Random Rants and Prickly Plants

2012-01-26T05:39:00.000-06:00

It would appear that yesterday I had 160 pageviews on Blogger.

Interesting. Don't know what the hell they found so fascinating, but there they are. If they come back... howdy. Nice to see you. Whoever you are...

Anyway... coming out of over a week of electricity was interesting. I habitually, and automatically, wake up at about 5 AM local time. After merely a week of no electricity, I find myself stumbling around the house NOT turning on a light. Finally, it occurs to me that I do have electricity, and I flip the switch... but damn, it's strange how quickly that happened.

Of course, there was some stuff in the fridge that has to go... but I don't really keep that much in the house. I'm a single guy, who works 8 to 12 hours a day. Not much of what I actually would call 'cooking' goes on here. I try to eat as healthy as possible... but after 12 hours on a road I'm hard pressed to find the energy to open a can.

What's in the house is salad fixins, milk, half & half for my coffee and any piece of meat I can slap in a pan and fry. The meat I usually get on the way home... I don't keep a lot here unless there is a big sale and some of it can go in the freezer. The problem with that is that I have to remember to defrost it.

I don't keep bread around because I don't eat it. Seriously, a loaf of bread will go green before I've eaten 1/4 of it. Plus... I've delivered to the big bakeries in the area. And I know people who worked for them. All that hype about buying day old bread? Nonsense. Your average loaf of white bread is a few days old before it ever hit the store to begin with. Stuff is so full of preservatives it's actually kinda surprising that it CAN grow mold. I'm afraid any carbs I eat are confined to the vegetable ones rather than the grain ones. Potatoes cooked in the microwave are about it. Although, I will confess to occasional strange cravings for Fritos corn chips. Love the things... but I think it's the salt as much as anything else.

Of course... now we're hearing all the hype about Gluten free foods. I don't worry about it too much... like I said... I don't eat much grain anyway. I always gravatated to real veggies and meat. Guess it was from growing up around my Grandmother and her half acre vegetable garden. She fed nine kids from that garden, and there were always quite a few hungry grandkids around when I was growing up...

Don't eat much in the egg department either. If I buy them, I tend to buy a half dozen, and they last a couple of weeks. This I attribute to growing up with my Grandmother again... an egg fresh from the hen house is much, much better than an egg from a grocery store. The color is better, and it acts different when you put it in the pan.

And one of these days... I'm actually going to talk about plants. You'll die of surprise.

I'm back... you lucky dogs you...

2012-01-23T18:25:00.001-06:00

so... I guess I should explain about that last post... especially coming so soon after one of my "depression" posts. No... the big D hasn't raised it's ugly head again, this was the blasted truck... I had a break down, and I had to buy a mondo expensive part for it.

Unfortunately, it came down to this... I could buy the part for the truck to keep working and make more money... or I could pay the overdue electric bill. I figured the part was more expensive and far more important. The Electric Company had other ideas entirely. I was cut off...

So, I know that sounds hideous... but I have that sort of background... out came the old kerosine lamps. Actually, they were already out, but they were filled and actually used for a change, and out of the cedar chest came the old wool quilts.

All I really had to go out of my way for was cooking food... Sterno is actually pretty affordable.

Speaking of affordable... If you go to the hobby stores in the area to find lamp oil... a half gallon costs about 15 bucks. If you go to the Wal-mart neighborhood market... it costs 7.95... or the Wal-mart superstore sells it for 5.95. I figured up how long that would last me, and it comes down to this... those lamps are cheaper to run than a light bulb.

True... they're not as bright, but they are brighter than a candle, and as long as your not reading, you're fine. And the light is warmer... nice and golden toned... really if you're looking into saving a few bucks... look into them. Provided, of course, you can find the oil at a reasonable price... and you don't have rambunctious children and animals that are prone to ramming into furniture and tipping them over.

Regardless, the electricity is back on... and I've learned a few new non-electric tricks to take forward into the future.

2012-01-18T09:25:00.000-06:00

Ugh... life has been challenging lately. I won't bore you with the details... but I'm posting from a friends house and I may be on or off line for the next few days.

Just once, I really really wish for a drama free week... LOL

2012-01-11T20:50:00.002-06:00

This blogger thing is starting to hack me off.

First... thank you all for your lovely comments on my last post... unfortunately... Blogger isn't allowing me to comment on my own posts.

GRRRRRR

Just some thoughts...

2012-01-11T10:45:00.000-06:00

Pardon me as I go on a stream of consciousness ramble here...

It would appear that overnight, I lost one of my followers. Don't know why... I can only assume that the rainbow colored scarf was just too much for them... oh well... If they're that touchy they don't need to be hanging around me anyway... I have strange fits of obnoxiousness and the thin skinned don't bear up well.

I've also been thinking about my depression fits. I've mentioned before that I grew up in a house with an unmedicated bi-polar sibling. I am probably a little more aware of moods and such than most... a few years ago I had it checked out, and, fortunately, I had a Dr. that didn't immediately start prescribing drugs. She ran the tests and came back with the conclusion that yes, I was probably a little depressive, but it didn't seem serious enough to resort to pharmacueticals. This is a good thing, as I've had experience with some of them and I don't always react well to them. She recommended a healthy diet, and learning what would trigger the depressions and avoiding that if possible or learning to deal with it in a different way. She even recommended a few books that might help. And they did.

That's why I avoid holiday parties. Not neccesarily all of them, in particular family centered ones where there's likely to be self-centered teenagers with a high sense of the dramatic. Which, let's face it, is most teenagers. And no, they probably won't throw a full bipolar fit... but things are likely to happen that will trigger a bad chain reaction in my head.

But, I've done a lot of reading and research on Depression. And I'm probably a bit of a sucker for any book that claims it will help me deal with it. Some are excellent. Some are pure tripe. I've found the ones that don't neccesarily talk about depression are often much more helpful. There was a book called "Embracing the Shadow" written by a Jungian psychologist (can't think of the author name at the moment) that was amazingly helpful.

I think I've also mentioned on the blog that I go to a Non-Denominational Church. Our members have had backgrounds in about every belief system out there. And that's good. We are not a 'blind faith' group. We don't neccesarily believe everything that a pastor says to us, nor do we follow like sheep off the cliff. We are expected to think and to discuss. The only requirement is that we treat each others attitudes with respect.

I am lucky that I have the kind of mind that doesn't dismiss things out of hand. When given a new idea, I tend to pick it up, turn it over, look at it from all sides... eventually I'll probably put it down and either abandon it or come back when it's needed. I have consequently learned things that I never would have learned before. What I've always found interesting though is how different sources, different backgrounds and different beliefs often have so much in common. It's that universal stuff that I find so fascinating.

For instance... I was given a copy of 'Eat Pray Love' recently. I had seen the movie, and it was ok... but the book is much better. It's a deeply spiritual book, in a down to earth and often humorous way... heavy on Buddism.

I was also given a copy of "The Secret." The best way to describe it is all of those Power of Positive Thinking type books smashed together, mixed up and condensed.

Another member of the church sent me a link to a website about creativity in general. The web site had a story in it... about a CIA study. It would appear that the CIA put a bunch of people in chairs and made them watch cartoons and comedians and such while they monitored their physical reactions. Anyone who has ever been amused knows that it affects you physically... it releases endorphins and all sorts of brain chemicals... nothing too surprising there. Next, the researchers took a group, and made them hold an ink pen between their teeth. This forces your cheeks up into an unnatural smile or grin... and according to the monitors... the physiological changes from sitting there with their faces forced into a smile were exactly the same as the people who were highly amused. (I should note that the site didn't give me any reference to the actual CIA study, so I can't confirm the source. I hate that about the web.)

Then I remembered in 'Eat Pray Love' that one of her gurus had recommended that she sit and meditate while smiling for about 15 minutes a day, to ensure happiness and health.

And in 'The Secret' they recommended watching comedies and listening to music that made you happy, because happiness attracts more happiness.

I find these areas of common ground in these vastly different contexts fascinating.

I have come to a certain understanding about some things.

People always see what they want to see. A devoutly religious person will see evidence of the divine in everything. A committed athiest will see the lack of the divine in everything. Most of the population are somewhere in the middle.

That sort of thing.

I think I'm about done for the day. I should get on with what needs to be done. Sorry about the rambling nature of the post... I'm afraid I didn't write in my journal this morning and you got one of my journal entries here... LOL

2012-01-09T19:04:00.001-06:00

Well, I haven't been here in a while, have I?

Here's the thing... I got through the holiday season just fine. However, for the first time in my life, I had Post-Holiday depression. Ugh... just can't seem to get away from that big old D-thing, can I...

fine now.

Here's my latest project... I think I mentioned before how I was making scarves for all the church guys. Did that... they liked them, everything is cool... but they were all plain ole 1 color scarves. Then I got a bug up my nose and I wanted to make something colorful... and with the big D looming, I crawled out of the house and bought some yarn.

I made a big ole rainbow scarf.

Pardon the bad cell phone pics...

now... when you buy six skeins of yarn to make one scarf.. you end up having enough yarn to make six scarves. So I made them and I put them in the vehicle to drop off at the flea market next time I was in... and in the meantime, I wore one out. And promptly sold half of them out of the truck when I walked into the bar wearing it.
The thing is... they're really nice scarves. A full six foot long, because a short scarf is completely and totally useless as far as I'm concerned, and nice and fluffy. And evidently worth about 20 bucks each... provided the customer base has had a couple of 'refreshing beverages'

So, I've been crocheting away, and I've given myself a wee case of carpel tunnel in the process, but that'll pass, and now somebody who works at the Dallas Apparel Mart, who represents 5 fashion designers, wants to sell them at his market store and if I actually go into production I have a strange feeling I'm going to be haunting nursing homes trying to get little old ladies to supplement their income with crochet projects... Lord have mercy on us all...

Tire trouble update...

2011-12-11T21:29:00.001-06:00

so... if you read the last post... you know about the tire trouble... and the lack of spare tire and whathaveyou...

I figured the best thing to do was pull off the blown out tire, take the danged thing, with a ride from a friendly neighbor, to the used tire store, and get a replacement, then put the tire on the truck... unfortunately, what I wasn't aware of at the time, is that the last time I'd had the tires changed, the lug nuts had somehow gotten stripped. Which means the blasted things aren't moving.

I got the lug wrench on there... tried to turn it... and the lug wrench snapped... Now, I've heard of lug wrenches snapping before. But I'd never actually known it to happen... but this one did... and unfortunately in the process, my hand rammed into the pavement, and I now have bleeding fingers... one of them actually took a hit right in the cuticle of my nail which is the most esquisitely painful place to get a cut... and it didn't want to stop bleeding.

Fortunately, I grew up on an Army base, and I knew exactly what to do... which is to sit on the curb screaming every curse word you know for the next 15 minutes. Much to the amusement of my neighbors, I assure you.

Finally, cold, frustrated, bleeding and thoroughly pissed off... I called a tow truck and had the thing towed to a used tire place. Fortunately the Corpus Christi job 2 weeks ago paid well and I had the money. I would have infinitely preffered to buy something else with the money... something silly like food or maybe pay a bill or two... but there we are.

2011-12-07T12:07:00.001-06:00

so... a few weeks ago... maybe almost a month ago... someone stole the spare tire on my truck. I don't know why, I'm not aware of a huge black market for spare tires, but they evidently crawled under my truck, cut the cable that holds the spare on with a pair of chain cutters or something and made off with the spare.

I put the word out for another spare, but never heard back and then yesterday, I had a blowout in the middle of the freeway in Dallas. And NO SPARE. Dammit all to hell...

Ended up having to get towed home. Which means the account for my gas is now empty, and since I had my gas money, the other account was used for bills so no help there and I'm waiting to hear from work to see when an advance on my paycheck will come through.

I used to hope for an uneventful week... lately I've been hoping for a single uneventful day... Oh well...

2011-12-04T04:54:00.001-06:00

Ok folks, it's Christmas at the flea market... and here's some of the things in my stall that we have for the holiday shoppers. I wouldn't bother y'all with this sort of thing, except some of you seem to enjoy seeing what I have... I apologize for picture quality. I'm stuck with a mobile phone at the moment... and the red background doesn't seem to condone pics for some reason.

First... there's a set of 8 of these powder horn beer glasses that would make somebody a wonderful present. These are TIARA glass. Tiara / Indiana Glass closed in 2002, and many of their pieces are coming into their own as collectables now... I'm pretty sure these date to the late seventies or early eighties.

Next on the flea market tour is this teapot from Fitz and Floyd. It's a nice majolica piece that is in absolutely excellent condition. No cracks, chips or even the tiny glaze flea bites that are the bane of majolica. It's made to look like a Christmas cottage. More a display piece than anything else... dating to the mid-eighties.

And heres a pair of Fitz and Floyd salt and pepper shakers... I like these because the S and P's are actually usable pieces.

More Tiara glass... this pair of beer steins are marked on the bottom and are in Tiara's 'black onyx'. Definitely mid seventies here...

This pair of Salt and Pepper shakers in the Fitz and Floyd 'Damask Christmas' pattern are in their origional box... which is very important to collectors. Early eighties.

And I actually really really like these... dating to the late seventies, the tumbling reindeer are one of the earliest Christmas sets that Fitz and Floyd put out... there's a pair of candle holders, made to be centered on the table with the five cavorting reindeer surrounding them. I once saw them in someones house worked into a table center with holly and pine, and it was quite striking. These are in excellent condition.

And that's a few of the pieces that we have in the Flea Market this week.

2011-12-04T01:57:00.001-06:00

On Friday, I officially spent 17 hours on the road. The highlight of my day was a 400+ mile 'emergency' run to Corpus Christi. Actually, I would have liked to have just found a cheap hotel room and stayed the night when I got there, but a quick check on my accounts showed that I couldn't really afford the room plus the gas back, so I turned around and came home, ariving about 2 am.

That's one of the frustrating things about this job... yeah I go places, but all I see of them is the warehouse district. True, this warehouse district had an interesting palm tree... but that doesn't really seem worth the trip.

I spent all day Saturday dragging and nursing my knee. Turns out my left knee doesn't particularly appreciate being asked to work a clutch for 17 hours straight. When I woke up, it had stiffened up and didn't particularly want to bend. A heating pad, elastic bandage and a certain amount of cussing seem to have finally convinced it, but today, Sunday, I won't be going to church. I'm just too old to spring back from these things the way I used to. I will however be listing some more on Craigs list... gonna sell off some Fitz & Floyd china that I have around here, and I have no use for. Good thing about working in a flea market... I get tired of something, I have a place to get rid of it fairly easily.

Speaking of Flea Market... There is a new one opening next year, and I've been approached about managing it. Definitely interested.

I'll attach links to the CL listings, or maybe just post some pics, later today...

2011-12-01T18:57:00.001-06:00

well, everybody out there will be glad to know that the elephants in the last post... are sold... so, here's the whole story... I bought that pair for 10 bucks. Because they didn't have tusks.

Believe it or not, I just happened to have tusks at home. Actually, I think they started out as cow horns, but they were in my bit's n pieces box... so I glued them in, and resold the elephants for 25 bucks each.

Well, that's what I do for money. Oh well... if you people had enough sense to save your own elephant tusks, you could have saved a few bucks, right?

2011-11-28T17:59:00.001-06:00

Howdy folks... I've been listing on Craigs List, so I thought I'd drop by and see what everybody was up to.

We list a few items a week on CL for the flea market, so that we can get out of town customers in... Not only from Dallas, but we've had people come in from Louisiana... It's good PR for the stores, and people like CL for some reason.

Here's what's in my stall that is listed...

Well, I like to have funky things in my booth. And elephants are really popular...

note... pic was added on December 9th, because I realized the craigs list link was now dead and I really really really hate posts that are talking about pics & links and things that aren't there anymore...

Black Friday

2011-11-25T18:34:00.001-06:00

I don't take part in Black Friday.

I find the whole concept appalling.

Probably because of things like THIS.

Now, before I continue... this video is a Wal-mart riot depicting people risking life and limb for the right to spend $2 on a waffle iron. And, to be quite blunt, most of the people in that video would do well to lay off the waffles... there aren't many that I'd exactly call slender. But that's beside the point I suppose.

You see, I was raised to believe that Christmas was a celebration of the birth of Christ. Unfortunately, it seems to have devolved into some sort of Capitalist Pig-out. (Don't worry... I'm not going to go off on a Jesus is the Reason for the season rant.)

Now, I'll always admit that there was a certain desperation about gifts. Especially for children. But I don't recall anybody risking injury to get any gifts. This year I have, through facebook, read stories and seen videos of people getting maced, trampled and even a few stories about gun-fire.

Come on people.

So... I'm going to announce now... DON'T BUY ME ANY PRESENTS. The mere thought of somebody risking serious bodily injury for the sake of purchasing somthing for me makes me cringe.

I don't want anything. If you absolutely have to get me something, then make it, or bake cookies or something. There are a few gifts that I have to give, and I'm making them.

You see, when I was a youngster, I developed a case of mononucleosis. This was back in the day when the treatment for mono demanded complete bed rest. I think it was 6 weeks... but to a 8 year old it felt like half a life time. As I lay there, perishing of sheer unadulterated boredom, my Grandmother took it upon herself to sit with me. Consequently, I learned how to knit, crochet and tat. My close friends are recieving hand made scarves. I may send out a few cards. That's gonna be about it.

Now, kids probably need something storebought. Fortunately, I don't have any kids to buy for. If you do, you have my pity. But the rest of you people are full grown adults and if you're one of those people who have an internal calculator that keeps tally of the cost of every present you recieve... grow up or get the hell out of my house, because you're gonna be bitterly disapointed.

Happy Thanksgiving!

2011-11-24T07:50:00.001-06:00

Howdy folks... and Happy Thanksgiving.

Just a quick note before I head out... I'm on my way to a friends house to have a Thanksgiving lunch and then on my way to my nieces to have a Thanksgiving dinner. I'm going to get really really fat today.

But of course, it's difficult to get really really fat all at once, so I'm taking my own tupperware.

Silent Auction Update

2011-11-23T05:43:00.001-06:00

Howdy!

First, I said I would update ya'all on the benefit where I provided a vase for the silent auction. I dropped by event thinking I would have a couple of drinks, maybe bid on a few things... little did I know...

The organizer of the event saw me and said... "Good! You're here!" and set me to work... I spent most of the evening working the room selling raffle tickets. I personally raised about 140 bucks before I had to leave to get sleep... it was a Thursday and I have to work on Friday morning. So, being slightly obnoxious and having some PR experience does come in handy.

Also featured at the event were a few of the local Drag Performers who were also working the room. If you've never been to a drag show, generally the 'girls' get up, talk, fling some tude around, then lip sych a song while collecting tips from the crowd... on the night in question, all the tips went into a bucket and were donated to the cause.

