hello, nothing much...

had a decent day at work. Kind of.

Had to drive 95 miles to Bonham, TX in a really bad thunderstorm. I actually saw lightning hit a tree! I mean, I know lightning hits trees, you hear about it all the time, but until you actually see it, it's just theoretical. Kind of like Iceland. You know Icelands there, but you never once think that it has anything to do with you...

So, anyway, I obviously didn't get to take any pics, as I was too busy trying not to wreck, and I didn't see anything worth taking a picture of. I'm sure that Bonham has plenty of photogenic sites, but not in the middle of a thunderstorm. Then I had to drive back down south, and then to Midlothian, which is about 30 miles south of Dallas, then back up north, and you're probably getting a general drift of my day...

Finally got back to Arlington and decided to go thrift store shopping. Found a great pair of Luchesse boots, which I could sell on ebay for mega-bucks but I'm keeping them for me. They need to find their own dang boots...

There's more big storms coming tonight supposedly, and they'll probably be hanging around tomorrow.

Just wanted to check in.

1st day back...

An absolutely horrid day back at work. It's not that I was overworked, it's that I was under worked. Literally spent about 2 hours sitting in parking lots in not very nice parts of Dallas, waiting for someone, somewhere to need something delivered...

Did find this beauty growing by the side of the road in a vacant lot I was waiting by... A pomegranate bush. They're fairly common here as ornamental fruit trees... this one didn't seem to have any fruit on it from last year, and since it was the only one around for a good mile, probably isn't getting the proper pollination. But at 8 feet tall and around, it was putting on a darned good display... I understand that these fruit bushes are native to near dessert areas, and thats probably why they do so well in our area.

But back to my point, I'm not the kind of guy who can sit around doing nothing for an extended period of time. I start to think too much. That's never safe.

It shouldn't be a problem tomorrow... I've got one of those extended long distance drives tomorrow. 97 miles to Bonham, TX. It'll take all morning, but it'll pay good... and I'll take my camera, since I might see something worth taking a pic of.

later.

Busy Sunday...

well, I've been off of work for a whole week, and today I was just gardening a lot, between naps. This last weeks "vacation" has left me far more exhausted than working, but I've come out of it with a new flea market booth, a new AC system in my car, a new (used) stereo in my car, and a couple of thinned out iris beds... no pics of the iris... new beds aren't that attractive.


sent fifty gazillion iris out to my sister so that she could do something with them.

here's a pic of charcoal briquette kitty... who didn't appreciate her nap being disturbed...

and here's a pic of the cactus again, the first bloom dying off and the second opening... (If I appear to be fixated on this cactus, it's because it's a fairly new and it's the first bloom I've had from it.)and here's a pic of the agave americana, yucca, rosemary and various other plants in a tiny little space in the front yard about 3 weeks ago, this little 4 x 4 bed seems to catch a lot of seedlings.... The white iris in there are one of the batches that I had to thin out. There were too many, they were threatening to crack the sidewalk, and that's really a small bed. Anyway, reduced it down to 2 plants, which will be a dozen by bloom time next spring/summer.

I guess I'll have to go to work to get any relaxation time... LOL.

Trees...

According to one legend, Buddha meditated under a bodhi tree and achieved enlightenment, attaining complete awakening by realizing that the cause of human suffering was ignorance, and also realizing the proper steps to eliminate it.

According to another legend, the Chinese princess Si Ling-chi was sitting under a mulberry tree when the cocoon of a moth fell into her cup of hot tea, and began to unravel... hence silk was discovered.

Still another legend says Sir Isaac Newton was sitting under an apple tree when a fruit fell on his head, and inspired him to research the nature of gravity.

And the moral of all this is, that if people wish to attain great things, they should probably linger under a tree...

and it bloomed...

More cactus pics...

well, I'm having a bit of a fit posting nowdays aren't I?

Echinocereus reichenbachii v. baileyii, a.k.a. Baileys lace cactus. You can see him down the page... The bud on the right should be opening tomorrow... the great thing is that yesterday, these buds were both the same size. That's a lot of growth for one day !

Passiflora incarnata... the native Texas passionflower... just to prove I can grow something besides cactus, I can also grow rampaging vines...

The name passionflower refers to the passion of Christ. The three pistols are the three nails of the crucifixion, the five stamens are the five wounds suffered by Christ, the corrolla is the crown of thorns, and the 10 petals are the 10 disciples that were present at the crucifixion... or that's what the priests told the natives when they tried to convert them, right before they used them as near slave labor... but that's another story.
just an agave. Don't know exactly what kind, I bought it from one of those people by the side of the road. But I like it, and I'll figure it out eventually...

woke up in the wee hours of the morning. Not by choice, there's a small black demon cat responsible for all this...


Anyway, I decided to check in again.


Closed my ebay store last night... I know that a lot of the ebay stores are closing to protest the new fees and feedback policies. For me it's the fees. I just no longer find it viable to pay ebay a monthly charge when they're not giving me any help. It's almost impossible to get any traffic from their search engine, and they seem to be going out of their way to make the site very seller un-friendly. They keep carping on about keeping the customers happy, but they seem to be forgetting that the sellers are the ones paying them, so the sellers are their customers... the buyers are my customers.

Anyway, I'll still run a few auctions, but the store, "buy it now" listings are not paying for themselves, and I don't have the time to manage those listings while I'm trying to do anything else... so I'll be removing the link to the ebay store on here too...


