From faithful Garden Correspondent Marvel:
We’re having a warm, 90+ degree weekend here in the Willamette Valley — I’ve started a a pool with my friends re how many inches the corn grows these next few days — I’m betting 3.
With the welcome warmth, everything else in taking off, too.
The peas are showing plenty of flowers & pods, the lettuces are will no-doubt be bolting soon (we picked & “green” bagged several heads of romaine, pre-bolt, today).
The carrots & beets are a JUNGLE of robust green tops and the potatoes have sprung up at least a foot above the last of their leaf mulch hills.
I planted some kind of jasmine a few years ago (white fowers, purple vine) — it embodied that nursery adage: The first year, it sleeps; the second year, it creeps; the third year, it LEAPS! It’s breezy out right now and the yard is filled with that lovely jasmine scent.
And I ate my first artichoke — heaven.
***********
Here north of Boston, it’s been a tiring week of hauling sacks of sodden potting mix and dragging laden root pouches. But I’m down to the last few waiting transplants (two more full-sized tomato plants, four cherry tomatoes, another basil, and a rosemary that will no doubt disappoint me bitterly by refusing to bloom, just like all its forbears). If moving up to bigger pouches to give each plant more root space doesn’t improve production, the Spousal Unit will never let me hear the end of it.
What’s going on in your gardens this week?
OzarkHillbilly
Looking good Marvel, looking good.
Gonna hit 93 today. I am gonna melt. Been a long cool, wet, very wet, spring but I am not at all ready for summer. Calling for more rain tonite and tomorrow. Have I mentioned how wet things have been? Sigh…. My weeds love it. So do all the fungicide manufacturers.
Got a brown rust in some of my potatoes. Been using an organic fungicide on them and it has halted it’s spread and seems to be giving the infected a chance at producing. Cabbage worms finally showed up. Need to give my cruciferous a bacterial spray. The flea beetles have been partying hardily on my eggplants such that they look like I have been using them for target practice…. With a shotgun.
All my peppers are looking good so far, running a little behind I think or maybe it just seems so when I look at my tomatoes, most of which are already at 4′ or more. Got one banana pepper showing and 3 tomatoes on a Mallorcan plant grown from seed my wife brought back from Spain. I will have to pick lettuce today before it all bolts as well, grew a mix this year that my wife is in love with: Redina, Crisp Mint, Rocky Top, Tennis ball, a Mesclun mix, and one more that escapes me just now. And spinach, almost forgot them.
raven
The girl took up all the collards and kale because they were at the end of their life span. We had a big stump that was in the way of the grading so a guy with a grinder came out. We had another big one we wanted taken out and he only charged $75 for both of them! The concrete crew worked all day yesterday pouring the pad for the addition and extended it under our deck. One cool thing about the addition is that it is directly over the garden and she has big windows planned that will look over it.
JPL
It’s going to be a nice but a tad to warm day here. I’m going to go outside and spread some mulch, then I’ll watch Djok win another match.
@raven: Did you put your initials in the concrete? It is looking good.
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: Progress. It will be framed up in about a day and a half and you’ll think, “Wow, they’ll be finished in just another week or 2.”
NOT! :-)
And then, it will seem like forever. Every day people will be there but nothing will ever seem to really get done. But they are.
OzarkHillbilly
@JPL: A buddy of mine inserts a brand new penny in every pour. I insert a beer cap.
satby
I now regret yesterday’s lazy low productivity day, because huge storms are heading this way in the next couple of hours. Or less, as I look outside at the gathering grey skies. The weeds are only 1/2 whacked in the dog yard and will be over 2 feet tall in the unmown part by the time it all dries enough. I’m hoping I can plant my last two transplants into pots before it starts pouring.
But not till I finish my first cup of coffee. Everything waits for that.
ETA: damn, now one of the dogs just puked. That kind of a day, it seems.
satby
Marvel, you’re giving me a complex. Really great garden and pictures!
RAVEN
@OzarkHillbilly: We are thinking 3 months but who knows. Mr bride is more fussy than I am since I am home and know they are working. The two guys that have been there for the last couple of weeks are really good people as is the general. They are pretty comfortable that I basically check in with them in the morning and tell them if they need to holler.
JPL, I jumped the gun on the paw prints and they smoothed over them!
geg6
We’ve eaten so much asparagus that we’re sort of sick of it at this point. We’re onto lettuce and the peas shouldn’t be long after by the looks of them. Grilled some spring onions the other night and they were heavenly. Peppers and tomatoes are looking good. Zucchini and yellow squash are also looking healthy and ready to produce vast quantities. The red and black raspberry bushes are going to be going gangbusters if the temps and sun keep it up for a few days. And the peach trees we planted three years ago are filled with tiny green peaches. Finally.