I don't know exactly how much my vase brought in... but the total for the event was $2040 towards the food pantry. And the food pantry people are very good and ensuring that each and every dollar donated is stretched to the max. They'll be repeating this event quarterly, and they've asked if I can help do some PR for it. I have every intention of doing so...

2011-11-17T02:55:00.001-06:00

Started work yesterday with a drive out job... here's the difference. A direct job is when I pick something up here and deliver it 130 miles. A drive out is when I drive 130 miles to pick up something and then drive it back... so, yesterday morning I drove to Wichita Falls to get something that was terribly important and bring it back.

Now, as a courier, I don't always know exactly what's in those boxes. There's very good reason for this... unless it's haz mat or dangerous, it really doesn't matter. I get the box, I take it where it goes. No big deal. Also... there's security reasons... for instance, if I'm picking up a lockbox full of cash, jewelry, etc... and they're only paying me 25 bucks to deliver it... well... they'd just rather not let me know about it for some reason... Eyeballs they'll tell me about, simply because there's very little chance a driver is going to disappear with them. And I'm sure they like to watch some drivers turn green.

So I ran up to Wichita Falls, get to the pick up and watched them pack the box. Two cans of paint thinner. Which prompts the response... "REALLY?" I mean... are they honestly going to tell me there's no paint thinner in Dallas/ Fort Worth? Did anybody think to check with the local Home Depot? Lowes? Wal-Mart for Christ's sake? I mean, for the amount your paying me... I'd be perfectly willing to drop by any of those places, buy the blasted paint thinner and you can pay me back when I get there.

On the other hand... if you wanna pay me a decent sum of cash to drive your paint thinner all over the state of Texas, I guess I can do it... I've certainly done sillier things in my life.

Regardless... I used enough gas that I had to call dispatch and arrange for an advance on the paycheck, since I used up my gas budget for the next two days...

And as grateful as I am that I have a job... I soooooo want a new one...

Rainbows and Eyeballs...

2011-11-15T21:59:00.001-06:00

Well, the title probably sounds far more interesting than it was when it happened... basically, I had a really bad day at work. Only 4 deliveries all day... I'm used to doing a dozen. True, they were good deliveries in that they paid well, but still, there weren't enough of them.

As for the eyeballs... well, I delivered eyes today. There's a vision lab here in the metroplex, if I said the name you'd probably all recognise it, but I'm not comfortable giving out client information... anyway, at various times I have had to deliver eyes to them. Sometimes they're pig eyes from the abattoir where the pigs are butchered... I understand that they extract the corneas and prepare them for human implant. Last week I delivered a box of 70 to them. I have also picked up human eyes from the airport and ran them out there... It's not really as creepy as it sounds. Well, maybe it is, but I'm just over it... anyway... today I went to the lab and picked up a few eyes to deliver to one of the local medical schools.

I'm pretty sure they were swine again, as if you are shipping human parts there are usually haz mat certificates and such... Don't know why human eyes would be haz mat and pig eyes wouldn't, but then I've learned to just go with the flow and not worry about it too much...

So... as I'm driving down the road on what was really a dingy kind of day, with a box of disembodied eyeballs in the seat beside me, lo and behold, I see a rainbow in front of me... hence... eyeballs and rainbows.

And in many ways... that seems to be how my life has been lately... kinda gorey and weird with strange rays of light shining through.

I work very hard at being grateful. I know I shouldn't gripe about my job when unemployment is reaching record numbers and yes I know I'm struggling financially, but here in my county of Texas, approximately 17% of the population is on food stamps... which is a record number. And, according to the news tonight, a large group of the food stamp people are employed, but due to pay cuts and such, they just aren't able to make ends meet anymore. It's depressing if I think about it too much.

So I have a little sign I made to put on my dashboard that says simply... "Be Grateful" The strange thing is... it works. It keeps my mood up. When I pull up to a delivery, I look at it, I am grateful, and I enjoy my customers more. It seems to be changing my attitude. I'm being a little more cheerful, and that makes the customers easier to deal with.

Really, I'm just babbling along here.

Don't know what my point is.

2011-11-14T15:53:00.001-06:00

So... no sooner was I ready to get a new blog started (for the flea market) than my computer developed scizophrenia and by the time that was figured out, I couldn't get on the internet... UGH...

Anyway, it seems to be all right now. But six days without the internet is not something I wanna go through again.

Regardless, I'm putting off the Flea Market blog for the moment. There's a very good reason for this... I'm being actively recruited to manage another flea market... and there's another job offer too... things are starting to look up around here. Not sure about anything yet though.

2011-11-07T10:41:00.001-06:00

Well, the flea market is talking to me about maybe starting a blog for them... It wouldn't be too extensive, probably a weekly post on what's new at the store, maybe pics of the Christmas parties and such... What y'all think?

Just for clarification...

2011-11-06T07:01:00.000-06:00

I apologised for the political rant because I just don't do them... It's been my experience that a Republican and a Democrat can argue all day every day for a solid week, and neither will ever change their mind about anything, despite logic, fisticuffs and tornadoes... (I know this because I've seen them do it, and I still don't know how that tornado was the democrats fault, but there's somebody out there who swears that's the case.) So, in my opionion, political rants are pretty much useless.

Everybody is convinced they are correct and everybody else is wrong. We seem to come to our views as a result of our individual life experience. And that's OK.

When I made this blog it was about some of my things at the flea market.

Then it segued into cactus with the occasional gripe about whatever had crawled up my nose that day... or whatever I happened to see on the road when I was driving that I decided was interesting enough to talk about.

I have, or rather had, an unwritten rule about talking about politics and religion in that these discussions are divisive and, for the reasons stated above, largely useless. And the blogs I read about politics primarily seem to be some schmuck stringing together a few "facts" that are dubious at best to prove their point so they can say... "told you so, na na na na nah na" Not all of them, but a large amount of them. There's some good ones too...

But... I guess the political rant can come under the heading of whatever crawled up my nose that day, so I guess I can allow myself the occasional tantrum.

One thing I do feel very strongly about, both by politics and religion, is that we are all here to help each other. That's why, when I heard that they were having a silent auction to support the AIDS Outreach Nutrition Center, I grabbed this from the flea market stall and donated it...

It's Royal Haegar by Royal Hickman... (BTW... Royal Hickman was one of the designers for Haegar Pottery, and that's where the "Royal" in "Royal Haegar" pottery came from... it's basically a line of better pieces) These vases were produced from 1938 to 1944 and the picture does not do the piece justice... There is no way a photograph can capture the colors... Actually, they've never been able to adequately reproduce Mr. Hickmans glazes. Retail price for the vase is in the 100 dollar range, but no matter what it brings in the auction, it will go to feed men, women and children who are struggling. Most of them are struggling because their medications, without which they'd die, cost about 1200 a month, and insurance companies are often discontinuing their coverage.

I'll give an update on how much it brought it after the auction on November 17th.

2011-10-31T08:51:00.003-05:00

I've worked in a lot of bars in my life. One thing I have learned... no matter how many Vodka /7"s you've had, you should always avoid discussions about politics and religion. Another thing I've learned is that it's easy to avoid them if I confine myself to vodka/7's, but the minute tequilla is involved... all bets are off...

I have strong politcal beliefs... and I'm an army brat who was raised to believe that if you don't take part in the system then you have no right to bitch about it... so I vote. I was also taught that the voting booth is confidential, and that you have no obligation to tell ANYONE who you voted for.

I also go to church, but I know people from all backgrounds and religions. Among my friends I know Athiests, Pagans, Wiccans, Islamics, Buddists, as well as the full spectrum of Christians. I don't try to convert them... they don't try to convert me. We get along just fine, If I'm absolutely honest, the church I go to is non-denominational, and several of our members have one or more of those belief systems in their past. I'm pretty sure that there are very few of our members who found their way to our church on a smoothly paved road. That's part of our strength.

The Occupy movement is interesting. I'm not saying that I agree with it, and I certainly have no intention of pitching a tent in the park... but I find it fascinating to watch.

I've been keeping track of the local movements... there's one in Dallas and one in Fort Worth... the latter being smaller but also closer, I've probably paid more attention to it. I also, through their facebook pages mostly, keep track of some of the other movements through the country.

I agree that there are serious problems with the economy.

My personal experience is this... there is nothing I'd like better than to get a new job. I'm over qualified and over experienced to be a courier. I've been applying for jobs at a rate of at least 2 or 3 a week for over a year. People want to hire me. Part-time with no benefits. And no... they can't give me regular hours or a schedule, because that would mean I'd be able to get another part time job, and they don't want that. So I'm stuck driving 5 days a week, and working at the flea market one day a week. At least for the moment.

And I'm doing better than many people I know.

I personally know people who have a bachelors degree and are working at McDonalds.

I know a single mother with a college degree in psychology who is working as a bartender.

I know someone who has paid his insurance for over 15 years, only to have it cancelled when he was diagnosed with a life threatening condition.

I know so many of these stories... that they're sadly typical.

Somethings gotta change. Maybe the Occupy movement will be some sort of catalyst for that. Maybe it won't, maybe it's just a way for people to express their frustration.

I do know that I don't wanna hear about any marines who survived two tours of duty in Iraq, getting their skull cracked open with tear gas canisters, as happened in Oakland.

I know that if Groups can drive in from out of state to stand by the road screaming "God Hates Fags" at people, then the residents of the state should have the right to stand by the road with a sign when they get off work at the warehouse.

So... I'm watching the movement. I'll see what happens.

And I apologise for going off on a political rant.

and it blooms again...

2011-10-08T19:31:00.000-05:00

This is the second bloom from my Stapelia gigantea... tomorrow might actually be more impressive, as I think the other four buds on the plant will all open at once then..

It's one of my favorite plants, not only for the impressive flowers, but for the sheer ease of growing the thing. I yank it inside in the winter and ignore it. Then I put it outside in the summer... and ignore it, apart from it getting some water occasionally.

And, every fall, it pretty consistently puts these flowers out. Not bad, huh? Now, I'm not getting as many blooms as normal, we had a killer summer. But I didn't fare as well as normal this summer either... so what more can I ask, right?

The plant carries the common name of Carrion flower. This is due to the fact that it does smell like rotting meat. There are some people who prefer the name of Starfish flower. These are the kind of people who try to change the name of Datura Inoxia from Devil Apple to Angel Trumpet. I find these renamings silly. Listen... you can call this plant "sweetheart with a bow on top" but it doesn't change the fact that it looks unearthly, and it smells like something dead. Carrion flower is what I've always called it and always will.

Just Saying...

2011-10-06T20:12:00.002-05:00

almost a month!

2011-10-04T22:46:00.000-05:00

Wow! How did that happen?

well, a week of it I can account for... I spent it house-sitting at a friends house in Burlesson... actually, dog sitting with two of the stupidest canines on the face of the planet... I will redily admit that Cocker Spaniels are not my favorite breed of dog. They're kinda like the Anna Nicole Smiths of the dog world... pretty, and they do what they do... But lets face it, nobody ever expected Shakespeare from Anna Nicole.

And these two were no exception... I'd been sleeping there for 3 nights, and feeding them every morning and evening... and every time I came in from work they had no bloody idea who I was... finally, on the fourth day, they seemed to realize that this was the guy with food... about the sixth day they decided that I was definitely not there to kill them and I might actually be pretty nice... oh well.

The rest is just me being busy I guess. As Grandma would say... "Runnin' round like a chicken with it's head cut off..."

Other than panicky dogs, the house sitting thing was actually a relief. There's something about being in a house that you're familiar with, but isn't yours, that just relaxes you. And the fact that the only computer out there is a laptop with a tiny little keyboard that my manpaws couldn't manage gave me a break from lots of things.

Furthermore... it was also an excuse to not do things that I didn't wish to do but was somehow obligated to do... What? Oh I'd love to watch a 50 year old movie at church with a bunch of 10 year olds while eating cheese sandwiches and drinking Kool-aid.. Really, there's nothing I'd like more. But you see... I have to drive all the way to Burlesson to house sit. Can't let those sweet puppies starve now can I? Although, Burlesson is only 15 miles from the church, so that was pushing it... but you get the idea...

2011-09-06T19:11:00.002-05:00

well, I'm happy to report that I'm in a much better mood... I think it's primarily because the heat wave has broke. On Sunday, it topped out at 95 degrees. And it was a relief, let me tell you... I know, 95 a relief? How sick is that?

Regardless, Monday was mid-80's... and Monday night it got down to 59. I actually was a little bit chilly when I got up. And it felt WONDERFUL.

Today, Tuesday, high 80's... and I'm feeling just fine.

Now... about that last post... afraid I didn't come off too well in that... Sorry... not perfect... You will be glad to know that church guy and I are just fine. He's back on his meds. I read my scriptures in church. Everybody survived... actually I went over and stayed with above-mentioned church guy over the weekend. It's not that I'm a self-centered, foul tempered uncaring person... well, a little, but I was having my own issues that particular day.

In preparation of my move, the large, hard to handle cactus are gradually being distributed among various plant sitters. That way, there won't be a mad rush to move several hundred pounds of well armed botanica all at once.

Hildy is blooming for her host. She always was an accomidating house guest, and I may have a bit of a problem getting ole Hildy back...

2011-08-27T21:04:00.001-05:00

I have not had a good day.

A flea market day at the end of the month is rarely much fun... add in that everybody has been spending all their money on school supplies, and the heat is sapping whatever energy everyone has left, and it just doesn't add up to huge sales... but still, we were busy in a very strange way...

It started when one of the local 'homes' stopped by with a busload of people that are 'challenged'

They bought a few things. And paid for them with an astounding collection of pennies, nickels, dimes and the occasional quarter. And some of that change was... sticky... lets just say that the hand sanitizer was very popular today...

And while this was happening, a church guy has been having a battle with depression issues, which I'm afraid to say I strongly suspect are more about his sense of drama than any real issue I can see... and after about the 4th text telling me about his total inability to sleep the night before, I responded that I was perfectly willing to cure his insomnia by knocking him out cold with the nearest heavy object. (I can be very warm and nurturing at times... with proper warning, When I'm not driven to distraction. And provided you're a cactus and not a full grown person who has stopped taking their medication.)

And of course, about 20 minutes after that, I recieved notice that the church would very much like it if I would read the Biblical Scripture during church service. Now, those of you who remember the Archangel Gabriel moment, may remember that these things always seem to be thrust upon me when I have just said or done something that is most vehemently Not Christian... and threatening to knock someone unconscious would probably qualify for that.

And to top it all off... Little Bit... which is what we call one of our regular customers behind her back, came in at exactly 15 minutes to close, and began her favorite tactic of placing items priced at 10 dollars on the counter and announcing she was only paying two dollars. It hasn't worked at any time in the last 2 years, but she keeps trying. Gotta admire her persistance, God love her.

She invariably pays the marked price... eventually... and I was 30 minutes late getting out of there.

I have one nerve left, and I would strongly advise anyone out there to STAY OFF OF IT.

Last night... a small miracle occured...

2011-08-13T20:26:00.000-05:00

It was all very confusing... I walked out of he house this morning and the first thing I noticed is that it didn't seem quite bright enough outside. And it wasn't as hot as usual...

then, I felt something on top of my head. A little cold spot suddently appeared... then another and another... on my head, my shoulders, my back... I looked up and something hit me in the eye... not unpleasantly mind you, but still, it was jarring...

turned out to be... WATER.

What is this? Is my neighbors sprinkler system being a little overzealous? No, water is coming down everywhere... terrified I ran into the house and turned on the TV...

Turns out that this mysterious phenomenon is called 'rain'

seriously folks... rain for the first time in well over a month feels miraculous. And you have no idea how good 85 degrees feels when it's been in the mid hundreds for weeks on end. It lifts your soul not to be oppressed by the very air that you're trying to breath.

2011-08-02T22:44:00.000-05:00

so yep... it actually hit 110 degrees in the Dallas Ft.Worth Metroplex today... unfortunately I missed this great historic event as I was driving up to McAlistar Oklahoma... where, at 3 PM it was a mere 107... HAH... I laugh at 107... WIMPS.

Raced back to Ft. Worth, because I'd been invited to dinner at one of the church guys house.

Now, this particular church guy has these dinners almost weekly. I enjoy the company. I enjoy the food... usually, but we'll get to that... I don't enjoy the wine.

He invariably serves chardonay.

I hate and despise anything chardonay. Now yes... I will admit that there are very subtle nuances to it's flavor... sometimes its a hint of kerosene. Sometimes it's turpentine... on one very memorable occasion, I would have sworn that someone had poured a glass of chilled vintage gasoline. But, according to my tastebuds... it's all distinctly oily and petroleum based. It doesn't taste like anything that should be in my mouth.

I have tried every subtle way of letting this be known. I have had loud, easily overheard conversations obout the lack of merit of chardonay... I have taken one sip, sat the glass on the table and drank water for the rest of the meal. I have even, three weeks ago, brought a fairly espensive bottle of wine along... that is still sitting on that mans kitchen counter...

Tonight, as I was speeding towards Ft. Worth and dinner, I made a quick call from the road saying that I'd be about 15 minutes late. I texted another guy that was going to be there and said I'd see him there but I was running late.

I get there... only 10 minutes late actually, go to the table, and commence to dig in. Or try to. What's this?

"It's Moroccan Chicken..."

"There's chicken?"

Then the guy who I had texted said... "Oh, well we figured you weren't coming, so I ate it"

"I said I was gonna be late..."

"We didn't think you'd make it back from Oklahoma this quick."

"I drive places quickly for a living."

Blank stares all around.

Finally, after a little digging, half of a chicken thigh was located. There were also four chunks of potato and some carrots with what appeared to be onion gravy on them.

I was offered cous cous which I declined. I've eaten a lot of cous cous in my life, but I have to admit I've never tasted any of it. Evidently, the tastebuds that taste petroleum in the chardonay also refuse to acknowledge the mere existence of cous cous. I also didn't eat the pita bread, but that's because I'm not a bread eater. We didn't have one of those families that had bread on the table at every meal. Actually, it was rare. I evidently just don't have the habit of it.

And then, of course, the inevitable glass of chardonay. I'm afraid that after the polite sip, setting the glass down was a bit of a thud, followed by a lunge for the water glass tho... this glass was distinctly on the chilled gasoline list.

Anyway... excused myself as soon as possible and headed to the nearest fried chicken joint. It may not be "Moroccan" but it's damned good.

I had a few drinks and I think I woke up in hell...

2011-08-01T21:55:00.000-05:00

No, really...

Today the weather man was predicting 106, but the temp officially reacged 107 degrees, and the thermometer in my back yard read 113. We're not even going to talk about the heat index. Tomorrow... they're predicting 110. Please God help us all...

