Product Endorsement

Last weekend we hit Costco for our usual stocking job. One of the products being pushed was a liquid that supposedly removed moss, mold, mildew and stains from “anything”. Anything including decks, awnings, screens, walls – all the places and surfaces that collect grib in Florida. The product caught my eye because we fight the grib more or less year round and I was facing a major job of cleaning the awnings which were, day by day, getting greener. Supposedly the stuff was better than bleach and not caustic. You apply it using a standard pressure dispenser like I use for spraying herbicide and insecticide. So if it worked, it would be alot faster and easier than soaking/scrubbing with bleach and then power washing – my normal method. Not to mention that the last time I bleached my new pants half way up the leg. But it seemed a bit pricey – $38 for 1.3 gallons. The 1.3 gallons is concentrated and produces 8 gallons of useable product. So at almost $5/gallon, it’s maybe double the cost of bleach and doesn’t sound so bad that way. Of course I know bleach works and this would be a total gamble. The guy who was pushing it said that all you do is spray it and forget it – that it takes a while to work and continues working for months. I went for it.

Today I decided to do the flight test and sat down to read the instructions. The devil is in the details. The literature reiterated that it works over time rather than instantaneously and uses natural factors to gradually make it happen. That would be things like dew, rain, and sunlight. And it could be up to a year to see the results. That cracked me up and I knew I had been scammed since you’d really never know if it was working. I laughed out loud when I thought about explaining to Nancy how it was really working when the awnings were still green a month or six from now. But it sounded good to me and cut me quite a bit of slack. Nancy is a nit picker inspector kind of person so this delayed results thing would definitely throw her off her game.

I mixed up 2 gallons and in 10 minutes had sprayed the awnings and a few stained spots on the deck. For me that started the 12 month wait. And I’d only used maybe 1/2 gallon of the juice so this was looking cheaper too. I remembered that our porch screen was also turning green and that an hour of pressure washing a few months ago had not touched it. We really didn’t have a solution for that and had been talking about maybe having a professional cleaner come in and tackle it with steam or something. What the hell, let’s spray the screens. My reservation was that if this stuff ate away the screens, I’d have real problems. The container said non caustic, non acidic, no bleach and that it worked on any surface. It also said “Danger, keep out of reach of children”. I went back to the awnings and noticed that they were still there and had not started fallling apart; in fact maybe they were not quite as green. So I decided to experiment with one screen panel. When the spray hit the screen it started to fizz. I checked back in 10 minutes and the panel was almost green free; just a few spots that I had probably missed on the first spray. I hit those spots and moved on to a bigger, gribbier panel. In about 20 minutes I had sprayed all the easily reachable areas and could see the mildew disappearing within seconds of the application. Back to the awnings – the mold and mildew were gone. I can’t imagine how good they are going to look in a few weeks if this stuff actually takes time to work.

I have about half a gallon of the first batch still in the sprayer so I’ll do a touch up tomorrow – assuming the screen is still intact and not all eaten up. So far this stuff is incredible. If you’re interested it’s call Wet & Forget – moss, mold, mildew Stain Remover.

digital TV upgrade?

You’ve been seeing all the stuff on TV about the switch over to digital in Feb. 2009. It’s a switch I’ve been dreading since I have this deep abiding distrust of all things digital. Something is always lost when you try to express it in a fixed number of ones and zero’s. Without getting into conspiracy theories, let’s just say it’s going to happen. I signed up to get the $40 discount coupons for a device which converts the incoming digital signal into regular TV. The words are that all you do is plug this boy between the antenna and the TV set and all is right again. When the coupons came there was also a long list of devices and information regarding purchase points. A friend of Joey’s advised that Consumer Reports had rated the Zenith unit the best. That was good info because I had assumed up until then that probably all devices were the same, just simple D/A converters. I researched it a bit further and learned that the Magnavox unit available at WalMart was not a good unit – bad reception. I also read that the zenith unit – Circuit City – was great and that people with marginal reception were seeing dramatic picture improvements. The Zenith unit was $10 more than the Magnavox so cost was not an issue. Two TV’s, Two boxes.

