I would like more details on your name change.

First it was John Galt, which I thought was awesome of course. Not that I do not like your new name but, I thought the first name you used stirred a little something up here which is always a good thing.

Also, I want to start a garden but am a complete noob when it comes to such things.

How did you get started in gardening and do you have any advice for this less than "green thumb"?

Great choice! (i keep ducking my head every month when these come up)

Three questions to start with -

Do you play piano?

How did you find us?

Are you from the Chicago area or did you migrate there from somewhere?

Thanks for handing off the baton to me, markj. Hope I can live up to the high standard you set last month!

About the name change...I found out about TNCR from a friend and hung around for a while just reading the various threads. I didn't know that activity is called lurking and that people do it all the time. I thought I was this mysterious person and "Who is John Galt?" flashed into my brain and I signed up as JG.

I read about WTF, came over here and decided to sign up. I followed the convention that other members who post in both places use, so I signed up as John Galt. Unfortunately, in a momentary lapse I attribute to middle age-itis, I deleted the email account that I used at WTF. I think I tried to log in and LiveCloud wouldn't let me, so I signed up again, this time as wtg and let everyone know that the gardener and Galt were the same. I was delighted by OT's suggestion of Peter Sellers' Chance the Gardener (from the movie Being There) for my avatar. Each reflects a part of who I am, so I think it's worked out OK.

As for my interest in gardening, my dad got me started at a young age (maybe five or so), planting radishes in the veggie garden. My grandfather had a killer raspberry patch, and grew tomatoes and pickles to boot. I love food, so I was hooked.

When hubby and I bought our house in 1980, I started experimenting in our yard with different plants and shrubs. No veggie gardening because we have lots of trees and shade, though I did find a corner with enough sun for a small raspberry patch. About fifteen years ago, I went through the Master Gardener program and got a pretty good grounding in the basics (integrated pest management, lawn care, botany, etc). I also took a landscape design class at a local community college.

I garden like an engineer, which means I'm great at plant selection (size, growing requirements, etc) and lousy at design (oh, how I envy lilylady her skills in that regard).

What type of gardening might you be considering? Veggie? Improving your home's landscaping? Specialty plants like roses or wildflowers? From what I recall from the photos that you posted of your home, you have a naturalized woodland landscape with fair amounts of shade. Do I remember that correctly?

One thing that I found really helpful is visiting a botanic garden and looking at the various types of garden styles. The Chicago Botanic Garden has an English Walled Garden, a Circle Garden, an Enabling Garden (for people with physical limitations), a Japanese garden and others. There are also some books with great photos (those by Ken Druse come to mind). If you can identify a style of garden you might want to implement in your own home, I think it's a good starting point.

I will give one recommendation for reference material that I think every serious gardener should know about, and that is Michael Dirr's Manual of Woody Landscape Plants. It's the go-to book (also now on CD) that has tons of information about shrubs and trees. I've learned that when I'm at the nursery and fall in love with some gorgeous whatever-shrub that I just have to have, I always check Dirr first to see if it has some fatal flaw.

quote:

Originally posted by jon-nyc:
Great choice! (i keep ducking my head every month when these come up)

Three questions to start with -

Do you play piano?

How did you find us?

Are you from the Chicago area or did you migrate there from somewhere?

You may have just sealed your fate for July, jon.... (now you'll probably tell us you have a one month vacation scheduled for July, but there's always August...)

My parents listened to the classics on our record player (for those youngsters here who know not this antique device, that was what came before iPods, CDs, and cassette tapes). I've always been around music and loved it.

I took lessons and played AT the piano from age 8 to maybe 16. No real theory or technique; just learn to read music and play the notes. I did OK, but I never felt as if I was making the music I would like to. A large part of that was that I just didn't spend the time that is needed to learn a piece well.

After Mr. wtg and I bought a house, I moved my childhood piano (a Wurlitzer console) to our home, thinking I would take up playing again after college. Didn't happen, and in our small house, the piano ended up being a huge unused piece of furniture. I sold it and hadn't really had a hankering to take it up again until recently. My energies are being spent elsewhere right now, but I can see a time perhaps not too far down the road where I might at least consider a digital piano for some casual noodling.