Now, I know what some of you are thinking... you live in Texas... what are you griping about. Trust me, these temps are record breaking. The usual case is a few days hitting a hundred in July... we've now had aproximately 30 days solid of it... and there's no summer storms. There hasn't even been a heavy dew. There are big burned patches by all the highways. Even the cactus are suffering, many look like half inflated balloons, and no amount of watering seems to be helping.

Yesterday, I washed a pair of jeans, put them on a hanger, and hung them from the eaves of my house. They were dry in 15 minutes and I'll swear to it in court on a stack of bibles.

I'm pulling every trick I know to keep cool and hydrated, but I think I may be losing the battle...

Everyday, I pack a little cooler with frozen bottles of water and bottles of fruit juice. Juice is better for you than those sports aides which are full of corn syrup. And they taste better. (Quite frankly, I can't choke Gatorade down.) And if you buy the fruit juice in big bottles or in frozen concentrates, then refill bottles at home, it's much cheaper, and you're saving the landfills from all those hideous single serving bottles.

I also take frest fruit of somekind. A banana is good... most fruit juices don't have the potasium that you need when you're that hot, and a banana can replenish you. Sometimes, I take cherry tomatoes... I can eat them like grapes and they're a great potasium source too.

I also take peppermints. Those little startlight mints actually make you feel a bit cooler. Of course, Altoids can give you a cold jolt! Some people almost find it painful!

I also pack a plastic bag with 3 or 4 wet bandanas in there... if you get too hot you wrap a wet bandana around your neck and you feel much better. Lately, I've been putting a capful of rubbing alcohol in the bag with them... it helps. I also keep hand sanitizer in the truck... it's rubbing alcohol too... NowI know... they say putting rubbing alcohol on your skin will dry it out. Listen, I'm sweating faster than I can drink sometimes, my skin is consequently extremely oily. If it was 70 degrees... I'd worry about drying my skin out. It's bloody 106 already!

Every day when I come home, I take a special cool bath... now, this is gonna sound strange, but I'll explain it... Three or four inches of cool water with two capfuls of mouthwash in it.

here's the thing... the blue mouthwashes, like Scope, (although I tend to buy the store brands that are identical but cheaper) contain Eucalyptol, Menthol, Methyl salicylate and Thymol, in addition to alcohol. Eucalyptol and Menthol are both great for cooling down the skin, and these ingredients are all stong antiseptics. What most of us smell like when we're skanky sweaty isn't our sweat, but the bacteria growing on our bodies and feeding on the sweat... now, I don't claim to smell like a rose, but I don't smell as bad as I used to. No, you're not going to sanitize yourself, everything is diluted in all that water, and it probably isn't advisable to sanitize yourself, but you will seriously keep it under control, and when you're sweating buckets, that's neccesary.

Then I do a quick rinse, again cool water... quite frankly when it's this hot outside, the water that comes out of the tap marked cold.... ain't cold... but again, hot showers actually promote bacteria growth, and quite frankly you're sweating when you go in and with a hot shower, you're sweating when you get out.

And... a cool shower actually feels good. I know, there's all sorts of jokes about cold showers, but it ain't any colder than jumping in a swimming pool.

And now... that's more information than any of you needed to know about my grooming habits. LOL

a random post about nothing at all...

2011-07-29T16:11:00.000-05:00

you ever had one of those days when living in a cardboard box under the highway actually sounded like it might be a good idea?

I mean, I always assumed that the homeless were under the overpass because they had no other options... It's starting to dawn on me that at least a few of them may be under there because they needed to get away from this batshit crazy world we live in.

Well, I had that feeling today. For a few minutes at least. Then it dawned on me... I couldn't live in a cardboard box. I'd have to have plywood. Which entails finding some plywood, some 2 by 4's and some nails... and then it all started to look like an actual project, and I have to many projects already, so there we are.

we're on the 28th day straight of over 100 degrees outside, with absolutely no rain, and that's probably got a lot to do with my grumpiness. Because, somehow, even with no rain, we're still getting high humidity. Don't know where it's coming from. There is a tropical disturbance on the coast, that might give us some relief when it makes landfall... the church guys are praying for it. I don't quite know how I feel about praying up a tropical storm over Corpus Christi... but on the other hand the beach bums should be prepared for hurricanes so they're on their own.

Now, this is a blog about gardening, right?

Got nothing.

How about a cut rate decorating tip... go to your local thrift store and get cheap florist vases that are either colored or painted glass... gather them in a group in the middle of a table, put a tea light in each, and they suddenly turn into really cool 'lanterns' They're deep enough to protect the flame if you put them outside for garden parties too... not that there's any garden parties happening in this heat

sunflowers in the morning....

2011-07-21T20:24:00.000-05:00

So... I know it's not the prettiest pic around, but I've found, as I've gotten older that pretty doesn't always matter to me anymore. I really really like these wild sunflowers...

I don't know for sure how they origionally seeded in my yard, but these are the wild variety of sunflower that grows in fields throughout Texas... not so much in cow pastures, as cattle seem to delight in the seedlings in the spring.

Usually, In the spring, I have hundreds of these seedlings along a wooden fence and I fastidiously clean them out to one or two plants. This year, I got delayed, and they were 3 to 4 feet tall before I got to them. A few got crowded out naturally, but the rest came up and were blooming before I even had a chance to think about thinning them, and the flowers were so cheerful perched above the velvety green leaves

that I left them thinking they weren't doing any harm.

Now they're going to seed, the leaves are browning, and they're decidedly ugly, weedy looking things anywhere from 4 to 8 feet tall... and I would definitely be out there with machete in hand if it weren't for one thing...

Every morning, I sit and watch cardinals, song sparrows, purple finches (they call them purple, the males have a raspberry red head and a decent little chirping song) and the mourning doves come and have their breakfast. I've even seen house wrens and mockingbirds come down and search out insects, and particularly the ants that seem to colonize the stems. It's really quite fascinating to watch them.

I used to put out bird seed. But the Grackles and English Sparrows would attack the feeders. These two species don't seem to be bothering my sunflowers.

So yes, the sunflowers, at this particular stage of their life, look ugly and weedy. But I'm leaving them. I enjoy them too much...

Cactus flowers...

2011-07-14T08:01:00.000-05:00

finally... something plant related!

2011-07-13T18:42:00.000-05:00

and a cactus plant at that... although, it is one of my old faves... and by checking my stats... I can also see that it's one of the most popular posts I' ve ever made too....

Hildy... aka Cereus hidmannianus... will be opening her blooms tonight...

and I still haven't got a camera. will have to see what we can do with a porch light, a flashlight and a cell phone... but we're gonna give it the ole college try...

WORE OUT

2011-07-05T22:19:00.001-05:00

I swear, there are times when I go to work just to get some relaxation!

Of course, as soon as I swore to myself that I was going to get back to blogging more, and had even gone so far as to make a separate blog for my devotionals... (see last post) the blasted modem on my computer decided to develop schizophrenia. It would connect, then it would disconnect, then it would connect again... basically flipping on and off like a demented strobe. Quite maddening.

I was really looking forward to the July 4th weekend... I had been invited to a party for the fourth that promised to be fun, and it's traditionally a good weekend at the flea market... I dared to hope for a little fun.

Then a friends father passed away.

The funeral would be on Sunday... they had the choice of Sunday or Independence Day... if they wanted anybody to show up, it had to be Sunday. It was also in a small town in east Texas, about a hundred miles away.

Now, this particular friend, his wife and his daughters had been a huge support for me when my Mother passed, and there was no way in hell that I was not gonna be there for them.

It was not the most pleasant experience, well, it WAS a funeral, but it was definitely an interesting one in a kind of lugubrious way, and I'm actually working on writing it up into a short story, so I'm not going to go into great detail now... but I will say this.

I have mourned among the rednecks. And then, I ate catfish...

The Saturday before was pretty standard at the flea market... only a few minor squabbles.

The party with the church guys was more fun than most people would probably think... I mean... for most of us, myself included, a room full of Christians is not the first thing that comes to mind when you think party, but we're a fun group. And when one of said Christians if trying to figure out the best way to make mojitos, it helps. We couldn't let his various experiments go to waste, now could we?

But... I'm tired. Way too tired. I need some sleep...

The devotionals...

2011-06-28T19:51:00.000-05:00

I had mentioned before that I was writing some devotionals for my church... a few of you asked if you could see them.

I wasn't entirely happy with the idea of posting them here tho... so I've made another blog so you can look at them if you're interested in such things...

Haven't quite finished with the design of it... very much a work in progress... and there's only one on there so far... but HERE IT IS

flea market stuff...

2011-06-25T20:49:00.002-05:00

Well just one flea market stuff...

Got a wonderful vintage TV lamp... from the 50's... perfect condition.

bad pic... the boat is actually brighter yellow... and there's a place in the top for a plant... most of these I saw growing up had a plastic ivy in them... the light, which shines from inside, is red...

Can't find the maker, but it's in perfect condition, and I've priced it at 45 bucks.

Anyway... hadn't posted for a while, so I had to post SOMETHING and there we are.

2011-06-06T21:53:00.004-05:00

Well, here's a surprise...

Last year, out of the kindness of her heart, Julie, that wonderful lady over at A Succulent Life, sent me a Gloriosa Lily...

I am ashamed to say that I thought I killed it. I neglected to dig it up in the winter as I'm supposed to in this zone. I'm a bad plant parent. I am a bad plant recipient. I should be taken out and beaten soundly. But, I thought to myself, there's a very thick layer of straw mulch over that tuber... maybe by some miracle it survived our record breaking cold weather this winter.

This spring, nothing.

But, evidently, the thick layer of mulch was enough. Imagine my surprise when this morning I walked out and saw this dangling over my head in the carport...

There's still not a shoot showing by the ground though. What happened, is that evidently, the lily sprouted and sent it's shoot up inside the hollow metal pole that holds up the carport... and after it reached the top, it grew out and began blooming...

Determined little thing, ain't it?

a bright shiney morning...

2011-05-25T10:14:00.004-05:00

Don't get all excited... I don't have a new camera yet... can't justify the expense because of other stuff going on in my life. This is a really crappy cell phone pic.

yep... the peanut cactus, 'rose quartz' is blooming it's fool head off after the HUGE storms last night... here in my part of Texas, we just caught the tag end of the things... through the midwest... well parts of Oklahoma came might near to being scraped off the map as far as I could

tell.

But these cheered me up a little this morning, and quite frankly I needed it... not gonna go into details at the moment, but let me say this...

My Grandmother, who was a very wise woman, always said... "The good Lord don't give you any burden you can't carry. But there are times when I've wished He didn't have such faith in me." Let's just say... I know what the hell she was talking about and leave it at that, OK?

driving...

2011-04-27T18:37:00.004-05:00

I forgot my phone at home today... by the time I figured it out, I was 20 miles away and in the middle of a delivery... not possible to go get it.

At first... there was a sense of panic. What if there's an emergency? What if I have a flat tire? What if something happens to a friend and they can't get ahold of me? The last is a legitimate concern. A couple of them are prone to assuming that anyone out of phone range is obviously lying in a crumpled broke pile in a ditch bleeding to death.

And what if I needed to call someone for work... Occasionally, on a delivery, I have to get in touch with someone for assistance. OK... about twice a month... but still, it happens...

But then, inexplicably, I felt a sense of calm come over me. I heard a voice in the back of my head say... "YOU"LL BE FINE"

Got a flat tire? Change it.
Someone can't get a hold of me? They'll call later.
I need to call someone for work? Find a pay phone or better yet... let the dispatcher call them.

I relaxed.

And I enjoyed it.

There's something amazingly and wonderfully liberating about not being at the planets beck and call. It's totally amazing how much the phone bleeping at you interferes with your day.

I drove around. I made my deliveries. I joked with warehouse guys, without having to worry about returning a text. I sang a whole bunch of songs I remembered. (This is actually almost a psychological breakthrough... I have major childhood traumas around singing... don't ask...) I had a great day.

It's true, when I walked into QT and they had 5 liter boxes of wine on sale for a buck... I'd gone in with the idea of buying a lotto ticket, but quite frankly, the odds are better on a box of wine... I really did want to send a message to a church guy. But I can text him later. Or maybe I'll have a glass or three of wine and not worry about it. Hard telling...

And when I had an hour without a delivery, I pulled out a pen and a piece of paper and started writing down an idea that had occured to me for a church devotional. (I sent in a couple during lent and they asked me to keep em coming... oh well...)

Don't get me wrong... I'm not going to start leaving the phone at home. There are legitimate reasons why I might need it on the road. But... I may be turning it off for long stretches of time.

2011-04-26T21:14:00.002-05:00

Well, Good Friday was actually OK...

Last year on Good Friday, I made a single delivery, so I took this one off.

Went to rummage sales, found a few good things, and took myself to the flea market to price them and then, changed shirts to go to Tennebrae... now I guess I should tell you what Tennebrae is since I've had to tell about everybody else... Tennebrae is the old name for a good Friday service. Basically, it's a sunset service where you go over the Passion of Christ in reading and songs, while the lights are gradually turned off in the church, until, at the moment of sunset, which is the moment that Jesus died, all the lights go out. At the beginning of the service the altars, and all the crucifixes are draped in black... basically, the church goes into mourning.

It's a very deep and emotional service, that is usually only performed in what's refered to as 'High" churches... Catholic, Episcapalian, Anglican, Orthodox and some Lutheran... but it's actual form varies, and many churches are passing it over. Seems it depresses people.

Anyway, after Tennebrae, we went out for a drink... Really, what's a funeral without a wake, Right? Just kidding, but we were all together on a Friday night, so what the heck...

Saturday, I worked at the flea market all day... had a good day actually...

Easter Sunday was... different...

I'd never been to a Sunrise service before, and we were having one in the churches rose garden, so I decided I'd crawl out of bed at 4 AM... well, for various reasons, I was late... got there just at the end of it. But, even though I was late for the service, I was there in time for the breakfast (some people fast from Tennebrae to Sunrise on Easter, so breakfast is a big thing) and I'm not one to pass up free food, so eggs, sausage and biscuits and gravy.

I decided I'd go ahead and stay for the 9 o'clock service... I didn't really want to go home and come back for my usual 11 o'clock. One of the Assistant Pastors came over and asked me if I'd mind carrying a banner in the procession.

See, after the black drapes are taken down, the chior comes in, in procession, followed by six huge banners that are placed around the sanctuary. I say sure... and after I've placed my banner and am making my way to the pew... the head usher grabs me and co-opts me to replace an usher who didn't show up.

So, I have to pass communion, collect offerings and basically stand at the back of the sanctuary for an hour.

Here's the problem. In true Easter tradition... I am wearing new shoes. And I've been wearing them for several hours. I started out standing in the back all right, but by the time it was all over... NO MORE.

So off for the between service coffee hour where I can sit down and rest my feet when suddenly... Asst. Pastor shows up again, and I'm not really given the choice of whether I want to carry a banner again. I did, however, fairly loudly, refuse to usher again. Primarily by barking before they got the question out.

After all this, I went to an Easter lunch at a church guys parents house, and Thank the Lord, everybody there had kicked their shoes off and I was able to finally get mine off too...

and that was my Easter. Not too exciting, but there we are.

music...

2011-04-12T19:10:00.003-05:00

Well, I don't usually inflict my rather bizarre taste on the world at large, but this video from Florence and the Machine made it through... 1) Amazing voice... 2) Amazing song... 3) and as far as I'm concerned... bright blue go-go dancers with brooklin girl wigs are perfection personified... Besides, I looked over my last few posts... and I need to lighten up!

well, I had this big long post...

2011-03-30T18:53:00.005-05:00

but I had to delete it... I looked at it and said, "What the hell are you whining about?" To be blunt, it touched on 1) church politics... which are boring to anybody not involved and not all that fascinating to those who are... 2) the trials and tribulations of working 10 to 12 hour days... which I'm sure many of you already know about and don't need to be reminded of... 3) and then there was a good dose of POOR ME, boo hoo boo hoo... I don't know why anybody out there would want to read that. I don't want to read that. But, I have been working too much, and the yard has fallen behind, and even if it hadn't, I still haven't gotten around to getting a camera. Did take a nice long drive to Temple TX to deliver some pieces of metal to a factory that I'm sure is going to make something absolutely fascinating out of them, but I have no idea what. It's frustrating delivering to these places. I'm sure there's lots of wonderful things in all of them but I never get to see them as I have to drop and/or pick up and run... but such is life. As soon as I get a camera, I'll be back in full force... the Mammillaria sonorensis v. craigii in the front yard was lucky enough to survive the winter and is setting buds, and the Escobaria missourensis is also... but this winter, while it didn't produce as much snow as last year, was much colder than last year and a few of my plants didn't make it, so I'll be replacing some and propogating some others and replanting. After I've had a nap or two...

Walking Cactus?

2011-03-05T08:07:00.002-06:00

On 20 legs no less....

Of course, it's not really a cactus... not a plant at all... and it's not alive anymore...

but it is intriguing enough to catch my attention... seems they found an ancient worm creature fossilized and all here's the link to the NPR story...

Whatever have I been doing?

2011-03-03T16:00:00.003-06:00

The answer to that question is "Not much of any interest to anyone but me..."

Sorry about that...

The truth is that I'm working and working and working... and as much as I want a new job, I haven't had time to even think about applying for one. The only time I have is on Sunday afternoon... and I usually spend that asleep.

I work, I go to church on Sunday and to the classes when I can drag myself there... These are from one of the classes on a Wednesday...

They're an Anglican Rosary... We strung them ourselves at the class... my little summary of the class is this... Almost all major religions of the world use some sort of prayer beads, to repeat a prayer or mantra. In the mid-eighties an Episcopal pastor, during one of their study groups, created these, and they've been slowly catching on ever since. To find the complete history of them, and other stuff like suggested prayers and how to make them... go here

Anyway... my church is non-denominational... and the former Catholics were missing their rosaries... for no good reason really, none of the rest of us are stopping them from saying them, but they missed the communal rosaries that are often said in Catholic churches and most of us just don't know what it's all about, and the former Baptists, Methodist, etc... who do know what it's about aren't objecting, they just are most CERTAINLY not praying to the virgin Mary.

The Anglican Rosary or Protestant Prayer beads are a very nice compromise. As you can tell by looking, there aren't as many beads, and they aren't as large as most rosaries that you see. You go through the entire strand 3 times. And while the church has distributed prayers that we will all recite together every Monday during Lent if we choose to participate, there are no hard and fast rules for saying them. You can make up your own prayers. You're kind of expected to actually. So while I have memorised the prayers the church sent out, I made up my own for myself... for several reasons.

