image size: 14 x 11 inches
Paper size: 24 x 20 inches
© 2011 Ed Ruscha

These images are from a new portfolio that is being sold to support Elton John’s AIDS  Foundation.  The portfolio is an edition of only 40, there are ten images in the set and it can be purchased through the fine gallery of Marian Goodman for 25,000 USD…2500. per print is not a bad price and of course, it is for a very good cause.

Both the intense light of the David LaChapelle and the endless presence of the Twig circle remind me of John McWhinnie and so I share these with you to remember him.


THOUGHTS ON KEEPING WARM:
( or VAROIUS METHODS for CONQUERING  the  COLD)

The time-honored practice of protecting tenderer trees has been accomplished in several ways around here.

Remembering how her father wrapped their fig trees in Connecticut, Lys super-wrapped our Fig Tree Ficus carica ’Brown Turkey’ first in hay, surrounded that with burlap , then a tarp; and added a Khmer goddess and a rock for good measure.

This next is my loose approximation of a Christo.

 Notice how the English Garden Twine caresses every curve of the fledgling summer magnolia that I am trying to accustom to the maybe-too-shady spot.

Wrapping a tender plant, here  a prized  big-leaf
Farfugium, like a gift basket is another favorite method to be accomplished with a few squares of burlap (available at most garden centers, but you usually have to ask for it) and more of that fabulousEnglish Garden Twine, which has a million uses.

The Farfugium came from Plant Delights.  They got it from Marco Polo Stufano, so I feel particularly protective about it because not only is he the retired originator of the great gardens at Wave Hill – he is now conferring with LongHouse via The Garden Conservancy on our new Affiliate status.  And you know how I feel about LongHouse.

LongHouse, East Hampton, NY