Memory Wall

I picked up this wall-hanger thing for sixteen bucks and used it to display about 75% of my collection of buttons and pins dating from the 1970s to the 2020s. This saves a little bit of closet space and, more importantly, puts the nostalgia out where I can see it.
 

The Good, the Bad, and the Needs Revision

Midway through one of my political science courses at the University of Alberta, my professor pulled me aside for a chat after class. 

"What happened with this essay? You've done very well on your exams, so I know you can do better than this. It reads like a Time magazine article." 

For a second, I was confused. I don't remember exactly what I said, but it was something along the lines of "Isn't that good?" 

"No, no," he said. It's well-written, but it lacks depth. There's no real analysis here, it's just a shallow summary of the subject matter. You need to dive deeper, think harder about the subject matter, do some extra research, develop your own thoughts." 

Those may not be the professor's exact words, but that was their spirit, and they hit me hard--because I knew he was right. Sometimes, when I'm not motivated or invested or I've left an assignment to the last minute, I can get lazy and produce material that doesn't reflect my full potential. It still happens on this very blog! 

A little over a decade later, my friend Bruce (then my supervisor), criticized a story I'd written for our gardening magazine in much the same way, comparing it to a freelance article I'd written about Superman. The words he used were different, but his point was the same--and like my professor, Bruce was right. 

During my time at the University of Alberta and at my corporate writing jobs across the years, I've written plenty of stories and speeches that I'm quite proud of. But there's also a large collection of pieces I know could have been better. 

I feel especially bad to have let my professor and Bruce down, back then, and I'm sure those weren't the only instances when a teacher or colleague or client was disappointed by my work. 

It makes you wonder if writers of, say, Hemingway's caliber have drawers full of old articles and stories that they look upon with a bit of self-loathing. 

On the bright side, it's a real pleasure when you stumble upon a work you've forgotten and think to yourself, "Hey, I wrote this? I did, and wow, it's pretty good." 

When I look back on my career, I hope I can say I wrote more good stories than bad. 

My Desk at Hole's

Over 21 years ago, I started working at Hole's Publishing in St. Albert. Here's my desk and Apple computer; I think it was a IIc with a  monochrome monitor. 

All About Alliums

At least, I think these are alliums. Shot at Hole's, St. Albert, Alberta, 1998. 

Mom and the Tripod

Long ago - sometime between 1998 and 2005 - I shot this photo of Mom beside a tripod. You'd think that I would have shot Mom from the tripod, but no. I like the expression on her face: "Why are you doing this?" It's too bad the tripod is in the shot, because otherwise it would be a reasonably well-composed image of Mom and the garden. Well, with a little cropping, maybe. On the other hand, I could use Photoshop to turn the tripod into one of the machines from War of the Worlds, but then it would be menacing my mother, and that's no good. 

New Selection of Bonsai

I shot this just after I started working for the publishing department of Hole's in St. Albert, back in 1998. Bruce encouraged me to wander about the property in search of stories, to learn about the way the greenhouses operated, or just to clear my head. It was a nice perk, and I believe it helped the books I contributed to.

This would be a better photo if the Hole's sign itself weren't so underexposed. Maybe it's something I can fix with Photoshop; it would be nice if you could see more of the cloud reflections in the sign. I like the lens flare.

It's hard to believe I was in my 20s when I shot this, almost 19 years ago. I didn't buy any bonsai. 

Edmonton Skyline 1998

Back in 1998, I obtained permission to shoot some photographs from the top of Fort Garry House on Saskatchewan Drive. Bruce and Akemi handled the actual professional photography while I puttered around with my own camera, resulting in this underwhelming, backlit skyline of Edmonton's downtown as seen from across the North Saskatchewan River. I "fixed" the image as best I could with Photoshop, but it's still pretty bad. One day I'll learn how to be a real photographer...

iMac Flashbac

Here I am sometime in the late 90s working on one of the first iMacs; this one was aqua-coloured. Presumably I was ghostwriting one gardening book or another. My desk at ATCO is even messier than this. Bruce or Jim probably shot the photo; I was trying to finish a roll of black and white. Yes, this was shot...on film. 

