Month: March 2005

History
Well the quality of the 1880 census microfilm at the MLK Washingtonia Division is near crap. Lots of scratches, so I didn’t complete the last block I needed to do. I’ll have to go back to the National Archives for a better copy. And finish it there. But between copy card troubles and the microfilm reader’s outright refusal to print anything, I wandered over to the Hopkins maps and took a tons of pictures with the Palm so I can figure out which blocks were vacant and near vacant in 1887.

Real Estate

63 Quincy Pl NW (Eckington)
Price: $594,500
Bedrooms: 3 main/ 2 rental
Bathrooms: 2 main/ 1 rental
Fireplace: 1
Garage: Yes
Basement: Yes, rental unit
I had no intention of really looking at any houses this weekend. Yet I came across this house and looked at it anyway. Whoever did the reconstruction work they did a very good job. I mean if you are going to blow $600K, this looks like a decent buy. My travel companions really liked how the ductwork was hidden by (I’m not going to describe this right) the ceiling dropped down along all four sides of the room boxing in the middle where the ceiling fan/light hung. There was decent closet space and the house was well designed. Kudos to the Realtors who staged it by putting in some nice towels and other neat touches, along with plying visitors with wine.
The back had a tiny little space between the house and the garage. From the house one could go on the deck on top of the garage or go down and access the basement apartment. Or look at the HVAC thingies. The garage was decently sized, big enough to fit a normal sized car and store some things, or a Mini Cooper and have a work space, or a SUV and a bike.
The basement would be the kind of basement I’d want to rent, as soon as they add bars. Of course there was a security system so I guess bars aren’t needed. One of the bedrooms was a bit oddly laid out, so it would make more sense as an office, but one could have a twin bed in it and it would be perfectly fine.

Crackhead Rant
If you hang out with a crackhead, I’m calling you a crackhead.
Anyway, a visitor/resident (I can’t tell with the in & out traffic that house gets) was commenting in a voice loud enough to be heard clearly across the street, that people are too nosy, always starting something, and the area is turning white. Negro please, you haven’t been in that house long enough to justify your old timer rant. The neighbors are alert and aware, among your crack buddies I guess that is considered nosy. Always starting something, yes, we are, and the something is trying to make the place a safer and better place to live, which I guess is incompatible with the whole crackhead lifestyle. (whispered) I see white people. Sorry, can’t help you with your white people problem, as long as black folks keep selling their houses to white folks for obscene amounts of money (or enough crack to keep you and all your buddies high all year, maybe 2 years), you are gonna get more white people.

speaking of black folks selling…
Early Signs of Spring
You know Spring is coming when the Tax assessments come out and make people scream ‘screw it, I’m selling!’ Rumor has it that someone on the block has had it with the rising assessments and is gonna sell their house. A long time African American resident with strong family ties to the community, broken by the assessment. This is what gentrification does, raise housing prices, thus raising taxes and the homesteader exemption is a drop (plink) in the bucket, and driving residents to sell.

Okay update on the on again, off again history project. I think I might be done with collecting the household info for Truxton residents from the 1880 census. I am so glad there were fewer houses back then. Some big blocks weren’t as populated as I feared, like a handful of people on Bates street, but not the gobs of families I feared. I need to go back and make sure I’ve hit all the houses surveyed and check it against the map to see if a house existed. Thank G-d for deserted blocks of empty lots. If I ever get to 1900, when a lot of your houses were built, I’m gonna be so hatin’ life.
Summary of what I’ve come up with so far:
Lotta Irish
Lotta Germans
Lotta 2nd generation Americans
Lotta African Americans from VA & MD
Small population of native born White Americans with native born parents

Part of the plan is trying to figure out where the sun will be most of the time. Sadly, I don’t have a southern view and almost every stinking thing I want to grow wants lots of sun. But my yard is like survivor, you live or you get voted out of the yard. I don’t remember to water until I see droopy leaves. I know, bad gardener, bad!
Last year’s winner was the arugula. I admire a plant I plant from seed and ignore the rest of the season and grows. I think it helped that it was a deep pot, about a foot deep and sat directly on the ground. When I pulled the pot up, the dang thing had sent a root through the plastic pot and into the ground anchoring itself to the spot I left it. It wilted a bit after the removal but sprang back after some watering.
Dill and tomatoes were directly sown into the ground and came up wonderfully. The dill particularly, sowed itself, I expect to see unplanned dill again this year. Cherry tomatoes, the other bite sized tomato, and the Lemon Boy did okay with 4 hours of direct sun leaning on the southern fence. B&I were good sports about it, allowing me to keep the tomatoes growing on our common fence. It would be good to see if I can repeat the same success in a pot in the backyard. B. gave me some hope as his red tomatoes did well last year in his backyard. However, they required daily watering and constant fertilizing. Argh, I don’t have the patience and my goal is to grow organicly, so easy on the fertilizing. I hope with deeper pots being a foot and a half deep at the least, they will hold water better, and I may dig part of a soaker hose in the pot to deal with the water issue. Another idea is just to break down and buy an irrigation system or punch a bunch a holes in a garden hose.
The tomatoes and the squash have first dibs on the deep pots as tomatoes need to be in a 15-30 gallon pot. Squash roots need about 10 inches. Most other plants I’m growing in pots only need 5-8 inches of room.
This morning, I noticed the article in today’s Post about starting plants from seed. Apparently I’m doing everything wrong. No heating mat, growing things in peat pots, no fan, and the growing lamp is now just for the picky citrus sapling. I’ll take my chances and see what develops.

Okay, I’m curious, why y’all reading my blog? Just yesterday I got 200 visits. Of course many of those are looking for my post on IT’s garage makeover experience. But for the rest of you, I’m curious, what’s the draw?

I turn my back for one day and the dang seedlings are popping out and getting out of control. For days I would monitor the little farm of seedlings I’m growing in the window and basically things would emerge slowly. And because I didn’t label some things well I play the guessing game of what’s that? Last night, almost overnight, the cilantro seedings just bursted out all over the place. I had a gang of them erupting from their little cell in the same spot, so I have to get the scissors and cut some back. My tomatoes have to be closely watched too. They outgrew the minigreenhouse and had to be transferred to pots. It is going to probably be a good month before I can actually transplant them outside.
I’m trying to map out where the pots are going to sit in the backyard for when I finally move them all outdoors. I am thankful for a reader/neighbor who gave me her recycle bin so I almost have all the pots I need. I’m still waiting for B. to decide which pots he’s going to reuse this year. I suggested raised beds for his needs as some of those pots aren’t deep enough (it seems) for tomatoes and other waterhungry crops he planted last year. I’m going to buy one more IKEA pot and that should be it.
Also this week I scored a used wood folding babycrib that would make an excellent trellis for some of the vining plants. I saw it put on the curb for garbage pickup and dragged it 2 1/2 blocks back home. I’ll take it apart when the weather warms up and use it as support for the squash. I’m still probably going to buy a nice trellis for the front yard because the front should look nice.