Something a little different

From Swiss Pictures Drawn with Pen and Pencil New Edition, Rev. S. Manning, Edward Whymper, illus., The Religious Tract Society, London, 1891.

A little more on Whymper here. 

Climb if you will, but remember that courage and strength are nought without prudence, and that a momentary negligence may destroy the happiness of a lifetime. Do nothing in haste; look well to each step, and from the beginning think what may be the end.

My nickers are in a knot right now.

I'm inclined to agree with Mr. Big Food on this one. This sucks. This is the real Mississippi and company is due to arrive later today. And then there's the conference at Ole Miss. And the reception at the Farm. 

And we have no water.

So there you go. You go vote for Thad on account of all he's done for you. You go. 

First Greens

For the venison burgers tonight as we welcome company to the Farm.

Secure the Perimeter!

Wait! What? Where are you headed?

This is a pretty amazing story! Missy was outside and I realized she was barking which is something she hardly ever does unless... 

"Oh! Marica! That's just not true. I don't need my Dear Friend Rocky to tell me when to bark! I bark at the birds all of the time."

"RUFF!!"

"My apologies, Missy. You do bark at the birds. And today a turtle that was far far away."

"rufffffff"

"You seem surprised."

"Well, as I said, you don't usually bark at much besides birds."

"RRrrruuuufffff ruff!"

"You find that amusing, my Friend? May I remind you that you bark at just about everything. You even bark at Mr. Big Food when he incites you."

"Okay. Okay. How did you know the turtle was way down there by the fence, Missy?"

"Oh my goodness! Couldn't you smell it? It was abominable."

"Wonder if that's the way the males and females find each other?"

"Ruff."

"So you smelled it. Why! I'm impressed, Missy!"

"Thank you. I was just, however, following my instincts."

"Ruff ruff."

"You know, we should talk about that one day-- what we've learned about our instincts."

"We must have a crappy book, sorry-- an old book-- or two about instincts we could read together at reading time."

"Some William James?"

"Lovely! And there's that brand new volume of Henry!!"

"Ruff."

"By the way-- I might have forgotten to mention-- but things are about to get hectic."

"oh. Ha. Um... Excuse me, Marica. I must have been nodding off. We did have a big weekend. "

"Indeed we did. Goodnight, Missy. Goodnight, Rocky."

I Have an Idea!: A. Leland's Melon Patch

This is one of the things that went on this weekend. 

Earlier, I had said:

Here's the situation. We have the space. There's time. What I need is for A. Leland to offer to take over the squash/melon/bean/corn garden that he just tilled up. And I wonder if Miss M would pay special attention to the herb and lettuce gardens? Not asking you to do anything, just let me know.

And then A. Leland found some petrified wood. 

They had to use a vehicle to move it.

And the design of A. Leland's bean-melon-squahs-corn garden just took off from there. 

Us? Civilized?

A civilized society is one that exhibits the five qualities of truth, beauty, adventure, art and peace.

--Alfred North Whitehead

Peace

Isn't that sky lovely?

Thank You!

We got a lot of stuff done this weekend,

thanks to you.

So Matt Explained Why The Sun is Green

And Daughter C is moving to LA. 

I Hope You and Your Family and Friends

had as good a weekend as I.

Easter Sunday Dinner Dessert

Between us, Daughter C & I took over 200 photographs in three days. 

We had friends over. 

I hear tell

there's going to be a produce shortage. And you know what happens when that happens, don't you? Produce prices go up. (I took Econ101. & 102. You can check my college transcripts, if you wish.)

I did serious research.

I'm quite certain I've forgotten something-- though Swiss chard is the only thing that comes to mind-- but I'm hoping to have a banner produce year.

Lettuce: ✔
Avacodos; :-(
Broccoli: Broccoli Raab,  ✔ ✔; other varieties, we'll see
Grapes: Grapes are nice. I don't plan or plant my life around grapes, but grapes are nice. We have several varieties of grapes here in Mississippi. I could live with them. 
Tomatoes: Glad you asked! I planted 34/50 of them today. 
Melons:  ✔ ✔
Peppers:  ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ I reviewed the pepper selection this afternoon with Miss M. As it turns out, I have no green bell pepper seedlings. By the way-- we had a great pepper season in 2013. I pulled one of the last couple of bags of frozen peppers out of my freezer this afternoon. It was dated 9/22. The seedlings look good. I am hopeful.
Berries: What to say here? The dewberries are slow to bloom this year. BUT... We did bushhog late last summer. So maybe there will be a bunch of dewberries-- for dewberry jam. We shall see.
Corn: I've been beaten by corn. I think this will be a better year.
Packaged Salad: We don't grow Packaged Salad here on the Farm.

Oh! That Mache SomethingOrOtherSalad is coming up! So is the escarole. 

