Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Lucky Bamboo, liars, militant feng shui, RIP Stargate, David Hewlett,

This mornings rant is on ... Lucky Bamboo. Why lucky bamboo? Cuz the garden is in, and there is only so much one can say about watching  dirt and waiting for something to happen. The chickens have adjusted nicely to   summer confinement.  I have to give Jimmy a break from the smell of paint in the house before I tackle the living room and kitchen. There have been no new good UFO sightings.  The giant crochet rug project is going slow because its soooooo heavy at this point.   I'm not cooking anything special cuz Jimmy is putting in some really  long hours and I learned my lesson on that last year  when he almost fell asleep in the  'simmered all day', 'from scratch' pasta sauce. The new Palm has stopped talking to me,  while it was kind of cool..... I'm sort of relieved  cuz I really hate thinking I'm going off my rocker.   So, all I'm left with is  maintenance of  what we have put together.  So....... Back to Lucky Bamboo.  Lucky Bamboo has been part of my  pursuit of  Militant Feng shui-ing  of the house.   Sky nursery had the  shoots for $0.97.  I 've bought 10  or 12 of them over the last 4 months and they keep dying on me. I've put them in plain water, rocks and those little hydroponic clay balls.   Varied the water levels, the sunlight. Used bottled water and  fertilizer . I even tried the mystical  'superthrive'.  Nothing seems to work. So, yesterday I took the remaining three live ones that were beginning to suffer and planted them in   potting soil.  Its a last desperate attempt to  have and care for these plants that are..... according to all sources .... easy to care for.    If these die, I am giving up my pursuit of Lucky Bamboo and calling everyone  a liar who says they are easy to care for. There! There's my rant on  Lucky Bamboo.  And now we say Goodbye. The LAST episode of any stargate  EVER aired last night.  Its a shame, cuz the last  4 or 5 episodes they finally started figuring it out (with the emphasis on starting) To the producers of SGU I say, "Thanks for Killing the franchise". To the actors.... "YOU all did a great job ! Looking forward to seeing you in other productions"  To David Hewlett   "Hurry up and get another job in  'Outer space' Cuz I'm missing Rodney and would at least like to see shades of him"
That's it for today boys and girls. I think maybe I will wander out into the studio and try to be brilliant.

PS. On the advice of a friend I have started a new blog just for the 100 year old recipes.
http://100yearoldrecipes.blogspot.com/
It will probably  take a couple of weeks to get it packed with recipes but its up and  running! Go over and take a look.   Tell me what you think and  maybe send over a helpful suggestion or two.  

Sunday, May 8, 2011

Gardening in Seattle, Bean sign, Gardening mystery, everything in the ground

Saturday came and there was no bean sign.  When I say that,I mean NO  sign.  I dug up the bed thinking I would see  at least   baby bean plants trying to grow..... or at least the  beans we put in the ground. But there was nothing. Not a single sign of a single bean.  So bereft of bean sign ,  I asked Jimmy "We did plant this bed ?  right? We DID plant this?  He said yes,  So....it must be true.  He thinks crows got them.  But why would crows dig up the bush beans and leave the pole beans untouched?  And it all was covered with bird netting.  We have ourselves a genuine  gardening mystery  boys and girls.
The cold frames went in yesterday and the squash, cucumbers and tomatoes went under them.Red cabbage went in  many of the corners and ........ brussel sprouts.  The sprouting sprouts were a fail..... sort of. They all tried to flower and go to seed. So, they too went  away and were replaced by new  seedlings which we picked up at Sky Nursery http://www.skynursery.com/.  Jimmy complained that I could have learned this info on the internet.   My response?  Sometimes we need to learn  these things for ourselves just like in the olden days before the net.  Anyway, we found red brussel sprouts  and put those in. At least they will be a change up  from the gazillion green ones we had to eat last year.  I dug the potato sprouts out of the bed  from last year   ( I don't  know how they sneak past , but they do.  I put them in the back corner in the  'old'  compost pile.   where the soil has been nicely broken down.  We will see how they do.   If the potatoes work on that hill they may find a permanent home cuz I get tired of chasing them down..
We  also put in the  next batch of  snow peas.  The first seeds we put in a month ago  are beauties to behold.  We should be eating snow peas by  the first of June.
 That seems to be it. Everything is in.  Now we just have to feed, weed and water them and enjoy the bounty

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