Kakahead

Summer isn’t officially here in beautiful West Michigan, but around here summer “begins” on Memorial Day and starts slipping away after Labor Day. We’ve had some 90 degree days already and a good amount of rain. Needless to say, the vegetation has exploded all around us.

The garden is a-kickin’ in…

Friends and family know that organic gardening is permanently embedded in my soul. I always fuss because I get the planting done “way too late;” then I fuss some more when the kids go back to school and all the harvesting has to be done.

I simply love all of it to pieces.

I’m a bed planter. No, that does not mean that I dig really large holes and put bedroom furniture in them. What it actually means is that, because I like to make the most of my miniature farm, I do a lot of companion planting in beds about 2 feet wide rather than many single rows. Companion planting involves a little “reminder research” each year; during which time I read up on what plants like to live with each other.

Rows are nice and tidy, and relatively easy to maintain. However, I can get much more “production” from beds once they get established. Of course, bed planting also invites weeds, and for the first few weeks of the garden season it can be a challenge to keep the “uninvited guest” plants out.

Most of you call these uninvited plants weeds. I guess a weed, by at least one definition, is a nuisance plant. Many weeds are useful and even edible, however. My Dad introduced us to “sour grass” when we were very small. It’s actually called sheep sorrel, and is sometimes used as a salad green. Dad also got us into wild berries and fruits, so of course it’s not uncommon for us to think of him when we are chowing down on some wild strawberries or blueberries.

When I left home, my interest in natural foods grew and I started gathering books on native plants and such. Friends still think I’m a little off when I stop in my tracks and pick some wild greens for munching. One of my personal favorites is lambs quarters, which is actually quite nutritious. Actually tastes pretty darn good too. Then our friend Pam introduced me to purslane, another common “weed” that is packed with nutrients including omega 3 oils.

But while weeds can be yummy and useful, I have to admit that my gardening focus has been primarily set on keeping “weeds” like lambs quarters and purslane OUT of the garden. Hey, I figure if I really want to eat them, all I have to do is do a little weeding, or else venture outside the garden a bit and find all I want.

Recently however, our lovely, tree-hugging daughter (the nuts don’t fall far from the tree, so to speak) informed us that she spent $4.50 on a one gallon bag of lambs quarters at a local organic produce market. Upon hearing this, I had to chuckle a bit.

“You bought lambs quarters?!?!?” I snickered. I’ll have a bunch soon… how much can I get for them? “Yeah,” she said a bit sheepishly. “It’s the only fresh greens they had.”

Yesterday I called her while I was weeding out in the garden.

“Hi, this is K&K Hansen Farms calling. I have lambs quarters coming, I can sell you them for $2.50 a pound. I have a produce scale in the shed… just weigh up what you want and leave your money in the jar.”

After the joking and poking, I asked seriously if she wanted them (for free of course).

“I’m weeding right now… if you want some of these I’ll forget to pull them out of the ground and save them for you.”

So I did. And I did something historic: I ACTUALLY MULCHED AROUND THE LAMBS QUARTERS TO HELP THEM GROW BETTER. Never in my living life would I have guessed that I’d be mulching “weeds.”

Here’s a photo to prove it!!

I mulched these "weeds" for cryin' out loud!!

Then to make things even more interesting, we brought some rhubarb to one of our favorite local restaurants, Mia and Grace, and were talking to our server. A nice gent, probably around the same age as our lovely daughter. He mentioned that he enjoys eating both lambs quarters and purslane.

Maybe I’m on the cutting edge of a burgeoning market!! Planting could be pretty simple next year. Just make my planting beds and water, then watch the food sprout!

OK, maybe I’ll grow some beans, corn, and squash and such too just for the halibut (we also love fish).

Now here’s a way to prepare vegetables that I’ve never really thought of before…

Due to family fun this weekend, I didn’t have time to compose anything Happy for Friday.  So, I’m going to cheat and let you kick back and enjoy some of the cool things I (we) grew up with.  Let’s hear it for glorious Black & White!!

Well OK, I was only a year old when Dean and Jerry were on the Colgate Comedy Hour. But even though we still had black & white TV when this one came on the Smothers Brothers show… it was still a lot of fun.


One last time for the glorious Black & White: I admit I had lust in my heart for this gal when I was a kid, even though she was a cartoon character. One of my favorites though…

Here in West Michigan, it’s the height of planting season.  We had a wet, cold spring this year so I’m a bit behind getting stuff in the ground.  I did get my plants in pretty early though.

