Song from Hell, for a Saturday

This came about from a conversation with my good friend Gayathiri. She finally got to spend some actual time with one of my acquaintances, Jason. She said that he was really nice. I totally agreed. Jason is honestly a positive person. He is an excellent people person when it's his job to listen and work with others. He has impressed several of the volunteers with whom he is working at our local Center. He is actually a joy to be around. A different acquaintance I know dislikes him, but we figured out why: that guy is a person who is just ugly, inside and out, who dislikes Jason because he is a cute, positive, and competent person.

So describing to Gayathiri, I said, "ya, he is just sunshine and lollipops all the time." UGH...that is all it took! Know I am stuck with it in my head...and now you are.

Monday's Song from Hell - April 25th

The back story on how this was pulled off in the Oregon legislature. I wish more legislative bodies treated each other with the respect required to build the kind of trust it must take to do something like this. That legislature is probably able to come to compromises

Harps adds bulk food section

Seen today at the Wedington St. Harps store. First time I have seen it.

Ozark Natural Foods has some competition now. Bulk foods is what I buy the most of at ONF. Though Harps is not offering the huge selection of organic bulk food, I will probably start buying some of my bulk food here. Most of this selection is nuts, dried fruit, and oats. I mostly buy almonds, pumpkin seeds, oats, and lentils by bulk.

Why bulk? Well...for one, you decide how much you want. It's slightly cheaper too. Less packaging. Supposedly more sustainable...even if you are buying in small quantities, the super thin produce bag is less intensive than whatever extra crap marketers incorporate into packaging in hopes of higher sales.

Map of the Day - April 5th

This is my proposed redistricting map for Arkansas. I did this to illustrate that you can basically do anything you want with redistricting as long as the districts have equal population and don't dilute minority voting rights (not much of a concern in Arkansas). I started this map with two ideas: give each district an equal length of state border and have them all meet in the middle of the state. This map would be a big change for many cities, but gives each district a share of urban and rural areas.

(Bentonville, Fayetteville, Fort Smith, Hot Springs together in a district. Rogers, Springdale, Russellville and Conway in another. Jonesboro, West Memphis, North Little Rock, and Pine Bluff in another. Little Rock, Saline County, Texarkana in the last one)

There has been much hullabaloo about the congressional redistricting that is happening in Arkansas this spring. The main controversy is about moving Fayetteville out of the 3rd CD and into the 4th CD. "Fayetteville to the Fourth" one of the plans has been called. I oppose moving Fayetteville to the 4th CD if there is another way of creating equal population districts that are more compact. This opinion is not very popular with many Democratic party leaders, officials, elites, and activists. Some have said that moving Fayetteville is best because it gives Democrats more opportunities to win Congressional seats....I support compact districts over partisan success. Some have accused a few Fayetteville Democrats of this plan because those elected officials want to run for Congress in a district that is much more likely to elect a Democrat....again, I support compact districts over the success of any individual politician.

There have been many maps from many people. I hope someone creates a website to archive all the possible maps created by legislators and by citizens during this session. I think far too many people during this session simply said "the 3rd has to lose voters" then accepted whatever was put in front of them. There are plenty more than one way to skin that cat. High schoolers with access to the internet can create all kinds of maps that are equal population that satisfy legal challenges. UPDATE: The most recent map to pass the AR Senate!

Make your own redistricting map with this online tool. It maps and counts the voters in districts that you create yourself!

http://gardow.com/davebradlee/redistricting/launchapp.html

Map of the Day - March 18th

Thanks Tin Can Tabloid for the inspiration for today's map.

Tin Can Tabloid: CNN Races Fox To The Bottom...

They switched San Fransisco and Los Angeles. What a bunch of morons. They are off by 350 miles....with two of the largest metro areas in the United States. And San Fransisco is kind of hard to mess up...it's got that huge body of water with a very particular shape..call SAN FRANSISCO BAY. 350 miles...that's not a small mistake. That's like mistaking Miami for Jacksonville.