We got them home and I read the installation instructions and sure enough, it seemed to be a no brainer – unplug the antenna from the TV and plug it into the box; plug the box into the TV. Red Flag #1. I noticed that the instructions made no mention of how to deal with a VCR. I called Zenith and learned that you can no longer record a channel on the VCR while watching another on the TV. The guy said I could hook it up so that I was recording the same show I was watching. I asked him why anyone would want to do that and got silence. I’m guessing somewhere in Bombay there was a guy with a blank stare on his face pondering my question. For us, that’s a huge downside. I continued on with the installation setup and in a couple of minutes it was up and running. Red Flag #2 showed immediately – the picture is smaller than it was before with big borders top and bottom, and both sides. I dove for the manual and they steered me to a button on the remote called zoom. When I hit “zoom” a screen message appeared and said the program determined the size. So at this point I’ve lost the VCR and the picture is smaller – the exact reasons I hadn’t bought a digital TV a year ago. I guess I could buy a 42” digital TV to get the same size picture I now get on my 32” set.

But there were some plusses. The channels were much clearer. Our channels 6 , 24 and sometimes 35 were marginal at best. Now they’re crystal clear as were all the others. And the number of channels increased dramatically. I think I counted 35 channels compared to 8-10 previously. That sounds impressive but several of the channels are Spanish speaking versions of the regular show; several are strictly weather info from the regular channels which I guess will be ok once in a while but hardly count as regular channels. On the 2 PBS channels there are 4 sub channels which seemed at the time to include classroom stuff from DBCC and UCF and the Florida legislature. I don’t see me watching those any time soon. Ditto the 2 religious channels each with 4 subchannels. So the bottom line is that channels 6, 24, and 35 come in better than they did before, albeit smaller.

For now I plan to leave the box on one of the TV’s and not on the other. That gives us the ability to at least tape most of what we want and to see full screen shows rather than the shrunk down versions. And if we want to watch a noisy channel, we have a TV that’s got the better picture quality. If I need to surf between Pat Robertson and Jimmy Swaggert………………….

Couldn’t test red flag #3 – what happens when it rains hard. My experience with things digital is that they are either very good or 100% gonzo. Another reason to keep the 2 set solution until Feb. 2009 when big brother kills my fallback. argghhhhhhhhhhh.

Spring Break with Simon

Had a really great week. Simon came up and spent it with us on his spring break. He and I went fishing every day; twice to the surf and three times kayaking in brackish water. We hit the Tomoka River, Bulow Creek, and the back canals of Tomoka State Park. The fishing itself was ok – not good – but we did manage to hook and land several nice fish. Ditto the surf although in Flagler the cross currents were strong enough to make fishing a bit of a chore. We both got sunburned and have achy muscles from so, so much kayaking. At least I admit to being sore. And of course we took time out to do a crabbing venture so that he and Nancy could have fresh blue crab appetizers before dinner one night. The great thing about Simon this year is that he crossed over solidly into being a fishing companion in the fullest sense from being a student fisherman. He’s a 100% help in moving boats, loading, unloading and splitting all the overhead associated with a trip. That cuts my work at least in half. The other nice thing is that I am now coaching him on subtle techniques rather than the basics of how to do this, that and the other thing. Those have all been mastered. The other large advantage to fishing with Simon is that every morning Nancy fixes a nice lunch in a cooler. That never happens when I’m by myself.