“Gotta get yer peas and potatoes in by Good Friday,” Grandpa Bunny used to always say.  Well I didn’t quite make it.  Just a week before we had quite a bit of rain.  Since we live in Bear Swamp, I knew full well that tilling the garden would be very much like running a rototiller in ankle deep chocolate pudding.

So I waited a bit.  Went to Weesies just before Mothers Day to buy my plants before the rush came.  Around here, all the veggie plants become slim pickin’s by Memorial Day.  Of course, if you let your peppers, eggplant, and tomatoes sit in those little tray thingies for very long they get root-bound.  Therefore, each year I “commit sacrilege” by putting my frost sensitive plants in the ground before Memorial Day.

I love to share my adventures in the garden  When I tell my friends I’ve had my peppers, eggplant, and tomatoes in the ground for almost three weeks, their eyes get big and they shake their heads and say things like:    “Aren’t you worried about frost??”  “I thought you weren’t supposed to put anything like that in until after Memorial Day!!”  I reassure them that it’s very OK so long as you have enough “hot caps” to cover each one if there’s a danger of frost.

“Hot caps??”  they ask quizzically.  “Yeah, you know, buckets,” I explain.  “Keep them handy so you can put them upside down over the plant before you go to bed.  That way when the frost comes they don’t get killed.  But make sure you take them off first thing in the morning or your plants will get roasted inside those things.”  They’ll say “OOoohh…” but I can sense they are wondering whether I’m OK in the noodle or not.  Of course when they hear I went to Dollar General and spent $50 on buckets they may really think I’m nuts (at least they were made in the U.S.!!).  Seven buckets at $1.75 each and 13 waste baskets at $2.25.  The guy at Dollar General said, “you must have a lot of trash!!”

Hot caps or no, there’s nothing quite so unnerving as carefully planting your baby tomatoes, etc. and waking up the next day to find a decapitated stem with its head lying next to it.  It’s happened to me… but only once.  The stupid pest didn’t even have the decency to eat the leaves that fell to the ground!!  Here’s a picture of the culprit:

A cutworm... photo by Neil Phillips, UK

It’s called a cutworm.  It’s not a worm at all, but a caterpillar; and after it devours the stalk of your baby plant it curls up just under the soil and takes a nap.  Then off it goes later to search for another.

Well I learned about cutworm collars after one of my babies got decapitated all those seasons ago, and I’ve been using them ever since.  Very easy to make, I simply cut the bottom off of a paper drinking cup.  I use paper coffee cups from the vending machine at work.  I simply flatten the cup and cut about 1 ½ inches from the bottom and turn it upside down over the plant.  Then I press it into the soil just a bit so the wind won’t blow it away, and also making sure the leaves of the plant are above the cup.  Here’s an example:

Paper Cup Cutworm Collar

Something like that.

Well, enough of this monkey business.  This video has absolutely nothing to do with cut collar worms.  I’ve never grown Black Eyed Peas, but in my professional opinion, this video of theirs is a lot of fun.  So there.

Our acquaintance first began when we were both just 17 years old.  Sociology class in high school.  I remember that she said she was from a big town, Detroit.  I was from Long Island and our family had relatives in Brooklyn.  Two “city kids” (ok, “suburb kids”) transplanted at different times together to Rhinelander, a dinky town in northern Wisconsin.  I have no idea what the premise was.  I do remember being in front of the class and asking her some question that related to having been yanked out of a rather urban environment.

Fast forward into the last half of senior year, which brought a new set of classes and a new study hall which met in the cafeteria.  The study hall teacher was convinced that if he placed us boy / girl in alphabetical order that there would be very little talking.  Senior year and the boys and girls don’t talk to each other?  Anyway, I lucked out and this “city kid” was planted right next to me.

We became friends pretty quickly.  We sometimes commiserated about how the little hick town of Rhinelander took some getting used to.   Mostly I acted like the silly person I still am today, writing silly stories and sharing them at school, acting weird, making her laugh.  I admit though, that I was a bit dumb about dating and it basically took a clunk over the head with a big stick for me to get a clue.  That came in the form of female attire:  she switched from blue jeans and smock tops to dresses and make up.

I remember being mesmerized by this lovely lady and exclaiming to myself, “OH!  I get it now!  SHE LIKES ME!!!”