OzarkHillbilly
@RAVEN:
Heh. After I finished the last pour on my porch floor the Woofmeister signed it. I decided it was meant to be and left it.
satby
@geg6: Nice!
I planted crabapples that may bear a few fruit this year because I like making the jelly, but the nectarine tree died. It had done fine in a tree tube the first year, but didn’t overwinter, along with about 5 roses. No idea why, since all of them came through our polar vortices year ok.
OzarkHillbilly
Heh: Gone native: how Manhattan’s richest women follow the laws of the jungle
Wednesday Martin the author of Primates of Park Avenue:
“I set out to write a memoir with some anthropology, social research and some dish,” Martin, who describes herself as a “cultural critic at large in high heels”, told the Observer. “But that apparently is a problem for people.”
Ya think?
Denali
Oh what a beautiful morning! Time for pot a few more plants and then head out to the garden stores for more.
The artichoke photo is awesome!
the Conster
It’s a sparkler of a morning here in Boston – perfect temperature. If it never goes over 72 it would be fine by me. Since giving up my garden beds when I sold my house, I’ve got pots of flowers and a little bitty cut flower garden bed off my little deck. The morning glories are starting to climb, and my hope is that the deck railing between me and my neighbor will be a screen of blue flowers. I’ve already had to spray for bugs though. It’s amazing how quickly they set in, and how much damage they can do in a short period of time.
Germy Shoemangler
Something is eating our roses. Insect. We sprayed this morning, hope it discourages them.
This, in the nytimes:
OzarkHillbilly
Time to weed while there is still a coolness in the air.
PurpleGirl
Looks like one of those clear, crisp days in NYC. Haven’t been outside yet but I’ve had breakfast and am now doing some laundry. (It’s so nice having a laundry in the building.)
JPL
@Germy Shoemangler: The only time that I saw the President in person was at GA Tech. Granted his second term, he spent his money on a narrower path but the article was ridiculous. It was more how do we diss Hillary today.
Germy Shoemangler
@JPL:
True. The nytimes does NOT like Hillary. And this is the paper the teatards call liberal?
For a while I felt like they were really pushing for Jeb. Not sure if that’s still true. But who else can they get behind? Walker?
Germy Shoemangler
Public radio is on, and they’re doing a glowing report on Joni Ernst. They like her! She rides a motorcycle!
Eric S.
One of the two tomato plants and 3 of the 4 pepper plants started flowering this week. That puts mine ahead of my urban gardener buddy just a few blocks over. I switched the position of my swiss chard planter (always dry) with the planter the herbs are in (never dry with a green mold on the dirt). They both hang over the railing on the deck but one spot gets much more sun. I’m going that solves the mold issue. The weed, I mean the sweet mint plant, continues to grow at gangbusters speed.
I’m newish to this gardening thing so I’m pretty excited about the progress.
Baud
@Germy Shoemangler:
I’m disappointed she won’t contest Utah.
Baud
@Germy Shoemangler:
When was the last time they endorsed a Republican in the general election? W.? If Hillary gets the nod, I bet the NYT endorses the Republican candidate.
Eric S.
@PurpleGirl: when I bought my condo in unit laundry was one of the few non negotiable requirements.
PurpleGirl
@Eric S.: When I was deciding between Co-Ops, I had least wanted the laundry room in the building, behind the building security. My sister was pushing me to buy her brother-in-law’s Co-Op but their laundry room was two washers and two dryers (not commercial units either) and in a room that you had to leave the door open when using it that was outside the main building. In the complex I bought into, the laundry rooms are in the basement, have like 10 double load and 2 triple load washers and 10 dryers. For me this was luxury. I don’t have to stay downstairs either.
MomSense
@Germy Shoemangler:
What? Pretty sure Obama won with solid majorities twice.
Pogonip
Those pictures make me think salad and iced tea.
Shaper-uppers, due to a sinus infection I didn’t do much shaping this week. How’s by you?
Also, does anyone know how Soonergrunt is feeling?
Baud
@MomSense:
But that was with ACORN’s help!
MomSense
@Baud:
And the New Black Panthers!
MomSense
@Pogonip:
I didn’t do much shaping up at all this week. Actually called a trainer who is a friend of my oldest son. She’s starting a business and I decided that I could use some support. I’m not trying to lose weight just want to be more fit and less stressed.