1) the prayers the church will be saying during the mass are heavily focused on mercy. The phrase, "Have mercy on me..." is chanted a hundred times during the rosary... and while I'm not perfect, I don't think I need THAT much mercy. I just don't feel that pitiful.

2) The prayers are all directed towards Jesus... which I don't object to by any means... It's just that I had the sudden realization that even though I was definitely raised Christian, our church prayed more to God than Christ. Primarily because, in the New Testament, Christ never said pray to him, but to pray to his Father... and I guess my particular sect took that pretty seriously. Oh, we prayed in Jesus's name a lot, but not too Jesus... kind of a petty distinction, but... still...

3) There are certain prayers and phrases that I remember from my childhood which give me comfort for some unknowable reason. They fit just fine into the beads, and I will use them...

Now... the purpose of the beads is more meditative than anything else... repeating a prayer, mantra, phrase or any word really, can, bring about a very calming state almost like a trance.

Provided it's done right... like one of our assistant pastors pointed out... if you're gonna be like her brothers when they were growing up, and have contests to see who could get through the beads first... well, then don't bother.

Anyway... We made our prayer beads in class, and I got home and started trying to memorise them... and the beads promptly broke. Scattered all over the floor. And my first thought was... "great... now I'm damned to hell."

The cats however were thrilled to no end... and were chasing beads all over the place... and they made a nice maddening high pitched rolling sound on the floor as the cats batted them across the room...

The above pic is a restrung set that I made myself. The cross is from the church beads, the others are hematite and silver beads that I had in my flea market stuff... they look pretty good actually.

So... now that I've gone on and on about some things that most of you probably don't care that much about... I guess I should probably let you go...

2011-01-18T17:51:00.002-06:00

Haven't been posting much lately. Hardly surprising... this is largely a garden and plant blog. And this is hardly the time of year for gardening or plants... I look outside and all I see is brown grass and the occasional mudhole. Not much to talk about it that arena.

That, and I've been working extra to make up for the paychecks I missed when the engine needed replace, shortly followed by the power steering pump burning out. There are some bills that have gone unpaid, and the only way to get the money is to work extra, so there we are.

Considering the current state of affairs... it's certainly easy to see why this title jumped out at me from the bookshelf... "The Freedom Manifesto" How to free yourself from Anxiety, fear, mortgages, money, guilt, debt, government, boredom, supermarkets, bills, melencholy, pain, depression, work and waste.

This little mini-tome, written by Tom Hodgkinson, has been providing me with some valuable insights into things... and while I can't say I agree with everything he has to say, there's certainly enough valid points for me to seriously have some thinking going on.

But a lot of it boils down to this... We, as a society, tend to overspend. The basic workers life goes pretty much like this. We go to work so that we can earn money to pay our rent or mortgage. We work over time usually at a job we don't particularly like, with people we don't particularly like, and for bosses we don't particularly like. When we get home, we are so physically exhausted that we sit in front of a TV and watch something that's moderately entertaining, while being periodically blasted with advertisements that are informing us all about things that we need to buy to make our life easier or better and which we will have to go further into debt to buy. And it doesn't end. We keep going to the job to pay for the stuff we keep buying in the hopes that we will be happy and we never seem to get there, and the only people that seem to benefit from all this are the 2 percent of the human beings that control all the wealth... and quite frankly, they don't seem to happy if you look close enough.

There are two ways out of this. One is to deprive yourself of everything while you work and amass a huge amount of money, then one day, you will have enough money to be able to not worry about it.

Or two... stop buying things that you don't need, simply because somebody out there says that you do need them.

His contention is that your time is better spent doing things a simpler way.

I'll probably go with the latter... but quite frankly, I probably was leaning that way anyway... For instance, I don't posses an I-pod. Can't really see the reason for one. When I'm driving I'm concentrating on the road, listening to the dispatch radio and my GPS. I'm certainly don't have the extra attention for anything else. When I'm shopping, I've managed to get in and out of the market for years without listening to my favorite song, and when I'm at home, I have a CD player or even a radio. Who needs it?

I do not have twitter. I can't imagine that anybody out there cares that I'm pulling into Ennis TX to deliver a load of whatever, and I have enough experience with twitter to know that 99 percent of what comes over it, I don't care about. Honestly, I was once at dinner with a friend when we were subjected to the announcement that someone elses baby had just had it's first "Poopy diaper!" While this may, or may not, be a milestone for the child and something Mommy wants to celebrate, I, quite frankly, don't give a damn.

I'd do without the cell phone if I could, but I do use it for work. And I text more than I call my friends, because it cost less than the minutes... but even that has it's limits for me. This morning, I turned the phone off. I figured I'd turn it on if I needed to make a call. This happened about 1 pm. So, I turned the phone on, called the customer to arrange his delivery... and within 15 minutes I was besieged by about a half dozen texts asking if I was all right.

It seems that if you can't be located at the blink of an eye, everyone assumes you're comatose or something. I'm pretty sure that as recently as 5 years ago, I had friends that I saw once a week, and didn't talk to between those times. And I never assumed they'd lost consciousness.

I'm pretty sure that human beings have, historically, gone for very long extended periods of time without speaking or texting every few minutes. My own mother was an Army wife, based in Germany, and when Dad went on manuevers for periods of one to three months, I'm sure she worried. But she didn't panic. Instead, she packed up the kid and jumped on a train and visitied Bavaria, or Munich or basically she did something on her own, and when he came back they no doubt had long talks about their seperate times... face to face talks. Over dinner. Without some thing bleeping at them and interupting.

So... for the next few weeks... I'm going to be re-prioritizing.

I'm certainly not going to take Mr. Hodgkinson's suggestions and quit my job, move to a shack in the country and grow all my own food. And, if I'm honest, I don't think he expects anybody to go quite that far... But what I will be doing is this.

I will no longer spend $1.50 on a cup of convienence store coffee when I can certainly make a cup of coffee at home to take with me in the truck.

I will not spend $6 ot $8 a day for fast food lunch, when I can pack a weeks worth of lunches at home for the amount one of those bad-for-me barely food meals costs.

I will not spend $1.29 for a bottle of water when I can buy a case of the things for less than $5, and actual tap water is free... (I don't care what what the health freaks say, I've never heard of anybody who died of tap-water induced cancer.)

With the money that I save on lunches... I will be more than able to pay for my after church lunches with my friends, and still have plenty of money left over.

And I'm looking for other ways to avoid spending money. It's not exactly Puritanical thrift... it's just that I don't see why I should spend money on things that aren't good for me or I don't need or enjoy, when I can save the money and do things that are good for me, that I do need, and that I do enjoy.

And there we are.

And now to another subject.

Facebook.

Yes, it's a strange addiction, this social networking. But it's also infuriating, in it's way.

1) People... it's not a private diary! Please, please, please don't tell me the intimate details of your love life, or drag any fights you're having with a significant other, complete with graphic details of what they were doing when you caught them in bed with whoever. REALY. Especially when a quick look at our mutal friends list tells me that our Pastor can read this too... And our pastor DOES read our facebook posts... honest...

2) You do not work for MTV and you are not a Video Disk Jockey. And even if you were, I can not think of any thing that would induce me to look at a video of the latest single from a group of people that call themselves "The Vagina Divers" Never heard them... never hope to. OK?

3) Fine. You found an abandoned puppy and you're trying to find it a home. That's cool. However, in the last week, you have found 3 abandoned puppies, 2 full grown dogs and innumerable kittens, and now your posts are not only about finding them new homes, but are filled with pleas for money to buy animal food and veterinary care. All of which is laced with much hand wringing and wailing about these helpless innocent victims of society and how we are obligated to help them, and quite frankly if you, and several other people out there devoted half this amount of time, energy and money to alieviating human suffering, the world would be a much more pleasant place to live in.

And now... I'm gonna see if I can get off this soap box without breaking my neck...

Just a little rant...

2011-01-08T21:44:00.003-06:00

We're expecting our first snow of the year in Dallas - Ft. Worth this evening. Usually we get it a bit sooner, but then again, there have been a few years where not a single flake fell. The newsmen, in their typical panicky level, are telling me that the storm will start with rain and then turn to snow. as much as two to five inches of the stuff... which means that there will be a layer of ice under the pretty white powder.

Now, I realize northerners will find this a bit of a yawn. But the truth is that southerners don't know how to drive on it.

I actually do. I drove in Illinois over a few winters, but I am a little out of practice. But even if I did want to try it, NOBODY ELSE ON THE ROAD CAN DRIVE ON IT. It honestly doesn't matter if I can drive a straight line when there's likely to be a chevy sedan plummeting towards you at any moment.

Whether or not I go to church tomorrow depends on what happens in the weather tonight. It's quite likely that I will be reading the first chapters of a friends writing project that was sent to me via e-mail. Even though I have been published in magazines (not that you can tell from this stream-of-consciousness posting I do here) I am a much better editor than writer, so occasionally friends will forward something to me to look over. There's a 66 page chapter that I've actually scanned the first three pages of and found some major grammar problems with. That and it seems to be Chick-lit. Not my favorite genre. But there's a few intriguing themes presented, and it doesn't actually look that bad for a first draft. There's something to work with here.

But authors, especially first-time authors, can be touchy. They tend to think of their work like a baby. You really have to be careful of what you say. Consequently, an editors notes to the writer are often more subtle and creative that the novel they're working with.

I should also add that I had a really bad day at the flea market.

One of our dealers got into an attitude flinging contest with a former dealer who had dropped by, and for some unknown reason they decided to do this at the front counter, beside my cash register. And for some other reason they decided the I would be the perfect person to mediate this little drama.

Unfortunately after about five minutes, it boiled down to every sentence that began with "Well, I think..." or "Well, she said... " was met with me blurting... "DON'T CARE."

Really, I wouldn't even let either finish a statement. I just started barking before they got it out of their mouth.

Which means they both bounced their little selves to the back and lodged a complaint with the manager. And when she came to the front for a little talk with me... she got "DON'T CARE."

Fortunately, she had a pretty good idea what was going on and basically told them that my job was customer service, not group therapy... and they both bounced out the door, their fight forgotten and now united in a huff.

and I... "DON'T CARE."

Happy New Year!

2011-01-01T21:07:00.003-06:00

Again, no photographs.

It may be a good thing....

Anyway, myself and two of the church guys decided to spend New Years Eve at L's house in Mineral Wells... a mere 67 miles from my house, and I had to work New Years Day at the flea market, so I would just spend the night there and drive to work from Mineral Wells. OK.

So we had an OK time. We played dominoes. We played scrabble. We watched movies.

L & H drank beer. (we're a drinking, cussing kinda church... anything but holier-than-thou) I was drinking Mikes Hard Lemonade, because I never could choke down beer and I wasn't up to vodka. But nobody got drunk, we were just chilling.

L's parents, who live on the same block also stopped by, I think they wanted to get a look at the guys that their son has been hanging around at church, just to make sure we didn't have pentagrams tattooed on our foreheads or something.

Anyway they are one of those country style couples that you don't see much of anymore. They talk at the same time as the other, carrying on completely different conversations and you're supposed to keep up with both of them. And they're both about as deaf as a stump.

L's father wanted to discuss his days in the navy, and was telling a rather amusing anecdote about a rather drunken trip to Juarez, Mexico when his mother broke off from discussing the merits of various cornbread recipes and shouted... "Why don't you tell them about the green stamps?" Of course, this interjection didn't warrant so much as a eye blink and he continued his stream on consciousness...

"THE GREEN STAMPS. Oh you wouldn't tell them about THAT would you now?" and something along those lines several times through.

And he continued despite it all until she finally just couldn't take it any more and finally blurted out, "He was in a Mexican bordello, and he was trying to buy a prostitute with green stamps!"

At that point, L's father stood up with full military posture and announced, "It was nice meeting you boys, but I think it's high time we moved along and let you have your fun..." and marched out the door.

H & I were both about rolling on the floor, laughing so much it hurt, and L was saying, "Y'all, don't make fun of my parents!"

Make fun of them? Hell, I wanna adopt them.

So, after the ball dropped, I went to sleep and woke up in plenty of time to get to work, and since I didn't wanna bang around a strange kitchen making coffee, I said to myself, "Self, why don't you just stop and get one of those jumbo coffee's from 7-11 or Racetrack or someplace on the way in... you got plenty of time."

So off I go, and stop at the first convenience store I see, and they haven't got any brewed. Neither did the next. Or the next. And they're looking at me like I'm requesting caviar.

It's 8 AM, on January the 1st, after a very large percentage of the population has been intoxicated, and nobody has any blasted coffee!

It wasn't until I got to Weatherford, about 17 miles down the road to Ft. Worth, that I finally walked into a convenience store that has one of those giant walls with a dozen coffee dispensers, and one, count them.... one... of those blasted coffee machines actually had hot coffee in it.

I swear, I could have scored heroin easier.

Finally got some caffeine in my system, and got to work, and it was actually a decent day.

And one of these days, I'm going to actually post that I had a boring uneventful week and everybody who reads my blog will have an aneurysm.

2010-12-27T01:56:00.002-06:00

Well, it's probably no secret that this was a rather thin Christmas for me... money problems have shown their ugly face, so I didn't have the where-with-all to be buying presents, and seeing as I'd been stuck in the house due to a truck in the repair shop, I didn't really have the ability to go shop anyway... I made a few calls, with apologies and planned to spend this holiday much as I'd spent the last one. Midnight Mass, then spend THE DAY curled up under a quilt, with purring cats, reading a book.

Now, when I tell people this, it makes them crazy. What most people don't understand is that I grew up in a house with an unmedicated bipolar sibling, and Christmas wasn't so much a holiday as it was prime staging for a fit, so I don't have a huge fund of warm fuzzy Christmas memories to draw upon. I truly PREFER a quiet holiday. If I do go to a party, I find myself doing what I always did at our families Christmas dinners... namely, sitting in a corner, sucking all the joy out of the room while waiting for the inevitable tempermental explosion. So, rather than torture my hosts or going into long-winded explanations about it, usually I just tell people I have plans.

The church guys however saw through it.

So, I was finally confronted with an invite that I couldn't get out of.

And to be blunt, I'm really glad I went. True, I showed up at somebodies house without a present in hand, which is very un-Southern and enough to make the ghost of my Grandmother rise up and come get me, but I did have a nice holiday dinner... actually, a traditional Mexican holiday dinner, complete with home-made tamales, carnitas, barbacoa, guacamole, hand made tortillas, stuffed jalapenos, and the list goes on and on and on... all complimented with my church friend Hectors mama shoving plates under my chin and demanding, "EAT!" I didn't spend my time worried about how to act or if I was depressing anyone, because I was too busy chewing.

So, I shouldn't need a full meal for the next 4 days...

And, I got the recipe for those stuffed jalapenos. SCORE

And the Trauma continues...

2010-12-21T22:06:00.002-06:00

so... here we go... get woke up bright and early Monday morning by someone ringing the doorbell.

It's a cop.

someone two doors down has had their truck broke into, and cop noticed mine had been hit too...

Cops before coffee... wee haw.

They stole my stereo... which quite frankly is no big loss since it stopped working last year sometime and I never replaced it. I gotta hear a GPS talking, the dispatch talking and occasionally my cell phone... I didn't miss it. But, like a fool, for some unfathomable reason, I had left my GPS unit in the truck... and that's gone. so, damn.

So, can't work Monday like I planned, and off to get some things done at the flea market... Pick up a used GPS for 50 bucks at a hock shop... (yes, I realize that I may have just replaced my stolen GPS with someone elses stolen GPS, but money is tight right now... ) and I get home to find an envelope stuck to my door... Inside is a Christmas card that says "I realize you're having a tough time right now, please accept this..." and there's a $50 bill inside. It was signed by one of my neighbors.

Then I see my other neighbor, the snotty ones I rarely talk to, but I know that she's there alone at night sometimes with two kids, and the right thing to do is give her some warning of what's going on in the neighborhood, so I mention that there's been a rash of robberies lately. And she gives me her typical snotty look and says... "Oh, I know... they stole my husbands stereo last week... they got the gun he had locked in the truck too..." and she kind of ambles off...

Now 1) Well thanks for giving the rest of us a head up, sweetheart. Then 2) Why the hell does your husband keep a gun locked in a truck that doesn't have a burglar alarm? and 3) Now we have ARMED burglars in the neighborhood... that's just spectacular....

And now that I think about it... that's kinda how my life has been going lately... something that makes me feel like crap, followed by something that makes me feel all warm and blessed, then followed by something that pisses me off royally, and this see-saw is bloody exhausting and I wanna get off... really. I'm not kidding. It's wearing me out.

Ok.

Got that off my chest.

Sorry about that...

2010-12-12T23:20:00.003-06:00

Ok... so you know when you are trying to get your Christmas poinsettia on the overloaded shelf, because that's really the only place you have to put the thing, and you accidently knock something else off the shelf, so you kinda instinctively grab for it?

well, that doesn't work out so well sometimes. Especially if what you knocked off was a cactus.

What I'm trying to say is... OUCH!

And, speaking of ouch... one last statement about my fabulous career as an angel. Wearing wings hurts. Seriously, they are strapped on you with elastic straps that cut off the circulation to your arms, bite into your flesh and pull your shoulders back into an unnatural scrunch. Four days running of that, and I feel like somebody has pounded me between the shoulder blades.

But now I have a little extra time to catch up on my blogger friends.

Merry Christmas, y'all...

gabriel update...

2010-12-11T07:47:00.004-06:00

well, I was the angel... didn't fall off my milk crate or nothing... here's somebodies pic from a cell phone... it's the only one I could find right away...

and this is an old pic of my younger and wilder days, but it's the only one I can put my hands on of "The Hair" and it's not quite that long right now, but that's it. And I'm used to the questions, so here are the answers... Yes, the curls are natural, and No, I don't particularly like it when strangers run their fingers through it, but I only really mind because they tend to get caught in it. (I've now established a policy that any jewelry that gets lost in my hair is MINE) And Yes, I do know how much women pay to get their hair to look like that, because they keep telling me and I guess it's your money you can pay that un-Godly amount if you want...

And there we are.

of Engines and Angels...

2010-12-09T08:26:00.004-06:00

So... haven't checked in for a while...

Last week, the engine went on my truck. It has to be replaced... I did manage to find a used engine at a junkyard, only 88'000 miles... damned good actually, got a ride over to pay for it and it was supposed to be delivered to the mechanic last Friday.

It wasn't.

Nobody, however, found it necessary to call and tell me this.

So Monday, I call Reuben (the mechanic) to ask for the status. Eventually, through broken English, I find that no engine was delivered Friday.

So I call Chris (the junkyard) to find what's up, he apologizes profusely, tells me he got slammed, and the engine is already on the truck and on it's way to Reuben.

Tuesday, I call Reuben, and again find out, no engine.