Perhaps I should get a job at CNN. My degree in geography would qualify me. Actually, my ability to throw darts at a map seems to qualify me.

Where to put your compost pile

I am a compost convert...I am completely sold on the idea of closing the nutrient cycle of everything that grows and comes onto someones property. Of course apartment dwellers can't do this easily, but so many people live on suburban lots. There are lots of excuses why people don't compost and most of them are crappy ones. Basic knowledge shouldn't be one of those excuses. You can find all kinds of advice...everything from detailed scientific or pro-farmer experiences all the way down to average yokels like me. Here is one simple lesson.

Where to site your pile is a common question. Common pointers: not near trees (roots will suck nutrients), not in the shade (heat helps decomposition), close to your garden (for convenience). Sometimes they add "close to your kitchen." Well...guess where mine is? Not close to my kitchen. Look below:

All the way at the back of the lot near the corner of the neighbor's fence.

Do you know why they recommend putting it near the kitchen? Because this is what you collect to put in the pile:

Not exactly what you want lingering in your kitchen.

Now Northwest Arkansas has mild winters...but this one was extreme. We had four snows in a six week period. The first was the dusting above.

The second was several inches..okay, normal. And usually it melts off fast.

The third was a very decent snow by our standards. And some very cold weather to go along with it.

The fourth snow was 14 inches at our house. A record during my lifetime for Fayetteville. And BITTER COLD for days. (don't the raised beds look like shallow graves covered in snow?)

Well guess what happens when you don't want to trudge through knee high snow at 4 degrees?

PILEUP!!!!!

Lesson learned.

The Garden Awakes!

After a bitterly cold winter with far above average snows, Northwest Arkansas is getting a taste of a traditional spring. We had several warm days that saw 70 degrees and sun. We have had several VERY rainy days complete with thunderstorms and hail. Cloudy, mild days into the 50s feel like normal. It's enough to warm the hearts of gardeners and the soils of their gardens. Seed orders are coming in and we are already procrastinating on the indoor seeding. I took a walk around the garden and realized that it has awoken, despite the hard winter.

Garden looks pretty boring here...depressing even. Notice the newer beds on the outer edges. These additions add 176 sq ft of raised beds, bringing the total close to 400 sq ft.

Garlic is up and ready for warm days. As opposed to last year, I got these in the ground in the late fall rather than waiting until the spring. That is the way it is supposed to be done evidently. These overwinter just fine. I have a challenge among a few friends for the best garlic to be pulled on July 4th.

Parsley overwintered just fine and is starting new growth. Curly leaf parsley on the left, flat leaf (Italian) parsley on the right. You can't see it but behind the parsley the chives are pushing up mounds of soil in their effort to break through.

This bed is the permanent strawberry bed. It was started last year with just one row up front of everbearing plants. The rest of the box was filled in the late fall with first year transplants from our friend's borrowed box in our garden and his pots. We needed to dump a lot of new compost in his bed and I feared the small pots would not protect the plants during the winter. The potted strawberries also had many runners that had rooted into the rest of the box. The whole thing was a mess....the friend hadn't visited his plot in months. So his have now filled the back of the bed. Some were everbearing and some June. Kyle added 3 or 4 inches of compost right on top of the plants and the existing mulch.....I feared that this would hurt the strawberries, but I think it actually provided great insulation. He was careful to make sure he gathered the plant leaves up and spread the compost all around them. I imagine as perennial plants with quick rooting, the strawberries will just gradually raise their root level and thrive. Let's hope.

Brand new growth of strawberries. They are ready for spring!

Mint. This is a 2x5 raised bed that is completely segregated from the rest of the garden. Mint can be very invasive, so we planted it away...in the shade...and we kind of ignored it as it is just far enough out of sight and hard to reach with the hose. It didn't do very well at all last year, but we sort of don't mind. We dumped 3 or 4 inches of compost on top and just let it sit during the winter. All kinds of new growth...but we may have killed one or two of the varieties planted in this box. We will see.

Is anything waking up in your garden/farm?