full sail

Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Devour old films, new films, music, books, paintings, photographs, poems, dreams, random conversations, architecture, bridges, street signs, trees, clouds, bodies of water, light, and shadows. Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your work (and your theft) will be authentic. Authenticity is not invaluable; originality is non-existent. And don't bother concealing your thievery - celebrate it if you feel like it. In any case, always remember what John-Luc Godard said "It's not where you take things from - it's where you take things to."

-Jim Jarmusch

ginseng, ginger, and cinnamon

Madrone produces a virtual kaleidoscope of colors accentuated by its extraordinary bark, which is orange-brown or terra-cotta and shreds off all summer in ragged, papery strips to reveal smooth, chartreuse inner bark. Near the base of old trunks, the bark becomes brown with flaky, gray scales.

Mardone leaves are elliptical, 3 to 5 inches (8 to 13 cm) long, thick and leathery. they are shiny dark above and pale silvery below, resembling leaves of rhododendron (R. macrophyllum), which is also in the heath family. In June, shortly after the new crop of leaves has become fully grown, the second-year leaves turn orange to red and begin to fall.

In May, the tree produces grapelike fruit clusters of small, white to pinkish, urn-shaped flowers, often in profusion. They have a strong, sweet odor that attracts honeybees. Clusters of orange-red berrylike fruits ripen in autumn and persist into December.

Increasingly, madrone is valued as a colorful ornamental and shade tree. It can be propagated from cuttings. It seems to prefer dry summer conditions, however, and often declines in yards that are heavily irrigated. Residents with madrone in their yard are well aware that it is continually shedding something - bark, leaves, flowers, fruit. A mature madrone will give the homeowner plenty of exercise in the form of raking.

-Northwest Trees

No. 7

japanese fishing buoys

i like the way you smile

Here and there Samuel could see secret movement, for the moon-feeders were at work - the deer which browse all night when the moon is clear and sleep under the thickets in the day. Rabbits and field mice and all other small hunted that feel safer in the concealing light crept and hopped and crawled and froze to resemble stones or small bushes when ear or nose suspected danger. The predators were working too - the long weasels like waves of brown light; the cobby wildcats crouching near to the ground, almost invisible except when their yellow eyes caught light and flashed for a second; the foxes, sniffing with pointed up-raised noses for a warm-blooded supper; the raccoons padding near still water, talking frogs. The coyotes nuzzles along the slopes and, torn with sorrow-joy, raised their heads and shouted their feeling, half keen, half laughter, at their goddess moon. And over all the shadowy screech owls sailed, drawing a smudge of shadowy fear below them on the ground. The wind of the afternoon was gone and only a little breeze like a sigh was stirred by the restless thermals of the warm, dry hills.

-East of Eden