Earlier in the year, I made a couple of small test batches of mead. Mead, if you are not familiar with it, is honey-wine, very old and very simple; in its base form, it consists of only honey, water, and yeast. I made a gallon of mead with clover honey, and another with orange blossom honey. They were delicious.

Both came out light and (unsurprisingly) a little sweet, but also crisp. There was a champagne-like quality about them, which was made more prevalent by the fact that both batches were slightly carbonated. Which was not certainly not a problem, but also not my intention; I bottled them both just a touch too soon, with the yeast still active. Oh, and did I mention that it's really strong? Stronger than wine, certainly. I neglected to take any measurements, so I can't know for sure exactly what proof it ended up, but it's strong enough to warm you as it goes down, and two glasses is enough to make me pretty tipsy. If I had to guess, I would put it at 18 or 20 percent.

This past week, having successfully done my trial runs, I started a big batch- 4 gallons. Which, for your reference, ought to yield me about 18 wine bottles worth of mead. I am quite excited.

I made it with buckwheat honey. I don't know if you have ever had it; it is very sweet, dark, and full of flavor. Imagine an equal mix of clover honey and dark molasses and you have it about right. It ought to end up giving me a very dark, rich, and seriously strong mead. Sort of the stout of meads, I would think.

I know what you are thinking, Gentle Readers. You are wondering how you can get your hands on some of this elixir. The truth is, at it's base, mead is really simple, and you probably have nearly everything you need in your house to make a gallon of mead right now. The batches I have made, including this last big batch, all follow the same basic recipe- combine 3 parts water to 1 part honey, add yeast, and let it sit and ferment for 6 weeks or so. It is a little more complicated in practice- everything needs to be sterile and handled right, so you don't end up growing a giant mold colony- but only a little, and certainly doable in your kitchen.

If anyone is interested, I will post detailed directions for making a batch yourself. And I will certainly let you know how this batch turns out. I should be able to taste it somewhere near the end of August....

You see the bear charm in that picture? It was the first external element of my bearish persona to come to me, and up until a couple of weeks ago, I had worn it around my neck nearly continuously since 1993. In fact, I can only recall two occasions on which I removed for a period of time longer than that which was required to put it on a new string.

It is no secret that I feel a great affinity for the bear, and it shouldn't surprise you that I hold the bear as my totem and spirit guide, and that I regarded the necklace as a token and symbol of that relationship. When I saw it for the first time, I was unaware of this facet of myself; yet (as corny as this may sound) when I saw it, it really spoke to me, resonating in a way that would take me years to properly understand and put into words. But even if I didn't understand it at first, it nonetheless had a powerful effect on me, and I have had it as a touchstone and reminder of things greater than myself throughout my adult life, through many joys and many trials.

I found it while randomly browsing the wares for offer at a sale some group or other was sponsoring in the Campus Center. They had brought in a bunch of vendors to raise money. You know the type well enough- army surplus, rainbow hackey-sacks, cheap jewelry, black lite posters- the mainstays of college life in the early 90s. I am sure you remember it well. I passed it by at first; I didn't understand or really want to acknowledge the incredibly strong pull I felt towards it. I drifted by the table two or three more times before moving on with my day. However, I just couldn't let it go. My thoughts kept drifting back to it, and at the end of the day I went back to get it.

Only to find it gone.

Let me tell you, Gentle Readers, I was crushed, and I cursed myself for being such an idiot as to pass it by in the first place. Luckily for me, I had been browsing with a friend, who not only noticed my fascination with the bear charm, but bought it for me after I left. It was presented to me the next day, after I relayed how much of an idiot I felt like for letting it go. (It was, I gathered, to have been a birthday present, but I was apparently so morose it was given to me on the spot...)

And, as I said, I have worn it ever since. Until I lost it a couple of weeks ago.

I noticed, in the middle of a load in, that the bit of wire that held the bear to the string had snapped sometime during the day. It was pretty much the perfect top off to what had been a supremely craptacular day, and while I tried to tell myself that I would find it, I knew the truth of it, and to say it bummed me out would be a very large understatement.