Again I call Chris. He tells me that when they pulled the engine out of the wrecked vehicle about noon (WTH? Then how the hell was it on the truck Monday morning?) it turned out to have a cracked head. But he's found another one at another junkyard, and it's going to be delivered instead, and there would be no extra charge (dang straight there wasn't gonna be no charge, I could have told him that...)

I then called Reuben again, reported what I'd just heard, and his response I don't care to report here. But I must add that it was the clearest English I'd ever heard him speak. I'm not gonna get judgemental about it though, because what was coming out of my mouth wasn't much better...

Then, when Wednesday rolled around, I, for the first time, actually get a call... this one from Chris. The new engine is here... it's in good shape except for some minor things that have to be replaced. He wants to know if he can pick up the old engine from Reuben, pull off the parts and replace them on the new engine. Junkyard mechanics are actually pretty good at putting engines together, so I'm not too worried about this... The reason Chris wants to do this is so that he can deliver an engine that he's willing to back up with his guarantee, and if he delivers this to the mechanic as is, most will charge 300 to 400 to do this extra work. (Reuben wouldn't charge that much, but I will concede that point.) Again, no extra charge.

Call Reuben... again a torrent of perfect, albeit unprintable, English... I finally impress upon all of them that I don't give a flying **** who does the **** work, I want the **** truck on the **** road.

So. They call each other, and it has been arranged.

But five minutes after I've had my little unprintable, although impeccably pronounced, fit... the phone rings.

It's the church.

The Christmas Cantata, which will be performed this weekend, has hit a snag. They want me to portray the Archangel Gabriel.

I was not, at that precise moment, feeling particularly angelic. Fortunately I have a way out.

"I'd love too... unfortunately I can't get to the church, my trucks out of commission."

Fifteen minutes later... another call... "Great news... one of our assistant pastors will be there to pick you up and bring you home for the next four days..."

Now, I live 20 miles from church. If the pastor feels so strongly that I, and nobody else but me, has to portray the Archangel Gabriel, and has harangued some poor assistant pastor into chauffeuring me... can I really argue?

I get there. I don't know why I'm the only member of the congregation who can do this, but I'm there...

What's going on is silhouette vignettes. We stand behind a white screen that has projected lights and we, with the aid of sheets, hats, and various other impromptu objects, cast shadows on the screen. And I find out why I'm so necessary.

HAIR.

I have been blessed, via a distant Jewish ancestor, with hair that hangs in long spiral curls. I haven't cut it in over a year and a half, and I must admit it's a pretty impressive mop. Plus, I'm generally tall and thin. Wrap me in an old bedsheet, add wings and stand me on a milk crate... and I project a shadow that looks pretty darned angelic.

So, there we are.

Pastor did ask me if I was happy being the Christmas Angel...

I replied that I was perfectly comfortable being an expression of divinity on earth. Did it all the time.

She laughed, then said something about crucifying me next Easter.

I laughed.

I think she was serious. Hair gets cut off next week...

autumn among us...

2010-11-21T13:35:00.003-06:00

the pear leaves are turning again this year... there seems to be much more variation in the color this year, probably due to the temps getting chilly, then warming up again... over and over...

but I't taken a pic last year, so I thought I'd take one again this year.

Mondo Aloe

2010-11-15T17:51:00.002-06:00

Well, again, I don't have anything exciting to add... spent today trying to get some of the yard in order. I'm afraid that with my schedule and everything happening, that it's all gotten a little out of hand.

There is a small, suposedly decorative brick wall in front of my house... I usually find it more annoying than anything else, but I do have 3 plastic planters on top of it, which I usually plant with marigolds or portaluca... for some reason, this spring, I had an aloe that someone gave me, and it had two off-sets, so I stuck 1 of each in each pot. I also put in some cuttings of Stapelia gigantea.

I then proceeded to ignore them. This is actually rather easy, as behind the wall are tall bananas, cannas, and a mexican fan palm, and I'm afraid that pretty much all of them threw their leaves over the wall and the pots... and I'm one of those out of sight out of mind people.

Evidently, the bright shade was just what the Dr. ordered for these guys though... My one 6 to 8 inch tall aloe turned into a monster over the summer

(you can barely see the stapelia in the pot behind the plant... )

the offsets grew up, and they all produced more off-sets... so everything is now uprooted...

well, a lot of the off sets I'll pot up in styrofoam cups and sell at the flea market for a buck or two, depending on the size. The grown ups will go in a bucket with fall leaves around the roots, will sit in a window, and pretty much be allowed to go dormant until next spring.

Same with the Stapelia. I know... I'm supposed to pot them up and baby them... but that's how Grandma did it and she never lost one... so, there we go...

strange days...

2010-11-13T22:06:00.002-06:00

but I'm not complaining...

The first pic is a sly bit of silliness on my part.

I spent a huge amount of time making these little "green guys" when I was growing up...

It's really not that difficult. You just find a leaf, gently bend it and press with your thumbnail to cut a little holes. I don't know why it was so fascinating to me when I was a kid, and I certainly don't know why, as an adult, I suddenly remembered it, but there we are. He's kinda cute though...

The following pic is something from the flea market. Western cowboy kitsch is a very definite sub-genre down here in Texas, and we make a lot of sales...

This statue of a mare, with foal underneath her, stomping a rattle-snake flat, definietly fits the bill...

One of the flea market dealers brought in a whole bunch of stuff, then, realizing that he was overstocked, decided to put everything in his booth 50% off... so I walked through the store, saw this and grabbed it for $6.

I then put a $20 price tag on it, took this pic and asked my boss if I could borrow the computer to list it on Craigs list. She said sure, as long as I was quick about it.

So I listed it. No sooner had I clicked the "Confirm Listing" button in the e-mail they sent, then Dustin, the other guy who works there, ran back to the office to tell me that it had sold.

So I had to cancel the listing.

Which means that yeah... I was 14 dollars ahead, but, according to my boss, I was wasting time that I should have been working. Whatever...

Really, I just wanted to make sure I checked in, and I didn't really have anything else to talk about, so there we are. Hope everyone is having a good week!

2010-11-06T04:59:00.004-05:00

On Thursday, as I was trying to make my way home on Loop 12 in one of our interminable traffic jams, almost without thinking I made an exit and ended up at the Dallas National Cemetary.

Not too surprising, as many of you know, I tend to visit cemetaries quite a bit... But this one is a bit different. This is where my parents are. I haven't been here since my parents were intered in the Combarium. I don't exactly know why I've avoided visiting, or why I suddenly visited that day, but ultimately I'm glad I did.

The National Cemetary is a beautiful place.

As I pulled up to the Columbarium... I wondered if this was a mistake. It had a been a good day, beautiful autumn weather after the last two days of bone chilling rain. Was I putting a jinx on my good day? Was I self sabotaging the small amount of contentment I'd been able to find?

I know some people find comfort in sitting beside the graves of loved ones. For some, it's an essential part of the grief and healing process. They sit and meditate, and have long internal conversations with those who've gone on before...

I wasn't sure how I'd react.

Nothing.

I stood by the niche where my sister and I had personally hand placed the ashes of our parents, and we had both watched as the man screwed on the marble slab, and I can't say that I felt anything remarkable.

My parents aren't there.

They've gone on to wherever they've gone, and all I was doing was standing in an extremely well manicured and maintained park in the waning sunlight of a brisk November day.

And I was fine.

I picked up a couple of pieces of litter and placed them in a trash can.

Someone had placed flowers in a plastic vase at the base of the columbarium. The flowers had tipped over and I righted them.

There was a little potted succulent at the base of another row ono the columbarium... Knowing that the Caretakers remove all plants and flowers every two weeks, I considered taking the poor doomed thing home with me, but instead I gathered the fallen leaves to take home to root as cuttings, and left the plant to it's fate.

It is a quiet serene place in our modern screaming world. As you stand there, knowing that, as the crow flies, it's less than a mile to a rather maddening road, you can look over the military stones and not hear a sound.

The cemetary is randomly divided by gullies that would be difficult, if not impossible, to clear and mow, and large areas of untouched woods. These are kept as a nature presserve, and signs tell me that these areas shelter many native species.

I like the idea that at night, when the gates are closed, deer graze among the stones that mark our fallen heros, Coyotes slink in the moonlight... and maybe, on some night, a bobcat will stretch out and lay on the sun-warmed cement walk in front of my parents marker.

Mom and Dad would both like that.

I will go back, when I need a fix of quiet and contentment.

Right now I work. I go to church. I go out and have lunch with my friends, and over the next few years I expect to have some fun, and have some hard times.

Sometimes, I will do the right thing, and sometimes I will make bad decisions.

I'll probably break my heart.

But, most importantly, I'll survive.

(note: still no camera... these are cell phone pics.... not bad for a phone pic, huh?)

Flea Market Stuff!

2010-11-01T20:38:00.004-05:00

well, some of you over the past have expressed interest in the flea market stuff... so, I thought I'd show you a couple of things...

But first, I have to apologize. There's still no damned camera in the house. These were taken with a cell phone, specifically so that I could list on Craigs List... People in Flea Markets tend to list on CL to get a wider range of buyers. That, and when people come to pick the item up... Often from 50 miles away if they really want it... they usually look around and buy a few other things too. Seriously, a few computer savy dealers in the mall can make a big difference to the enitre store... In my listings I always reveal that I'm a flea market dealer. I don't think it's fair not too actually...

Now first... a couple of velvet matador paintings... believe it or not, there's a large market out there for this sort of thing...

A pretty cool oval mirror... 4 feet by 28 inches... it's pretty nice... but don't let it decieve you. The frame is plastic...

And these are actually way cool... 2 vintage diner counter stools. Right now I've got them marked at 45 each. They were rescued from a diner that was going out of business in the early 70's. Neat, huh?

And that's my fantabulous post for the day.

It's really appalling how much you depend on your digital for blogging, isn't it? I mean, I used to be able to actually write... now I have a hard time without illustrations...

Well, I'm back...

2010-10-26T07:09:00.002-05:00

not that it's going to do us any good... now that my DSL is up and running, my camera has called it quits. Guess I'll drop by a pawn shop and see what's available for cheap.

just checking in...

2010-10-20T18:20:00.002-05:00

on a friends computer... My DSL is down and out... it's entirely a pain in the ole ass, let me tell you. But I didn't want anybody thinking that I was ignoring them so I borrowed a computer to pay bills and check in with everybody.

Hope y'all are doing well, I should be back next week.

buzz buzz buzz

2010-10-11T20:10:00.003-05:00

It's really bizarre when insects don't act like they're supposed to, isn't it? Life just isn't like they tell us it is in grade school science class...

Take these bees for instance. At the house of an older lady that lives down the block, these insects have been clustering every evening around her porch light...

Now, everybody learned in grade school that bees go home to the hive every night and re-emerge every morning to go about their business of polinating and nectar gathering...

My first thought was that they were somehow missing from their hive and were just clustering on the light for the warmth it puts out... but they've been there all summer. And our night temps don't drop that much in the summer... about 10 to 15 degrees. It's quite common for us to have temps in the upper 80's every evening, so I doubt warmth has much to do with it...

Whatever the reason, they are a menace. I've checked thoroughly, and there's no hive in the neighborhood. I don't know what they're doing. Except being a menace... you see, every morning there's a bunch of bees who have lost their purchase all over the sidewalk, yard and porch... ambling about in a lethargic manner and getting caught in the fur of Miss D's little dog... which brings them inside where they suddenly wake up and just aren't happy. It's quite a nuisance.

Miss D, a few days ago, sprayed some sort of insecticide on the poles and lights when no bees were present, and it seems to have been enough to repel them and keep them at bay... no more stung doggies or senior citizens... but I would like to know what was going on...

well, I promised I would try...

2010-09-29T16:52:00.002-05:00

I promised I would try to find SOMETHING to blog about... and it was as good a day as any to do it... three... count them, three, whole deliveries today... to absolutely no place interesting. But, between deliveries... I pulled off to the side of the road to have a good pout and there was this unused cattle pasture there...

I saw some Snow-On-The-Mountain... which is some sort of Euphorbia. They're interesting plants... green except for the leaves around the tiny flowers. Here they grow wild, but in some parts of the country, people actually buy seeds and grow the things as annuals in the yard...

and the common burdock is putting out it's burrs... which are interesting when they're green but danged annoying when they dry and stick to you...

And this next plant I've always heard called ground cherry. There's several different varieties and colors... They're a close relative of the common ornamental Chinese Lanterns, and also Tomatillo, or husk tomato's that you buy in Mexican markets and are instrumental in making Salsa Verde.

As you can see, the 'cherries' on this variety are small and purplish black inside their lantern shaped husks... and these have a sweetish flavor... I understand that they make a very good preserve. The more common yellow ones, or at least the yellow ones in my area, are hideously bitter. I once experimentally tried one and spent the next 30 minutes spitting after the initial gag...

And that's about it.

Hope everybody out there is doing well... have a great day.

2010-09-27T06:10:00.002-05:00

OK... it's been more than a month since I posted.

Not really sure how that happened, except to say that September is not my greatest month. This September held the 1st aniversary of my Mothers passing, the 7th aniversary of my fathers passing... those are the two biggies... but this September also held a few other fun days... Let's just say that it's not a good month for me.

That, and there's been absolutely nothing to photograph... which explains the total lack of photographs I suppose. Now you could, argue that there's plenty of things to photograph, it's just my mood... and I guess that's a pretty valid argument actually, but also, there's been no interesting destinations at work driving, no interesting things at the flea market, and, until the recent rains, nothing growing in the yard.

So, no matter what the reason... there's still a big ole lump of nothing...

The only thing I've done yesterday that's in any way, shape or form interesting is turn cheap silk flowers into pins that flower pins that I sell at the flea market... women buy them to pin on their hats or jackets. And, that's not really interesting... it's only vaugely craft-ish, and anyone who can run a hot glue gun can do it, it's just that nobody does...

As for other news... I ushered at church. Which consists of standing by the door, handing out bulletins and saying good morning. And passing a collection plate. No big deal...

But I was feeling all guilty that I hadn't posted, so I'm taking care of that now.

Now, in contrast... October tends to be a good month for me. So you should be seeing more of me... Later...

2010-08-26T19:14:00.002-05:00

Nothing too impressive. Haven't really had anything to post about. Central Texas in August isn't exactly a garden site... Temps have been officially in the 100 to 104 range, but add all that concrete that I'm on constantly, and you're talking more like 105 to 109. Looks like the heat has finally broke though... only mid-90's today...

Here's a few random pics from the past few weeks. Normally, I would try to come up with interesting factoids. But the heat leeches most interest out of me... still...

this is the Rylie Cemetary. Rylie was a small town, and is still an area in South Dallas. The origional grave here dates to 1887, I think... there's about 400 graves on the site, and the cemetary is still in use.

And one day last week, I ended the day in Pittsburg. Not Pennsylvania of course, Texas, a mere 150 + miles from my house. Pittsburg is probably best known as the origional site of Pilgrims Pride Chicken. There is still a large poultry plant here. And this now multi million dollar industry all descended from this building... the origional Pilgrims Feed and Grain...

It's a good thing for the town. I've delivered to many small towns throughout Texas, and this is probably the first that still has a vibrant local economy with a viable downtown I've seen. That factory is keeping this town going.

Lots of churches. One on about every corner, actually... More different types of Baptists than you would think are absolutely neccesary. The most impressive church I was was the First Methodist, built in 1904-05, in what's called Prarie Style Architecture.

Love the stonework... around the rooflines...

Anyway... that's about the best I can do right now. But it's been a while and I had to do something.

nothing about plants... but anyway...

2010-08-10T21:12:00.002-05:00

Well folks... it's been a while hasn't it?

Hope nobody was worried... I've just had a tough few weeks, and didn't have the energy required to put thoughts to paper. And what energy I did have was being sapped by Texas summer... it's hideous out there!

But today, at the end of a day of driving all over the Dallas Ft. Worth metroplex... I saw an Ice Cream store... and a little voice inside my head said, "I want ice cream."

I tried to ignore it.

Then the voice went, "PLEEEEEEEEEEEEESE.... I want some Ice cream please, please, please, please, pleeeeeeese..."

I kept ignoring it.

Then the voice stated quite firmly and with a surprisingly matter of fact tone... "If you don't give me an ice cream cone I'm going to throw a temper tantrum. And then you'll be sorry."

Your inner child should never be ignored. He needs occasional treats. Otherwise, you lose your sense of fun and happiness.

So that's how a mid forties, hot sweaty man ended up in the Braums Ice Cream Parlor leaning against the glass over the party colored flavors mumbling... "That looks good... no, I think I want that one... no wait, is that Rocky Road? Oh cool! Cookies and cream... and what's that one?"

I settled for cookies and cream, and mint chocolate chip.

And yeah, I'm sure they thought I was an escapee from the local mental asylum, but who gives a damn? I'm never gonna see those people again... Actually, the lady behind the counter, a fifty something Grandmotherly type, had a look on her face that said this isn't the first time a full grown man stood in front of that counter acting like an over excited 8 year old.

And not only did I get ice cream... I came out of it in a totally better mood.

Now, me and ice cream go way back... Mom and I used to go get ice cream about every week in the summer, usually on Sunday evening. It was one of our favorite minor rituals. Since Mom passed, I haven't been in an ice cream shop... I had no reason to go to one.

Now, I'm realizing that I was depriving myself. Not neccesarily of ice cream, although that would be bad enough, but more the sense of fun that ice cream evokes from my childhood. I don't know that I'll be going every week again... but I am going to make a point of giving my inner child an occasional treat.

gloriosa....

2010-07-27T19:58:00.003-05:00

Gloriosa Lily is blooming! Actually, this is the second bloom... the first I snipped off and gave to someone down the street...

I love this plant, it's fire-hot blooms seem to be perfectly happy in our summer heat. I'm very interested to see how tall it gets... right now, it's climbing about 2 feet, but supposedly, it can get much, much taller... Thanks to Julie, over at A Succulent Life for sending me these wonderful plants...

2010-07-23T06:16:00.003-05:00

Well, Hildy has up and done her thing again... looks like she'll be doing it tomorrow and the next day too...

This pic was taken with a cheap kodak. At 6 am. I am a bit past staying up until 1 am to take pics of cactus blooms in their full glory. I've done it before. Several times. The thrill is gone.

Seriously, if you look at past posts... you will see that I've stayed up till the wee hours of the morning, sometimes aiming my trucks headlights to light up a shot... on one memorable occasion even balancing a flashlight, umbrella and camera in the rain, all so I can produce a pic for my blog friends. No more... Love ya to death... But...

Besides, I get up at 5:30 am to get ready for work anyway. Which is really surprising to me. When I worked in bars, that's about the time I came home and crawled into my coffin.