Fort Garry House Memories...Such as They Are

For a very brief time that lasted, perhaps, from sometime in 1997 to sometime in 1998, I lived in Fort Garry House, up where Calgary Trail meets Saskatchewan Drive. I had a one-bedroom apartment on the seventh with no balcony, and I remember virtually nothing about the place except that Colin visited once and Bruce and Leslie visited once. Oh, and Bruce and Akemi came by once to shoot photos on the rooftop for I'll Never Marry a Farmer.

There are more photos from that rooftop shoot than I have of my apartment itself; there might be five or six photos, including the one above, clearly taken before I had finished unpacking.

I was living here during the time I transitioned from my job at the Western Board of Music to Hole's - certainly one of the most important moments of my life, at the very least from a career standpoint.

And yet, I can barely recall the place itself. I'm not sure why that makes me sad, but it does. 

Edditorial

This was my office at Hole's Publishing, just after its completion. I joked with a contractor that the door plate would have been funnier if it read "edditorial," but the idea didn't fly. 

Earl and the iMac

From the spring of 1998 to the fall of 2005, I wrote gardening books and articles for Hole's Publishing in St. Albert. Most of that work was done on this first-generation iMac. (I never took to the Mac OS even after working with it for half a decade.)

This photo was probably taken by Bruce or Akemi, and quite early in my tenure at Hole's for as you can see my bald spot has yet to appear. This image required a lot of cleanup, scanned as it was from a pretty dirty, beaten-up slide; it could still use some work. 

See Me, Heel Me

I've been trying to get some exercise this week by taking long walks at lunch, but it appears to have backfired on me as I now can't put any weight on my right foot, particularly the heel. But late this afternoon I remember that this has happened to me once before, back when I was working at Hole's. At the time the doctor said I'd been doing too much walking on hard, flat surfaces - i.e. sidewalks and concrete. It wound up taking six weeks of physiotherapy to fix, mainly dipping my foot into alternating hot and icy cold water. Not much fun. 

Mystery of the Missing Magnet

I was nearly finished Tarzan and the Golden Lion this morning when I noticed something caught between the pages of the decades-old book. My eyebrows leaped for my hairline as I recognized my Star Trek: First Contract soundtrack fridge magnet, long thought lost. I slapped it onto my office refrigerator as soon as I returned home.

Star Trek: First Contact hit theatres in late 1996. My friend Leslie accompanied me to the film. She probably didn't enjoy it as much as I did, but I do recall she found it interesting that Star Trek's utopian vision required a nuclear holocaust as part of its backstory. (I find it pretty interesting too.) In the instant before Zefram Cochrane's Phoenix lifts off from Montana, I knew with absolute certainty that he was going to play Steppenwolf's "Magic Carpet Ride," and sure enough that's exactly what happened.

So impressed was I with this choice of music that I bought the soundtrack shortly afterward. When I opened up the CD package, I discovered the First Contact fridge magnet.

"That's odd," I thought. "Why would a CD include a fridge magnet?"

Not knowing what else to do with the odd bonus, I took the CD to work - coincidentally, the Western Board of Music, where I'd worked with Leslie only a year or so before - and stuck the magnet to a filing cabinet, where it stayed for the year or two.

Months later, I moved on to a new job at Hole's. And months after that, I realized that the fridge magnet had gone missing. Why I even noticed its absence I cannot say, but for years afterward, every few months, a small corner of my brain would ask "Whatever happened to that fridge magnet?" "I must have left it at Western Board," another part of my brain would reply.

Until today. My edition of Tarzan and the Golden Lion was printed in 1997. I must have read the book and used the fridge magnet as a bookmark. Or perhaps that's the book I was reading when I left Western Board and I tucked the magnet into the book for easy carriage.

This is probably the most inconsequential post I've ever offered here at The Earliad, and that's saying something. I wouldn't have written a thing about this event if the magnet's unknown status hadn't plagued me, in the mildest way, for years.

I didn't particularly care about the magnet; it's not some valuable collectible. I've lost plenty of things with far greater value, and I'm not particularly thrilled to have found this one.

And yet when I saw that magnet peeking out between the covers of my book, it felt like an accusation of some kind, like I'd deliberately abandoned the worthless geegaw. I could have thrown it away, but instead there it hangs, on my fridge, the baleful eyes of Picard, Data and the Borg Queen mutely watching me type this.

