The Corner on First Street

I could go on a very long tirade on why I hate lawns.  We'll save it for another day, but suffice to say that I just don't get it.  Maybe it's because I don't have kids who need to safe place to play under my watchful parent eye, maybe it's because I don't see my lawn as a status symbol that I need to maintain to impress my neighbors, or maybe because I see nothing therapeutic or beneficial in the time, energy, and money it takes to maintain that lawn.  I really think people are just stuck in the status quo, this is how we've always done it, this is how I'll keep doing it.  Bleh. 

Due to all these lawnophobic tendencies I'm slowly engaging in getting rid of my lawn, either turning it into garden space, fruit tree orchard, or annual/perennial shrubs and flowers.  I have to do this slowly so as not to alarm the locals (any more than they're already alarmed by my very odd ways).  A few dozen square feet every couple of months (during the warm planting months that is) get reclaimed from boring green crew cut grass into something more interesting. 

So when Alycia wanted to plant some flowers in the corner of the yard I was enthusiastic to help.  OK, maybe not super enthusiastic since the project would involve me doing all the heavy lifting. shoveling, moving dirt, etc. while she got to plant pretty flowers.  It's an acceptable bargain, I know my role in life and that's to move heavy things and provide the manual labor. I actually stalled her for a bit by convincing her that we couldn't dig the ground around the power pole because the power pole might fall down.  I convinced her that the poles are actually not very well supported (why else do they always fall down in windy weather or tornadoes???) and we'd be flirting with disaster if we dug around it.  This only worked for a few minutes, but was a fun exercise in messing with Alycia. 

The area in question is right on the corner, outside the sidewalks, against the street and has the electric power pole right in the middle of it.  It's never a good looking space, and in order to even make it decent looking, you need to weed whack all the tall grass down, and even then I still think it looks unsightly.  Here's what it looks like on a good day. 

Here's a closer view..

We actually got the idea to fill the area with flowers (a couple of different kinds of marigolds) from a neighbor down the street who does the same thing.  I need to let him know that we copied his idea, hopefully it's not copyrighted or anything.

It looks so much better like this, and it's that much less lawn for me to mow every time.

It looks a lot better huh?  It'll look even better in a few weeks once the marigolds really get to blooming.  I really enjoy projects like this, taking one small space at a time and changing it, rather than being immobilized at the overwhelming task of the big picture.  I can't get rid of all my lawn at once, and the task of transforming large swaths of grass is a lot easier to envision if you carve it up into small chunks. 

Do you have any lawnophobic tendencies?  What would your ideal yard/landscape look like?  Would it have lots of lawn?

New Amazon.com Feature

As I have previously mentioned in other posts (see Selling Out), I got into blogging for the money.  Big money, no whammies (someone should get this reference).  I've had Amazon.com product stuff on my blog for a while but as of yet have not received enough money to comfortably retire or quit my sort-of job.  This is all your fault.  If you would all just stop being so selfish and each spend a few thousand dollars every month buying Amazon.com items through my blog I'd be able to accomplish all of my monetary goals in blogging. 

As such I've created a new widget on the lower left hand side of the blog page of Amazon.com products that I genuinely use every day and really, really like.  The widget itself is a carousel that spins around and hopefully makes you clap your hands and gleefully exclaim "Yayyy!! Make it spin again!!"  This widget is in addition to the deals widget at the top of the page, and the "Search Amazon.com" box on the left side of each blog page.

Hopefully I'll get around to writing a few testimonials for the products in this new widget since I do think they're pretty darn great.  Like the Mario Batali spatula.  It's awesome, it withstands high temps, and I really like it and use it almost every day.  In my years of cooking, canning, and kitchening, I've had some crappy spatulas that always left me yearning for more.  No longer.  This spatula kicks ass and is the first spatula EVER to be recommended by the honorable folks at Deaf Dogs and Benevolent Gnomes.  If you're currently in the market for a new spatula and don't have a Spatula City (serious mad props to anyone who gets this movie reference, you tube clip here) location near you, I would highly recommend this particular spatula. 

Remember that a portion of all Amazon.com products you purchase through the Deaf Dogs and Benevolent Gnomes blog goes to help deaf dogs in North Dakota, a very worthy cause.

Fireworks Accident Decapitates Fargo Man

Today's story comes to you from the Grand Forks Herald, story by Heidi Shaffer.

I was going to make some snarky comments, but it's not nice to poke fun at the tragedies of others, even if they were playing with illegal, military grade pyrotechnics/explosives and literally blew their own heads off.  I've highlighted the super relevant portions for those who need to skim or have poor reading comprehension skills.


Fireworks Accident Decapitates Fargo Man
 
A 41-year-old father of two was killed when he lit a commercial-grade firework, an explosive that is federally regulated.

FARGO — An eyewitness here says a Fourth of July fireworks accident decapitated a Fargo man Monday night.

Police identified the victim as Jesse William Burley, a 41-year-old father of two, who enjoyed life to its fullest, said Burley’s stepfather Chuck Asplin of Fargo.