Regardless, there's Hildy up there. Four blooms tonight, more over the next couple of days. Probably more blooms over the next couple of months too.

nothing at all...

2010-07-17T02:27:00.002-05:00

no pics

Oh Well...

I've had one of THOSE weeks... although I have to admit that yesterday was the worst of it... so when I got home about 5 pm, I kinda collapsed into a comfy armchair and woke up about 10 pm because the neighbor was pounding on my door... but I'm getting ahead of myself.

So, Thursday... the worst day at work imaginable... Picked up at a church office. An envelope that's going 30 miles away... OK... picked up another order on the way, get to where the envelope is going and it's locked up tight, signs say appointment only, with a couple of phone numbers... I call the phone numbers which ring inside the empty office... call dispatch, he calls everyone he can think of... 45 minutes later and the other order in the truck is already late, so I go drop it off.

Then I go to the airport to pick up, sign all the papers, go through all the security carp, and the guys in the warehouse bring up 12 boxes. That were damaged in transit. Nice... so I demand, on the behalf of my customer, a damage report, call dispatch, so there's another 45 minutes of sitting in a warehouse... actually standing in a warehouse. There's a small square painted on the floor where you have to wait. No chairs. Security guy sitting in the only chair, staring at you. Whatever...

Finally get the reports, loaded up, take the reports to the office of the actual shipping company that I've been subcontracted through, then, on the way to dropping off the boxes... I'm exiting the freeway when some woman bashes into the back of my truck. I'm fine, she's fine, my truck is fine (big metal bumper back there has a couple of scratches) but her little KIA is not in good shape.

Another hour wasted while she tries to convince a cop that bashing into the back of my truck is all somehow MY fault... then I deliver 12 boxes, some of which are damaged, total weight of 250 lbs, to the 9th floor of a bank building.

Then I called dispatch and said... enough.

So today was actually rather uneventful.

I made deliveries... and that envelope from yesterday is still in my truck, no one will answer any phones at the pick-up or the delivery now... finally, ended the day by taking the envelope to my office and telling them it was their problem now, came home, collapsed in the comfy armchair, woke up because the senior citizen neighbor has a smoke alarm going off... turned out to be a dead battery alarm so I ran to the store, bought a nine-volt, changed the battery under the watchful eye of their guard dog... and haven't been able to even think about going to sleep since.

And that's my life.

Wee haw.

hildy's gearing up!

2010-07-14T09:19:00.005-05:00

Well, Hildy, my Cereus hildmannianus, (aka Peruvian Apple, or one of the dozen or so plants called Night Blooming Cereus or Queen of the Night) is gearing up for blooming... counted this morning and there's 18 buds forming. Now, usually some of the buds will abort, usually under half... but I've tried to see if I can get more of them to stick around this year, by giving her a shot of plant food a couple of days ago when I first noticed the buds forming.

Currently, Hildy is about 4 feet tall, and consists of a trunk that was broken off and now has 4 branches, 2 from near the base and two from further up the stem. The branch in the pic is the tallest, and it would appear that the growing tip has become damaged in some way, as it doesn't appear to be growing... but the other three stems have already put on about 3 inches each this year. Eight to 10 inches a year seems about par for the course...

Next is a newer plant that I managed to aquire earlier this year. A San Pedro cactus, (Trichocereus pachanoi) that I found at Wal-Mart of all places around May.

I wonder if Wal-Mart is aware that they're selling plants that are often used by idiots to produce mescaline? Seriously, I about got into a fist fight with some stoner when I purchased this thing... It was the only one there, and we were both intent on aquiring it. Fortunately, aging hippies are often slow moving. Their reflexes are shot...

Of course, I won't be producing mescaline from this plant. I just like the looks of him...

Slightly less than 18 inches tall... he (I think I'll call him Packy) Packy is large enough to bloom, but I don't know if he will honor us with any blooms this year. You'd think he would, I saved him from some hippies blender. I mean... where's the gratitude, right? He looks a lot like Hildy, with less spines, and fuller bodied.

I wanting some of these taller cactus for the new planting bed I'm putting in... of course, I won't be able to leave them outside... but I'm thinking of plunging old nursery pots into the ground, so that I can set my big guys in the ground for the summer... just put them in the plunged pot and fill around their actual pots with gravel. Come autumn, when the frost are threatening, I can pull them out fairly easily.

And now... I must apologise... My internet service has been blinking on and off like a defective strobe light with a short circuit. I haven't been around to post on my blog, or to comment on my friends blogs.

but I am keeping up with you!

Plant updates...

2010-07-12T19:39:00.003-05:00

Spent part of my afternoon out in the yard...

first a quick shot of the gloriosa lilies sent to me by Julie over at A Succulent Life... 2 of the 3 stems have made it, and they're starting to climb... and even putting out some buds! I can hardly wait!

And now we have to check in with Claudes Home for Wayward Plants... I have been planning on extending the border on my front yard for a couple of years now... and I started digging today... with bermuda grass lawns, it has to be done very thoroughly... you have to get down in the dirt and break up each clod with your hands, and make sure you get all the grass stolons out. Which can be tricky... Bermuda stolons have hard pointed growing tips... they can pierce right through a cactus!
Anyway... I got the larger of the rescued Sago's in the ground...

It'll look better after I get more dug up, and mulch, and other plants around it... hope he's happy...

The other sago still needs some love... he put out exactly 1 small and stunted leaf... but today I noticed that there's some more coming out... maybe these will be more normal sized...

weeds

2010-07-10T06:54:00.003-05:00

Now, it's probably no secret to anybody out there that I'm not the perfectly manicured lawn type. I just don't apprecieate them. Especially not if you're expecting me to be the one out there doing all that manicuring.

You feed them, water them and do everything possible to make them grow, and then, the split second they grow... you chop it off. At which point, you water them to make them grow again...

it makes no sense.

Plus... if you have a perfectly manicured lawn, you miss things like this...

I have no idea what kind of weed/wildflower this is, but I have to say it's cute as the dickens. Probably prompted into bloom by our recent rains, it's a cheerful little guy, and each bloom being less than a quarter inch across. If it bloomed longer, it would no doubt be a much cherished addition to the garden... as is, we just enjoy it for what it is... whatever it is...

I found it growing in the lawn outside a factory/warehouse so I had to take a shot for you...

Why do my plants insist on doing wierd things?

2010-07-05T15:42:00.005-05:00

Well, some of my regular readers may recognize these plants... having seen them before. These are the infamous Ferocactus wislenzeni... or at least I think that's what they are... or, I thought that's what they were... I'm not 100% sure anymore.

Now, origionally, I got these just over a year ago, in the mail from an ebay seller in what had to be the absolute worst packing job ever...

There were five total... I wanted them because these plants are rather winter hardy for a Ferocactus, and they're reasonably common as a landscape plant in this area... they're also way too expensive for my small budget to buy one of any size, so I bought these seedlings, hoping that I'd eventually get them to blooming size. One I planted in the rock garden, and the other four I potted up to bring in last winter... They're all doing just fine, actually... I went out to do some basic plant stuff today, and here they were...
Now, it's fairly easy to see in the above pic, that the second from the left is putting up a little pup or offset. My reading tells me that this isn't common, but it isn't unheard of. The plant generally grows as a solitary column though... I didn't think too much of this when I noticed it this spring. It happens... and heres a close-up of it...

Then, in taking care of them... I noticed that another one was putting up pups... 2 to be exact...

Ok... that's not right... if something is uncommon, half of them shouldn't be doing it, right? So, off to the front yard... and what do you know...

The one in the rock garden is doing it too... that means out of 5 plants... thats 60% of my Fero's are doing something that they're not supposed to do...

So, the question is... Do I have some remarkable Ferocactus? or did that dweeb, in addition to packing the cactus badly, pack the wrong damned cactus? Which forces the question, what are they? The one that survived the winter seriously narrows the field. Echinocereus will survive here, and pup rather redily... after they're bigger than this... theses are really too small... Well, I don't know.

And of course, they're not putting out the hook shaped spines... I had put that down to them being still juvenile... the spines they're getting now are definitely a little different from the spines they had when they got here... so, there's a definite chance that they're not fero's or if they are, they're not wislenzeni...

But if they're not fero's, then I need to find some more, because I really really want feros.

If they are fero's, then why are they doing this? The inside ones got no water during the winter, as our winter isn't long and I wanted dormancy. They haven't gotten too much or the wrong kind of plant food, as they've gotten none that I know of... and the two that haven't pupped still may, they're noticably smaller than the other three. They may be waiting till they reach the right size...

Really, I don't need this confusion right now...

episcia...

2010-07-02T18:34:00.004-05:00

I've posted about this plant before.

The thing is, it's been raining for about a whole week solid... well not exactly solid... the days start out all right, sometimes even sunny, but by the afternoon... well, you're just driving along and suddenly, it looks like someone up and dumped a swimming pool over your truck.

It's not fun.

Especially when you're hauling mattresses.

But I had to post something... I mean, I've resorted to clothes hangers in the previous post. That's scraping the bottom of the barrel...

So, here's the Episcia. NOID. It's a cutting off a plant that was given to me by a lady down the street. Well over a year ago.
Planted in one of those evil self-watering pots that promote root rot and yada yada yada... but quite frankly, if you expect something like this thing to survive in my house, it has to be in one of these pots. You skip watering an episcia, and they just don't get over it.

It sat for the longest time in my kitchen window...but it outgrew the window and kept mounting attacks into the sink... now it sets on top of the terrarium where the African Violets are living. I figured there was enough light for the African violets, there's enough light for this. It seems to be happy.

Wish I liked it better. And really, I don't know why I don't except that, like the African violets, it just ain't my style. It's not like I hate the thing... if I did I wouldn't have said "What a nice flame violet" when I was at that ladies house for coffee and at a sudden loss for topics of conversation. Of course, I immediately ended up with a cutting. I should of kept my blasted mouth shut... warning... don't go handing out compliments when you're out of things to talk about...

So, I don't really like it... and I don't really dislike it... I guess I'm more or less indifferent... and if I had anything else to talk about, this post wouldn't exist. Hmph.

Hangers? Really? NO, REALLY?

2010-06-28T20:55:00.004-05:00

No garden pics today... It's been raining off and on all day... a cold front is moving through, tomorrows high temp will be 86 F... brr, break out the sweat shirts... so, no gardening happened today...

So, today, since I couldn't garden, I decided to take some stuff into the flea market for the booth. OK.

So I loaded up my truck... and I have literally hundreds of those plastic store hangers... you know, the ones with the wire hook that swivels around? For some reason, I collect them. I've never figured it out... When I had my own store, they were very valuable. Later, when I decided to cut back on using the clothes dryer, a plastic hanger was perfect for hanging shirts and such in the garage or even off the eaves of the house. (Wire hangers stretch out the shoulders and sometimes leave rust stains.) Here in Texas, air drying is quicker than the dryer anyway... but for some reason, much like when ever I see a still alive plant by the road, whenever somebody cleans out their closet and tosses a box full of these out on the curb on garbage day, I pick it up. Don't take me wrong. It's not a fixation, I don't jump out of bed and go running through the neighborhood in search of hangers. But if I see them, I pick them up.

So, I have, out in my storage shed, tons of these hangers.

So, other dealers at the flea market are always asking to borrow one or two of mine... and I know I'm never going to see it again, but I'll "lend" it to them anyway... I have plenty, right? It's really no big deal...

Well, the other day, someone 'borrowed' one, then I actually saw them writing their vendor number on it, so it'll be returned to their booth after whatever on it is sold... which really pissed me off for some reason. I know, terribly petty of me, but damn... now if they were writing my number on it, so it would go to my booth later, that would be cool, but they're not... They're blatantly laying claim to something that isn't theirs. GRRRRRR

Anyway, I decided that I would just put these hangers of mine, which let's face it, I have way too many off, in bundles of 10 and sell them off, for a buck a bundle. That way, the next time someone wanted to 'borrow' one, I'd just say "actually, I sell them..." They're cheap, I'm not making much money off of them, but I'm not getting pissed off... everything is cool, right?

So, on the way in, I told Joy, the cashier who works on the days that I don't, what was up... and she agreed with me that it was a good idea. Besides, you should always tell the cashier what's up... that way if anybody said they needed hangers, Joy would say, 'Claude's got some for sale in his booth.' And Joy always tells me what's in her booth too, when I'm cashier. It works out well...

So, I sat 8 bundles in my booth, didn't even get them in the basket I was gonna put em in, just laid them on the floor then walked back to the truck to grab something else... and when I got back six bundles were gone. Walked back up front, and Joy was putting them in a bag for a customer. I bought a coke, me and Joy had a bit of a laugh, and then I went back to my booth, and the other 2 bundles were gone...

Who the hell would of thought that bloody hangers would be such a hot item?

Here I've been concentrating on collectables, china, and other items of decorative interest, and what I should have been doing is running around saving the landfills from unnecesary plastic and wire hangers.

Anyway... in the future, the $1 bundles will consist of 7 hangers. Might as well get as much as I can right?

cats birds and cactus...

2010-06-26T07:16:00.003-05:00

First... we got rain! Not much, but enough to wet everything down...

Next... we got dead birds! Phennig was very proud of himself this morning and brought this home. I can only hope it's the mockingbird that has been pecking holes in my tomatoes...

And now, we got Leuchtenbergia principis, also known as the agave cactus...

I saw this somewhere... I've been wanting one for a while, but I hadn't seen one to buy. Actually, the only one I'd ever seen in person was at the Ft. Worth Botanic Garden, through the windows of the greenhouse... so when I saw one in a big box store, I grabbed it.

I know it doesn't look like a cactus. It looks like an agave. But those leaves aren't leaves... they're the plants tubercules.

We all know that some cactus produce ribs of spines, and others produce bumpy tubercules. These are tubercules taken to an extreme level... to the point that they look like leaves. They'll get up to 6 inches long, and the entire plant can get to 2 feet tall... This is the only species in the genus, but the genus is very closely related to barrel cactus, and they can produce intergeneric hybrids referred to as Ferobergias.

And those spines aren't half as mean looking as they appear either... they're papery.

And that's as exciting as it gets around here.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Egyptian onions... again...

2010-06-23T20:27:00.003-05:00

I knew I had posted about these before, and I had... 2 years ago, in this post...

These are Allium cepa var. proliferum. AKA Egyptian onion, Walking Onion, Tree Onion or Winter Onion...

As you can see in the pic, the Egyptian onion reproduces by forming bulbs at the top of a stalk that can be 3 feet tall, but is more typically 2 to 2 1/2 feet tall...
here's a close-up of the "sets" or "bulbils" these are about 3/4 of an inch wide, the largest are about an inch wide... The larger sets will produce even smaller sets of their own...

as seen in this pic...

and sometimes the stalk will produce sets, then a secondary stalk that has no connection with a bulbil at all, which produces small tiny sets.

Now, if you check with the garden writers, they'll start gushing about how unique and unusual these plants are... not really. Texas has quite a few different wild onion and garlic varieties. And I'd say at least half 'top-set' although usually not so dramatically, producing small balls of 1/4 to 1/2 inch bulbils that are white, lavendar or deep shining purple... actually, several of them are very decorative, and I've been thinking of grabbing some of the sets and sticking them in the yard...

I find these fascinating... I can't exactly claim they're decorative in the garden, but they are interesting. And I've certainly seen less attractive plants planted in borders... here's how I use them in the yard:

At about this time of year, the larger sets are pulled off. Any secondary sets are removed, and the larger sets are placed in the garden with a good layer of mulch over them. They will quickly grow to a large enough size to use as scallions. Very strong scallions... these are not subtly flavored plants. Most people say they taste like strong onion with a definite overtone of garlic. I like them though...

I've heard of people peeling the larger sets and pickling them for 'cocktail onions' and I have no reason to believe you couldn't. It just sounds like too much trouble and I've never tried it.

You can also just give them a quick chop, or crush them under a knife blade like you would garlic and cook with them...

The smaller secondary sets are usually either planted for more plants next year, or given away to anybody who wants to start some of their own... Anybody interested? Just give me an address in the comment section to send them, (the comments are moderated, so I won't publicise it) and I'll be glad to send an envelope full... but don't expect any topsetting until next spring.

There are several web-sites dedicated to them, and selling them, that give lots of info on how to grow them. Evidently they're winter hardy all the way up to zone 3, and down to 9, not really in 10, as they need a little winter to grow properly... and in 8 and 9 you might be able to eat them all winter.

and back on topic... kinda...

2010-06-23T05:48:00.002-05:00

After my little denominational diatribe... I feel I owe you a garden pic...

Tomatoes in the back yard.

growing like crazy!

Sherman TX...

2010-06-22T19:16:00.002-05:00

On this baking hot day, I had to deliver to Sherman, TX... a mere 97 miles from my house, the seat of Grayson County. Aproximately 38,000 people live in this sleepy town...

First of all, I should apologize... usually when I play travel blogger, it's someplace where I've actually had a little bit of time to find something to photograph. Not today, as I was on a hot run, and had to get back to Dallas. I only had time for a few quick pics... and the sun was beating down making everything a bit overexposed.

First of all, a few lots down from my delivery, I saw this, and my regs know how I am about run-down and/or abandoned houses... so here's the obligatory shot of one...

And, of course, my second weakness, old churches...

You can see some info on the Historic Marker below...

although, now that I've gotten home and done a bit of research, I should point out a correction to the above marker.

The first line of the marker has one flaw... if the church was organized in 1875, it was not organized as the "Christian Methodist Episcopal Church" It would have been the "Colored Methodist Episcopal Church." The name would have been changed from Colored to Christian in the mid-1950's. The question is whether this was an oversight, a lazy researcher at the historic society, or a slight glossing over of history.

If you have no interest in church politics, and if you don't I can't blame you-they can be awfully messy - you might want to skip this part. And just for the record, I HAD to research it, as the name Christian Methodist Episcopal Church seemed a little strange and redundant to me. The first thought that came to my head was something along the lines of, "As opposed to the Buddist Baptist Catholics, no doubt... then I HAD to look it up... sorry if I'm boring you, but now I have all this info and nothing to do with it... so I'm dumping it on you...

What follows is a major simplification of the info I can find...

First, it's fairly common knowledge that the Episcopal church broke from the Anglican (or Church of England) in America at about the time of the American Revolution.

The Methodist movement, what most modern people would now call a Charismatic or Evangelical movement, although I think technically it isn't... took place within the church and eventually built their own Temples and called themselves the Methodist Episcopalian Church. Well, the ones in America did... I'm not concerning myself with anything else at the moment. I should also point out that several Methodist groups formed together and eventually became the United Methodist Church here in the states. But before that happened...