The garden is now at full size. I tilled up the last few hundred square feet using my new tiller. It worked like a charm and I am so glad it’s part of my arsenal. I reckon the total garden at 1250 SF give or take a few. The new summer stuff planted over the past few weeks is taking off. Believe it or not there are wee tiny crooked necks; micro zucchini; and teeny weeny cucumbers on the respective plants already. That’s about a month after planting the seeds and 2-3 weeks after transplanting them into the garden. I really wouldn’t have believed that if I hadn’t seen it myself. The last of the broccoli should come out this week and we ate the first cabbage from the winter planting last night. The cauliflower will be pickable this coming week. Each time I pull out one of the winter veggies, I replace it with a summer variety and we’ll have a few weeks where both the winter stuff and the summer stuff are hitting the kitchen table. I planted corn seeds about 3 weeks ago and it’s now all standing nearly a foot tall. I planted the rows about 2′ apart and have put winter squash in between the rows. That would be varieties like butternut, acorn, spaghetti and on and on. I have six different varieties of hard squash living in the corn patch. Simon and I kept two fish and buried them next to two tomato plants in a scientific experiment. We want to see if there is any noticeable difference in growth rate with those two plants and also whether the fruit will taste fishy. We could have anchovy flavored tomatoes, pizza ready tomatoes right from the garden. The trick might be keeping them buried until they disintegrate and away from the possums and raccoons.

50th reunion

Had a very nice weekend. It was my 50th High School reunion and the festivities started Thursday with a visit by an old buddy now living in San Diego and his wife. Ed was my college room mate as well for 3 of the 4 years I spent in Gainesville. They had arrived in the area on Wednesday night and were staying with another of his room mates who now lives in Ormond Beach. I had never met Bill Robeson and his wife but invited them all over for lunch and adult beverages. As the afternoon wore on I asked Ed how he had hooked up with Bill and he said that he was the cousin of one of our high school classmates who I knew very well. And it turns out that the cousin, lives in the Condo’s behind Joey’s dock and is a steady customer of IndianRiver Cruises. So that was a nice hook.

Friday we drove to Cocoa to attend the annual Mosquito Beaters gathering. The Mosquito Beaters is a loosely formed group of people who have a long history of either high school in Cocoa or having worked at the Space Center in the old days. That would be days when the Mosquitos were at the top of the food chain. There are several thousand members who attend a Friday evening gathering at the Civic Center in a giant pot luck, open bar kind of affair. The low point of that was when one of my old high school flames stepped into a group I was mixing with and seemed not to remember who I was. What was that all about – that was my senior prom date. Later she strolled by our table and sat down next to me but still no outward sign of recognition. I couldn’t stand that so I said, “Sue Ann, do you know who I am?”. She replied, “sure, Joe you and I went to the prom”. I was being nice called her Sue Ann since I used to call her catfish because her mouth was kind of shaped like a catfish. In retrospect, maybe that was a tactical error. The next day they reconvene at a local picnic area for a barbecue. I think you have to be 50 to get in and I’m guessing the average age is maybe 25 years beyond that. We missed the Saturday event to celebrate Tina’s birthday onboard Double Shaafted. Joey had paying customers for dinner so we were scooted off the boat promptly and headed back to my sister’s house to get dressed for the big reunion dinner.

I enjoyed the reunion and didn’t know I knew so many old people. There were several far west kind of people that I hadn’t seen in 15-20 years and probably won’t see for another 15-20 years. But it does seem like more and more of them are moving back into the area and the group of locals remain active so it all seems to keep fresh. And having Joey so active in Cocoa Village keeps them all closer too. The MC of the event gave his boat a promotion and several people seconded the promo so I know he gets some business and references that way.

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I was past the $$ break even point on the garden based on the amount of food we are now getting – and the incredibly high prices on fresh produce – but blew that out of the water with my most recent purchase – an electric tiller. I moved the break even point out at least a year but probably saved my back. This little beauty weighs 20 lbs but does an incredible job churning through the soil. I was skeptical as to whether it could really cut it but they offered a no questions asked return policy and have been around for years so I decided to give it a try. George and I completed the first of two planned expansions using his monster tiller and it about killed both of us. And the serious garden is happening. Serious means tomatoes, beans, corn, cucumbers, squash and peppers in place of the poofier winter stuff. You eat winter stuff because you know it’s healthy but you really wished it tasted better; summer stuff is just more fun to eat. You know, carry the salt shaker to the garden kind of eatin.

garden transition

It’s transition time in the garden – transitioning from cool weather to warm weather crops. I’ve got starts going for several kinds of peppers and tomatoes, some cucumbers, along with crooked neck and zucchini squash. If the weather holds thru the 20th of this month, I’ll plant those along with a couple rows of green beans. The issue now is finishing up on the winter stuff to give me the space for the replacements. Picked the last of the snow peas today, a big section of broccoli, and loads of lettuce which we are now giving away is ever increasing bundles. I’d say there’s only about 10% of the area now available for planting but anticipate that will be more like 50% by the end of March and 100% by mid April. If all the plans work, we’ll be picking the first of the summer crop and the last of the winter crop at the same time. All in all, I’d give the winter crop a solid C+. I learned quite a bit and am confident that next cool season will be primo.

