Category Archives: Random Thoughts

It’s a crazy, amazing world.

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Officially, I was out of school on Friday, June 6, as soon as I had my progress reports handed in and my cubicle cleaned. It didn’t feel that way, though.

I turned in my progress reports, cleaned my cubicle, and then took off to pick up Amigo at his sister’s apartment in Lake Geneva. We were on the road home when Amigo realized he’d forgotten his wallet. La Petite met us midway, and we were on track again.

Saturday was a busy day and a napping day. Amigo left for camp Sunday, so he spent Saturday doing his laundry and I helped – a little.

Sunday we took him to camp.

Monday could have been  my first day of Summer Break, but I signed up for a training session that lasted four days. as Thursday ended, I gave a deep sigh of relief.

Then, Friday, we drove to camp to pick him up and bring him home. Still busy, not feeling the break yet.

Saturday and Sunday I did relax a little, but I did it with La Petite. She needed a little moral support for a few days, and I was available.

Well, folks, now it’s Monday, and it’s not going to be a manic Monday. I’m done traveling (for now), and I plan to stay at home, do my own laundry, and weed parts of the garden. I might even sleep in and/or take a nap.  If you’re expecting a lot out of me, you’ll have to wait.

 

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Portion Sizes

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Readers, I know that Blog Basics state “Nobody cares what you had for lunch!” but I’m going to chance it. Due to a rude awakening (99% blocked carotid artery, et. al.), I’m getting serious about keeping my blood pressure down. Task one: monitor the aforementioned blood pressure.

Petunia bought me a home monitor, and I’ve been faithfully using it since I came home from the hospital. Now that I have the numbers and I’ve learned a little about what those numbers mean, I want to move to the next step: do something to keep those numbers low.

In the meantime, I’m paying attention to my eating habits. By using the USDA’s DASH diet, I hope to keep the BP numbers below that mystical threshold. So far, I’m meeting my goal of eating 6-8 servings of fruits and vegetables a day. The tough part: what makes a serving? Well, I did find some guidelines. I think I can handle this.

Fruits and veggies will be easy for the foreseeable future: it’s Farmers’ Market season! My favorite market, the one that spans the entire downtown of my small city, is starting soon. Time to get out the cloth bags! Vegetable vendors, here I come!

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Everything’s coming up — pollinators?

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Directly above my planting table, my storage spot for pots and soil and tools, a few newcomers are moving in.

wasp

wasp paper

They’re gone now. Don’t ask for details. It was a dark night in a backyard that likes to keep its secrets. Guy Noir himself could have staged a Raid and I wouldn’t reveal the details. No one was injured in the sting — well, no humans were stung. That’s the buzz, anyway.

And when my attempt at humor gets that bad, it’s time to stop blogging, wash the dirt out from under my nails, and put down the laptop.

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The Truth about Straw Bales

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I mentioned my dilemma about the straw bales. Did I have the right fertilizer? For that matter, did I have the right bales? We bought them from two different places last fall, and it seemed like one might have labeled the bales Straw when they were really Hay.

Hay? Straw? I’m a city girl, despite my green thumb and green attitude. I didn’t know straw from hay. So I did what a good virtual teacher does; I asked a student and her family for advice.

My students live all over Wisconsin, and several live on farms. I asked about the bales, describing the one set as looking straw-like and the other growing like a Chia Pet.

One of these things is not like the other.

One of these things is not like the other.

I learned that straw is what’s left over after the wheat is harvested and removed from the stalk, and hay is a grass. Yep, that’s it. I can extend this to say I learned not to buy a bale of “straw” at a grocery store. Uh-huh. This batch was left over from a fall display, so the store sold them off for a few bucks each. The rest are from a garden center. I know where I’ll go if I need a set of straw bales again.

Meanwhile, I took time to yank most of the growth from the hay bales. They’ll still work for planting; I just might have to weed them more often than not. And that’s alright. Weeding, after all, is therapeutic, too.