Fast forward again to May 19.  The “big day.”  By this time we were more than friends… no kissing or anything yet…  However, each of us were going steady with another.  Her beau was in the Navy and my sweetheart was in a suburb of Chicago.  My new lady friend wrote her Navy man a “dear John” letter (poor guy).  My dirty work was done face to face:  she was due to come “to the cottage” for the first of her family’s annual northward treks.  We met during one of her family’s summer stays and wrote gooshy letters when she had to go back home.

So on May 19 I hopped on my Honda CB-175 and rode to Holiday Acres to let my long distance sweetheart goodbye.  Not fun, but business, as they say, is business.

That day was, no fooling, the first day of the rest of my life.  May 19, 1972.  My new love and I rode to the fire tower and climbed to the top.  One could see for miles from up there.  Back down we went, off to the Dairy Queen for an ice cream, and basically just burned up the daylight enjoying each other’s company.  Upon nightfall we hopped back on the Honda and buzzed back to the fire tower to catch a glimpse of the small town lights and thousands of stars.

I drove her home, again no smooching yet… just two youngsters falling in love and loving life.

We got married the following year and are still smitten with each other to this day.  Sure, we’ve had good times and bad.  Marriage has given us many “growth opportunities.”  Nearly grew apart a few times… both of us have indulged in shenanigans that could have destroyed our relationship.  Fortunately for us, The Divine Committee Upstairs apparently kept smiling on us and gave us the ability to work out our problems.  Our marriage is very good.  Not every day is happy happy joy joy mind you.  We’re into reality now.  If you’re old like me you might remember a bumper sticker that read:  REALITY IS FOR PEOPLE WHO CAN’T HANDLE DRUGS.  Well, guess what?  We’ve handled more than our share of drugs and we much prefer reality.  Sometimes reality stinks and puts us in a bad mood; which helps us say or do stupid and even hurtful things.  We still butt heads occasionally; but a “fight” that often lasted days or even longer now gets shrugged off in less than an hour.  Most of the time.

We are still very much in love and tell each other so every day.  We even have that same 1970 Honda CB-175 motorcycle… it sits patiently in our shed waiting for both of us to get skinny enough to be on it together again.  Hasn’t run in years but hey, it’s a Honda… we’ll get it going.  Life is good.  We have each other, a nice home, cars that actually run and don’t even leak oil.  We are blessed and very grateful for it.  She even lets me kiss her!

May 19, 1972.  We celebrate it every year.  I had a crazy work schedule yesterday so not much celebrating except a kiss and hug and a “Happy First Date!”  I made up for it today; I picked lilacs for her.  Then I picked some asparagus from the garden and made asparagus and bean wet burritos.  Now that’s living!!

Oh by the way, please don’t tell anyone about the fire tower, I don’t think we were supposed to be up there.

Our favorite songs from all those years ago still conjure up some rather blissful memories. We both still love “Strawberry Fields Forever” but alas, the song’s video shows the Fab Four doing some rather weird stuff. Hey, it was the ’60s for crying out loud. So I found a much nicer video. Although my favorite Beatle is not necessarily Paul, this song still brings warmth to our hearts when we hear it.

Holy Hemoglobin, Batman!  There are vampires lurking outside!!  I narrowly escaped having every last corpuscle removed.  I ran to the garlic patch and yanked off some of the greenery and stuffed it into my face.  Chewy chewy chewy… “ooooey gack” you say?  Well, I don’t mind a little pinch of garlic between cheek and gum now and then.  As Grandma Loftus used to say, “it’s good for what ails ya.  And if nothin’ ails ya, it’s good for that too.”   And vampires are supposed to be repelled by garlic, right??  But in spite of my ingestion of Instant Vampire Be Gone, many of those little boogers kept coming back for more blood.

I’ve recorded the horrible sound they make and have put it into this here Frappy Hiday for your conjugation.  Just click right hereVAMPIRE!! Give it a moment to load, then play the horrifying recording.  I hope you can still sleep at night after listening.  That is the taunting noise they make while trying to suck the life force out of me.  It’s like they can smell me from miles away.  And I even bathe once in awhile!!  Honest!!  I’m convinced they have some sort of signaling network…

Calling all vampires!!  Dinner is served!!! He’s out here in the garden with shorts and no shirt on!  COME AND GET IT!!!

