Just a quick "Hello"

A car waiting in a long line outside the window of a Starbucks in Nashville.

We picked our way across western & middle Tennessee today. I took some pics. I'll share next time I have some down time. For now, let me just say you can rest assured that JESUS is doing well in this part of the country.

Tomorrow will be a BIG day for all of us.

I'll ask Miss M. to communicate her thoughts to me throughout the day.

What I miss when they are gone is the almost constant contact and the quiet times in the truck when you check off conversation starting point and reject them all in turn. There are some false starts. But the point is, you're/I'm going away tomorrow. What do you want to talk about? 

We talked a lot about dogs and cats and cooking and baking and gardening and landscaping and vegetables and animals. And nutrition and kids. And family members. 

We did some planting. 

[LANGUAGE ALERT IF YOU CLICK TO CONTINUE]

Looking forward

Day After Tomorrow we drop Miss M. off at MEM and pick our way east. We'll pause & overnight in Nashville, thanks to the hospitality of Friends. We will get up in the morning and turn left. And then, Poof! We'll be in Cincinnati.

By then, Miss M. will have been home in NC for some time. And Daughter C. will be here with Rocky and Missy and Snaps.

If you are inclined to pray, I'd recommend praying for Daughter C. Odds are that Miss M.'s flights will go well, as will our travels. (Still, if you want, say a little prayer for us... .) Daughter C. is going to have her hands full.

Bless her heart.

Priorities

Eleven ingredients (not including those in the made-from-scratch vinaigrette dressing)

4 varieties of lettuce (oak leaf, butter crunch, some French red leaf, & some German sort)

Broccoli raab

Beet thinnings

Celery leaves & flowers

2 varieties of radishes (China rose & ...?)

Yellow granex onion (an official Vidalia onion)

Micro-green flowers

Erika Johnson at Hot Air has a post concerning "food deserts" (so-called). Quoting from Bloomberg, Johnson reports that several large chain grocery stores have reneged on their commitment to opening "more than 1,000 stores selling fresh fruit and vegetables in underserved urban neighborhoods." 

Johnson says, "This is yet another example of nanny-state bureaucrats ignoring the laws of supply and demand and attacking the symptoms instead of the disease." Agreed. She notes a NYT's report of a study dispelling the correlation between food deserts and obesity. She then goes on to say, 

Secondly, if there really aren’t many healthy foods to be found in these areas, it’s only because there isn’t a market for them. For whatever reason, people in these areas do not want to buy fresh-caught scallops and broccoli sprouts. The likeliest over-arching explanation is indeed low-income levels — having the time and money to plan, shop for, and cook nice healthful meals is a luxury that comes with prosperity — but spending taxpayer money to merely improve access to these communities’ foods isn’t going to change that.

[My emphasis]

Storm clouds

Miss M. had never seen a Mississippi Spring Thunderstorm before.

The plan was for us to plant some seeds this afternoon. That will not happen. Maybe we'll bake a cake instead. After all, the kitchen had recovered from the weekend.

Funny stuff

Mr. Big Food's Dad sends this along with the comment

ONLY IN TEXAS!!! Well, maybe in Mississippi, too......

Feel free to share.

Recovery Monday

What a weekend! After preparing for the get together, and then getting together with folks Saturday, we all-- Daughter C., Miss M., A. Leland, Mr. Big Food, and I-- enjoyed a "Lazy" Sunday.

Girls! Take the dogs on a pack walk to the pasture.

Miss M.! Make some delicious bruschetta for us.

Hey you! Have a BIG salad with Sunday Supper.

Truth be told (that's a joke) we did a lot of stuff yesterday. 

Today we recover. We'll begin by recovering the kitchen for the upteenth time.

Some people came out to the Farm today.

There were already some people here. I think we all had fun!

Ham smoked over Hickory

We had to get Mike up to Speed.

Duck gumbo

Corn Hole

Here I gave my camera to Bart.

It's been a fun 24 hours!

This morning Miss M. and I were out on the patio enjoying the morning. Miss M. looked at the tiller that was on the patio and said, "What's that?" Miss M. doesn't know very much about County Life.

I replied, "A tiller."

Later in the morning, Miss M. moved the tiller.

It was a hoot & a holler.

~~

Miss M. thinks we should move the rocks Rocky, the Junk Yard Dog, dug up out of the front bed. Remember that?

~~

Later in the morning, A. Leland came out and we all smoked cigarettes and drank coffee and yacked. ... A. Leland read us a little story. And then he went to Starkvegas.

Miss M. and I also went to Vegas. We did some errands. We went to the Co-Op and bought some s&*^#-- 400 pounds of s&*^# to be exact (10 bags)-- I got a malt, we saw went to Daughter C's office and met some folk, had a beer then supper, went home and found ourselves yacking across the picnic table.