When the space opens, I’ll pop in watermelons, cantaloupes, and the hard shell squashes. I’m going to try summer greens this year including swiss chard and a climbing variety of spinach called Malabar. Both of these are supposed to handle heat and humidity. We’ll see. Just to show you how over the top I’ve become, I built a spread sheet program that projects exactly when to plant seeds to meet a specific harvest date. Even I have to admit that’s on the fringe of weird or a sign of having too much time on my hands.

In fact we’ll see about the whole thing. Last year’s start had problems because the soil was so bad and I was totally unprepared for the voraciousness of the critters. Certainly we got plenty to eat but had some wholesale failures which I don’t intend to repeat. Grade D+. Aside from the quality of the soil at this point, my seed buying strategy this year was heavily focused on seeds that were extra disease resistant. I’ve also vastly increased my arsenal of chemical weapons and have mapped out a cradle to grave attack plan on critter control. The other tactical change is to plant in smaller batches, scattered around rather than all of one type in one spot. Hell, I may even get a camo suit so that I blend in when launching raids.

The plan now is to expand the size of the garden by maybe 300 SF and to plant that in corn. That’s more work than I care to take on myself so we’ll tackle that when George finishes up his hyperbaric treatments and before he has some old, dead chest bone removed. I could probably do it myself if I could get the rickety old tiller he has running – which I can’t. George is the only one who can get it started and keep it running so he gets that job by default. Corn takes up lots of space for the yield but it tastes so good and maybe we’ll have the only corn around that’s not being converted to ethanol!!!

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Can’t resist a political comment. Way to go Billary! I was losing faith in backroom politicking and getting nervous that the big machine was losing steam. I couldn’t believe my man Carville was holding back so long. There’s still this delegate math to overcome but I’m sure the powers that be have much more control over that than they do plain folk voting. I knew they’d have to eventually break out dirt on Barry and couldn’t understand why they were waiting so long to bang the National Security Drum. That is the big trump card in the sky and she finally played the queen. Too bad the Ace is on the other side. Squirm, Teddy, squirm – sheeee’s coming!

No adult supervision

Nancy is away for a week on a Quilting Cruise – a real cruise to the Bahamas, Haiti, Cozumel and points wet and warm. She went with two others from her local quilt group and will join up with another 125 or so fellow stitchers from all around the country. This was perfect for both of us – she gets to go on a cruise that she’s always wanted and I get to not go, which I’ve always wanted. So I am without adult supervision. Nancy takes these lengthy sojourns a few times a year so I save up big jobs to complete during her absence. I do better without supervision and can get deep into these dirty jobs without worrying about coming into the house on occasion and really getting gribby and nasty. I also seem to survive with no scheduling – fish when the fishing looks right; eat when the urge hits; have the XM 50 on 24/7 or soak in total silence for hours at a time. I’m sure this will get very boring…….. won’t it???

I do a few quirky things to adjust to my temporary lifestyle. Such as setting out a set of silverware, a cereal bowl, a coffee cup and a wine glass. That’s all I use and just wash each piece as I finish it and return it onto paper towel on the counter. No sinkful of dirty dishes. A pot of coffee lasts me 3 days. I make it the first day and then just put the carafe in the refrigerator. I microwave a cup or two every day as needed. At night I blast thru NetFlix that Nancy doesn’t like – shows such as The Wire, Deadwood, and Quentin Tarentino movies. And I really do like to get into a made up bed so you might think that would be a problem. Not to worry. I am a very quiet sleeper and have it down pat to where I can slip out of bed in the morning and it looks like no one was ever there. Just reposition the pillows and oila, made bed.