ETA I’m looking at pics of my kids doing amazing hikes out west and I want to do those hikes too which means I have some work to do.
Steeplejack
@PurpleGirl:
I have a small over-under washer and dryer in a space the size of a closet in my apartment. Sheer luxury! And they’re quite adequate for my needs.
The last place I lived had pretty good laundry rooms on each floor, but this is way better. No hoarding quarters!
PurpleGirl
I see luxury in relative terms. I grew up in a 6-family building, which my parents owned, and our washer/dryer was in the basement. Walk-up building, our apartment was on the top floor. When I got my first apartment it was on the third floor of a 4-story walk-up building. I had to use a laundry shop down the street. My Co-Op building is 18-stories, I’m on 17. Elevators are great. We have our own power plant. I also have a terrace which is rated as a half-room. I’m happy here.
jeffreyw
Pretty nice day here in Beautiful Southern Illinois, sunny and cool this morning but it threatens to reach 90 this afternoon. Been playing with the camera in the new cell phone – I did this panorama while standing just outside the front door. The stitching software did pretty well but had a problem in the area at the end of the bbq grill and on up through a tree.
Mike in NC
Talking with neighbors at a party last night, it seems we’re all plagued by moles and/or voles burrowing in our lawns. So-called “mole mover” stakes in the ground that give off vibrations to repel them seemed to work at one time but not any longer.
ThresherK
@PurpleGirl: Was that the Perfect Six, common to many northeasren citiee?
My wife lived on the top floor of one in Worcester. Hauled lotsa laundry downstairs and up, but everyone else’s heat floated up to her large apartment.
PS NPR can’t suck any harder than with that Ernst piece. But somehow, they will find a way.
ThresherK (GPad)
Getting my exercise running communications for folks riding bicycles to beat MS. The long route weeds our the people who show up with rusted chains and tires containing negative air pressure.
satby
@Eric S.: Congrats new gardener! You’re off to a good start!
3 hours and 4 cups of coffee later, I transplanted my two last plants, deadheaded the irises, weed whacked another 1/3 of the dog yard and around the blueberry bushes before my battery ran out again, did some hand weeding, and planted some fill in petunia seeds in planters that already have small petunias growing.
Now taking another coffee break and working up the will to go clean 8 litter boxes. If I finish all those I will consider this weekend a success!
satby
@ThresherK: and the fact that they would profile Ernst with anything other than horror proves NPR doesn’t give a shit about the public it purports to serve.
Renie
@satby: OT – What’s the latest on Bella?
Zippity
@satby: I saw a picture of her wearing her Harley leather vest. I understand the need to wear some kind of protective gear when riding. People who dress themselves head to toe in Harley gear remind me of the people who wear western shirts and cowboy hats to go on a trail ride-and can’t ride at all. The whole, “Don’t call him a cowboy…” thing.
PurpleGirl
@ThresherK: I never heard them called ‘perfect six’ but there were 6 apartments on 3 floors and a basement. And the building size and apartment configuration is very common in the northeast.
My father had installed a Honeywell timer and thermostat in their bedroom to control the heat. He had set to run for x minutes every hour. Seemed to work to maintain the temperature. Of course being on the top floor our apartment also got sun heat buildup.
satby
@satby: ahhh, and here’s the rain. Nothing better than knowing you finished a lot of stuff before it hits!
ThresherK (GPad)
Sounds like the same kind of building. Ah, the summer in the GF’s apartment was like that. Now I’m wondering if she stayed with me cos the car I bought that first July together had AC and nothing else she sat or stayed in did.
Maybe I’ll ask her when I get home.
shell
Sigh. I tried growing artichokes one year. They’re a no-go here in the Northeast. Same with trying to get my rosemary to bloom. Have to be satisfied with the nice lavender blooms on the sage.
ruemara
@PurpleGirl: whoa. Are you in Manhattan with that or in the boroughs? I remember struggling with the shopping cart through snow & slush to get to the laundromat, which is why I don’t complain that my complex has laundry in its own building, but what you’re describing sounds like NYC heaven.
OzarkHillbilly
Just for all you NPR haters:
Red Cross ‘Diverted Assets’ During Storms’ Aftermath To Focus On Image
Red Cross Responds To NPR/ProPublica Report On Storm Response Inefficiencies
But I’m sure FOX, CNN, MSNBC, ABC, and CBS all covered this as well and far more thoroughly.