The Methodist Episcopalian Church (lets call them the MEC) was very very progressive for it's time. There were lots of adherents, although only about 1 in 5 were actual members. They had Reverends, but also lay preachers. And, what would have then been considered revolutionary, women and slaves were allowed to stand up and speak in church, and often lead meetings.

After the Civil War, the Colored Methodist Episcopalian Church (CMEC) was formed by adherents who didn't want to be overshadowd by the white leadership of the MEC. In the 1950's, as mentioned before, the word colored was replaced with Christian.

And now that I have all THAT out of my system, I should also mention that the church, or at least the historic building that the church is in, is for sale...

Now, see what a little random curiosity can lead to?

If that isn't an arguement for walking around with blinders on and minding your own darned business, I don't know what is... I now have all this information jammed in my head, and no real use for it.

If however, you'd like to know more about Sherman TX, here's a link to the wikipedia page...

and here's a wikipedia link to the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church article (and I hope my poor fingers never have to type THAT again...)

and since racial issues are running through the post, here's the Handbook of Texas online link to the Sherman Texas Race Riots of 1930 which is a fascinating read...

Foundlings... again....

2010-06-20T19:47:00.005-05:00

Hmmm, two posts in one day... I'm getting quite chatty aren't I?

well, first I have to show you this... and then beg a little...

This showed up at my house.

An orchid. I think I've mentioned before how I feel about orchids. In case you don't remember, I like them well enough, but I never actually wanted to grow one. There's always somebody saying, "Oh, they're not any trouble at all..." then they break into a list of requirements that I don't have and really have no intention of ever having. And while they look pretty good when they're blooming, when they're not... ehhh...

anyway... I remember seeing some orchid plant that vaugely looked like this in a nursery a while back, can't say exactly when, and if I remember right, I have a vauge impression of pink blooms, but seeing as it was an orchid I really didn't take that much notice of it. So, I have no idea whatsoever of what genus, much less species, this thing is.

I should really start paying more attention to things I suppose. I mean, all the decorators are throwing orchids all over model homes and all the big box stores are hocking them by the thousands, and it's gonna be inevitable that Claudes Home for Wayward Plants is gonna have to deal with the danged things eventually. But until I can muster up enough energy to actually look into them...

Is there some kind soul out there who can tell me what the hell this thing is? I mean, I know it's not blooming, and I know that there's probably several hundred orchids that have upright leaves like this, but a general area to start?

It's got sunburn on a bunch of the stems... and it seems that the clumps, (or psuedobulbs? Is that what they're called?) that produced blooms died after doing so... but I don't know if that's typical for the genus or if that's just what happened... and there's 2 new clumps(?) growing out... feel free to ask questions if that helps....

The next plant is not a foundling. I actually deigned to spend good money on this guy...

A Silver European Fan Palm, Chamaerops humilis.

I was at a big box store, with the general idea of trying to find something to plant with the foundling Sago Palms aka Cycas revoluta, thinking of producing a little semi-tropical area in the yard when I ran across this... hardy to zone 7, and nice glacous leaves that I think will look very good against the deep green Sago fronds...

And best of all....

so yeah, I spent good money, but not much.

Oh well...

have a great day all...

New things in the garden...

2010-06-20T10:33:00.006-05:00

so, last Thursday I got a wonderful box in the mail from Julie, over at A Succulent Life. It contained Gloriosa lily plants... (follow the link to wikipedia for pics & info) Three to be exact... and I've planted them in the strip garden out by the carport.

I know, it's a supremely crappy picture... but I'm 95% sure that it will be fine. I planted it by the metal post of the carport, on a trellis made of that wire lawn border stuff they sell that is absolutely idiotically useless as a lawn border, but if you stretch it from the ground to the carport roof makes a decent trellis for vines such as gourds, morning glories and such that don't need permanent trellises.

It shouldn't take long for the leaves to start climbing, and hopefully I'll get some of the blooms soon...

I also have a few more plants that I need to get in the ground and maybe make a few posts about, but I'm just having a hard time getting anything done around here... it should be better though. I'm not working at the flea market after church on Sunday anymore, which puts me back to a 5 day week. That's a good thing. Trust me. I wasn't making enough money in the 4 hours to warrant the stress level I was going through, that four hours will be better spent doing something useful. Like laundry. I'm realizing, rather late in my life, just how important laundry is. You'd have thought it would have dawned on me earlier, but there we are.

But this is supposed to be a garden blog, right?

So here's a garden tip:

You know those tree seedlings that get in your flowerbeds, and along fences? The ones that are too big to pull up by the root, so you cut them down, and they grow back, bigger and stronger than ever? Here's a good way to get rid of them without resorting to toxic poisons. I've done this myself, so don't think I'm talking out of my hat.

Aquire some large flower pots that DON'T have drainage holes. Terra cotta, decorative foam, plain black, it doesn't matter. All that matters is that no light gets through in any way shape or form. Thin white pots won't work... light gets through.

Cut your 'trash' tree down, leaving a 6 inch stump. This is not difficult, because that's usually what ends up after you cut them down. If you don't leave the stump, the tree will sprout from the roots, possibly several feet away, that stump means that's where the new growth will come from.

Turn the pot upside down over the stump. Pressing it into the soil if possible. In our heavy Texas clay, it's not always possible, but try...

Now, what happens is that the tree resprouts, and finds no light to allow photosynthesis. Eventually, it uses up all the reserve energy it has in its roots, and it starves to death. I know, bad plant karma... I'll probably burn in hell as a horticultural serial killer. At least there won't be any mulberry trees in my flower beds...

Of course, now you have the problem of upended flower pots sitting around for the 6 to 18 months that it will take for your suffering victim to give up the ghost. Use the pots as podiums to display other potted plants, maybe a cactus dish garden. Or garden art. Or pretty rocks. Or put a pretty glazed dish on it and use it as a bird bath... Anything really... but I'm thinking that a 3 foot tall plastic gargoyle would be perfect! Not only does it display things at a level above the flower bed, but the growing tree underneath can be pretty vigorous and lift up the upended pot. The weight of your average terra cotta pot full of echeveria is usually more than sufficient to hold it down. And if it isn't, retrim the growth underneath and start over... the resprouting stump is by then seriously weakened and you shouldn't have to retrim more than once.

Now, of course, I suppose it would be much less time consuming to spray Round-up around. I just don't roll that way.

Standing Cypress...

2010-06-15T20:02:00.003-05:00

Texas wildflowers still have the power to impress me on occasion... I saw these on a late day run to Granbury, so I stopped to take a really quick pic on the way back...

These are Standing Cypress...

Following info copied from Texas Wildflowers Information and Pictures
Standing Cypress
Scientific Name: (Ipomopsis rubra)
Definition: Standing Cypress ranges from East Texas to Gillespie and Taylor counties. The bloom is a spectacular column of scarlet trumpets displayed from May to July.

And of course, there's more info and much better pics available at the UTAustin's Ladybird Johnson page...

So what we got here is a plant that blooms for aproximately 2 months in the beginning of our Texas heat... and the ones I photographed today are bloomin in an overgrown pasture that hasn't had any rain for over a month. And they're still producing masses of flowers on top of 4 foot stalks...

And there were plenty of butterflies flittering around, and I'm sure that if I'd been able to stand there long enough, a hummingbird would have shown up.

I soooo need some of these for the yard. Seriously... imagine these growing in and around some prickly pears or yuccas, or even among the iris that have stopped blooming... I need these. Really really really badly.

update : I'm alive, honest!

2010-06-12T06:53:00.005-05:00

First... I feel I should apologize... I haven't been blogging as much lately, nor commenting on other blogs as much as I should. I still read all the posts, I just have been on the overworked side and therefore not very talkative.

That, and I just haven't had as much to say in general.

It's very hard to be interested in anything in these first few weeks of Texas summer. A kind of lethargy creeps into your bones with the heat, and it saps all your interest.

But, evidently I'm acclimatizing... this week I saw a lily-pond, and I took a few pics...

and just this morning, I went out into the garden and got a few home-grown potatoes.

Those are Yukon Gold, Adirondack Blue and Rose Gold. The Yukons seem to be doing the best...

I'm not getting a bumper crop, but considering the ease of harvesting, I'm more than happy... this is the Ruth Stout method of potatoe growing.

You throw the seed potatoes on the ground. You can cut them into 'sets' with 3 eyes each if you wanna, but I didn't wanna. They grow anyway...

Anyway, you throw them on the ground. Don't be digging in or anything.

Cover them with at least six inches of straw, hay or leaves. (I actually recommend more than six inches...)

Walk away, and in about 3 months, after the potatoes have grown, bloomed, and died down... pull back your mulch and there will be potatoes on the ground.

Pick them up, and eat them.

This is gardening I can deal with...

As I said, you're not getting a bumper crop, but you're not killing yourself digging in Texas hard-pan, so the trade off is worth it for me. Now, Seed potatoes at the nurseries can be expensive. Any potatoe that sprouts in the fridge can be sprouted and grown, although most are treated with a hormone that prevents or delays sprouting. They will still sprout, but they may produce in a lackidazical way... If you buy your potatoes for eating at a health food or organic store, they haven't been treated and they'll grow just fine in your garden.

And some of this crop will be saved for the next crop... here in Texas, we can plant again in September for a fall crop, in November for an early spring crop, (there's at least an 80 % chance they'll survive all winter, unless we have a hellacious freeze) and in January for a late spring crop, or in March for a crop now.

And here's a few more toms... pretty aren't they?

and back to gardening...

2010-06-03T20:03:00.007-05:00

Anyway... after my short little reminiscence about my glamorous past...

This is the Pseudoechinopsis 'dominoes' blooming again. (I know, I know... it's probably not a real ID but that is what was on the tag, and it's going to have to do until I find out the real ID. Ease up already... sheesh...)

The pot is so light weight that it tips over when it blooms, so I snuggled it up against one of the Agave americana in the yard until I can get it repotted...

And my official second harvest of tomatoes.

Wee Haw!

And now, on a totally unrelated note, does anybody out there know one darned thing about Royal Haegar Pottery?

I know the bare basics... the difference between haegar and Royal Haegar is that Mr. Royal was a pottery designer, and he put out a high end line. And I know that this vase, even though it verges on ugly, was a bargain at 5 bucks.

It's about 15 inches tall... which is fairly large for this sort of pottery... but despite the fact that I work in an antique mall and flea market, I've never picked up much on this company. Except I tend to know it when I see it... which is pretty bloody easy, as it says it on the bottom.

Anyhow... if anybody out there enjoys this kind of research, or just wants to tell me... I'd appreciate it...

midgets vs mascots...

2010-06-03T07:08:00.004-05:00

No, the title of my post is not in any way related to a Random Rant.

Nor is it in any way related to a Prickly Plant.

It's related to a movie.

Specifically, it's related to Gary Coleman's last film.

A little backstory here... I used to work in the film industry, in a very very very minor way... I was a movie extra in a lot of movies that you've probably seen, and yeah, I even had a few lines in a few of the movies... although most of what I said on camera more than likely ended up on the cutting room floor.

The high-light of my film career was as a featured F/X extra. This should absolutely make Mr. Subjunctive happy... I was Featured Flesh Eating Zombie in a movie that was called Scary Texas Movie. I don't think the movie was ever released in America... but I hear it did well in Italy... anyway, if you ever saw it, I was the zombie who got shot three times, and when they shot me in the head, green slimey brains splattered all over the wall behind me.

Show biz is so glamourous.

I keep expecting to see a copy of that movie in those $1 movie bins in the bargain stores. If I do, I'll probably buy it, because I've never seen it.

Anyway, the reason I'm telling you all of this, is that after Gary Coleman recently passed away, I got an e-mail through facebook. It seems that Midgets vs. Mascots was Gary Colemans final film project, and it was filmed right here in Dallas. I actually knew a lot of people who worked on the production, so I drug myself to a special showing last night.

I wasn't expecting much.

What I got was actually pretty good, in a drunken college kid kind of way, which isn't really my style but I was impressed.

The movie is a fake documentary/reality show.

The premise is that Big Dick, a little person who started his career as a mascot for a football team and then segueyed into porn, has died, leaving behind his son, Little Dick and his trashy ex-wife as the only heirs. In order to inherit, they must each coach a team, one team made of midgets and one team made of mascots, in a competition. The winner will get 5 million dollars, and each of the five members of the team will get 1 million dollars.

Much hillarity, gratuitous violence, gratuitous nudity, foul language, vomiting, booger eating (which I could have definitely done without) kinky sex, a naked midget shower scene and other drunken college frat boy idiocy commences...

Now, This is not my type of entertainment or humor.

That's why it pains me to say, I actually enjoyed it. It's not that bad. Just don't expect art, and you might like it.

This may well be the best film project that Gary Coleman ever did. Which is, unfortunately, not saying much. Mr Coleman did not have a good career. Casting directors didn't do him any favors and his own personal dramas and troubles eclipsed any work he did. We can all only hope that he can now rest in peace.

First harvest...

2010-05-31T20:13:00.003-05:00

Earlier this spring, when I was starting my garden in my haphazard lasidasical way... I found a packet of beans with about 8 seeds in it. I stuck them in the ground, and walked away... and today, I pulled a handfull of yellow wax beans off the 5 surviving plants.

Yeah, I know... not much, but I'm only feeding myself, and I most certainly am not going to can any, and frozen beans are always too tough to bear... so a few occasional handfuls of beans are more than plenty.

Today, I also harvested my first tomato. A porter... which is a little guy, smaller than a roma and larger than a cherry. I would have included him in the pic, but I had a flashback to childhood, and I sat right down in the garden and bit into it while it was still warm from the sun... wonderful...

just stuff...

2010-05-31T09:37:00.006-05:00

Just some shots around the yard... this pic is a little overexposed, it doesn't really show the firecracker red of the bloom... but you get the idea... Cleistocactus winteri, aka golden rat tail or my preferred common name, golden cat tail... click the label if you want to see past pics of the whole plant...

And of course, the Prickly pears are in bloom... I was worried that I was going to lose a lot of blooms and therefore fruits... which are very important to me for making jelly, but it turned out not so much.

Now this is a foundling from the side of the road, and I'm gonna see if I can do something with it... an Areca palm... Chrysalindocarpus lutescens. They make decent parlor palms... and if I was a little bit further south, decent yard palms to 10' tall... but this guy has been neglected.

Step 1: cut off anything that is obviously dead and leave anything that is green...

I realize that the couple of leaves left are in pretty bad shape, but there's enough green on them to still be doing SOME photosynthesis... and since they're the only leaves left, I'm leaving them for now...

SAGO UPDATE

The second Sago did eventually put up new fronds... kinda... it seems to be putting up 1 - count them ONE, new leaves. One of it's four remaining leaves has died off. The other three... beat up as they are, are staying on there for photosynthesising purposes. I just don't feel like further weakening an already obviously weak plant... of course, this is way too much bother for most people, but I seem to find a perverse pleasure in reviving the near deceased...

The other plant however is doing just fine! Remarkably fine, actually, and he's about ready to find a permanent home in the yard.

Hoping everyone is having a great Memorial day, complete with Bar-B-Que and lots of family and friends.

Later!

Chamaelobvia 'Rose Quartz'

2010-05-23T07:00:00.003-05:00

And this morning we have blooms from a wonderful Chamaelobvia "Rose Quartz", one of the hybrids of Peanut Cactus... I'm not even going to get into the nomclamature on this... lets just say that there are people out there who call this Lobvia, Echinopsis, and a few others... it's one of the plants that have historically bounced around from genus to genus. Yes, I realize that we should all know the accurate latin names of our plants. It would, however, be very helpful if you people made up your minds what they were before you twisted my arm to remember it.

I will take on the 'Rose Quartz' part of the name though... I've seen the rock called rose quartz. They're pale, milky pink. Absolutely nothing to do with these vibrant ruby toned blooms. I realize that the people who develop the cultivars and hybrids get to name them, but there should be some standards...

Anyway, this plant showed up at the house last July, in this post.

Peanut cactus are one of the easiest cactus to grow, and very rewarding. Repeated flushes of blooms all summer, unlike most cactus which bloom more or less once and you better be waiting for it with camera poised when it happens, cause it will only be there for a few minutes... Culture is simple. Pot it, stick it in the sun, and throw some water in it's general direction every once in a while. Come winter, stick it in a window, and try to remember which window next spring.

Pseudoechinopsis

2010-05-22T06:05:00.005-05:00

well, I woke up at 5 am out of habit, and I don't have to be anywhere until 9:30 so I was goofing off with the plants... as much as you can in the dark that is...

I did have this little guy blooming outside the back door this morning... one of those annoying ID's... Pseudoechinopsis 'dominoes' although the tag also says Echinopsis species... I don't really like those kind of ID's... it's not a real ID as far as I'm concerned...

And the tag didn't say one darned thing about it being a night-bloomer. Which is OK I suppose, but not really... all it had was a bunch of standard Echinopsis info that I'm not entirely sure is going to be accurate for this plant... I'd like to know how big the plant gets, if it produces offsets or just sits there like a lump, what kind of temperatures can it be exposed to... that sort of thing.

And of course, there's nothing on the web about it at all...

I'm pretty sure that it's a hybrid of some sort, only because most echinopsis you see are and I don't think the name pseudoechinopsis is valid, but I certainly may be wrong.

Other than that... I couldn't tell you.

Anyway... I brought the thing in and took a pic. It is a nice enough plant, and it blooms well. Night blooming plants have the advantage of blooming when I'm home, but they have the disadvantage of blooming when I'm asleep, and usually when I can't stay up all night to see them because I've got things to do in the morning.

And, just as an aside... The second Sago palm is definitely putting up leaves... I'm not expecting as much from this one. 1) the trunk is smaller which means the plant is probably younger and 2) it only had 4 leaves left alive on the plant when I found it, so it's probably not been photosynthesising as much energy for new growth as the other plant. But we'll see, won't we?

Finally, an ID on this darned plant!

2010-05-19T21:17:00.002-05:00

So... I've had this darned plant for 2 years now, and I've never been able to pin down an ID... so it finally occured to me to send some pics over to the wonderful guys at Cactus Blog... I mean, I've been reading their posts for a year now, and they are very knowledgable guys and they ID all sorts of things for other people.. why the hell didn't I ask before, right?

well, they've definitely ID'd it as Mammillaria perbella ... which was one of my tentative ID's, but compared to the pics on the sites it just didn't look the same.

Turns out that since this is growing in cultivation, the spines and the wool in the axils aren't as thick.

but it's definitely a M. perbella.

Well, that's a relief... now what am I going to worry about?

And the Beer Can Garden EVOLVES!!!!

