Up Potato!

How many people here have genuine hobbies or personal projects? Real ones, going to the cinema doesn't count!

Well I decided I don't have many, so me and my girl are working on a new project: Grow a potato plant, and then a potato!

Get weekly updates plus the photos here: http://www.johndriscoll.co.uk/potato/

Way too many. None of them are growing potatoes though.

I cross stitch

Jsecure - first they need a potato that has some eyes on it (the little root things), old wrinkled cheap potatos at the store are best. It is best if you put the potato in a paper bag in a slightly cool (cupboard) dark place. It takes about 3 - 4 weeks for them to sprout roots. Sunlight will actually stunt the growth, since the potato is a root.

Just thought I'd mention that.

Once the potato sprouts some roots, you can take it out of the bag and then put it in a glass jar of water holding it slightly up with tooth picks, I'll make a drawing in PS tonight for your girls. Then the plant part will begin to grow and you can put it in sunlight and it actually makes a very pretty house plant.


Rose

(edited to add that gardening is my hobby)

I sell cross stitch. No really.

I also:
Play guitar and take singing lessons
Like to cook interesting recipes
and I'm busy writing a book, but that's going very very slowly.

But the above list will change soon enough. So many interests, so little time...

I am a Gamer, So I play my games when i can.

Plus Iam working on my Gothop Style since I am its Forefather.

My main hobby is scrapbooking. I'm reluctant to say so, though, cause the sexist pigs on these forums make fun of me for that. I also like various kinds of needlework, papercrafts, painting (crafts kind, not on-canvas kind), and playing the piano.

coco

I design and build (mostly non working) free energy machines.

Juggling and board games (Settlers-like games, Go etc.) are my main non-SL pastimes. Also random puzzly events and art/math type projects.

I'm a biker and a combat vet. I've engrossed myself in veteran related activities to include the CVMA (combatvet.org) and the Patriot Guard Riders (patriotguard.org). Past that I like long rides on the beach on my harley and drinking beer.

Right you are, Rose. I've edited the page with my new action plan

http://www.johndriscoll.co.uk/potato/

I juggle.. I can plate spin..

I'm a clown really

Does Quake III count? If anyone wants to hook up to whip my butt at QIII just send me a PM, in fact, I'm gonna start a thread..

I'm learning how to swing dance.

Don't have to be good at it for it to count as a hobby right?

Oh hell no, as long as you're doing something you enjoy, that's a hobby in my book

Going to the cinema counts. I have a degree in cinema/television so it's not necessarily a passive experience for me unless I choose to vege out. I find the SOUND of broadcast television to be incredibly invasive and unnerving, so most of the things I watch are on PBS (few commercials), the movies, on dvd, or the internet.

I do photography. I write and produce my own music (although at the moment I am not because I'm too stressed). I have a pretty good ear since I listen to music almost constantly (and many types). I have a strong background in visual arts, including visual storytelling and comic book design, and have classical art skills -although I chose to abstain from them from 2002 until recently because creating visual art can make me very, VERY agitated and it really got to be too much. I like experimenting with exotic food combinations. I love origami but am ashamed that I know so very little of it. My favorite hobby is learning and I'll randomly research the strangest things, more often than not related to biology. I LOVE reading, but am easily angered by lousy fiction writers. I play some video games, but the only ones I stick with are ones where there are puzzles to solve or there are all kinds of things to collect, sort, and upgrade (yeah, I'm a bit obsessive-compulsive). I was taking Japanese for a few months last year but then I had a scheduling conflict and haven't been able to continue. I was growing maize in the bathroom a couple of years ago but all the soil everywhere made my girlfriend itchy so I stopped.

OMG! Scrapbooking? You're kidding?! [Insert appropriate sexist comment here]


Don't you mean creating a valuable historical record?

Let's go swing dancing some time?

hahahahaha Yes! "Using artistic and literary skills to document the historical and geneological progress of . . ." er, the family!

coco

RL projects? Too many of 'em, so they never get done.

I was always told that if I didn't wash my ears that potatoes would start growing out of all the dirt that was there. Maybe your next challenge would be to try that?

Here is a really good set of indoor potato growing instructions:

Growing Potatoes in a Bag

For those who don't have lots of gardening space, this is something that you and your girls can do even on the balcony of an apartment building. Also you can eat what you grow.

You will need:

A large dark plastic bag

Note: They say plastic but I found that a paper sack was better and the reduced the chance that the potato would rot, for what it's worth. I put the soil in the paper sack and then put the sack in the black plastic garbage bag. The paper sack absorbed any bad moisture that would mildew or rot the potato.

A garbage bag for the outer bag would work nicely or the easy route would be to buy a big bag of compost and soil and just plant into that. Maybe cover it with dark plastic or something to keep the light from coming through.

3 - 4 Seed Potatoes - available wherever vegetable garden plants are sold.

Note: Potatoes that have gone to seed in the store are fine too, though many have been treated to not grow roots, that eventually wears off. If you have a farmers market, buy some there.

Fill the paper bag with soil until it is about 1/3 full. Put the potatoes on top of the soil, spacing them apart. Cover the potatoes completely with more soil (until bag is about 1/2 full).

Check on them in a couple of weeks and see if they have sprouts on them, if they do, cover them back up and set the paper bag into the garbage bag and give them a little water.

Be certain there are holes in the bag bottom so excess water can leak out.

Keep in a dark area until you see green shoots starting to come up out of the potato.

When you see the green shoots, place bag outside or in a window in a sunnier area. Check moisture levels often and water as needed. Once the plants have grown tall (about 8 inches) fill the bag with more soil until the bag is full. This encourages the plants to produce more potatoes and keeps the potatoes covered up so they won't turn green Green potatoes are not good to eat, so keep the potatoes well covered so the sun can't make them green.

After about 3 months, your potatoe plants should flower and the new potatoes will be ready to harvest. Tear or cut open the bag, collect potatoes, and wash/dry them.

Note: Green potatoes can be poison and make you very sick - so don't eat them green.

.

How to grow potatoes.........

Buy a 3 lb bag
Leave them in the cupboard below the kitchen sink.

Forget them.......

Months later wonder why a bush is growing under the sink

Origami. 'specially when visiting family or friends, or anywhere that I can't attach myself to a computer and get bored quickly. Like a month ago when I stopped by a friend's house for dinner and then sat there for an hour because she hadn't started it, I folded a small zoo's worth of origami swans, cranes, frogs, ect...

Oh AND, throwing paper aeroplanes with sharp ends at small children..

Pics please.