One of those gribby jobs turned out to be a bit prophetic. Last year I ran an additional cable from the portable generator to the house. I felt better with a bit more current carrying capacity in that 150′ run. Putting the cable together turned out to be a bigger job than I’d estimated so I never got around to burying it. So with the grib patrol gone, I decided to bury it and did just that. Completing that I decided to crank up the generator. That’s something that should be done from time to time just to make sure it works It started right up on the first pull and I ran it about 5 minutes. Later that day, watching National news, I learned that Florida had a major power black out that darkened about half the state. We were untouched. I’m sure there’s a good technical reason we were spared but deep down inside I know it’s because I tested the generator and would have been ecstatic to actually put it to good use. I bought it after the 2004 hurricanes and it hasn’t run an hour since. I’d love a nice 2 hour outage in prime time just to luxuriate in my preparedness.

We got a reminder that it’s still winter with a freeze warning issued last night. I am a bit concerned about the garden but if it crashes now, we still got most of what I’d planned harvested. It looks ok right now but it will take a day or so to really determine if any damage occurred. My biggest worry is the grapefruit tree which started blossoming last week. Not sure what it will mean if it gets nailed now since there is no formed fruit yet and only a few blossoms are actual open. Perhaps it would blossom later. We have two grapefruit trees and the ruby red doesn’t blossom for another few weeks so even if we lose one crop, we have a backup going. When we get these freezes, the coldest point is just about dawn so I got up at AM and put the sprinkler system on the grapefruit tree. Hopefully that will be all it needs. Actually I don’t think it got that cold. The thermometer attached to our atomic clock was blank so clearly that craps out when it gets too cold. The old dial style read 40 and I’ve found that fairly accurate. And I have a couple of pans of water out on the porch and none of those froze so I’m hopeful that it just didn’t get all that cold. I’ll go out in an hour or so and check on the garden.
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And finally – American Idol to date. Seems to me to be a better batch with more evenly matched talent so far. Right now I’m impressed with the tattoo lady and Murray UT guy although Filipino girl and scarf neck guy are close seconds. Maybe weird hair need a shave guy but I think he’ll crash before it’s over.

Mizzou Trip

Had a great few days. Little Tommy graduates high school in May and is making his decisions regarding college. His interest is in Journalism and he learned that the University of Missouri (Mizzou) is ranked #1 Journalism school by US News and World Report. He applied and had all the requirements for a direct admission to the Journalism College. The college has a “Meet Mizzou” day for prospective students and family to spend a day there and learn more than you can just reading brochures. I was pleased that Tom called and asked if I’d like to join him and Tommy to the event.

Our initial plan was to fly but the logistics turned bad when we dug into flight schedules. Instead we decided to drive up. So this past Saturday at AM we headed off for Missouri. It’s a bit over 1000 miles, almost all Interstate so it’s an easy, fast drive. We arrived Sunday about noon and into a windy, sleety day with temps in the low 30’s. Still we braved the elements and walked the campus to familiarize ourselves before the official guided tour Monday. The campus is quite old; started in the late 1800’s so the architecture is mostly that era. Factoid: UM was the first public university west of the Mississippi. One of the spots not to miss is Thomas Jefferson’s original tombstone. I puzzled over why such an important monument would be on the UM campus. Answer – It was the first public University in the area defined as the Louisiana Purchase – engineered by Thomas Jefferson. They have done an incredible job of keeping that solid look while at the same time modernizing the interiors to the very latest designs. The campus is small enough to be walkable from end to end and then right into downtown Columbia. But it’s large enough to have eye opening facilities. It had the overall feel of the University of Evansville – personalized – but at the same time, the heft of UF. The prepared information sessions were well done and answered all the questions any of the three of us had.