~~

Miss M. was dressed very nicely.

Arrivals

A. Leland has arrived.

Miss. M. has arrived.

Mr. Big Food & I have retired to The Den.

If this isn't enough to tick off the Pope,

I don't know what is.

I highly recommend using straw as a mulch in the vegetable garden. Straw

• retains moisture
• modulates soil temperature
• decomposes, adding organic matter to the veggie plot
• inhibits weed growth
• allows for walking through a wet garden
• keeps fruit such as melon and squash "cleaner" 
• looks nice.

This is #2 Bermuda grass-- what's available in my area. It goes for $7-8/bale. 

That's about 1/3 of a bale that got blowed away.

BIG news!

It is  

BIG news that A. Leland is coming but it is even  

BIGGER news that Miss M. is coming!

  

The corn is as high as an elephant's eye

On our way to Oxford, Mississippi yesterday, I noticed corn coming up in gardens and fields. YIKES! I have so much to do-- company's coming-- and the Clowns think it's time to go for a run in the pasture.

While I'm planting corn, head over to Keep Guessing. Becca has a nice post up about kitchen economy and flavored water.

Signs of the time

I still can't get over that remark from one of our employees. She characterized us-- the citizens of the Hospitality State-- as "disgusting and shameful." She's entitled (isn't everyone) to her opinion, but I think it's ill-mannered to talk this way about your employers.

I was disappointed that there were so many weeds (not pictured) in the flower beds at TSUN.

As I mentioned, we traveled today to That School Up North (TSUN), located in Oxford, Mississippi (not to be confused with the real Oxford). I didn't purposefully go looking for evidence to the contrary-- that we are not disgusting & shameful-- but after reviewing the photos I took, that's what I found. We are neither disgusting nor shameful. (I think there are some grammatical issues in what she said, but it was a Twitter post.)

Granted, TSUN & Oxford are... how to say this?... different from the rest of Mississippi so we shouldn't be too quick to generalize, but still, that's what I found. 

B&N serves Starbuck coffee. I don't care for Starbucks coffee. But it's hardly disgusting. I will say the student body at TSUN used to dress better than they do these days. I guess it's a sign of the times that they look remarkably like State students.

Walk this way.

Champion

 Zoom in. It says, "[T]he heartwood is resistant to deterioration." 

There should be no shame in growing old. That's a normative claim. 

There's a bench beneath the tree.

Loyal Rebel.

I could be wrong about this, but I don't think it's shameful to be loyal to rebellious cause, is it? 

Especially when you have a Creed.

Class of 2005

Disgusting and shameful-- to Believe in Respect, Fairness, Civility, Integrity, Honesty, Freedom, Stewardship.

I make fun of TSUN a lot. But it's a good school.

Lyceum below.

I am disgusting and shameful.

As are Mr. Big Food, Daughter C., neighbor Ken, D.C. and his Piglet coworkers, Christine at the Dollar General, Bro Mike and his congregants, Nancy at the US Post Office, Jesse & Mary at the welding shop, all of the folk who will come out to the Farm for the Event this weekend, and let's not forget our friends at That School Up North (where we will be later today).

On her Facebook page, Voting Section supervisory civil rights analyst Stephanie Celandine Gyamfi says about the people of Mississippi:

“Disgusting and shameful. Hey, that should replace the state motto: ‘Mississippi: Disgusting and Shameful’. . . forget the Magnolia State motto.”

From J. Christian Adams' "DOJ Employee Contempt for Mississippi Citizens on Facebook" at PJMedia. 

Stephanie's miffed that we-- that would be the Citizens of The Disgusting and Shameful state-- voted for voter ID. 

Oh. By the way, Stephie, the state motto is The Hospitality State. But you're not welcome here.

Upper right portion of my FIREARMS PERMIT issued to me by the Sovereign State of Mississippi

Who is A. Leland?

We've We're tired. We worked all weekend. I had the tiller out. I'm fixin' to plant some okra. Mr. Big Food did some hard cuttin'. We're having company. Or so I hear.

A. Leland is to Suzy's left.

We're not in touch with Christopher and Lindsey anymore. But the rest check in from time to time. Max & Diana are married. Kat & Ton are married. Kyle-- bless his heart-- is getting married. Mr. Big Food & I are married. Sam is in a committed relationship with a wonderful young woman and a cartoon dog. Aaron needs to meet Bruno.

Big Life.

~~

Supper was good. Recipes tomorrow.

You know what's really funny?

Editing funny video of funny dogs barking while funny dogs are in the room.

They bark at themselves barking. It's metabarking!

Funny stuff.

~~

I should sew some valances for the windows in this room. I like naked windows, but I think the room would feel cozier to guests if there were valances. Unlike sheers-- which would be my first option-- valances wouldn't obstruct the dogs' view.