So you know what I do? Foist of awl, I pretend I don’t notice them.  Maybe let a few of them start to feed on me to get their confidence.  Then:   I smack them. I kersmoosh them into my skin. They bleed my blood. They die. Ha. Ha ha. Ha ha on you, you lousy rotten vampire pigdog jerkface monsterheads!!  Sure, maybe I should drive a wooden stake into their hearts to make absolutely certain they are dead.  That’s what they do in the movies to get rid of vampires.  But judging by what’s left of their kersmooshed bodies, I don’t think they’re going to slurp any more type A negative from the likes of me.  Or anyone else, for that matter.  Besides, do you know how tiny the wooden stake would have to be on this particular breed of vampire??  Every try to drive a toothpick through the heart of a mosquito??  Or maybe a gnat??  First you need a very small hammer…

Oh jeez, I gave it away. Ah well, it’s likely you already guessed I was talking about those doggone bugs!!  Man I hate those things.  When we were kids we used to douse ourselves with OFF or Cutter’s or some other DEET spray.  Well, after learning a bit more about that stuff, I don’t like to put poison on my skin to repel those stinkyheaded dirtmonkeys.  Sometimes I use that Avon Skin So Soft, and it does work pretty well.  Much safer than DEET.  I read somewhere that eating garlic will make them less interested in you.  Seems to actually work, although not completely; so I end up getting nailed a few times.

So far I have my tomatoes, peppers and eggplants in the ground.  No, not the vegetables!!  The PLANTS, you ninny!!  Some folks think I’m nuts for putting these plants in so early, but global warming has brought a strange benefit:  I’ve been putting tomatoes and such in the ground in early May for several years now.  Just need to keep buckets ready to cover them up when the frost comes, because although it was about 80 degrees today, we’ll probably get at least one more frost before summer is official.  I can remember when putting tomato, pepper and eggplant seedlings in the ground before Memorial Day would be considered pure lunacy.  Knot enny moor!!

Got my peas and potatoes in this evening, along with some beets, Swiss chard, spinach, lettuce, and onions.  All those are way late but hey, a few weeks ago we had so much water my garden soil was like chocolate pudding.

Along with this wonderfully strange, early summer weather we’re having here in West Michigan comes bugs.  Lots of ‘em.  Of course, the fact that our house is literally on the edge of a swamp gives all those nasty flying blood suckers a really nice place to settle down and raise a family. And they are all very hungry.  And some of them had dinner on me tonight, and I have the itchbumps to prove it.  But I also smooshed quite a few of those flame headed wombats.  Dirty rotten vampire bugs!  Now they are dead.  Or are they??

Anyone have some toothpicks and a teensy-tiny hammer??

So… I was hunting for a vampire video and looky here what I found!! Boop boop e doop!!

I come from a long line of cat lovers; so it seemed quite natural to marry one when I fell in love with my beautiful girlfriend. Both of us believe with our hearts that cats deserve to go outside, so we have dealt with all the interesting antics of the small predators. For awhile, we even went as far as to install a cat door that gave them the freedom to go in and out as they pleased. Seemed easier than opening the door to let them in or out every 12 minutes. OK, maybe it wasn’t quite that often, but at times it sure seemed like it.

We love our cats and all, and we do allow them outside. We also got just a wee bit tired of uninvited “guests” showing up in various corners of the house though. “Ken!! There’s a mouse in the compost bucket again!!” My wife would always dispatch me when “the one that got away” was busy trying to score a free meal after escaping the jaws of one of our feline hunters. Then of course there were some birds… Oh, and you really haven’t lived until you’ve stepped in a pile of guts on the kitchen floor in the middle of the night.

It took several years but finally, thank God, we came to our senses and boarded up the cat door. They still go outside and hunt, but they’re not allowed to bring in any take-out items they may have scored in Mother Nature’s garden. So now we still get the occasional mouse in the house, but it’s the kind we humans love to eat. This delicacy was first introduced to us by Mrs. Spoelma.

God bless Mrs. Spoelma, the “Hollander” (Michigan term for Dutch) lady who lived next door to us when we first moved to Muskegon. She and her husband were often outside cleaning up the yard, and we’d have many a conversation across the fence. That was 35 years ago (wow!!), and one couldn’t ask for nicer neighbors.