Of Christmas Parties Past

Nine years ago this month, Sylvia and I attended a Christmas party held for staff of then Lieutenant Governor Lois Hole. It was at this party I obtained the only and only photo I have of myself with Lois, and thankfully it's a good one.

I have several fond memories of this event: Sylvia in her Emma Peel-esque spy dress, Lois' very kind remarks about my work during her speech to the staff, chatting with Lois' aides-de-camp and administrators. In a way, serving as Lois' speechwriter was a queer sort of prologue to my work at the Alberta Legislature; I'd run into quite a few familiar faces after making the transition from Hole's to the Official Opposition.

Unfortunately this Christmas affair of 2003 was Lois' last; by Christmas of 2004 she was too sick with cancer to host another, and she passed away in early 2005. But her memory lives on in the many thousands of lives she touched during her tenure as author, philanthropist, gardener and inspirational political figure.

Northern Chopper

Leaf Rapids had (and possibly still has) a helipad. As a boy I was fascinated by this blank expanse of concrete, a small island of man in the middle of northern Manitoba's vast boreal forest. Only rarely did a chopper ever touch down; this one seems to be from the Northwest Territories, judging by the barely visible logo on the cockpit. It would appear that this model can land on water, if those big grey cylinders are pontoons - a handy ability given the thousands of lakes and rivers in the area.

Despite its small size, Leaf Rapids was rich in opportunities to explore. I wandered to the helipad often during my adventures, imagining that UFOs or Federation shuttlecraft might also pay visits to our isolated community.

Only years later did I ever ride in a helicopter: once in the early 2000s for an aerial photo of Hole's Greenhouses (thanks Bruce!) and once in 2008 in Hawaii, when Sylvia and I took a helicopter tour of the island.

Worth every penny.

Gardening 101 Lesson Four

Sometimes the writing process requires a little lubricant. On those occasions when I've been staring at a blank screen for too long, sometimes I'll quickly write something silly to get my creative juices flowing. In the case below, I must have been working on a gardening article for Hole's. Usually these efforts wind up in the trash can, but for whatever reason I saved this one...for better or for worse. 

Gardening 101
Lesson Four: How to Grow the Biggest Man-Eating Plant in Edmonton

The intriguing Man-Eating Plant (Ferosicus eatemupus) of Zanzibar isn't often seen in Edmonton's yards, mainly because this tropical beauty needs plenty of heat and light to thrive. However, this tender perennial can do very well here with the proper care. The MEP's gorgeous crimson blooms and handy disposal features make it a worthwhile challenge. Follow my lead to grow the biggest, baddest, bloodthirstiest Man-Eating Plants in the City of Chompions.

This weekend is the perfect time to plant MEP transplants or seeds. I grow the variety 'Bloodsucking Monster,' because it has the biggest, reddest blooms and the most ravenous appetite. 'Rabid Hellebore,' 'Satanwort,' and 'Beelzebub 496' are also excellent choices. Avoid older varieties like 'Slobber Girl' and 'Drooling Maniac;' these heirloom varieties tend to be sloppy eaters.

The first thing to do is prepare the soil. Do not remove any weeds; F. eatemupus likes weeds nearly as much as people, and will happily gobble them up. MEPs grow best in rich, well-drained soil, especially when fortified with human blood. For each transplant, add 10 L of fresh, untainted, deep red blood to the earth. If you don't have access to fresh blood, plasma from the blood bank is an acceptable substitute. When we first started growing MEPs at the greenhouse, we ignored this crucial step and lost a few employees because of it.

After the blood has soaked into the ground, plant each transplant to fingertip depth. Just poke a hole in the soil to the depth of your fingernail and drop the plant into the hole. Mound the soil around the plant, covering the roots. Plants should be spaced at least 2 m apart, to prevent them from feeding off each other. They should also be spaced 2 m away from any of your other plants, playgrounds, and pathways.

MEPs are very thirsty plants, and should be watered daily for best results. For safety's sake, I water in the morning, while the plants are asleep. Keep the soil around each plant very moist, but don't drown them. Be consistent! Water every day‹don't skip days and try to overcompensate by soaking them. Inconsistent watering can lead to splitting, or, even worse, explosion, and you don't want that.