"So you want to own a gun (Part Two)"

The Ruger Bearcat

The second installment of Bob Owens' series is up over at PJMedia. This one focuses on taking a non-shooting beginners class to learn basic gun safety and so on. He then goes on to extoll the many virtues of the .22 caliber long gun and handgun. 

If your eventual goal is to obtain a concealed carry permit or to obtain a handgun for personal protection or sport, the course of action I’d suggest is to first look at a handgun chambered in .22 Long Rifle (.22 LR). The .22 LR is an inexpensive, low recoil, and relatively quiet cartridge that allows shooters of every skill level to focus on the fundamental skills of shooting without being distracted by the kick or noise of larger-caliber weapons. I’d advise trying out both revolvers and semi-automatic pistols to decide which appeals to you, which feels more comfortable in your hand, and which has controls that you can manipulate.


At this point, you may notice a very loud wailing and gnashing of teeth around you. In all likelihood, that is the multitude of handgun shooters crying out in anguish at the mention of “.22 LR” in any proximity to a discussion of concealed carry and defensive handguns. Their complaints are not without merit — the conventional wisdom is that the smallest acceptable cartridge for self-defense is a .380 ACP in a pistol or a .38 Special in a revolver. I’m not disagreeing with that sentiment at all.


I’m suggesting you’ll learn faster, and often without imparting many bad habits you have to overcome later, if you learn your fundamentals with a .22 handgun. It’s all about the fundamentals.

I completely agree about the class and the .22.  I didn't like the fact that we had to take the class in order to get our carry permits in Ohio, but I was glad we took the class. Both .22 guns and ammunition are significantly less expensive that other calibers. If you are learning by shooting a lot of rounds, why waste money?

It's a beautiful day. I wonder if Mr. Big Food would like to do some shooting?

"Bring guns, fishing stuff, and wine.

Looking forward to seeing you!" read the invitation.

We are having a Thing next weekend.

Rumor has it A. Leland is coming.

He better not disappoint.

Farm Safety (con't): I've been to Romania. I know.

That, Dear Readers, is an example of a logical fallacy known as the "Anecdotal Fallacy":

You used a personal experience or an isolated example instead of a sound argument or compelling evidence.


It's often much easier for people to believe someone's testimony as opposed to understanding complex data and variation across a continuum. Quantitative scientific measures are almost always more accurate than personal perceptions and experiences, but our inclination is to believe that which is tangible to us, and/or the word of someone we trust over a more 'abstract' statistical reality.


Example: Jason said that that was all cool and everything, but his grandfather smoked, like, 30 cigarettes a day and lived until 97 - so don't believe everything you read about meta analyses of methodologically sound studies showing proven causal relationships.

From Your Logical Fallacy Is which simply explains 24 common logical fallacies. 

In this case, however, I have been to a Romanian farm and I do know. It has nothing whatsoever to do with The Children's safety.

~~

In the last few days, the general blogosphere has become aware of the Department of Labor's attempts to prohibit kids from working on farms-- including (and especially) family farms. I recently posted about it here. Over a month ago I posted some thoughts on the 80+ pages of DOL regulations. Those posts had a bunch of crappy old stuff about tool/farm safety, etc. (The most recent post has links to my posts and other relevant sources.)

I am happy to report that the new regulations-- which would have prohibited kids under the age of 16 from using a power screw driver-- have been scuttled. I'm sure you've seen mention of the decision already, but if not, read about it at The Hill or PJMedia. (Shoot. I had some blogger probs and the links didn't transfer.)

From PJMedia:

"The decision to withdraw this rule – including provisions to define the ‘parental exemption’ – was made in response to thousands of comments expressing concerns about the effect of the proposed rules on small family-owned farms,” Labor said in a statement. “To be clear, this regulation will not be pursued for the duration of the Obama administration.”

 

While not targeting kids under 16 who work in “agricultural vocations,” the Labor Department said it would be setting up an “educational program” regarding kids on farms.

From The Hill:

“[T]he Departments of Labor and Agriculture will work with rural stakeholders — such as the American Farm Bureau Federation, the National Farmers Union, the Future Farmers of America, and 4-H to develop an educational program to reduce accidents to young workers and promote safer agricultural working practices,” the Labor Department said.

As someone once said, "Are you serious?"

It has nothing to do with safety. These organizations already have safety education programs. I know this. They are advertised in the newspaper. Seriously, it's not as if parents and other adults in farming communities want kids to get hurt.

I am not alone in hypothesizing that it is about family farms vs. corporate "farms." [insert missing link] Nor am I alone in noticing the eery, although more subtle (maybe?), similarities to totalitarian takeovers.

"The People's Palace" in Bucharest, the world's largest civilian building (Image from Wikipedia)