Chris Hanson, Burley’s neighbor who saw the accident, was packing up his car to leave north Fargo’s Riviera Heights mobile home park as tornado sirens sounded just before 9:30 p.m.

Burley was getting ready to set off a second round of what Hanson said he believed was either a homemade or illegal artillery shell firework.

Fourth of July

My nephew took his first dip in the pool yesterday on the Fourth of July.  He's a robust kid, and every day his hair gets redder and redder, and Jacob's Dad (my brother in law) hangs his head a bit further in despair.  He loves the kid regardless, but I think all things considered he'd prefer that his kid not have red hair just like his Uncle John.

A Return Home

Don't worry loyal readers, I'm still here.  I got sidelined with a trip to San Diego for a whole lot of work and didn't have much time to post during the last few weeks.  I've come home to a tired puppy (she spent a lot of time at Puppy Camp - though she doesn't appear to have any new knot tying or kite making skills that we're aware of), summertime-in-North-Dakota weather in the mid-80's, and a garden desperately in need of tending. 

I'll charge up the digital camera and keep it in my pocket to record all the happenings around the garden as I do some watering, weeding, and various other tasks over the next couple of days.  It might not be the most restful Fourth of July weekend, but there is much to be done. 

You can look forward to updates about the vegetable garden, (especially the tomato cages), the proliferation of potatoes and pickles (they're cucumbers now, but they'll be pickles soon enough), and the crazy number of baby Grackles I've had to rescue so far this Spring and Summer. 

Homemade Tomato Cages

We had some serious trouble last year with our tomatoes.  Both the cherry tomatoes and heirloom/eating tomatoes got so large and heavy that they quickly wound up dragging on the ground and entangled in a huge mess.  Sure we used tomato cages, but quickly found that the small tomato cages are useless, the large "sturdy" ones are a bit better but they still collapse under the weight of all the delicious fruit by mid summer.

The solution?  Homemade tomato cages, with a large side dish of John overkill.

I read an article about homemade tomato cages using re-mesh (the stuff they use to lay on the ground to pour concrete over).  You can probably have it delivered if you have a Lowe's in your area. So I scampered over to the local hardware store and bought a roll of 5' by 50' 10 gauge re-mesh, some bailing wire, and large pair of bolt cutters to snip it with.  Construction actually went faster than I anticipated and I got two completed in about 45 minutes.  Subsequent ones will go much faster since I have a system now.*
*These are famous last words of mine.  "Having a system" always seems to work theoretically but usually loses some of its efficiency in practice.  I can't remember how many times I've "had a system" only to find that the system isn't as great as I thought.  It may even be that once I declare I "have a system" that I officially jinx myself and the universe must forcefully readjust the size of my britches since they have obviously grown too large for my own good.  Thanks universe. 

Follow Up - Escaped Prisoner Captured

Just to give you some closure on an earlier story I posted on the blog (Prisoner Escape In Cavalier, North Dakota), this story is from todays Grand Forks Herald. It's now safe for me and my people, folk of the red haired persuasion, to freely roam about Cavalier, North Dakota without fear of being mistaken for an escaped convict.

This article has one of the best quotes I've seen from a law enforcement official (I highlighted it below as well): “We weren’t treating him as someone who is a danger to the public, but we still have an obligation to the public that no one walks away from our jail,”. That's the new benchmark for public safety? That no one should be able to walk away from jail? Hmmmm.

Pembina County escapee captured in Fargo

Glenn Troy Stegman, the man who escaped from the Pembina County jail three weeks ago, was captured Wednesday at a home in Fargo.

Stegman, 34, fled from custody in Cavalier, N.D., on May 19 when he was returning to jail after a hearing.

Jeff Osvold, Chief Deputy Sheriff in Pembina County, said that Stegman was entering the jail through a series of doors known as a sally port. Somehow, Stegman was able to open the door that should have locked behind him and ran away, Osvold said.

Stegman was captured in Fargo on Wednesday afternoon by city police and agents from the state Bureau of Criminal Investigation, the Pembina County Sheriff’s Department said Thursday.

Stegman faces no charges in Fargo and will be returned to Pembina County.
There, he faces a felony charge of escape, and he may also face felony charges of burglary and theft. After fleeing the jail, Stegman allegedly entered a building and stole an all-terrain vehicle.

Osvold said the department believes that after escaping, Stegman headed for Fargo, where he had lived before being sent to Cavalier for violating probation.

He is believed to have spent time in a treatment facility in Fargo, but left.

“We weren’t treating him as someone who is a danger to the public, but we still have an obligation to the public that no one walks away from our jail,” Osvold said. “…We’re just very fortunate that we were able to find him again and happy to have him back so he can face the additional charges for the poor decision that he made.”

Great Online Articles

Got a few minutes to read some very good online magazine articles?  These came up recently and I would highly reccomend them:

Just Deserts - From GQ Magazine, the compelling story of a modern day US Army deserter living in Canada. 

Madoff's Curveball - New Yorker article on New York Mets owner David Wilpon and his entanglement with the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme. 

Flacking For Big Pharma - American Scholar website article on how Big Pharma has taken over scholarly medical journals.