Picture from Saturday April 23!

I am already formulating my plan for next year which includes MORE green bean plants but not right in the middle of the garden. We love green beans and I would like to produce enough to have some in the winter. We will see.

This was taken almost a week ago and everything is growing so fast, it has already changed. We've eaten radishes. And there are green beans, peas, peppers, tomatoes, squash, cucumbers, turnips, and carrots in there just trying to ripen! (Ok the tomatoes and peppers are in other pots) This is so much fun!

Blogger Is Working...

Check this out!

In the containers on the bottom and the side are radishes. They are also in the bottom right corner of the bed; I have some which should be big enough to pick soon. The BIG bushes in the middle are the green beans and I've put more seed right above and to the right of them. On the other side of them are the broccoli, but they can't be seen here. In the back left are the peas (there were actual tiny peas on them this morning!) and then cucumbers and squash growing to the right of the peas. There are tomatoes on the first plant in the 5 gallon bucket, but the next two have just been planted outside. Everything you see (except that first tomato plant) has been grown from seed

I am so proud.

There are 3 more tomato plants, 2 pepper plants, rosemary, and parsley outside of the picture. I have Ball freezer containers standing by for the surplus of beans and peas that I hope to have.

I am hoping to can some salsas and sauces also, but I don't want to jinx myself by buying all of the stuff already!

Keeping Busy!

I should be working, but I thought that maybe a few minutes to catch up with my reading is in order. I do appreciate the kind comments that all of you leave and I try to return the favor... when I have some free time.


My plan was to start with a lovely picture of my lovely green garden to allow you to see the raised box filled with soil, lovely green bean plants that may take over, onions, radishes, peas, cucumbers, squash,  turnips, and brocolli. YUM! Plus the 5 gallon buckets standing along side the bed holding my tomato plants. There are more tomatoes, and some peppers, but they are not seen in the picture. Why won't blogger let me upload my pretty picture?  I will keep trying, but I may have to do it from another computer.


I've tried again, but it just isn't happening.


In the comments from the last post Carl asked if I could post a link to the newspaper article, or post the article. I could not find a link to it, and my scanner doesn't produce JPEGs and Blogger doesn't read PDFs (why not?), but I will try to use another scanner and see what I can do.


In Week 5 of Term IV now, getting close to the Revolutionary War in Colonial History, learning the basics of Political Science in the other class (I can't ever remember the name), took one mid-term last Wednesday (how long does it take to grade?) and another tonight.. probably. I need to start the paper that is due next Tuesday (I've chosen to look at how Ireland is doing in a growing global economy... since it had to be bailed out last year) and finish reading the book for the other paper.


Work is crazy. I would still be here even if the rest of the government had completely shut down last Friday, because I am a contract employee. Of course we've been living on extension after extension of the contract, but I think that is coming to an end. I should have a new employer by the end of next month.  Same job, new employer. I hope that will help with the issues that I have had on and off around here for the last couple of years. Maybe it will ensure that other people are required to actually be here for 40 hours a week. Maybe.


Things are bad in my wonderful state and while I write letters and make phone calls, I am stuck firmly over here in Right Wing Country, where people love them some Tricky Ricky. Not everyone is crazy about the goings on in Tallahassee, these lovely grannies are probably not going to get a recording contract, but I would love to find a bumper sticker:

Thank you to Hen's Teeth

But while laughter is the best medicine, knowing that teachers, firefighters, police officers, and all state workers are losing ground every day isn't funny. Neither is the attack on my body parts. And knowing that there isn't much than can be done until January 2013 makes me a little sick to my stomach. Will I even be employable then? Or will Sharia Law be in place.. or the "christian" version of it.

I have more to say, but now Blogger won't let me change the font color, and I am finished with lunch, so I need to get back to work. I hope your states are all doing better than mine!

Completely Ready For Spring

Just a few random things I wanted to share.

**I seem to spend a great deal of time on Facebook arguing with the right.  It makes me tired. Especially when I post a link explaining why I am boycotting Chik-Fil-A and a friend from high school starts posting links to their Valentine's Party.**

**My instructor for my Biology Lab opened up all of the quizzes for the rest of the term, so I have finished that class already. I managed an A by the hair of my chinny chin chin.**

**I have a healthy A in my Administrative Law class. I am Facebook friends with one of the women in the class. We had another class together, back in the fall, and we really hit it off.  She seems to spend a lot more time than I do on her homework and projects.  Don't get me wrong, the class is A LOT of work, but I have never taken 6 hours on a quiz. I am not positive that I spent a full 6 hours on the (take home) mid-term, although DSD did pull me off the computer 2 nights during the week before the Super Bowl and said, "GO TO BED."  Does that make me smarter than she is? Just able to grasp it easier? I don't know. She seems very intelligent. I wonder about these things.**

**I am doing a lot more cooking at home using fresh (well, store bought) ingredients and I can tell a difference in the food. There is a new Farmer's Market here locally and I think I am going to head up there next Saturday.**

