Sense of Place art exhibit

Now showing at the Fendig Gallery is an exhibit called "Sense of Place." The brochure for the show says that it features recent work by members of the Jasper County Art League. The show runs through the end of October.

 This watercolor, "Gone but not Forgotten" by Judy Kanne, looks familiar. I am pretty sure it used to hang in the Saint Joseph's College faculty lounge. (The weird angle in this photo is due to an effort to reduce reflections.)

I do not think this painting by Marcia Johnston is recent. It is titled, "Shrimp Boats on Sunday."

 This oil by John Sirianni is one of the largest pictures in the show. It is called, "Winter Wildlife."

"The Road Home" is an acrylic by Irene Evans.

There are 27 artists listed on the program and most of them have three photos, paintings, drawings, or other kinds of work in the show. The gallery hours are from 10:00 am to 3:00 pm Monday through Friday.

Mystery garden invader

I am curious about a plant that grew up unexpectedly in my garden. If you can identify it, leave a comment.

When a plant that I do not recognize comes up in my garden, I usually let it grow just to see what it will become. In one of my gardens this summer a plant that I thought was a soybean sprouted.

 The seeds look a lot like soybeans but are a different color, a bit smaller, and more irregular. (Soybeans are top left and they mystery beans are lower right.)

 Unlike soybeans, this plant vines. It only got really big in the last month or so when it sent vines out in all directions. Some of them are now six or seven feet long. Also, it appears that some animal has grazed on the plant--there are leaf stalks that appear to have their leaves eaten.

 The beans do not look look like soybeans. They are long and thin, and at first glance appear to be stems.

 There are many flower buds, but I have not found the flowers. Perhaps, though, what I think are buds are really flowers. They seem to have a purplish tint inside.

 I googled "vining soybeans" and "trailing soybean"s and found some entries for plants that are planted for wildlife forage but no pictures that would help me.

Over the years I have planted almost everything that will grow in an Indiana garden. One thing I have not planted are husk tomatoes or ground cherries. (They go by a number of names.) However, I have frequently had the wild version of these plants grow--they are common along roadsides and often are a garden weed. The wild versions ,which are a different species than the cultivated ones, have small berries, unlike the much larger berries that were on this cultivated variety.

Maybe I should try them next year.

A new butcher shop

Dale' Steak & Chop Shop opened last week. It is located behind (west of) the bowling alley. (For some posts that watched the remodeling needed for the business, see here and here.) Despite being open for less than two weeks, their Facebook page already has more likes than the Rensselaer Adventures Facebook page has gotten in about two years. Their Facebook page has many pictures and a lot more information than is in this post.

The store is small. Upon entering, you see a long display case. On the north end it has some deli items and some cheese. the rest of the case is filled with meat.

 Dale cuts the meat himself--he does not get it pre-packaged. He gets his pork from the the processing plant in Monon and the beef from Kentucky

Along the east wall north of the entrance is a second display with larger packages of meet and specials. There a smaller cooler on the south end that has some packaged foods, including pizzas. He would like to add bread and milk.

It is a small store and a throwback to the days in which specialty stores like butcher shops were common. The store is open from 9 am to 7 pm Monday through Saturday. 

Dales Steak & Chop Shop will have a ribbon cutting on October 18 at 11:30 am and that will be the start of their grand opening.

Apple sauce

I wanted to go the the Rensselaer library's Fall Festival yesterday, but I had a meeting in Monticello. Someone who was there said that it was a lot of fun.

Passing through Monon I noticed Jacob's Professional Services on the south side of town. I am sure I have seen it before but it did not mean anything. Jacob's Professional Services was one of the contractors who were working installing new tanks and pumps at the BP station next to the Washington Street bridge. It struck me as strange that such a specialized company would call a little town like Monon home. But if they are doing work in the entire area, I suppose it does not matter much where they locate. (They had previously worked on tanks for the Family Express station in 2009.)

On my way to and from Monticello I saw many combines in the fields harvesting corn and soybeans. The weather this week seems ideal for farm work. There are still more fields unharvested than harvested.

I have been doing my own harvesting. The local apple trees produced bountifully this year, with so many apples that many had branches break. My old apple tree in the back yard was no exception. Normally it has a reasonable crop of apples every other year, but this year was exceptional--I do not recall a bigger crop of apples from this tree ever.

 It seems a shame to let all those wonderful apples go to waste, so we have been making them into applesauce. The first step is to cut them into pieces.

Then the pieces are cooked until they are soft.

 The next step is to pulverize the cooked pieces with a Foley food mill.
After much grinding, the apples are reduced to sauce. My job is done. Now they need to be seasoned with some cinnamon and sweetened with a bit of sugar.

The final step is to can the apple sauce by putting it in jars and heating the jars to sterilize the contents. With luck they all seal.

This batch yielded eleven quarts. It is a lot of work but we are finished--we have finally filled all our canning jars. (And no, we do not need more jars.)

So now that we have enough apple sauce to last for years, what else can I do with apples?

Things

Life is busy and because I do not have time to organize a post, today's offering will be a melange.

I went out to SJC on Saturday morning because the homecoming schedule said that Drexel Hall was open. However, the woman at the reception desk said that only the first floor was open, and because that is the uninteresting part, I left.

I went over to the campus to watch the marching band rehearse their performances for the football game. A couple band members came late and were apparently told to leave because they left. While I was watching, I noticed what appeared to be a blob of gum attached to the wall of the Science Building. Closer inspection revealed a frog, probably another Gray Tree Frog. They can match grey and green, but not brick red.

I had intended to go back to the campus in the afternoon, but the heavy rain discouraged me. The football game was called in the third quarter because of weather. On Sunday I saw that one of the tents for the alumni gathering had partially collapsed. I wondered if there had been more wind than I had experienced.

 Today Town and Country Paving was paving the roads in the western part of Weston Cemetery. They are not the company that was paving city streets last week. Work on the BP station is approaching completion. Here is was it looked like about a week ago.

 Here is a more recent photo showing that the concrete for the parking and gas lanes is finished. I asked when it would be open and was told next week.

 In the background is eMbers, which last night had a concert by a singer, Charlotte Sometimes, who does not normally visit venues as small as Rensselaer.

 This morning workers were painting the exterior of Walmart and installing new signs. Inside Walmart is devoting a lot more space to food. Since the store has not added space, I wonder what items are being eliminated.

 On the way back into town I noticed three guys hawking CDs. I thought one of them might be Mikel Knight the Country Rap King, but was told that he was with a different van somewhere else. I had never heard of the guy, but he does the music for some show of MTV about hillbillies running wild. (I was given the name, but do not remember what it is.) They said that some of the proceeds were going to support women and children shelters. After I got home, I wondered if they had a permit for doing what they were doing, or if anyone in the mall knew about what they were doing.

You never know what you will see in Rensselaer.