My version:

1/2 icebox watermelon
3/4 liter sparkling mineral water
1 lime, halved and squeezed (plus additional halves for garnish)

Scoop watermelon from the rind with a spoon and blend the fruit to a pulp (I used a food processor); pour into pitcher. Add sparkling water. Roll whole lime on work surface to soften it, then halve and squeeze into pitcher. Refrigerate for 1 hour, then serve in glass with another lime half.

Yields 6 eight-ounce servings

Here’s an excerpt:

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THOUGHTS FROM A HOMELESS GUY NOW THAT I’M BACK ON MY FEET

I was homeless for about 4 years until the manager of a car dealership took a chance on me and now I am the manager of our detailing department.

Okay, so what are the things that I really appreciate?

- Weather: I don’t pay much attention to weather anymore. On the streets, weather is your life. A homeless guy rummaging for newspapers only wants one section, the weather report. If you can read, and you know the weather, you will have every dude you know asking what is coming.

–

After reading that, I began to think about how simple it is to tell someone the weather. I love weather. I read the weather in four cities every day: San Francisco, CA, Palo Alto, CA, Richmond, VA, and New York, NY. I used to check more cities, but I’m whittling down. And if someone on the street asked me what weather was coming up, I could probably tell them. The weather is available to me at the push of a button: on my BlackBerry, on my Mac’s dashboard, on the internet at any hour, delivered to me on NPR every morning. The weather is around me just like stock reports or the time of day: basic information that I take for granted.

So I thought it would be nice to make some modular weather fliers to post around SF. A little project to make something in black and white that could be cheaply and easily produced week-to-week, but that would give all the information necessary to know the weather.

The flier is a grid of two weeks, in 7-day rows. Each day has four weather options—sunny, cloudy, rainy and windy—that can be highlighted or circled. Highlighting looks the cleanest, but it also fades in the sun. Depending on the location (and sun exposure), I’ve been using different markings. There’s also room to write-in the date range at the top, the days’ dates on the grid, and each day’s high and low temperature. I designed this specifically for San Francisco, which is why there is no sleet or snow or hail. We just don’t get that kind of weather here.

So I’ve been posting…

Some of the fliers remain for awhile after I post them, others disappear. A homeless man who sometimes sleeps on my block refers to them, and my first post sparked questions from a couple of tourists curious about SF weather. It’s been a nice little exercise.

If you’d like to post weather reports in your own neighborhood, you can download the flier here. For now, it’s SF-ish weather types only.

A few months ago, a friend told me that if he heard the phrase “In this economy” one more time, he might explode. Little did we know, then, how many more times we’d get to hear it, and, frankly, how much more we’d care about hearing it. How we’d probably come to hang on the words of stories that began that way, and how we’d pray to move beyond it.

This is a story that begins “In this economy.” It’s a story about the joy that consumables can bring us, and the ability to find that joy for under $20. It’s a story about a showerhead that has changed my life, or at the very least, my mornings … (more after the jump)

(THE TABLE AT THE FIRST DINNER PARTY AT GEOFF’S)

As an extension of a project Geoff and Lana and others were completing at Yale, we hosted another party, this time in our studio space. The table was formalized with matching dishes, linens, chairs, candles. I played a fake-fireplace from the projector onto the giant blank wall in our atrium. We ate, we danced.

(THE TABLE AT THE SECOND STUDIO DINNER PARTY)

Then came the dinner party at the end of the year that was more of a wine and dance fest. It was back at Geoff’s, and we ran out of real plates and glasses so it was a smorgasbord of breakables and paper goods, mismatched chairs and pieced-together tables. But much of it was the same: the communal, family-style eating, views of New Haven from three giant glass windows, a bare-bones space with people and food to fill it.

(THE TABLE AT THE LAST DINNER PARTY AT GEOFF’S)

Then, in the fall of ‘07, a farewell dinner for Chip Benson, our beloved, departing, Yale School of Art Dean. With the same accoutrements: long tables, wine, and Chip’s work pinned to the walls around us. It was a feast for the eyes and the bellies.

(CHIP BENSON’S FAREWELL DINNER, COURTESY OF KEN MEIER)

And finally, this fall, two stories published in the New York Times: one about Michael Hebberoy in the Northwest, and another about Anne Apparu and Agathe Snow in New York. And we see it over and over: the table, the unlikely-space-converted to-formal-dining-mash-up, the bits of art and conversation that make these events both a process and a product.

(DINNER PARTY BY MICHAEL HEBBEROY)

(DINNER PARTY BY ANNE APPARU AND AGATHE SNOW)

And it’s, in part, this space in which I’d like to reside. This blending of my home and my work, my process and my production, my hobbies and my education. I have no intention of becoming a chef or even a cook per se, but hosting and organizing and creating community — whether through this blog or print pieces or dinner parties — is certainly on the agenda for the next few years.

You can find my post here