While I was home with a bug last week, I took some pictures of the garden outside our Brooklyn apartment. It’s not a well kept garden and I don’t think much planning went into it. It can be a little gloomy; it’s completely shaded. But it has a definite charm, even in the winter.

A garden should be designed with the winter months in mind. We can take a few pointers from our Brooklyn garden on how to design a garden that looks good all year.

In a garden, every stone is equal in importance to every plant. And every garden needs some stone. It’s more prominent (and therefore more important) in the winter.

Try to fill your garden with plants that have very different stem and branch structures. Make sure you know what your plants will look like when they shed their leaves.

Don’t bring the pots in in the fall. A few potted plants in the corner piled up with leaves adds something. You can clean them out in the spring.

Lastly, lots of ivy and crawling plants stay green all winter. (Citydwellers beware this is an invitation for rats.) But they look good.

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Daily Kos diarist Asinus Asinum Fricat discusses a new study that reveals high fructose corn syrup leads to high levels of triglycerides.

Yet another damaging HFCS report surfaces: researchers from the Monell Center in Philadelphia report that overweight people who drank a fructose-sweetened beverage with a meal had triglyceride levels almost 200 per cent higher than the same group who drank a glucose-sweetened beverage with a meal. In plain words triglycerides are manufactured by the body from dietary fat and function as fat transporters. While normal levels of triglycerides are essential for good health, increased levels have been linked to a higher risk of cardiovascular disease.

It’s a must read for anyone concerned about America’s diet. The diary is also a good primer on the negative affects of high fructose corn syrup on the body.

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I get my dose of sensational news from the likes of Chris Matthews and the Sunday shows. But my preferred talk show hosts include Charlie Rose and Bill Moyers. My favorite show used to be Donahue on MSNBC at 8pm. Phil Donahue was the network’s original liberal going up against Fox’s Bill O’Reilly night after night. Phil was doing really well and was higher rated than even Chris Matthews but his anti-war message was too big of a risk for MSNBC at the time. He was shitcanned and the Keith Olbermann era followed soon thereafter.

Phil Donahue used his show to go after the truth and to press strongly those who try to spread misinformation. Donahue’s guests were scientists, scholars, leaders in their respective fields and, yes, politicians. The point of Donahue’s show was to cut through the bullshit to understand the issues we face; the conversation was casual but engaging.

I learned recently that MSNBC is looking for an anchor to hold down the 10pm slot, someone to round out what is becoming recognized as a liberal offering including Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow, who came from the liberal radio network Air America, which rose to prominence during the 2004 election.

The liberal blogosphere is not unexpectedly generating lots of creative ideas about what to do with that time slot from signing another big liberal radio personality like Ed Schultz to a riskier move like giving a regular like Eugene Robinson his own show. Two candidates particularly have risen to the (unofficial) top and both are being promoted through facebooks: Air America’s Sam Seder and the Young Turks’ Cenk Uygur.

The idea behind the facebook groups I suppose is just to build a big enough membership that somehow MSNBC notices them. Both the Sam Seder and Cenk Uygur groups now also have petitions of some sort set up.

So in the interest of promoting intelligent, productive conversation on television, I have set up a facebook group: Hey MSNBC - Bring Phil Donahue To 10:00PM ET

I don’t ask much of you modern anachronists but, if you can spare a moment, please join the Phil Donahue group. I wonder if we can get it rolling.

Phil Donahue, recognized primarily as the former king of daytime talk (and as someone who pushed barriers in that area), most recently co-directed a film about the wounded soldiers coming home from Iraq, Body of War. I couldn’t find any online footage from his MSNBC show but watch Donahue bodyslam Bill O’Reilly…

All of this, of course, without knowing if Phil Donahue would do it.

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Guest of a Guest discovers a fancy tree house (metal roof, windows, spiral staircase) behind New York’s Fifth Avenue…

Sorry, it’s for the kids.

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Sweets as a fundraising device has proven effective over the years. In America, the modern familiar form is the World’s Finest fund raising chocolate. As a kid, I sold boxes of these every year for my soccer team. One year, my sister and I ate them all; my mother had to fork over the entire forty bucks for the missing box of candy bars.

Caitlin and I went to pick up our wash-n-fold yesterday and the woman at the laundromat had World’s Finest Chocolate for sale - a variety now - for just a dollar. Even if it’s just the nostalgia that’s delicious, I’m going back for more ‘dark almond’ soon.

The added bonus of fundraiser chocolate bars is that the wrapper doubles as a coupon to Pizza Hut. (No use here in New York where Pizza Hut is nowhere to be found.)

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I began collecting political memorabilia in the last year. I got interested after Caitlin and I visited Roosevelt’s estate and presidential library in Hyde Park, where I bought a couple replica buttons for yucks. I also found an antique guide to collecting Roosevelt memorabilia on that same trip.

My interest was piqued, I joined ebay and had a full blown collection in just a couple months. After months of focusing on specific Presidents and filling in gaps and buying unique ones (I won’t say really old ones because I was always outbid on those.) I ended up with close to two hundred pieces. My collecting muscle was light years ahead of my collecting mind however. Around the holidays, I took a little break to learn more about the world of collecting political memorabilia.

I’ve been learning how to tell a fake from an original, learning the lingo, getting a better sense of asking prices and, of course, honing my eye for a real bargain. After months, I went back on ebay and bid on a couple pieces as a treat to myself after the holiday. It’s also a good set to introduce you to my collecting craziness.

Descriptions from top left clockwise:

Preparedness Peace Prosperity (Woodrow Wilson, no year yet) I like the wartime ‘Preparedness’ message. You can learn a lot about what messages were popular and the word choices are often very interesting. This one’s got no scratches. Color is sunbleached and the paper union tag is inside.

For Me and Mine (Woodrow Wilson, no year yet) That must have been a compelling message to family men. No scratches. Pretty sunbleached too.

Wilson (Woodrow Wilson, no year yet) The lip on the other side is warped a little. No scratches. Another faded one. I haven’t polked around online yet to learn what years these pins are from but they are a good foundation for my future Wilson collection.

Johnson Humphrey Vote Democratic (Lyndon Johnson - Hubert Humphrey 1964) This rectangular pin is called a tab. It is all one piece with a tab that can be bent back and pinched to your collar or lapel. It’s what museums sometimes give you at admission. Tabs (I wonder if I’ve made up this term on my own) are generally used at events and intended to be worn once. They’re just another cool way to add variety to your collection.

Johnson Humphrey 1964 (Lyndon Johnson - Hubert Humphrey 1964) In good shape. Not much to say about it except that I probably have more Johnson stuff than any other candidate.

Not a bad addition to my growing collection though I still have a lot to learn. Oh, and now that I’ve reigned in my ebay binging, getting buttons will be such a special occasion that I’ll have to write here.

PS - We got a new camera so expect the photo quality to get much better around here. Just not yet.

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