When our daughter came into the world, she started bringing us food. Most often, she brought an odd mashed potato dish we’d never had before. “This is mouse,” she said. “It’s an old family recipe: mashed potatoes, kale, and barley. Oh and a little bit of onion, too.” It was simply wonderful. Perfect food for a couple of tree huggers with a brand new baby. Free food is pretty doggoned perfect if you ask me; especially when it’s delicious. “Mouse” is not merely wonderful as a side dish for meat and another vegetable, maybe even some gravy. It is especially yummy the following day, reheated with an over easy egg or two on top. MMMMMmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

When I sat down to write this evening, I thought I’d go on the web and try to find a recipe that resembled this remarkable dish. No such luck. After many variations of the words potato, mashed, kale, barley, and Dutch, I found several interesting cooking ideas but nothing that resembled what our dear Mrs. Spoelma made.

However, I feel it’s my duty to share the basics with you. I love to cook but I rarely follow any recipe exactly. Mouse is no exception; but without further ado here is a rudimentary description:

Mouse: Delicious Mashed Potatoes, Kale, Barley and Onion

Ingredients: ½ cup hulled barley (pearled barley is OK but not as nutritious as hulled)

Potatoes : enough to fill a 6 quart pot a bit more than halfway when diced

Kale: 3 cups chopped

Onions: one large onion or 4 or 5 small onions, diced

½ stick of salted butter

1 cup of milk

salt to taste

Place the barley and kale in separate pots.

Add more than enough water to the barley to cover, at least 2 inches higher than the barley

Boil the barley until tender, then drain, cover and set aside

Add 1 cup water to the kale, and cover. Bring to boil, remove from heat after 2 or 3 minutes boiling. Drain, then set aside

Wash and dice enough potatoes to fill a 6 quart pot a bit more than half way. (We leave the skins on.)

Fill with water till the potatoes are barely covered, and boil until tender, drain.

Add butter and mash, adding milk and a dash or so of salt along the way.

When the potatoes are creamy, add onions (raw), barley, and kale to the potatoes and mash together until mixed thoroughly.

Now, don’t just stand there, it’s time to eat!!

Very nutritious stuff this “mouse,” makes me wonder if maybe a certain famous rodent ever sampled any…

Warm weather is finally sneaking its way into beautiful West Michigan.  Before you know it we’ll all be running around naked outside.  Well OK maybe not ALL of us.  Alright, maybe very few of us will actually do that when you get right down to it.  Anyway, we won’t need to wear nearly as much clothing and we’ll certainly want to have a nice cool beverage handy when we’re enjoying the outdoors.

Babies will ask for their “baba”… you know, a bottle… when thirst tells them to get a drink.  They might also refer to water as “wawa.”  Put those together and you’d get  “baba wawa.”  I suppose that could cause someone my age to reminisce about Gilda Radner’s timeless parody of Barbara Walters on Saturday Night Live.  When my sister  was very young, water was “joosh.”  I distinctly remember this, because she also thought my name was “B.O.”  after my mother was teasing me by showing me how to wash my armpits.  “B.O., can I have a glass of joosh??” my sister would ask; so I would always oblige and get her a glass of water.

So I guess bottled water could be called baba wawa in baby talk.  No, not Barbara Walters; bottled water.  Sales of the beverage soar during the warmer months, and tree huggers like me shudder at the sight of it.  I’m sorry but it’s completely wasteful to ship water all over the place.  Of course, there are certainly exceptions, like disaster areas or other rescue situations.

However, in most civilized areas of the planet, bottled water represents a terrible waste of resources.  Think about it:  water is pumped, filtered and otherwise treated, then put into disposable containers.  Those containers are packed into cases or crates, which are loaded onto trucks and sent to various retail outlets.  Then a consumer drives to the store, buys the finished product, and drinks water which is rarely any better than what they can get at home from the tap.  Finally, the packaging and the water bottle are tossed out, hopefully in an “environmentally friendly” way.  I put that in quotes because disposal of anything always implies that it will be moved to somewhere, either a recycling center or a landfill.  All the steps in the process consume energy and resources which could be much better spent elsewhere.

Rather than use all that oil to pump, package, and transport water; let’s maybe do something silly and save a few drops of the precious petroleum for future use.  And of course I didn’t mention the trees that die to make the paper for the cases in which these bottles of water are often shipped.