So, what is one to do, when one's totem goes missing? I thought about replacing it with as close a copy as possible, but that didn't sit right with me. I even have another bear necklace that was given to me as a gift. But, while I treasure it, it didn't seem like the right thing to do.

What I finally arrived at was that I could not try to replace the bear with another bear; instead, I decided to make myself a charm that would encompass a different aspect of the bear. Something that paid homage to my totem, but also reflected some of the ways that I have changed since that first bear charm came to me. So, I made myself a necklace with a bear claw as it's centerpoint.

It is very different from the last, and I am quite pleased with it.

I recently (okay, maybe recently is a stretch... let's try, In the not too distant past) became obsessed with the idea of making a black bread. Not a traditional pumpernickel or anything simple that I could easily look up and learn from others; that just wouldn't be my style. I wanted to make it black by dyeing it with squid ink.

It was interesting, no doubt about it. It turned out very black, and the egg I brushed on, combined with the black salt, gave it a nice sheen. The picture is crap, and shows neither of those things, so I am afraid you will just have to take my word for it. The flavor... well, that was interesting too. A little fishy. No, not quite fishy. Ocean-y, maybe, is a better description. It wasn't overpowering, but even so, this is not a toasted-with-butter-and-jam kind of bread. But served with a cream soup, or a chowder, or hollowed out and used as a bread bowl for some kind of dip? Oh yeah. It would be excellent for that. You really should give it a try, Gentle Readers.

You can get cuttlefish ink at Despaña. I got the black salt at Williams Sonoma.

Also, be aware that the cuttlefish ink will stain, so don't mix this up in your favorite wooden bowl; I recommend glass.

Black Bread of the Sea

• 1 Cup Warm Water
• 1 1/2 Teaspoons Honey
• 1 Package Active Dry Yeast
• 1 1/2 Teaspoons Salt
• 2 Packets of Cuttlefish Ink (4 Grams Each)
• 3 - 4 Cups Flour

• The White of One Egg, beaten with a little Water
• Coarse Black Salt

Dissolve the honey in the warm water. Add the yeast and let stand for ten minutes, until nice and yeasty smelling. Whisk in one cup of flour, the salt, and the cuttlefish ink. Continue to add flour 1/2 cup at a time until the dough pulls away from the bowl. Turn out on a floured surface and knead, adding flour by the tablespoon as needed, until the dough is smooth and elastic. Place in a buttered bowl loosely covered in a warm place and let rise until doubled, which ought to be about an hour.

Turn the dough out on your floured work surface and knead until it is once again a firm dough. Allow it to rise for about an hour in the open air on a buttered stone or baking sheet for a round loaf, or in a loaf pan for something more, well, loaf like.

Heat the oven to 450 degrees.

Just before putting the bread in the oven, brush with the egg white, sprinkle liberally with the black salt, and slit the top with a sharp knife. Bake for about 20 minutes, or until the bread sounds hollow when tapped.

Most of what I have been doing these last few months while I haven't been writing has revolved around making more of what I consume from its base ingredients. One of the things I have done do help me achieve this is to start a tomato and herb garden at home. It is, as you can see in the photo, thriving.

Some of it (the rosemary and the lemon verbena) are growing in earth in pots, but most of it is in an Aerogarden, which, if you are not familiar, is a small hydroponic system. It is pretty cool, I must say, and deeply satisfying to see the herbs grow. They grow quickly, too... It's been not quite six weeks since I got it, and you can see how far it's progressed.

There are some who may ask, 'My calamitous friend, isn't using some machine to grow your herbs sort of counter to the idea of making things for yourself?' Well, I did think about that. And what I decided was that I am not against technology in general, or using it to do things better- that is what it is for, after all. The garden uses little electricity, the plants produce oxygen as well as feeding me, and, since I am realistically going to be gone for days or a week or more with little or no notice (not yet being independently wealthy), the Aerogarden allows me to grow things that I might not otherwise be able to keep alive.

On top of that, it's just damn cool.