One part of the tour that has to be mentioned is the student Recreation Center. It’s a new sports facility that is mind boggling. The highlights include 10 basketball courts, weight rooms and exercise rooms with more high tech equipment that I would have thought possible, a winding “lazy river” with waterfalls and huge hot tubs all around. Oh yeah, in all these areas the walls are lined with individual TV’s and/or theater size screens for watching movies or sporting events. An Olympic size pool – a meet was in process while we were there. Not just a pool but get this – the floor around the pool raises and lowers depending on the requirements of the event. So instead of diving off a board for those starts – the floor is raised or lowered. And of course all of this is indoors but there’s a major league outside pool too. It also has the big screen for watching ball games from the comfort of the pool The Recreation facility was rated #1 in the nation by Sports Illustrated. Oh, and they have massage rooms, manicures, hair dressers etc. etc. etc. Those are fee based but the rest of the facility is part of the tuition – so you pay for it whether you use it or not. Of course you’d have to be wacky not to spend several hours a week right there.

And the library – wow!!!!!!!!!!!

And the eating facilities – wow!!!!!!!

We were mostly interested in the Journalism school and that was no disappointment. A few factoids: UM had the first Journalism college in the world. In the world. The local newspaper for the town of Columbia and the NBC TV affiliate are all on campus and manned by students. Students along with staff drafted from major newspapers put it all together in what looks to be a very professional setting. The Dean of the college said it was modeled after the newsroom at the Chicago Tribune. The college opened in 1908 so this will be the 100th anniversary year and they will be dedicated a new expansion, more than doubling the size of the Journalism facility. So all in all, if Journalism is your game, Mizzou is the place to be.

So to me, the decision to go there is a no brainer. The only negative I could see is the weather and Tommy should be able to handle that just fine. I couldn’t but he can!!!

We dropped Tom off at the St. Louis airport so he could attend a technical conference in the bay area and just the two of us made the return trip. Uneventful, just the way you like it.
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One political note – I’m totally blown away by how fast the Dem’s are dumping Hillary. Wow! I knew we Republicans really detested her but had no idea how deeply negative the Dem’s feel. How long before Big Al Gore supports Osamabamamama. I was totally confident that the Clinton machine would chew him up and then McCain would dump on her. Not sure McCain can beat Barackomon at all. So if Barack does triumph, I think my only hope is for Hezbollah or another mid east nut case to blow up something.

Italian parsley

About 4 to 6 weeks ago, Nancy and I were passing by a rural hardware store that we had wanted to explore for quite some time. We had time to kill so we decided now was the time. I hit the garden center and found 2” pots labeled Italian parsley and as best I could tell it looked like baby italian parsley. Italian parsley is easy to distinguish from regular parsley but not so easy to distinguish from say, Greek parsley. It was flat leaf which is what I really wanted so I bought the remaining three pots at $0.50 each. I had a perfect spot in the garden and set them out that day. Apparently they loved the spot and grew with abandon. Last week I commented to Nancy that I had never seen Parsley grow so big and so fast. That was an important piece of information because Nancy’s cousin is visiting next week and one of our rituals is for Fred to cook a feast of clams and pasta one night during their stay and Italian parsley is an important ingredient in his recipe. I’m not convinced he could tell the difference between Greek and Italian but why chance it. So yesterday we’re chatting with our neighbor George and he says “man, that celery looks good”. “That’s not celery, that’s parsley. It’s Italian parsley George, something you’re probably not familiar with.” So I walk out to the garden with him to gloat over how big the parsley was and he pulled off a leaf and started chewing it. “Hm, this Italian parsley has a celery flavor to it” I broke off a leaf and chomped down on it. Then I got down and looked closely at the plant. Celery. So the lesson to be learned is that in a 2” pot, it’s hard to distinguish italian parsley from celery. Maybe that’s why they developed the standard curly garnish parsley – so you could tell it was parsley not celery. I’m sure glad I wasn’t trying to defend it while we ate clams and celery over pasta.

political update

It struck me that this coming election is the perfect caricature of our two parties. The Democrat candidates are black and feminine and include an ambulance chasing lawyer – how perfect is that; the Republicans are fielding a business tycoon, a Bible thumper, a prisoner of war hero, and a top cop tough guy – all white males. Each of these represents exactly the face of one of their respective constituent groups. We are missing a Jew. There’s a Catholic, a Mormon, a Baptist, and a hint of Muslim. Perhaps one of the VP’s will fill the obvious hole.- Lieberman? Or will somebody do a deep genealogical search on Bill or Hillary and find an old Jewish grandmother way, way back there?

