Orange You Glad It's Not Your Hand?

Do not adjust your monitor. That is as orange as it gets, my hand. That was after a day of throwing red clay (you can see it on my jeans)--and after washing my hands several times.

The red comes from iron oxide in the clay. The clay I throw is called SB red, a commercially made clay from Laguna. I love the stuff, truly.

In the last month or so, I've thrown my way through about 120 pounds of it, which is a lot considering I've been throwing little one to one-and-a-half pound mugs. I've got just under a hundred pounds left and I'm planning on doing some handbuilt, carved calavera plates. I haven't made any of those in a long, long time. It's time!

I did not go to the studio today (that's an photo from about a week ago), so what did I use my hands for today?

Well, I shoveled a couple of plates down at Furr's where my aunt and I went for lunch. (I had two pieces of fried chicken, two helpings of mashed potatoes and gravy, two servings of macaroni and cheese, turnip greens, corn, roasted root vegetables, a slice of roast beef, a small green salad, and a few bites of apple pie with ice cream. WHEW! I couldn't breathe, I was so full.) When I came home, I had to move around a bit, so I watered the garden, cleaned the bathroom and did four loads of laundry, and washed dishes.

When Dave got home, we looked over the garden and I kept him company while he planted beets, miner's lettuce, carrots, and mache. Then he went to the gym and I lazed about. When he got home, he googled about looking for a seed source for Thai eggplants. He ended up on an heirloom seed site and placed an order for someone who apparently has a garden about three times the size of ours. He ordered the Thai eggplant seeds, along with shiso (perilla), purslane, ground cherries, and a handful of other kinds of greens. (I'm sure I'm leaving something out. He went a bit nuts.) The shiso and ground cherries are for me though, as long as I'm being honest. I ran into the ground cherries in Tokyo during one of the festivals, the plants were cut off at ground level with all the fruits attached and were being sold that way or were still in pots, but didn't know that the fruits were edible.  We're going to grow some in pots now, just to see what they taste like. The shiso we got because shiso is damned delicious. (I'm hoping we get something out of it, as some of the sites say it's hellish to get to grow and some of the sites say it's the easiest thing you'll ever grow.)

We'll see. As always, we'll see!