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There’s a map for that – or an app

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Sometimes I wonder if I seem like a diva-type to the folks in the main office in Baltimore. Whenever they ask if I’m willing to be “author of record” on a blog post, I insist on having input into the post before my name goes on it.

This one was no different. The research was already done by someone in the main office or the agency that works with them. I reworded several awkward phrases, inserted some simple explanations to define terms, and made it sound more like me. Since one of the reasons the office calls on me is because my posts are supposedly full of personality, I think I can add my personality if they want to add my name.

Anyway, they managed to link to two of my previous posts (Flat Stanley and Pop Culture),  so I tweaked the rest to make it mine.

Here it is: Navigating the Summer with Family-Friendly Apps.

Don’t get lost now.

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Three Minute Gardening

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Dilemma du jour: straw bale fertilizer.

I bought fertilizer with the right ratio of nitrogen to phosphate to potash. I measured (well, pretty closely) the proper amount. I soaked the bales with my soaker hose every night, every other night adding fertilizer. So why is the fertilizer still sitting on top of the bales and not washing into the middle of each bale the way I expected it would?

Possible answers:

  • Maybe I bought the wrong fertilizer and inadvertently got the time-release kind.
  • Maybe I should be using a hose with nozzle so the water pressure washes the fertilizer down into the deep.
  • Maybe I’m just impatient and should settle down, turn off the hose, and blog instead.

Gardeners? Internet research gurus? Others? What’s going wrong? Or is nothing going wrong?

For now, I’m going to send out a Tweet asking for help. The Twitter-verse is usually good for gardening advice. TTFN – Ta-ta-for-now!

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Rhubarb BBQ Sauce

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The rhubarb is coming up already! It’s not this deep yet, but my day will come. Good thing I used a jar of rhubarb BBQ sauce on a beef roast for tonight’s supper. Mmm. BBQ beef on fresh potato buns from local bakery — that’s delicious. Here you go, folks, an encore from last summer:

I stumbled upon a suggestion one day – rhubarb BBQ sauce. I looked over the ingredients and said to myself, “Self, we have all of these ingredients in the house, including plenty of rhubarb.” Chuck was skeptical at first, but I made some anyway. He tasted it before I went to the trouble of canning, and he pronounced it good.

This recipe uses a lot of rhubarb. I took a look outside to see how much rhubarb we might have, and if I might have enough to make another batch.

Will there be enough?

Will there be enough?

I needed at least 8 cups of diced rhubarb. Did I get it? Here’s the after shot.

After picking

After picking

I have about 6 and a half cups of diced rhubarb now. The dilemma: do I go back outside to pick right now? Or do I set aside the current harvest, maybe freeze it, until the remainder fills out a bit more? Or – cue the ominous music – do I buy a few large stalks of rhubarb at the Farmers’ Market?

Decisions, decisions.

 

 

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Bookstores and Book Spine Poetry

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I’m spreading the word again: the word of book spine poetry. This time, it’s on the national blog from my employer. Please feel free (and feel encouraged) to share, like, pin, or simply enjoy the post. We had a good time making it.

Meanwhile, I picked up a book or two last night. Bookstores are dangerous. I have to stay focused. Walk in, walk out, and only buy what’s on my list. Do not stray from the center aisle. Don’t go near that sale table. Get what I need, then check out, and then leave.

I was doing rather well, I thought. Picked up the two books in the humor section, then headed to the children’s section and asked for the book by title and author. That led me quickly to the shelf with no danger of browsing on the way. Then I headed out to the registers, and I found this.

Read from left to right.

Read from left to right.

The cashier said she’d never set foot on the other side of the counter. She had no idea how much fun some other employee had setting this up.

Now, readers, I suppose you’re wondering. Did I make it? Did I get to the exit doors without buying something on impulse?

Almost.

I bought bookmarks.

 

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