Instead, buy a rugged, reusable container and put your water in it.  Personally, I prefer glass, but it does have the drawback of being somewhat fragile.  But even if it does get broken, it’s very readily recyclable.  I get my glass containers by seeking out glass juice bottles in the store.  Only need to buy one!  I’ve also been known to keep a Snapple bottle for a very long time.  There are metal containers that work well also if you prefer.  I stay away from plastic… all these stories about BHA and whatnot.

Call me a radical tree hugger if you wish but I’d like to take this opportunity to ask EVERYONE, all over the planet, to please REFRAIN FROM BUYING BOTTLED WATER!! BABA WAWA NO NO!!

Speaking of Baba Wawa and reminiscing, here’s a clip featuring Gilda Radner and Madeline Kahn, who I truly believe are out there making the angels laugh.

Did I mention I never get tired of spring?  The peepers are peeping, the crocuses are croaking, the rhubarb is rhubing and the garlic is garlicking.  Even the wild cabbage is cabbaging!  Yes… the wild cabbage survived the winter and is already feeding us.

What’s this with the wild cabbage you say?  Well, my lovely girlfriend bought a pretty good sized package of seeds several years ago that were labeled “Broccoli for Sprouting.”  They sprouted nicely but the flavor wasn’t as remarkable as we had hoped, so into the fridge they went to sleep until another day.  Month.  Year.  Long time.

So last year, I got a bit adventurous.  I wanted to see just what kind of broccoli we’d get from these “broccoli for sprouting” seeds.  This is what we got:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/11/Brassica_oleracea0.jpg

It’s brassica oleracea or more commonly called wild cabbage.  Apparently it’s the “mother of all cabbages,” meaning it’s an ancient food plant that’s been grown for many thousands of years; and has been bred into other variations like cabbage, broccoli and cauliflower.

A tough plant!  It survived the winter just fine and is making new leaves in our garden already.  I picked several of those and also plucked some newly sprouted elephant garlic leaves.   Rinsed them off a bit, then dropped them in the pan with some shrimp, onions, a dash of thyme, parsley flakes, chili powder, and soy sauce.  The result was very delicious indeed.  We threw the shrimp in the garbage and devoured the greens in nothing flat.

OK maybe we didn’t really toss the shrimp…

Anyway, the wild cabbage is cabbaging, at least for now.  Next step in its life cycle will be to send flower spikes up and go to seed.  Very nice because I’d love to grow it again!

Last week I wrote about the peepers peeping, and a few days ago I heard a lovely ruckus coming from the back of our property.  The hooters are hooting!  OWLS you silly… barred owls I believe.  I haven’t actually seen them but I know they live in these parts.  Plus, I found a recording of their call after a search on the web.  Thanks very much to Bob Pearson, whose recordings I’m using with permission from here.

I’m certain that this is what I heard:

barred_owl_male

barred_owl_female

I’m pretty sure they were pitching woo… they were chattering pretty vigorously.   I believe they were singing the owl equivalent to “Who’s Your Little Whozit…”

I never get tired of watching spring come. The snow is pretty much gone, crocuses are croaking and the peepers are peeping!! Those little froggies simply amaze me. They go to bed in the mud in late fall / early winter. Sleep all winter long, and when the spring rains some they wake up and start singing. The noise is simply musical… Just click on the link below.

Peepers!

Oh wait… wrong sound file.  Try this one: Peepers!!!

Oy yoy yoy… this one maybe??    PEEPERS!!!!

Hmmm… ok let me tweak the audio selection variometer a bit.  Maybe I should wiggle the floaglit connections too… Oh, and reseat the Fremple memory chips. Ok… I think I have it now…

This time: PEEPERS PLEASE!!!!

Ah yes, much better.  You may have to turn your sound WAY UP to hear it well, the recording device was a cheapie… but it works pretty well really.  Of course, there’s no substitute for hearing it live and in color.  Not sure what color the sound is but I think it might be very dark purple, because the recording was made well after sunset.  A farmer friend of mine told me that the old wise farmers know that peepers have to “go to sleep 3 times before the frost is done.”  In other words, it’s warm now and the froggies wanna make babies.  So, they’re singing their little hearts out from the warm spell we’re having.  Sure as heck though, we’ll get some more cold weather before too long and they’ll go back to bed.

On the other hand, Grandpa Bunny always told me, “you got your peas in yet?? S’posed to have your peas and potatoes in the ground by Good Friday.”  Not sure how that really works because Good Friday moves around on the calendar.  This year, however it’s late in April and that might just be good reasoning.