ThresherK (GPad)
@Zippity: Just a vest? Not a full jacket?
Take it from someone who swelters a bit at stoplights in the summer: That vest is leaving a lot unprotected.
Of course, given how R’s love their motoring style statements, she could have been just FredThompsoning her Harley the last mile to the photo op. Then a vest isn’t such a risk.
JPL
Bags of mulch are really heavy when they are wet…. It’s already 86 and I’m glad I went out when I did.
raven
@jeffreyw: Sweet. I love my Weber gas grill even if I did slice open my hand taking chicken to it!
JPL
@jeffreyw: That’s beautiful. Do you ever have time to just enjoy yourself?
PurpleGirl
@ruemara: I grew up in Astoria and now live in Woodside. (I’m right on Queens Blvd but the ‘back’ side of the building so I don’t hear much of the traffic noise.)
jeffreyw
@raven: Read about your mishap, mine is so close to the front door the only chance I have of tripping would be over a dog trying to beat me out of the house.
WereBear
I remember those days :) Bless you.
These days I have the Wonders of Technology on my side!
jeffreyw
@JPL: Being as how most of that is maintained by Mrs J I have lots of time. I do the cooking, the mowing, all the household IT work, and tend the veggie containers – she does all the flowers.
Another Holocene Human
Well, hell. I am on day 4? 5? of a cold and while I’m not that bad physically I am completely spaced out. 2 cups of coffee have had minimal impact.
In gardening news my wife got a key lime seedling and we put it in a giant pot and mixed in organic citrus fertilizer. I can’t figure this tree out. I have no idea if it’s thriving or not. Some of the leaves appear curled in. I don’t know what that means.
PurpleGirl
@WereBear: Looks interesting. And it works? Wow. I like the robot design look.
Another Holocene Human
@OzarkHillbilly: Hey, appreciate the sentiment, but it says “NPR/ProPublica”. ProPublica is great. NPR not so much. Also, Red Cross USA isn’t one of their “underwriters” like ADM, Monsanto, and oil & gas companies.
ETA: It’s not fair to say I hate NPR. More that they disappoint me frequently.
pamelabrown53
@Another Holocene Human:
Could be your key lime is in mild shock after the transplant. I had to move one from the screened pool enclosure because without pollination, no key limes. It rebounded after a while; however it did require more initial watering.
Another Holocene Human
@satby: I HATE (okay, here we go) how they’ve all been trained to smile while reading the news so they sound absolutely delighted discussing horrible or otherwise serious topics.
It makes the whole show sound privileged and out of touch. Which I suppose it is.
My boss (at the job I quit/asked to be demoted out of) told me to smile on the air but the more I heard all the females on NPR do it inappropriately (and it does seem to be the women more than the men), the less I wanted to follow that guideline. How would the person on the other end feel if I did that? Ugh.
Also, one more reason to listen to Diane Rehm show and screw the rest of NPR.
PS: also like their Africa news correspondent because she sounds concerned when stuff is concerned, not overjoyed
Another Holocene Human
@pamelabrown53: Very possible. There was some mixup with exposing the top roots when we changed containers which I think is corrected now.
ThresherK (GPad)
@WereBear: Okay, science, now get to work building a version of that crossed with a Roomba, which can sense when a cat needs to go and track it down.
OzarkHillbilly
@Another Holocene Human: Pro Publica regularly partners with NPR. So does Kaiser Health Care. So does the Center for Investigative Reporting. So doe…. I think you are getting my point. NPR is not perfect, but they are head, shoulders, torso, legs and feet above any of the other major broadcast news outlets. Sure they soft ball conservatives sometimes such as in what I am sure is a Joni Ernst smiley face profile only lightly touching on politics. They do the same thing with liberals.
And when it comes to hearing what conservatives have to say, I trust NPR to relay that info far more honestly than FOX and when it gets so bad I can’t take an interview anymore (not challenging assertions)? I turn it off. 5 mins later I’ll turn it back on. My blood pressure is much better.
(their regularly Friday afternoon face off between David Brooks and EJ Dionne, I just can’t take anymore. The thought of Brooks’s overly smug face is just more than I can take sometimes.
Another Holocene Human
@JPL: It is ridiculous to engage in 90s nostalgia when nobody, not even Jesus could win an election using either party’s 90’s playbook in 2010’s America.
