Happy B-day big bro

My brother's birthday is today. He had to be away from home, working in Springfield to support the family so I can't give him his gift until he gets back. Which is good because I haven't finished making it yet ;-)

Yesterday was mom's birthday also, so a belated web entry of "Best wishes" to her too. I would've posted something last night but I was way too tired by the time I got done driving posts in the tomato field.

Be well, big bro.

Who knew evil could be so good?

The villains at Evil Mad Scientist have come up with a delightful meta-meme which I think could be adapted to lots of different pursuits. Model building, crocheting, quilting, education, sports, really just about any hobby or club activity. A box of junk might be the next social revolution.

Oh yeah, I wanne give a special shout out to my best bud. Steve; 43 years of wonder on planet earth. Wishing at least 43 more even better for ya.

All the rest of you, a very merry unbirthday.

Summer Tsunami

The tidal wave of crop is about to crash down on us and we are still planting more!

Lettuce and the other greens are heading up nicely. Should be ready to start selling by next weekend. Maybe still have some cherries left to sell too.

Dad and I are scrambling to get stakes sawed and driven for the tomato rows. I've got pics of that, hope to put them up later today.

Gotta go, too busy.

Y'all be well,

Cool Agi site

Found a cool new (to me) agriculture site, called "On the turn row"

F'rst fahr

This here's the first forest fahr of the season. Sorry I couldn't get a good pic of the helicopters dropping water. This is either up on Savage Creek Rd. or Greens Creek Rd. I could hear the fahr engines so that probably means Savage Creek Rd. Someone musta let their clean-up fahr get out of hand. Them's my tomatoes infront'n there.

Y'all have a fine day now.

Skin of the teeth

Keeping my fingers crossed and praying. There's frost on the equipment at the west end of the vineyard!! I checked the tomatoes and they still look fine, the sun is up now so hopefully we just squeaked by without loosing any important crops. Haven't checked the sweet potatoes yet.

If I remember correctly, my friend Del said the latest frost on record was June 10 so we may have just set a new record.

Oh yeah: Global warming my foot!

Stay warm.

Hoorah! water

Water's back in the ditch. Of course that means work, work, work, but at least one uncertainty is suspended.

I've got a good night's sleep behind me and my cough is a little better too.

A fine morning to everyone.

Bleak

It's such a lovely day I hate being bleak.

We're all still struggling with recovering from that bad cold. I'm just happy I haven't had to use my inhaler in over 24 hours. But still having aches and little fevers.

Now to truly ruin the mood of recovery: the irrigation district has failed again and the ditch is dry. 2200 tomato plants, 2500 cole/lettuce, 500 sweet potatoes and countless others now in jeopardy. Can't call to find out what is happening until tomorrow. Fingers crossed that it is just a minor problem with a quick fix.

The polywogs and tadpoles have begun to emerge from the pond. Dozens, hundreds of tiny frogs are scattering over the gardens. What fun! With the ditch filling so late in the year these frogs and toads have been in recession for the last 6-7 years but now that we've been keeping the pond full early they have a chance to restore their numbers. But for sure the environmentalists tell us how destructive those farmers are to the ecosystem. Feh! to them. Mankind is the environment.

Y'all have a super fun spring day.

Recovery redux

Finally getting my feet back on the ground after a week of a rather nasty head and chest cold. It got mom and dad too so the farm has fallen behind schedule a couple days. A limping sort of scramble has ensued to catch up or at least to not fall any further behind. The weeds in the corn are getting awful and cole crops are looking pretty bad too.

Yesterday dad and I summoned the courage to pull 4 more black plastic mulch and driptape rows. Then we went beyond the call of duty and planted another 9 rows of sweet corn. That was pretty much all we could sustain.

The plastic mulch rows are for sweet potatoes which should have been planted last week. The little slips are starting to hurt from being too long out of the ground. I just now got the drips running so hopefully by this afternoon we can start planting again.

Whew! that's all the typing I have the strength for, gonna rest now. Y'all be well.