Pretty soon it will be time to run the rototiller. I know better to run it this early in spring, because we literally live in a swamp. This time of year, our soil is squishy from all the snow melt and rain. Running the rototiller in soggy soil is very similar to tilling chocolate pudding.  Plenty of work to do outside anyway, now that the snow doesn’t hide all the firewood debris and doggie land mines anymore.

Tonight was a special treat.  Met our daughter and grandson at a local restaurant for dinner.  After dinner, she went to her house and we took Ollie to our house.  Nothing quite so magical than a young 27 month old guy marveling at the stars in the sky and the peepers in the swamp.

Spring is magical alright.

And now for something… completely different!!

Just when we thought “we’d seen it all,” yet another internet virus has been spreading like wildfire. However, the latest “computer bug” is the first known case of an organic pathogen that can actually infect humans. Infection is caused via skin contact with an internet connected computer or mobile device. Nicknamed “cyberflu,” what researchers know as the C18x virus has been propagating through e-mail servers in the eastern half of the US. The virus, although not deadly, causes great discomfort and is likely to become a worldwide pandemic if corrective measures are not quickly found.

What’s unique about the C18x virus is the recently discovered transmission method of electronic osmosis. I don’t profess to know the exact technical details of all this, but here’s a quote from the CDC’s Electrocybotics Lab in Atlanta:

“Effective immediately: we recommend issuing a precautionary warning to all computer users to wash their hands before and after using any internet-connected computing device. The C18x influenza virus has been known to travel across vast distances electronically and manifesting contagions on keyboards, computer mouse surfaces and other peripherals. Accidental ingestion of C18x virii can cause symptoms of nausea and other gastrointestinal discomfort within 37 hours of infection.”

As of this writing, the origin of the virus is not verified but researchers suspect that infected food processing plants that use artificial food coloring agents may be a likely source. According to electrocybotic researcher Dr. Javier Montenegro, “this appears to be the brainchild of a disgruntled whistleblower scientist whose warnings about artificial coloring in food went unheeded by industry executives during the late 1980s.” Dr. Montenegro refused to offer the indentity of the whistleblower, as legal actions are already being pursued and therefore cannot be discussed publicly. However, he went on to say, “after repeated warnings of adverse effects of food coloring compounds were ignored, the scientist became withdrawn and quit her job a few years ago.”

Little more was mentioned about food coloring agents until recently, when copies of a rather scathing letter arrived on the desks of several industry execs ordering them to “stop producing artificially colored foods or suffer dire consequences.”

Dr. Montenegro and his colleagues were alerted about the written threat shortly thereafter. Only eight days later, workers in various food processing plants began getting flu-like symptoms. “We believe she infected them remotely,” Dr. Montenegro stated. “She basically ‘threw the switch’ and zapped some of her least favorite factories with C18x using electronic osmosis technology. We’re guessing she genetically engineered an ordinary bird-flu strain of influenza and injected into her home computer network circuitry; then sent it via spyware infected e-mails to her former employers and their peers.”

The magnitude of the C18x is not easily downplayed. As the CDC’s Electrobiotics lab stated yesterday, “computerized manufacturing machinery in such factories could easily spread C18x throughout the factory via electronic osmosis in a very short amount of time. Since many computers in a typical factory are connected to the internet, that would also explain the rapid spread of the virus. If left unchecked this could quickly become a global pandemic.”

Recent reports have already cited artificial food coloring agents as a possible cause for behavioral problems in children. Other ill effects of artificially coloring foods have long been suspected, including damage to our immune systems. If Dr. Montenegro’s theory is proven, significant vigilance should be taken by parents of school age children. Pre-adolescent youths now spend much of their time using computers. In the US, this age group is also known to consume snack foods; many of which contain artificial colors. Consequently, our young people’s immune systems may already be compromised; leaving them even more susceptible to the hazards of a C18x infection.

“Similar susceptibility exists with elderly populations, who also may have fragile immune systems,” according to Dr. Montenegro. “One should be especially wary while visiting social networking sites,” he added. “Any doctor, nurse, or even mother knows that wherever large numbers of people congregate, the possibility of catching something increases.”

As I learn more about this nasty bug I will be happy to share it with you. In the meantime, I’ll be sanitizing my PC (and everything connected to it) on a regular basis and I would strongly advise all those I love to do the same.