Times change. Get over it, Grandpa-per.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Another Holocene Human: I used to be in the habit of listening to NPR on weekend mornings, background noise that I could stop and give my full attention to when an interesting story came up. I always found Scott Simon mildly irritating but I did like Daniel Schorr, but I gave up (I think just before Schorr died) when Simon did an interview with a middle-aged woman who had been laid off in ’07/’08, went back to school and was doing an internship. She was clearly someone making the best decisions she could at a difficult time in her life, but Simon had decided his hook would be to playfully treat her as if she were 20, at one point asking if she had met any boys. It was truly atrocious. I gave up.
The Sunday show has gone downhill since the longtime reporter whose name escapes me retired, but it’s not as bad as Simon. During the great ISIS flare up of ’14, they did bring in the neo-con Danielle Pletka to talk about it, and presented her as a Middle East analyst or something equally neutral. I wrote to their Ombudsman, but got no response.
Another Holocene Human
@OzarkHillbilly: Did you wife get a permit or is she just that cold blooded to lie to US Customs and stroll through?
I ask because I got nailed for illegal tomatoes. Well, not nailed exactly, but we didn’t cross into US soil with those seeds, let’s put it that way.
OzarkHillbilly
@Another Holocene Human: Yeah, I love Diane Rehm too,
Baud
I’ve never been able to get into any type of news on radio or podcasts.
Another Holocene Human
@OzarkHillbilly: I trust Kaiser (the non profit, not the actual HMO) as well. NPR has two problems. One is their management, and I doubt you’d have to look far to see all the dirt on that going back to the 1990s. The other is their funding situation. Newt Gingrich engineered that shit. You just have to accept that NPR is what big business thinks that America’s elites/thought-leaders need to hear. And you can be propagandized for free. What a deal!
NPR didn’t say boo about the housing bubble until after the market crashed. Imagine you were a middle class family and relying on them for news. You got screwed. (The newspapers are funded by RE ads so they were pushing the NAR party line right to the end. The end is when everything crashed and there were no ads and the paper was showing up 1/3 to 1/4 of its previous weight.)
OzarkHillbilly
@Another Holocene Human: I never thought about it one way or the other…. Baker Creek Seeds regularly gets seeds from contributors all over the world to breed here. Her parents did get caught smuggling a $400 Spanish Ham into the country once. I bought a buttload of European cheese to bring back (I lurvs their cheeses over there) my last trip and made sure to declare it.
“No problem.” the customs agent said.
shrug go figure
satby
@OzarkHillbilly: I worked for those f¥ckers and volunteered for them during Katrina. Image is very much what the management is all about. And they have scores of dedicated volunteers, many of them senior citizens, who they betray with their malfeasance.
OzarkHillbilly
@Another Holocene Human:
Nobody did. And they should have. Especially the people who’s job it was to see it. (Fed Reserve? Treasury? SEC? I’m looking at you) I’m no genius but I saw it, or top be more accurate, I saw how easy it was for people who had no business getting a loan to get way more money than they ever should have been trusted with.
Kaiser the non profit is the one I am talking about.
WereBear
@PurpleGirl: IT IS THE AWESOMEST.
After 18 years of multiple daily litterbox cleaning, it is delightful to have something automatic that works. I never had an automatic litter box before because the engineering part of my brain dismissed all previous attempts.
With two Robots we’ve handled up to five cats so easily.
satby
@WereBear: So jealous!
BTW: I’m waiting for my next payday to kick in on your fundraiser, and when I said I was sending out samples Monday, I meant tomorrow. They’ve been going on ride alongs with me all week, I inevitability remember to go to the post office after 5pm.
satby
@WereBear: OMIGD! I just looked at the price. That’ll have to be a dream purchase.
Another Holocene Human
@OzarkHillbilly: George W Bush’s SEC wasn’t worthy of the name, and Greenspan, or as we were calling him, Greedspan, can rot in hell.
You’re right, nobody was covering it except some bloggers on the internet. Housing Bubble Blog was my jam but there was Bakersfield Bubble, a bunch of finance/daytrader hangouts, and so on.
Oh, Jim Cramer can burn in hell too.
gelfling545
I got pictures today of the lettuce, beans & sunflowers my 3 year old niece is growing from the seeds I gave her along with garden tools for her birthday in April. They look excellent & Sophie was quite excited to eat her first homegrown lettuce and thus are new gardeners made.
I was next door this am stealth planting a few $3 hostas & daylilies in place of the weeds that habitually grow there. It’s a rental & the landlord cuts the grass but that’s about all. Last year I put in a few cheap arborvitae. It’s much easier than dealing with the weeds that invade my garden from that side.
satby
@jeffreyw: Wow. What a beautiful yard!
