By 'Early Spring Harvest' scheduled

Common Ground Organic Garden Supply and Education Center is featuring an “Early Spring Harvest” event featuring author Pam Pierce. The event is scheduled for 10:30 a.m. to noon, Jan. 26, at Common Garden, 559 College Ave., Palo Alto.

You can enjoy delicious wild and garden-grown foods long before the usual spring planting season begins. Learn how to grow and use the especially easy, tender and delicious crops that you can be harvesting at this time of the year. Taste samples will be included. Pierce is the author of “Golden Gate Gardening.”

Guests may preregister or send a check to: Common Ground, 559 College Avenue, Palo Alto 94306.

Common Ground Organic Garden Supply and Education Center is a nonprofit project of Ecology Action, an organization dedicated to “Grow Bio-intensive” food raising. Bio-intensive gardening and minifarming, researched and developed by Ecology Action over a 27-year period, allows growth of food while maintaining and improving the fertility of the earth.

Housing market ‘bouncing back’

Silicon Valley’s housing market appears to be bouncing back from its post-Sept. 11 downturn, perhaps proving the adage that during times of crisis and economic uncertainty people invest in real estate, according to Coldwell Banker Northern California.

“It’s like springtime in December,” said Avram Goldman, president of Coldwell Banker Northern California. “The Silicon Valley housing market hasn’t been this busy since March.”

The real estate market, like the stock market, cooled off from last year’s sizzling pace during much of 2001. The terrorist attacks pushed sales even lower as many jittery buyers took a “wait-and-see” attitude about investing in a home. But by mid-October, the picture began to change as sales started moving up again, Coldwell officials said.