2010-05-18T20:15:00.003-05:00

Now, I've posted a couple of times about the beer can garden... the first time HERE

Basically, here's the story in a nutshell...

this is in a rather neglected part of Ft. Worth... unfortunately, the yuppies have decided on an urban renewal plan and condos are going in.

so the Beer Can man had to remove a whole bunch of the beer cans, and what was actually a rather amazing sight was reduced to something rather pitiful. The reason for this was that they were supposedly impeding foot traffic outside his fence, which is technically public property. Now, even though it's public property, the city doesn't feel inclined to maintain it in any way, and there's no sidewalks, but the city had the law on it's side and the beer can garden was partially dismantled.

and it looked pitiful.

and now, it's starting to look like something again...

now... as mentioned in previous posts... these neighborhoods exist in every larger city... forgotten little pockets crammed between factories and the railroad... sure, there are trains going by at 2 am, but nobody cares... and you can usually do what you want. That's the only real reason for living there. I have personally seen goats wandering less than a mile from downtown, and a dozen old toilet bowls planted with geraniums lined up in military precision.

It's eccentric.

I'll give you that.

But, really, it's kinda cool too...

Random pics and stuff...

2010-05-15T19:53:00.003-05:00

just some random pics around the yard... not sure that there's anything all that interesting going on...

This is an actual Mansfield Cemetary cactus blooming in the back... not bad for a cutting that is a little less than a year old, huh? As you can see, he's already growing offsets, and the smaller cutting directly next to him is more typical of the cuttings that I have... still too small, but I expect big things from them next year...

And the winter may have killed my Variagated Agave americana... but the roots have evidently survived underground and are starting to resprout... how cool is that? I'll probably take one inside this winter, as they're evidently not as hardy as the unvariagated form. The web-sites aren't in agreement as to exactly how hardy they are... so we'll not take any chances...

And here's a common everyday thistle by the side of the road. I've always been fond of thistle. I have no real reason why, just am...

And here's the new growth on the Sago Palm... The other rescued sago may be showing some signs of stirring to life... but it's very subtle... anyway... as soon as these leaves get up and hardened off, I'll cut off the older beat up leaves, what few are left, and try to find a place in the yard to put this guy... where he'll sit for at least 3 months before he puts up another whirl of leaves... they don't grow their leaves one at a time, but rather in periodic bursts. Sometimes only one group a year, and never it seems more than 3 a year. hmmmmm.

Anyway... no day off for me this week... I've got to work on Monday for someone who's got a Dr's appointment... oh well...

Ft Worth Botanic Garden on Mothers Day...

2010-05-09T17:58:00.008-05:00

As some of my older readers know, my Mother passed away last September... so I have to say I wasn't looking forward to my first Mothers Day without her.

Don't get me wrong... I'm past the grief stricken part, but the thing about Mother's day is that there are quite a few of us out there who don't really have a mom around to celebrate with. Let's face it folks... there's not a lot of guidelines for the people who are outside the box. I mean, what exactly am I supposed to do? There's no tradition that I know of... so for some reason I decided that I'd celebrate Mothers day with Mother Earth...

Anyway, after church I drove a few miles and went to the Ft. Worth Botanic Garden. The rose gardens are in full bloom right now, and they were getting a lot of attention from family outings today. Not to mention a few photographers and young ladies in wedding dresses... I steered clear of them. Don't get me wrong... Roses are great. I've just seen them before. Today I went into parts of the Gardens that I don't normally...

The FWBG has a very natural garden plan. Much of it looks about as much like untamed woods as a planned garden can, and consequently it also has a lot of wildlife... all the way up to coyotes that tend to stay hidden all day but come out at night I'm told. I started my day in these "untamed" areas... and right off, I found a 4 leaf clover in a patch of white clover by the pond.

Actually, 5 minutes of poking around yielded 3 four leaf clovers... not bad huh? I've got them pressing in a novel I had in the truck...

I also saw a heron stalking through the pools...

But he'd better watch his step. There are snapping turtles lurking under the surface...

As naturalistic as the plan is... it is a botanic garden, and there are some water Iris planted around...

After about an hour of wandering around and snapping pics in a very distracted sort of way... I walked over to the Conservatory.

Now, the conservatory of the FWBG is a rather overgrown and overblown place... It's actually rather small, but they've got a lot of plants kind of crammed together in there. I've never been particularly fond of it... primarily because I always get the urge to attack it with pruning sheers. Spent leaves are always underfoot, and branches and vines are always threatening to strangle you... but that artificial wildness appealed to me today so I paid my one dollar entrance fee and wandered in.

This first plant I know because Mr. Subjunctive talked about it on his blog... but I'm sure that his looks nothing like this... it's a Screw Pine, altogether about 18 feet tall, and complete with arial roots that look like they may become weapons...

The next is a tropical pitcher plant. Nepenthes of some sort... it wasn't tagged though... (don't you just HATE that...)

the nest two pics are a hanging fringed hibiscus...

in the second pic you can see a huge NOID bromiliad of some sort that the plant is draping itself over...

and here's the path through the conservatory, past the banana trees...

And this is the humungousest (is that a real word) corn plant draceana that I've ever seen or ever hope to. About 25 feet tall... which would be really really cool if I was fonder of draceana...

and this is a chenile plant that is hanging it's fuzzy flowers over the path right at my face level... you have to duck to get past these...

And this was going haywire... the plant clump is huge and there were at least 2 dozen of the blooms going...

And that's how I spent the better part of my afternoon.

Really, replacing Mothers Day with Mother Earth day worked for me. I came out of it not quite as moody as I went in, and trust me, that's a good thing...

As for any of you out there who do have a Mom to celebrate with... treasure every moment.

And for all my readers who are Moms... have a great and blessed day...

The last pot of Chilli for a while...

2010-05-07T19:46:00.002-05:00

No pics though... I ate it all up...

For my final pot of chilli for the season, I made one of my Mom's favorite recipes...

Detroit Chilli (I don't really know why this is "Detroit" chilli... but that's what Mom always called it, and I learned at a very young age that questioning her could be dangerous... anyway, this is how it's written in her cookbook... )

brown:
1 lb hamburger
1 diced onion
1 clove crushed garlic

When meat is brown and the onions are transluscent add

3 tblspoons chilli powder (more or less to taste)
3 tblspoons cinnamon
salt and pepper to taste
and enough flour to soak up the grease.

Stir in quickly, so as not to scorch the cinnamon then pour in:

1 bottle of beer

as this is heating up, open 1 large (28 ounce) can of diced tomatoes
2 15 ounce cans of pinto or red beans.

- always drain and rinse beans, that way they won't cause as much gas -

Add tomatoes and beans when the mixture starts boiling, simmer for at least 1 hour, more is better.

It's amazing how the cinnamon and chilli powder combine their flavors...

but it's getting too hot here for chilli. Right at 90 degrees today, and our actual summer heat hasn't hit yet...

Look what I found scrounging around...

2010-05-06T17:08:00.005-05:00

I was driving to the grocery store on trash day about a month ago... when I happened to see these by the road.

two badly treated cycas revoluta... more commonly known as sago palm. (of course a real sago palm is another plant entirely, but that's what these are called) It would appear that our rather hellacious winter had killed all of last years more tender growth, and had prompted a home-owner to just give up hope, so out they went to the curb.

Where I picked them up. That's because I'm pretty sure that if there's any green left on a plant, there is a chance that it can be recovered.

Well, as I said above, this was a month ago. And they've been sitting there looking like... well like that up there. Nothing. I suppose some gardeners would be discouraged. I however grow cactus. I'm used to plants sitting around doing nothing but looking like an unfriendly thorny lump for long stretches of time.

But then today... I saw this...

See that in the middle there? It's new growth! Specifically, it's new growth on the plant in the top right hand side of the first pic.

The other plant... well not so much yet...

But I'm not giving up hope yet. It still has those green leaves after all. And even if it's main growing tip never stirs to life, the plant can produce new growing tips off from the roots...

And why go through all this trouble? Lots of reasons.

1) I'm an experimental type of gardener. I like to do things just to see what happens

2) This plant is considered pretty drought tolerant, and if I get it in the ground it is reasonably hardy in my area.

3) Cycads are some of the oldest species of plants on the planet

4) While they're technically not a cactus or a succulent, they are however prickly enough to fit into my Prickly Plant theme and finally...

5) These are damned expensive plants!

That price tag was from last year, they've gone up a little last time I checked.

I see from my tiny bit of research that they like sandy, quick draining soils with some organic matter mixed in. Quite frankly, that describes the topsoil that you buy from the nurseries locally...

Anyway... my experience is more in the cacti realm... any wisdom from anybody out there?

Cemetary cactus all abloom...

2010-05-03T20:51:00.003-05:00

All right, not the actual cemetary cactus... those are in another part of my yard... this is an Escobaria missouriensis that I'd had for a few years before... the actual cemetary cactus are producing blooms, or about 1/3 of the cuttings are... the other ones are still too small... But the slightly pinker toned blooms in my header photo were taken in the cemetary last year.

This plant crowns the top of a strawberry jar in my back yard, and by this time next year will have totally covered the opening...

It's been blooming for about a week now. Unfortunately, the blooms only open when the plant is getting direct sun. The sun moves behind the house and throws a shadow on the plant every day at about 4:30 pm... causing the blooms to close. So today, when I had a day off, was the first time I've been able to see the blooms open.

I'd move the whole thing to a sunnier spot... but all together it weighs well over a hundred lbs, and it's just not worth it to me for a blooming season that's going to last about 2 weeks.

I've found that photographs don't do these, or any cactus bloom, justice. Cactus flowers have a pearlescent sheen on their petals that is impossible to capture on film. But, you get the general idea, I'm sure...

Wildflowers...

2010-04-28T21:56:00.002-05:00

Just a quick post... it's late and I gotta get to bed, but I just had to share the wildflowers...

no bluebonnets today. I'm actually getting tired of them, believe it or not... today there was a roadside full of indian paintbrush though...

they photograph a little redder than they actually are... there's actuall a bit of an orange tone to them. The old fashioned name for this color was 'flame' but nowdays we tend to call in Day-glo

This patch actually has a few of the albino or yellow flowers too...

At the fence line at the back of this patch we got some wild prickly pear...

and scattered around there's some milkweed...

And the coreopsis are just starting to open too...

Hope everyone is having a great week.

later.

Well, it's been over a week...

2010-04-22T19:38:00.002-05:00

And it's been raining off and on all week... not really great light for pics or anything, so yeah... I've seen some fields of bluebonnets, and the coreopsis are beginning to show, and the indian paintbrush is painting some fields orange-red, but not in the kind of light that I can take a pic of...

So you're going to have to settle for Siberian Iris from my yard...

The origional plant came from an abandoned farm site. They were fixing to start plowing it up to build a strip mall, so I ran myself down to rescue these, and some crinum lillies.

Now Siberian Iris aren't as flashy as the German Iris that most of us think of when we think iris... but they're much sturdier plants, at least in this part of the world. Don't get me wrong... Those full bodied, blousy bearded iris do just fine here. But they do best if they're thinned every two years, or they stop producing large amounts of blooms.

Siberian Iris are just the opposite. These guys do best if you leave them the hell alone. Seriously. Don't even think about digging around they're roots... They'll survive it... but they will skip blooming next year.

They're actually very common around abandoned farm sites for exactly this reason. No one is messing with them.

These had to grow 2 years in my yard before they produced a flower, and they've been thriving, in a huge clump that is threatening to crack a sidewalk, for the past 15 years, without me so much as deigning to throw fertilizer on them.

The leaves are very upright, to just over a yard tall, the flowers floating about six inches above the surface of that... The leaves do die down for a dormant season in the heat of summer. I'm told that they would survive if I watered them constantly. I'm not gonna. About September, the leaves resprout and keep growing all through the winter and they bloom in late spring. What more could I ask for?

And now, garden tip for the day...

Always go to used book stores, and look for the publications that were put out by your LOCAL garden clubs in the 50's to 70's. Almost every garden club put one out... they tend to be stapled or ring bound paberback books that look like those cookbooks that schools, lions clubs, and churches put out... these books are so valuable, because they were written when people actually gardened, and were written by people who were actually growing things in your climate... Modern gardening magazines are written by people in a very limited gardening zone, and are usually being paid not by the magazine, but by a nursery organization. Lilypons was pretty bad about this. I've read plenty of magazine 'articles' telling all about how to use Lilypons liners, pumps and etc without ever mentioning that anything that holds water can be a pond. Seriously... I've seen 6 dollar kiddie pools from Wal-mart being used to raise koi, by people who then turn around and sell you $100 pond liners, so that you can put the danged koi in your back yard.

One of these articles really about sent me lunar... They were talking about tropical water-lillies, (which lilypons just happened to be selling that year, what a coincidence, huh?) and the author actually said something like, "While tropical water-lillies can be kept from year to year if you have a green house, I've found it too much trouble, and recomend buying a new one every year..."

Those blasted plants cost over a hundred bucks each! And, I know from reading old garden club magazines that you most definitely don't need a green-house, you can let them go dormant and keep the root in a bucket in the basement until next spring.

The whole point of this little tirade is that if you want real gardening advice, you go to the older books... since most modern gardening books are simply advertisements trying to part you with money you don't have to spend.

I think I'm done now... for the moment...

2010-04-15T00:22:00.005-05:00

Well, I had a good run yesterday...

I had to pick up something... (It's a high security delivery so I'm not allowed to say what or which company... but I must say that it's probably not as important as everybody is making it out to be... it's not uranium or anything, and I seriously doubt that Osama Bin Ladin is gunning for me... ) before 4 pm on Tuesday and deliver it to Oklahoma before 7:30 AM on Wednesday. I don't really mind this... these overnight deliveries pay extremely well, but it does make planning your life a little difficult...

So I picked up the box, kept it locked up until 2 am, woke up then took off for Oklahoma.

Now, when planning my route I ran into a glitch. I usually avoid toll roads. The ones in Dallas only save me about 3 minutes on a trip, and aren't worth the money. But if you're going to Oklahoma from Texas, you can take the $1:50 toll road and get where I was going in 3 hours or take another route, across what my GPS insisted were unpaved roads, and get there in 5 1/2 hours, not to mention the waste of gasoline... Very clever of those Oklahomans... got them quite a little money-maker there.

Now, Oklahoma is a beautiful state, full of rural pastures and scenery.

Not so much at 4 AM though... Nice skies full of stars... which my camera won't capture, but not really much else.

and I developed a tire issue... a slow leak.

Stopped a couple of times to fill the air up.

Got to Lawton, made my delivery, then waited around for a used tire store to open up. While I'm waiting for the tire store, I get a call from the person I just made the delivery too... seems that it wasn't supposed to get there until after 10, and he's quite irate as he just got woke up at home when I made the delivery. I explain that the order came through to be delivered before 7:30. Finally, we determine that someone in the main office is a total jack-ass... and we're all good. Then I got my new tire, and back on the road... this time going to Wichita Falls, TX... so back on the toll road I go.

Picked up, and finally, on the way back, I saw something worth taking a pic of... well it's worth photographing if you really stretch your imagination... Opuntia leptocaulis...
They're commonly called "christmas cactus" or 'Christmas cholla" by the more polite locals... and those little red berries are why. They show up bright red during the holidays... of course it's well into spring now, and the local mockingbirds have pretty much cleaned them off...

Now, if your not so polite of a local, you call them " that (insert cuss word here) cactus"

The plants have viscious little spines, and tiny little pads that break away at the slightest touch, and dig right into you. They're the bane of ranchers.

They're scattered throughout the state, and there seem to be varieties... the ones I see down around Austin are lighter in color and the sections seem longer. I once had one of them in the yard, but it didn't like our slightly tougher winters. Never bloomed and eventually just gave up the ghost after about 5 years.

These are growing north of me, and would most likely handle our winters like a dream. Might even think it was on a tropical vacation. So yes, I used extreme caution and brought a few little sections home to root. If you'd like to know more about them, try this link... or for a more detailed scientific discussion, try this link...

Anyway, I eventually dropped what I picked up in Wichita Falls in Dallas, and then I went home after driving 12 hours straight and collapsed in a small coma. And then, I woke up at midnight. I'd try to get something useful done, but then, come time to go to work in a few hours, I'll be tired out, so I'm using this time for lolling around doing nothing. I haven't had a good loll in a while.

2010-04-12T19:14:00.000-05:00

And we got blooms... Woo Hoo!

Well, I know better...

2010-04-08T21:13:00.002-05:00

So, I went to one of my local nurseries. It's not my favorite... actually, it's one of my least favorite. Overpriced and not good plants... And they have this cactus section.

This cactus section is one of my biggest pet peaves actually, and not only in this particular nursery. It seems that all the local nurseries sell cactus, but none of them have labels... You actually have a better chance of getting a cactus with an accurate label at Wal-mart or Home Depot... and even if it's not accurate, you at least have the right genus. Usually...

Anyway, this particular nursery has something that's really amazing... Succulents and Cacti that are actually dying from lack of water. Someone once told these people that cactus don't need much water and they decided that meant that they need absolutely none... I usually wouldn't lower myself to enter the door of this place. But I was bored. And, as usual, I saw a bunch of seriously deflated, under cared for cactus and succulents that were less than an inch from death. Even grafted cactus whose Hylocerius grafting stock had dried up and died already.

On a table full of Golden Barrel cactus (Echinocactus grusonii) right at that stage where they're losing their juvenile bumpy look and developing real ribs, I found this guy. I don't know if it's some sort of mutant, or if the stress it's been under has somehow damaged it... but for some reason, at the precise moment it started to put out adult ribs... it's growing point has split into 4 different heads.

Now, I've seen 2 headed Golden barrels, but never a four headed one. I kinda had to get it.

Actually, I'm thinking it's a result of stress more than anything else, but it's intersting to note that the new heads all have juvenile ribs, and it will be interesting to see if, when they start their adult ribs, if they'll split again, which would point to a genetic mutation of some sort. regardless, it's an interesting plant.

just had to share...

more pics from around the yard...

2010-04-06T20:13:00.005-05:00

Well, last Monday, my day off... I was out in the yard working and decided I'd take some pics of what's happening out there... The M. sonorensis v. craigii is just starting to bloom... Click on that link to see the whole plant and other stuff about it... This is one of the plants that I was really worried about. I didn't think it was going to make it through the winter, but it managed, although there is some dammage visible on the plant. I'm not gonna worry about it too much, I don't look as good as I used to either. We call it character.

Now, some of you may remember this plant from the absolute worst packing job ever...

This is one of five that I got in the mail... this one was outside to test hardiness, while the other 5 stayed inside for the winter. I really really thought I lost this one... after the last snow, I checked him, and the center growing tip was dark, almost black. I figured rot had set in. Turns out, not so much. He's just fine.

And the Yucca aloifolia... is blooming too... 2 stalks are up and open, and 1 is just starting out. Remarkable things aren't they?

And that's about it...