And truth be told, it won't be all that long until I'm thinning. And you know what happens when that happens, don't you? We start to eat fresh salad, with homemade dressing.

It's good for Brain Growth.

Brain Growth

Miss M read my most recent Books Bygone newspaper essay column this evening after supper.

For some reason, Miss M found "brain growth" highly amusing.

Here's what got her laughing:

... the questions must not be suppressed, because that means death to intelligence and to brain growth. ...

To which I said:

No grownup in his or her right mind wants to stifle the growth of children’s brains, and so we look to encyclopedias for intelligent answers for our children and ourselves.

"The Kiss of Betrayal"

Lots going on today!

Since tomorrow is Good Friday, lots of businesses and such will be closed-- even State!-- so today substitutes for Friday-go-to-town-day. But first I have to get the first coat on. But before that I must post at least a little something. So I turned to a crappy old book, Christ and the Fine Arts, for inspiration. 

Perfect.

There's a nice little commentary to quote. But before I do that, I need to find the color version of this painting. Easy-peasy, right?

How sad is this?

Three search engines later-- including duckduckgo.com which claims to never track anyone-- and I give up. I've got things to do. 

Christ and the Fine Arts Revised and Enlarged Edition: An Anthology of Pictures, Poetry, Music and Stories Centering in the Life of Christ. Cynthia Pearl Maus. Harper & Row, Publishers, New York. 1959.

WECD

I'm taking over Wednesday Evening Comment Drive to bring you these.

Thanks to all who participated!

The blue sky is for suek who dries her clothes in the sunshine.

For the Fun Loving!

We continue this week's etsy impromptu features with Ivan Werks, the shop owned by family members of loyal reader and frequent commenter (thank you!) 'suek.'

Here are a few of my favorites....

Check out Ivan Werk's shop and if you'd like a different combination, let them know and they'll make it for you. 

What's your favorite etsy shop?

Pass it on

Posted to the shared Pintrest board "G.M.O.Y.A." by Miss M.

What's Happening Now!

That's Mr. Big Food's shop light that he uses to see the grill when he's grilling after dark. I put it up under the covers on the walkup greenhouse.  

"They" "say" it will get below freezing tonight-- maybe even as low as 28 °F. That's cold for tomatoes and peppers and eggplant and tobacco and stuff. 

Let me make a statistical point. There is no such thing as the "average last frost date." That is an impossible statistic, given the nature of the data. And don't even get me started on the Lickert scale. 

That said, it is April 15th! That's the latest last frost date I saw predicted for this region. With all this rain-- and the sun and wind today-- it will frost in places over night.

But I doubt that it's going to get below freezing here on the patio. But that's not the point. The point is, tomatoes and peppers & such do not like cold weather. It is cold. 

Cruel, cruel April

For my friends who are suffering through this on-again off-again spring.

Song

April, April,

Laugh they girlish laughter;

Then, the moment after,

Weep thy girlish tears!

April, that mine ears

Like a lover greetest,

If I tell thee, sweetest,

All my hopes and fears,

April, April,

Laugh thy golden laughter,

But the moment after,

Weep thy golden tears!

--William Watson (1858-1935)

Found while looking for another poem about April in The New Oxford Book of English Verse 1250-1918 (New Edition), Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. Oxford University Press, New York, 1955 (first published 1900).

Just when you think it's safe enough to stay inside...

this happens.

That's one of the buckets the Girls gave me for Mother's Day a few years ago. It's coming in handy. It sits about... two feet from me. There's another bucket just under the ceiling vent up there in front of me. When the sky is falling and I leave the house, I move all of my electronic gizmos into the breakfast room.

So it rained today. A guy came out yesterday to assess the situation. He called today. You just can't do what he needs to do in the rain.

The other day, A. Leland asked if it was always like this-- one thing and then another. I replied that this winter was exceptional with respect to the sheer number of things that had gone wrong.

• We ran out of propane. This never happens.
• The furnace stopped woking.
• Turns out we had a bad regulator.
• We got that fixed.
• Next day, A.L. & I smell gas everywhere. 
• A gas leak explains everything.

Did I mention the busted/frozen pipes so keep the water dripping all night water bill? 

And the dryer that quit? And the dishwasher that would not drain?

And the tomatoes that are desperate to go into the ground but cannot on account of the fact that it's gonna be freaking freezing tomorrow night? 

It's not even safe to go outside!

[Shelter in place.]

etsy 2A

https://www.etsy.com/shop/2ndAmendmentJewelry

Hat tip to Aggie who found the etsy site for 2nd Amendment Jewelry. Thank you!

As you can see, Brenda and Glenda really do create their jewelry in Starkvegas, Mississippi!

Here's the necklace Daughter C got for me from their stand at the Arts Festival this weekend.