And Today's Tip Is......

Plastic hangers melt much faster than one might think.  

Flashing the Neighborhood

Not having a back fence--or actually any fence--has been rather unnerving.  People walking past stop and ask about our garden, which is really quite cool and I'm very happy to be getting to know more of our neighbors, except that A) I can't be out back in my pajamas, which happens more than I'd care to admit, and B) I'm a bit embarrassed by the manginess of our backyard.  It's probably good for the garden as I'm being FAR more diligent about weeds than I normally am, but I'll be glad when the fence is done and I can go back to being my normal lazy self. 

The cats are finding the whole experience rather interesting,

though Calisto

 more so than Theo

I think all the activity is keeping the birds at bay, so

the strawberry Bird Wars haven't really started.  Or maybe they're conserving their energy for the Great Blueberry Assault again this year.....

Questions While Waiting For the Coffee To Brew......

*  If a cat has no owner, how does it find a door to always be on the wrong side of?

*  The other day I was in a public restroom, and a woman came in, entered a stall, presumably sat down, and THEN made a call on her cell phone.  What kind of a relationship do you have with someone when THAT MOMENT is when you're reminded to call him or her?

*  How annoying does the ice cream truck music have to get before it would no longer be wrong to rip the speakers right off the truck?

*  Even in a loving committed marriage in a community property state, can't a few things be "finders-keepers?"  Like the first strawberries in the garden?

*  I'll admit--sometimes when my cat is sleeping, he looks so cute that I just have to pet him.  When I'M asleep and he feels the need to wake me up, does he think I look cute sleeping or is he just retaliating?

Things I've Learned This Week

*  Check to see whether they cause drowsiness or not BEFORE taking someone else's allergy medication.

*  Just because a blueberry bush is more than 2 feet away from the fence people, it doesn't mean they won't somehow destroy it. 

*  Not having a backyard fence for a week makes me feel very exposed.  I'm not ready for the neighbors to know how often I go out in the backyard in my pajamas.

*  We either have highly evolved slugs who have caught on to the beer-trap thing, or else ours have chosen to not drink alcohol for religious or health reasons.

*  Taking down a fence makes WAY more noise than one might think.

*  My gardening organizational skills still need some work.  Last fall, I carefully drew a map showing what type of garlic & how much of each variety I was planting.  Which would be really, really useful, of course, except that I can't find the silly map............

*  Normally, I'm not a huge radish fan, but after a month of salads of just chives, spinach, and 3 types of lettuce, I am REALLY excited to see them finally ready.

*  Andy and I agree on most things, but we take very different stances on birds.  He finds them interesting and would like a bird feeder.  I find them to be little monsters who are always after my garden and would like to feed them to the cats.  We're trying to work through our differences.......

Mushrooms and Slugs and Mud, Oh My!

If April showers bring May flowers, know what May showers bring?

Slugs and mushrooms. 

The mushrooms we're assuming will go away once they get smacked with Idaho's NORMAL summer weather--hot & dry.  The slugs we're trying to catch by putting little half-cans of beer in the garden.  Everyone swears this works, but it still seems odd, or like the punchline to a joke about how to stop rednecks from stealing your tomatoes.  But, we are willing to try anything. 

Anyone know if slugs prefer regular or dark beer?

Seriously?

You might have noticed by my incessant whining about it that we've had an abnormally cold & wet spring.  In May, we had 25 days of lower-than-normal temperatures, and double our usual rainfall.  As this is the third year in a row of really wet early summer, I'm getting used to it.  And I'm convinced that global weather patterns are changing, which is a bit unnerving though I admit I'm not sorry that we seem to be being spared those weeks of 100+ temperatures we were getting a few years ago.  Not that I was amused by the week of being below zero or anything, but I'm a knitter, so anything that justifies more wool sweaters is easier to take. 

Last night, however, Boise received tornado warnings.

Really???????????

I admit, my tornado knowledge is pretty limited (hazardous to evil witches and a possible means of relocation to a land of vertically-challenged citizens), but I rather assumed that one had to live in a flat state (Kansas) to get tornadoes.  Sort of like one has to be near an ocean to get hurricanes.  I don't know if you know much about Idaho, but one of the reasons we're in what is known as the Mountain Time Zone is that we have mountains.  Lots of the things.  Not that I'm complaining--it makes a nice view, brings tourism, and up until now I thought they had kept some of the nastier weather options at bay.  In exchange, we live with winter road closures and drive front-wheel and 4-wheel drive vehicles.  This, to my understanding, has been our system.  Lately, however, one of us--and I'm not naming any names here--has not been living up to one's end of the bargain......

Any thoughts, exactly, how one gives mountains a "time out?" 

Things I've Learned This Week

* If you're going to keep putting horse manure on your lawn in order to improve it, you'd better have it worked out ahead of time exactly who is going to do the mowing if it works.

*  The fact that little plants are coming up were I planted seeds is VERY exciting, even if I'm not sure that they aren't weeds.

*  It will pay off in the long run to have finished planting the garden in the never-ending-rain, but that doesn't make me any less whiny.

*  My arm is starting to feel better, so I'm finally being good and not overusing that.  Obviously, somewhere in the depths of my mind, this makes sense.

*  I'm a lot less stressed about how the food will turn out for our dinner guests tonight after we promised them white chocolate martinis.  One of those babies and I could even serve SPAM.

*  There probably isn't a group in the world that won't eventually need to vote one of the members off the island.  I'm just relieved when I'm not the one who has to be the enforcer.

*  If I'm reading a nonfiction book and come across a generalization about "all" of any group, it's time to stop reading the book.  It's obviously not objective and is probably full of untrue statements, unless it's about math, and what are the odds that I'll sit down and read a math book just for fun?

*  Fred Meyer's garden department is run by an optimist.  They are selling eggplant starter plants in 6-packs.

*  One person can love a book and another person will think it's the worst book ever written, and they'll probably end up in the same book club.

*  Even though I realize it's probably just because there's a door and they're on one side while I'm on the other, I still can't help but take it as a personal commentary when the cats sit outside the shower and howl.