**I hope that my garden does better this year. I have everything planned beautifully, from the time to start plants from seed, to when to transplant them, and which ones to start in the ground. Unfortunately, those tomatoes & peppers I started last month didn't do anything. Why? Well, we turn the heat down at night & 60 is a bit too chilly, especially for peppers. Who knew? The onions are not a healthy bunch either. But the peas and the spinach I started in the raised bed two weeks ago are just peeping their little green heads up this afternoon. I almost peed my pants I was so thrilled!**

**I heard my state Representative Marti Coley saying that the Education Committee was not happy with Governor Scott's budget recommendations and that they would have some budget suggestions of their own. (Scott is SLASHING education, prison, and police budgets to name a few while cutting property taxes and corporate taxes). I agreed with her and called her office to tell her staff that. I thought the young man I spoke with was going to cry. "Really? You called to say you were happy with the Representative?" It was funny and sad. If your Senator or Representative has done something you agree with, TELL them.**

**I also called my Senator Bill Nelson to tell him I was NOT impressed with budget coming out of the House and that I did NOT want the budget to public broadcasting cut. And I volunteered to help out on his re-election campaign next year.  The people who are going to run against him are as right wing as they come.**

**There is probably more, but it is time to start the potatoes, make the salad, and then work on the pork loin.  I don't know this Betty Crocker me has come from, but I am loving it!**

Y'all be safe out there and keep up the great work!

A New Way of Life

I do wish my paper on capitalism and fascism was as easy to write as a 'blog post.

I have been working on DSD and our eating habits lately. I am not sure where my desire to eat healthier, be healthier has come from, but that, combined with my need to reduce my carbon footprint, has produced a clash or two... a week. Especially at the grocery store. He wants to buy pre-prepared boxed dinners: chicken marsala, jambalaya, beef stroganoff, and what's wrong with the occasional Raman noodles? I say, "I can make it cheaper, healthier, tastier," (take your pick). Sometimes he gets mad, "why change up things?" sometimes he just moves on.

Three weeks ago he went to the doctor for a physical. I have been pestering him to go for at least two years, partly to see if there was ANYTHING to be done about his snoring and parly because he did have cholestorol issues in the early part of the decade that we managed to get under control so that he didn't have to continue to take medication. The doctor was thorough and immediately sent him for blood work and asked that he (DSD) take his blood pressure every other day. DSD returned for the results this week:

BP: OMG! On medication
Good cholestorol: 28
Bad cholestorol: Unable to be measured
Overall: 256
Triglycerides: 1250--- ONE THOUSAND TWO HUNDRED FIFTY!! Crazy.
Sugars: Normal (which is actually the one we were concerned about because his father has type II diabetes)

He was given an EKG and sent for a chest x-ray and was sent for MORE blood work. He has an appointment for Monday 11 October to get the results of all of the above. We have fought. Quite a bit. He doesn't want to change the way he eats. He doesn't want to stop his alcohol intake. He doesn't want to CHANGE. Who does?!?!?

 I don't want to lose him.

We went grocery shopping today and he was fabulous. We spent A LOT of time looking at the fat levels and sodium levels of everything. He even bought ketchup with no salt added.. which sounds gross, but I don't eat a lot of ketchup.

We started composting in March and he will build our raised garden bed in the next few weeks, now that it is not 100 degrees every day.  I have radishes, tomatoes, and broccoli growing in containers right now. Maybe next year we will produce enough tomatoes that I will be able to can my own ketchup (and tomato sauce and salsa), but no.matter.what I would really like it if DSD were here to help (or hinder, but don't tell him that!) .

One Giant Step for Caterpillars!

I have just discovered the joy of gardening. As I get older (and wiser) I notice that I eat almost everything now that I never would have considered years ago and I enjoy it. Fresh fruits and vegetables from the grocery store are not very yummy, and who knows where they have arrived here from. Plus one day I will (I hope) be an old Southern woman and there is a requirement that we "wear funny hats and old clothes and grow vegetables in the dirt." (Shirley McClain's charactar 'Ouiser' "Steel Magnolias")

So I planted tomatoes and red peppers and cucumbers and summer squash and 2 kinds of basil and some oregano. And I watered. And I talked to the little darlings. And I watched them.

And blooms arrived. And I watered. And I fertilized. Organic, of course. And fruit arrived. And rotted.

I did manage several cucumbers. And a tomato. And a squash.

Ok, new tomato plants and new squash plants and LOOK AT THIS! Peppers growing. On the vine.

And the bugs came.



Nature is a circle. And these bugs provide a service, somewhere in the cirle.

And I do NOT want to use pesticides. So we have donated the pepper plant and 1 tomato plant to these really fat things.

And the cucumbers were taken by what DSD is referring to as 'mites'

But the basil and oregano are coming right along! I think we are going to be eating a lot of Italian food. (Basil/oregano pizza is really yummy! Too bad the sauce isn't fresh!)