I’m actually starting to enjoy the process because this year it’s turning out to be so blatently hypocritical. The Kennedy’s can come out with their dislike of the Clinton’s and no longer have to pretend that the NE liberals really do like the old south rednecks. And you get to see the Sharpton’s and Jackson’s squirm around trying to make Bill happy even though they dislike Hillary. McCain who fought all the Bush tax cuts is all of a sudden a big tax cutter; Romney who won MA by being a pro abortion, gun control guy is all of a sudden seen the light and gone pro life and is joining the NRA. Huckabee is a standard old fashion Southern Democrat. He’s the way they all were back in the 50’s and 60’s but was forced to the other side when all the liberal Supreme court decisions went against the south in the 60’s – that would be Roe V Wade; Miranda; prayer in the classroom. He’s the guy most of my Southern Democrat friends would like to vote for if only he were a Democrat.

So on the Democrat side it’s easy to figure out who votes for whom because they all have exactly the same policy positions – none, vote for me because it will be a change and I’m a __________ (fill in the blank). It’s also easy to figure out the numbers. I think blacks represent about 12% of the voters; women 52%. So even pulling off the black females, it says that in the end behind the curtain, Hillary gets about 40%. The redneck democrat vote goes to Edwards; Barack pulls off maybe 30%.

The Republican numbers are harder to come by and splits more along geographical lines. Guiliani will do well in the NE if he can survive Florida; McCain will do fine in the south where there’s a large military presence; Huckabee does best in the south and farm areas; Romney dominates the mountain regions. In the end I’m sticking with my earlier prognostication, McCain. Too many people will not vote for a Mormon; will not vote for a New Yorker; will not vote for a Catholic; will not vote for a Baptist preacher. That leaves McCain – the only group that won’t vote for him are the conservative Republicans (like me).

In the ensuing general election, McCain wins because there are so many people who won’t vote for a Clinton and so many Democrats who like McCain because he votes with them so often. So my democrat friends and family should be happy campers – either way a democrat wins. I’m going to vote a straight “none of the above” ticket. The good news for the Democrats is that O’Bama has 4 years to get out there with actual positions and collect some money. Even if McCain wins, at 72 not likely he’ll be an 8 year president and he’ll be in excellent shape to try again.

Garden news – Planting the last batch of winter crops and starting summer seedlings. Lots of new stuff including celery and Asian vege’s which I’ve never grown before. Vege’s with names like suhoi, tatsoi, komatsuna, haruki, and Michili – you know, all the old standbyes. I started the celery seeds a couple of weeks ago and was surprised to see how incredibly tiny the seedlings are. Wispy, fine plants that look too delicate to ever turn into anything. I’ve never grown celery before but expected something quite a bit bigger at the start.
The transition from winter crops to summer crops is soft so there’s really never a time when the garden is not fully planted and one item or another is either being harvested or planted. The trick is understanding the timing of each type of vegetable so you know when to start seedlings so that they are ready to transplant coincident with harvesting something. I’m getting the hang of that but still mess up more often that I like to admit. I attribute some of my mistakes to the variability in growth rates caused by weather changes. A crutch.

I’ll finish the soil building program in the next few weeks attacking the last couple of areas which have not been fortified. It’s interesting that when you view the garden you can visually pick out those areas instantly because the plants there are just not as robust and healthy looking. The plants never get as big and they are much later to actually produce a crop. I’ve split some crops with some plants from the same starter set in one area and the rest in another so that I could quantify exactly what the difference is and whether or not it’s worth all the extra effort. It is.

catch up

Catch up. Lot’s of stuff since the last update.