I found WTF via the Circle of Coffee at TNCR. Of course, I knew some WTF'ers who post over there, but there were also some really neat people who post mostly or exclusively over here, so I decided on dual citizenship.

I was born in a northern suburb of Chicago, lived in a western suburb of Chicago, went to college in a northern suburb of Chicago, and now live in a northwest suburb of Chicago. My parents were run out of their country during WWII and lived in Germany for some years as displaced persons. They came to the US in the early 1950's.

I guess they'd had enough of moving around for a lifetime, so we stayed put. We traveled some in the US on vacations during my childhood, and I've been to Europe and the UK a few times, but that's it for my world travels. I'm a real homebody.

I do hope that we can encourage you to explore the piano and music again. There is nothing like it. I am so much more hooked now than I was when I was younger.

More comments/questions later.

quote:

Originally posted by well-tempered gardener:

I garden like an engineer, which means I'm great at plant selection (size, growing requirements, etc) and lousy at design (oh, how I envy lilylady her skills in that regard).

I always knew we were sisters under the skin!

Paw paws grow in the shade. Do you have any paw paws?

What did you study in college? Are you an engineer, or do you just garden like one?

quote:

Originally posted by Mary Anna:

quote:

Originally posted by well-tempered gardener:

I garden like an engineer, which means I'm great at plant selection (size, growing requirements, etc) and lousy at design (oh, how I envy lilylady her skills in that regard).

I always knew we were sisters under the skin!

Paw paws grow in the shade. Do you have any paw paws?

You know, I'm not sure I've ever seen any grown around here. I just did a quick check, and it looks like some cultivars are hardy to my zone 5. Maybe Matt knows whether they grow around here or not. I'll have to check into them; the fruit flavor sounds intriguing. Though the description of "fetid flowers" does make it a little less desirable.

quote:

Originally posted by Mary Anna:
What did you study in college? Are you an engineer, or do you just garden like one?

I have an undergraduate degree in computer sciences, which at the university I attended was in the engineering school. My emphasis was in languages and compiler design, so I took a lot of linguistics courses along with the usual math, chemistry, etc.

I ended up working in the financial services industry doing high level systems architecture for a commodity futures exchange. Go figure.

quote:

Originally posted by well-tempered gardener:
... a commodity futures exchange.

On LaSalle or Wacker?

quote:

Originally posted by jon-nyc:

quote:

Originally posted by well-tempered gardener:
... a commodity futures exchange.

On LaSalle or Wacker?

Maybe WTG is old, err, experienced enough to remember the one at Washington and Franklin. (I know I am!)

I didn't move to Chitown until 1990.

But I assume thats where the Wacker Drive one was before it moved to Wacker Drive?

quote:

Originally posted by jon-nyc:

quote:

Originally posted by well-tempered gardener:
... a commodity futures exchange.

On LaSalle or Wacker?

Wacker. You probably know they took over the guys on LaSalle some years ago. We always knew we were smarter. We were #2 and we tried harder. They (CME) bought NYMEX a couple of years ago, too.

Before the CME I worked for ContiCommodities. We all lost our jobs after that nasty episode with the Hunt Brothers in the mid 80's.

quote:

Originally posted by Matt G.:

quote:

Originally posted by jon-nyc:

quote:

Originally posted by well-tempered gardener:
... a commodity futures exchange.

On LaSalle or Wacker?

Maybe WTG is old, err, experienced enough to remember the one at Washington and Franklin. (I know I am!)

They moved from the Franklin location to Wacker in 1983; I started working for them in 1984.

I love those old buildings. We used to walk over to the CBOT and have lunch at Broker's on Fridays (great fried fish sandwich, with cheese -- mmmmm....). I loved to walk around the lobby of that building and look at all the Deco elements.

I worked right next door to you, my office was at 100 S Wacker from 1990 until 1995.