A few pics that I've been meaning to add... here's a little abandoned farm I saw when I was delivering last week... I have a weekness for abandoned buildings. Don't ask me why, I don't know...

And here's the flower-pot tower I was talking about a couple of weeks ago. A great wat to grow hen & chicks (semperviviums) or encheverias. And easy to build, you stick a nice sturdy metal rod in the ground, string on the pots like giant beads, making sure to lean the rim against the pole, and fill with dirt.

and then, there's the regular pot tower... I've always liked these, because they remind me of pagodas for some reason...

and I'm adding the play blogger link... it's one of my new favorite toys. It's this thing that shows all the photos that bloggers post in a continuous slide show. It's very interesting how the images of everybodies plants, families, pets, kids just flow by and interact with each other.

So, I know that this blog is named after a flea market, and I do actually own a flea market booth... been awful today though. I'm changing from the front two booths in the window, to two other booths in the middle of the store, so I spent all day moving and rearranging and basically driving myself batty.



reasons to do this... (as I have to keep reminding myself)

• cheaper rent


• all those windows are wasted space


• This booth will look much better


• change creates positive energy


• cheaper rent


• I need to downsize


• I need to send a bunch of carp to goodwill


• cheaper rent

Notice that I keep going on and on about cheaper rent... I'm sorry, but in this economy, that's a major motivator.

Now, my real job, being a courier driver, is also starting to cost too much... Have you seen the price of gas out there? Yikes! But, since I took this week off to move the booth... (I'm an independant contractor, so I can take off any time I want.... despite silly dispatcher attempts to say otherwise...) I also went ahead and dropped 400 dollars on a new AC system. That's right, a rebuilt compressor, a dryer, freon and compressor oil, all for 425. That's a deal, as all the other mechanics I talked to estimated over 1000 and then gave me a list of a hundred other things that needed done. Now, my AC went out in the middle of a highway in Ft Worth TX last August, when I'd barely had this job for a month and there's no way in hell I could afford to get anything fixed. Then, whenever I saved enough money to consider it, I had to get tires, or I had to get a new clutch, or whatever... But now I found a good, honest mechanic who works at a very reasonable rate... (I had him do some other stuff first, so I know he's good... )

Anyway, I go back tomorrow, and I finish the booth move, come hell or high water.

Other attempts to save money:

• I take my lunch to work... Fast food is too expensive and it's bad for me.


• I have started hanging my washed clothes on the line outside. During the summer months in Texas, they actually dry quicker out there than in the dryer!


• I don't buy bottled water. Water is free from the tap, and all those blasted plastic bottles are filling the land-fill... I take water to work by refilling plastic bottles I already have.
• I don't buy coffee every morning. I now make coffee at home and take it with me.
• I buy the jeans for work at goodwill. Or I used to... Goodwill is getting a little pricey. Sometime a pair of jeans will be 9 or 10 bucks. Now, one of the other chain charity shops has opened an outlet... Any clothing items that are in their stores for over 6 weeks are sent to this place and sold on Wendesday for 1.75 a piece, then thursday for 1.50, then on Friday for 1.25, Saturday 1.00, Sunday .75 and Monday .50 After that, it gets shipped off somewhere, and Tuesday, they are closed to restock. For jeans that are going to get ruined in every factory and warehouse in DFW, it works just fine.
• I shop at the asian stores... The ones local aren't pretty, and there's some strange stuff in the deli, but the veggies are about half price. Some of my friends get snippy that they aren't clean... but you know what? I'm going to wash it before I eat it anyway...
• I don't run a dishwasher that isn't full.
• I don't buy silly products to clean with. Yes, they're convienent. Yes, they kill all the evil germs that are lurking to attack us... but so does Comet that I can get at the dollar store, 2 cans for a buck. Off brand bleach works just as good as the expensive stuff too...
• I have condensed my storage space from two store rooms to one, and I also put moms stuff in my store room. Since I haven't used any of that stuff for years, I'll be selling it at the flea market, as soon as I can get it in there...

That's just a few of my petty economies...

I am sure that I could make a list of more. But I won't bother you...

Purpose of this post... to clear my head. I just needed to vent a little. Thanks for listening... I don't know why you'd bother though...

Well, It looks like I kinda know what I'm growing now...

The unidentified Mammillaria has been identified as Mammillaria sonorensis v. craigii


The problem is that the darn thing isn't supposed to be winter hardy here... I'm in zone 7b and it's not supposed to be hardy above zone 9. Now it did survive outside last year, but it was an extremely mild winter... but, hopefully I'll get some seed and I'll be able to test the hardiness with seedlings... I'll be digging this guy up and taking it in over the winter...

The Opuntia gossliniana is doing good... these bright purple pads fade to blue gray after they grow up. When I bought this, I thought I was getting a Santa Rita... a plant that is purple, the new pads being green... I wasn't too happy with this, but it is growing on me. Unfortunately, it's a rather slow grower, only putting out new growth in the spring, unlike most Opuntias which will put up a new pad whenever the urge hits them...

Cactus Update...

Well folks, that Mammilaria is looking less like a meiacantha... it's definitely showing buds, and the buds are definitely purplish pink... strange since every pic on the web is white... but the references do say that the flowers can and often do have a pink or purple stripe down each petal... we'll see.

The Echinocereus reichenbachii v. baileyii has two huge blooms coming out, one on each 'head'... probably the end of the week before I see anything out of them. And the other big echinocereus, the unidentified one, is definitely setting a bud.

Should be interesting to see what happens when it does bloom, and we'll see if I'm able to pin down the species...