Your Man-Eating Plant needs plenty of food. At the seedling stage, they need only an occasional finger or toe once per week. Don't debone your offerings. Man-Eating Plants can use the calcium to develop strong vines. Once the plants are 1 m tall, start feeding them your enemies, dead or alive.

Pruning Man-Eating Plant tentacles is dangerous to the point of foolhardiness, but necessary if you really want that prizewinning specimen. To avoid being crushed by the deadly coils, spray the plant with Malathion while standing at least 2 m away. Once the tentacles are stunned, use heavy shears to snip off all but the longest, strongest tendrils. For tougher, Malathion-resistant plants, use small children or pets as bait‹these tender morsels will distract the plant, giving you the chance to leap in and prune.

Man-Eating Plants are tender perennials; to make sure they overwinter safely in Edmonton, cover them with a dark shroud or dig them up (carefully!) and place them in a thick-walled wooden coffin. Bury the coffin at least six feet under, then exhume in the spring. (Some MEPs may need to be staked during the overwintering period.)

For a great gag, sow Man-Eating Plant seeds into an unsuspecting neighbour's garden. He'll probably only lose a couple of fingers the first time he bends over to examine the unusual "volunteers" that have sprung up in his plot.

-30-

Copyright © Ghoul's

For further information, contact:

Ghoul's Greenhouses and Slaughterhouses
666 Hellerose Drive
Sinner Albert, Alberta T8N 8N8
Phone: (666) EAT-GORE
Fax: (666) HOT-BURN
Email: grub@ghoulsonline.com

Panorama Mania

For three or four years after I purchased my little Pentax point and shoot, I was enthralled by the camera's panorama feature, which allowed users to easily compose and stitch together panoramic shots to create a super-wide-angle effect. As you can see, the images can sometimes turn out a little distorted, but overall the effect is pretty good, at least to my eyes. Plus you can craft some interesting special effects with a little creative staging. Click to embiggen for the full effect!

It Came from the Garden

Earl waters some harmless flowers at Hole's Greenhouses in 2000. Photo by Akemi Matsubuchi.

Many years ago, I sold this article to The Old Farmer's Almanac Gardener's Companion. They sent me a cheque for US $400, but I never did see the published piece. Part of me wonders if they ever printed it. But hey, they bought it, so I guess that still counts as a sale - and a very lucrative one, considering it's a pretty light and fluffy piece that probably took me less than an hour to write.

It Came from the Garden!

There's nothing more idyllic than a summer afternoon spent with a book and a glass of lemonade, surrounded by your own jungle of colourful flowers, lush vines, and towering trees. But in the fantastic realms of science fiction, plants aren't always friends of humanity.

When Good Plants Go Bad

For millions of Canadians, plants are beautiful and benign, welcome residents of their gardens. But in popular culture, plants have often exhibited sinister, even blood-curdling traits. Just look at this brief list of killer plants in popular culture…

·         In the classic The Thing from Another World (1951, remade in 1982), scientists at an arctic research station discover a spaceship buried in the ice. They free the ship and its lone occupant, a Thing that turns out to be, according to the resident scientist, a form of sentient plant life. "Please doctor, I've got to ask this. It sounds like, well, just as though you're describing some form of super carrot," says Ned Scott, one of the men endangered by the beast. "An intellectual carrot. The mind boggles," he continues. Indeed.

·         In director Roger Corman's 1956 opus It Conquered the World, mankind is menaced by Zontar, an alien from Venus that fans have come to describe as the "space cucumber," for the being's resemblance to that vegetable.

·         Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956, remade in 1978 and 1993), is perhaps the best known of the killer plant films, though the menace is far more subtle than other examples in the genre. Mysterious pods, drifting through outer space like pollen adrift on the wind, land and take root on Earth. The pods split open and grow, taking on the form of the nearest human being and eventually replacing them with cold, soulless, robotic duplicates.

·         Roger Corman had another hit with Little Shop of Horrors (1960, remade in 1986), the tale of well-meaning goof Seymour and his man-eating plant, Audrey Jr. Legend has it that Corman made this movie in just a few days, using sets and actors left over from another production that wrapped ahead of schedule.

·         "Beware the Triffids... they grow... know... walk... talk... stalk... and KILL!" So reads the tagline of The Day of the Triffids (1962), based on the classic novel by John Wyndham. After a streaking comet blinds most of the world's citizens, the Triffids, once domestic, ambulatory plants, rise up to shake off the chains of their oppressors.