We had an interesting day last Monday. About noon Joey called and asked if we’d like to go out on the boat a few hours later. Seems that he’d been contacted by a local TV channel to do a piece on Indian River Cruises. On the local cable network there’s an all local news channel. One feature segment is called Flordia on a Tankfull and it describes different places one can visit in Central Florida within a tank of gas. The feature writer had been developing a story which for some reason cratered and he needed a replacement story which he could complete from start to finish in a couple of days. He had in mind to do a story on the boat and cruises some time in the future but needed to move it to the front burner. He wanted to film with a representative set of customers on board and who could be more representative than us. So we hopped in the car and were ready for a 3:00PM departure. It was a bit cooler and a bit windier than we would normally consider great sailing weather but we still loved it and were able to participate – even being interviewed. The reporter was a young guy who did it all – video camera, still camera, interviews – including taping himself sitting on the deck as if there was a camera crew focusing on him. As I said it was cool, as in jacket weather, but the reporter had an image to maintain so when he was doing the segment where he was the focus, he was seated on a deck chair wearing a short sleeve shirt and looking for all the world like it was a mid summer day. He said it was the same shirt he wore on each segment – his signature costume.

He goes back to the studio and edits all his footage down to a 5 minute piece that airs over the weekend once an hour on the 55 minute mark. Since we don’t have cable we won’t get to see it and to see if I’m edited out or have some role. I didn’t think twice about the writers strike and just went ahead with my performance.

On Wednesday we headed to California for a mini vacation with Fred and Martha. The main event for Nancy was a major quilt show in which her friend Barbara Jones was showing off her wares. Also on the agenda was a visit with Uncle Vinny, now 88.

The trip started auspiciously with the landing in Atlanta and the sight of snow falling. Atlanta is not the city you want to be stuck in when it’s snowing. The temperature hovered at 32 which required all zillion planes to be de-iced before takeoff. Atlanta has one de-icing station so I’ll leave the math to you. We boarded the flight to CA about an hour late; sat at the gate for an hour or so before they deplaned us and told us to hang around. A couple hours later the crew ran out of time – a union thing – so our flight and about 100 others were cancelled. All along planes were not able to land since there were no open gates and were diverted to alternate airports. Zoo. Luckily we belong to the Crown Room and they kept those open along with keeping the bar open so it was only so bad. We got out of Atlanta about 9 AM. The rest of the trip was flawless.

On the first full day, Nancy and Martha went off to the show; Fred and I hit the Apple store and Whole Foods. I had some questions for the Apple folks regarding an upgrade and also wanted to see the new Air in person. The Air has not yet arrived at stores so that part of the visit was for naught. But I did get my technical questions answered regarding an upgrade to the latest software and got to play around with the 24” Imac. I see one of those in my future – definitely easier on old eyes. The new Pasadena Whole Foods is incredible. Can’t begin to describe the prepared food options but for sure it’s the best I’ve ever seen. The only one even close to us is a mess so visiting this one really hurts.

On Saturday morning we did breakfast at a Chinese restaurant – a Dim Sum feast. There is simply no place on earth Nancy would rather eat than a Dim Sum place. The highlight for me was having Chinese Brocolli. It was the best green dish I’ve ever had. As soon as we got home last night I hit the seed catalogs and found it. It’s called Suiho and is actually Chinese Kale. Those seeds will be on order before the days over. Saturday afternoon we visited Uncle Vinny and Gerry. He had prepared a very nice meal, baked Cornish game hens basted in wine over a bed of pasta with his special spaghetti sauce. It couldn’t have been nicer and we had a great afternoon just catching up. Other than the fact that he’s 88 and moving more slowly, he’s still the Uncle Vinny we all know and love. All you have to do is mention Hillary or Barack to get him cranked up. I just didn’t have the heart to try to convince him how great it would be if either of them were elected. I wimped out!!! Twenty years ago I would have lit that fuse and ducked for cover.

Sunday was the quilt show for Nancy and Martha; playoff football for Fred and I. A nice dinner at a sports bar so we could see the end of the game and then a perfect, on time flight home. I had a smallish brain fart at the Daytona Airport finding the car but the place is small enough to do a simple search mission so that set us back maybe 10 minutes in time and about 30 minutes of grousing from Nancy.