ThresherK (GPad)
@OzarkHillbilly: Buttload of cheese?
I hope that’s a metaphor.
I want to know what local Public radio affiliate programming is worth seeking out online. I have a couple faves which would need to be hobbled before hitting the NPR bigtime, and wonder if others do too.
satby
@gelfling545: LOL! When I lived in Chicago I used to both stealth spray weed and feed, and mosquito spray in my neighbor’s yard. They only did anything whenever they got cited by the city, so about 2x per summer. It was a weedchoked jungle with lots of garbage to collect rain water and breed mosquitoes.
ruemara
@PurpleGirl: Ah, Queens girl. The family is still in Ozone Park. I’ve been debating returning, but who can afford to restart in NYC?
Mike J
@Another Holocene Human:
Ever listen to Science Friday? They’re crushed about what’s happened to NASA funding, (Earth science funding gutted, rocket research bumped up), but there are two words you will never, ever hear on that show: Republican and Democrat. They absolutely refuse to say why this is happening.
(And yes, I know SciFri is no longer an NPR production (having moved to PRI earlier this year), but they weren’t any better when they were.)
shell
@geg6: How do you keep the birds from devouring the raspberry bushes, not to mention the squirrels?
Litlebritdifrnt
@OzarkHillbilly: You should see my suitcases after a trip to England. It’s remarkable what you can disguise as Christmas presents :) (*cough* Kipper Fillets *cough*)
WereBear
@satby: They’ve got refurbished units, too. You can be put on a list. That’s how I got my first one.
And it’s so sweet of you to think of me! I look forward to my samples whenever they appear. Like you, my skin appreciates staying away from the chemistry set when I get cleaned up.
Amir Khalid
Slate has a hilarious headline up on its front page:
On the story page, the standfirst under the headline is
And the byline explains it all:
My favourite comment:
srv
@Mike J: I don’t know why anyone would need anything more than Freakonomics and David Brooks on NPR. I have all their totes.
ThresherK (GPad)
@Mike J: Something to remember when On the Media has another Thinkpiece(TM) about how scientists can talk to the media without getting their knowledge lied about.
Hint: If Fox News is going to lie about science, public radio ain’t gonna help Themselves. They are the fools who don’t know who their enemies are.
Baud
@Amir Khalid:
Should I know who that author is?
Obviously, it’s someone who I wish I’d never heard of.
raven
@jeffreyw: I wish I could blame it on something. The grill is right at the bottom of TWPO steps about 6 ft from the front door!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Baud: one of the Bright Young Things who’s been going to bring a new intellectual energy to conservatism for last decade or so, after Laura Ingram and her zany miniskirts and edgy haircuts failed to do so. He stands out in my mind for his appearances on Maher’s show, where he was a boorish, hectoring bully who wouldn’t let other panelists talk, and Maher (hang on to your hat) let him do it. I saw that same headline and byline yesterday and decided to skip the argument that Rick Perry can, in fact, vault over the “not an idiot” bar
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
You dismiss Perry at your peril. I fear for your safety.
Thanks for the info.
ThresherK (GPad)
@raven: Sounds like a problem that Red Green could solve on Handyman’s Corner. Working your grill from your indoor recliner. No stairway hazards.
Baud
@raven:
Do I even have to suggest it?
Amir Khalid
@Baud:
If you never read him, you certainly won’t be any worse off.
raven
@ThresherK (GPad): I tripped on nothing.
Baud
@Amir Khalid:
I barely have time to read people worth reading.
pamelabrown53
@Another Holocene Human:
I used to LOVE Diane Rehm. Listened to her 2 hour back to back shows religiously. Unfortunately, she was a primary target when the republicans decided to target NPR. Now, I hear so much muddle with Washington think tank persons that more times than not it’s better to skip the program than scream at my radio.
Terry Gross is still great because she can use interviews with artists as a back door to air progressive values without diffusing them in a muddle of Washington opinions
Origuy
Natural selection. Any thing that isn’t drought-tolerant isn’t going to survive.
opiejeanne
Marvel, your garden is wonderful. You must be in a bit of a banana belt there, because your garden is about a month ahead of ours right now and our artichoke hasn’t even thought about blooming, although it does seem very happy right now.
Marvel
@opiejeanne: Corvallis — not much of a banana belt, but the mild(ish) winter let four of my five artichokes retire in place (i.e, they didn’t die back), so once it warmed up a tad, KABOOM! — artichokes. Odd & wunnerful.