·         Star Trek featured the mind-altering spore plants of Omicron Ceti III in "This Side of Paradise," the deadly dart-shooting plants of "The Apple," and the poisonous apples of "The Way to Eden," bitter fruit indeed for the hippie space travellers who searched for an Eden among the stars, only to discover death.

·         Attack of the Killer Tomatoes! (1978) sees every tomato lover's worst fears realized as tomatoes grow to immense size and rampage through the streets.

Other plant related pop culture trivia:

·         Just before the Attack of the Giant Leeches (1959), one of the eventual victims can be seen browsing through a seed catalogue.

·         Many gardeners are familiar with the insecticide Rotenone. Did you know that intrepid scientists used this chemical as a weapon against The Creature from the Black Lagoon (1958)?

·         Everyone remembers the anguish and horror in Charlton Heston's voice when he declares, at the end of Soylent Green (1973) that "Soylent Green is people!" In Harry Harrison's original novel, however, Soylent Green is nothing more sinister than a paste made of soybeans and lentils.

It's clear that in fiction, at least, gardening has a dark side. The plant as villain or monster is a relatively uncommon theme in storytelling, but it is none the less captivating for all that. While plants are usually harmless in real life (unless you poison yourself by eating something you shouldn't), they do have eerie qualities given the right circumstances. Unlike animals, for example, plants are silent, making no noise saved that caused by the wind rustling through their foliage. And they aren't mobile; they live and die rooted to one spot. Plants are, in fact, rather alien, compared to the human experience of living.

But when authors and filmmakers make plants into threats, they often to so by inverting their normal characteristics. In real life, plants are an absolutely essential component of the environment; without them, we could not survive. This is not necessarily the case in fiction. Normally immobile, monster plants often have the ability to move or use their vines like limbs. Silent in reality, monster plants may growl or slurp. What was once benign becomes an insidious, nightmarish threat. This perversion of the norm is what makes killer plants so horrifying; they are entirely outside real human experience.

One thing is certain—despite these imaginative horrors, gardening will remain a safe and enjoyable experience.

Sidebar: Villainous Vegetation, Fiendish Flora, and Heroic Herbs—Plants in Comic Books

One of the richest sources of plant-themed storytelling comes in the relatively new art form of comic books. Here's a short list of some plant-themed characters.

Swamp Thing

Transformed from a handsome scientist into a horrific plant-man, Alec Holland fights crime and protects the plant world as the hideous but heroic Swamp Thing.

Floronic Man

This flowery foe sows the seeds of crime in the Batman's path.

Poison Ivy

There's a femme fatale in the flowerbed! Another member of Batman's rogues gallery, Poison Ivy hates mankind, feeling they are a blight on her precious plants.

Chlorophyll Kid

A member of the ineffectual Legion of Substitute Heroes, Chlorophyll Kid has the amazing ability to toss seeds at the ground and make them grow super-fast. Handy in the garden, not so handy when fighting supervillains.

White Kryptonite

White Kryptonite isn't a character, but a substance encountered by Superman in several of his adventures. Formed when some of the more traditional green Kryptonite rocks passed through a mysterious "space cloud," white Kryptonite has the ability to destroy all plant life. Great for weeding!

The Arch at Hole's

Once in a while I borrow Mom and Dad's old Canon T70 and load it with black and white film. Back in August 2002 I photographed the show garden at Hole's Greenhouses and Gardens in St. Albert. I'm pretty happy with it, though I wish I'd caught the flag fully unfurled - it would have been more picturesque.

I assume this show garden won't be around much longer, since the members of the Hole family are moving their operations to the new Enjoy Centre, a multimillion dollar megaplex opening sometime this year.

Working for the Official Opposition is very rewarding, but I'll admit that I do miss Hole's sometimes. If I needed a mental break, all I had to do was step outside to - quite literally - smell the flowers.

Thanks, Neil

I've been very lucky to have had some excellent supervisors who I also consider friends: Leslie Vermeer, Bruce Keith, the Hole family, and now Neil Mackie, until recently Communications Director for the Alberta Liberal Caucus. I've worked with Neil for almost two years; it's always been fun, challenging, and full of great learning experiences.

Thanks for a great couple of years, Neil. It's been a privilege.