We went on a mission today. No, not to go steal more rocks. I wanted cilantro seedlings, and desperately needed some Round-up. Our subdivision's homeowner association decided in its infinite wisdom that it will not run the sprinklers at all this year, in an effort to keep down costs. That means the dandelion population got way out of control, and now they're sprouting up in my flower beds.

They're probably skimping a bit on landscaping too, because the lawn should be cut twice a week this time of year, but they're letting it go to seed. Maintenance costs have soared the past couple of years, and people are really complaining about it. I don't see how letting the lawns go to seed and brown out before the dog days of summer even hit is going to help keep up property values any better than cutting services and increasing fees will. They can't even collect recyclables more than once a week, and then have the nerve to yell at us the commie bins are overflowing.

Basically, anyone who has a garden will now have to water it by hand. Ladies and gentlemen, start your hoses. Even the sedum's wilting, but the termite contractors may have something to do with that. They destroyed a bed of lilies of the valley and most of my bee balm.

We're supposed to get t-storms this evening; it's already muggy enough for it.

Hmm--a friend just IMed me that Peaches Pacione is trying to get her in trouble with the MySpace TOS police for posting her own book's cover art, the the TOS police fell for it and sent her a threatening note about it. Sheesh. Rule number one of being on the police squad is "find out whether the person making the complaint about someone else is career crank before taking them at their word. In this case, he is. Peaches is well known for harassing authors. In fact, he's infamous for harrassing anyone who thinks his writing sucks, regardless of whether they are actually competitors of his. He posts his own cover art and banners all over the internet, then rats on another author for doing jsut that--there's no copyright violation whatsoever involved.

So Peaches, if you're reading this--you're a schmuck. I'd have a lot worse things to say to you, but this blog is read by several god-fearing Christians, who really don't need to be subjected to sailor-speak.

Andy's Roadside Stand

It's that wonderful time of year when the farmer up the street from me open up his roadside stand. That place has been in his family for generations. Thirty years ago, deer hunting was outlawed, which really had an effect on what he can grow without the deer decimating his crop. Little by little, a parcel here and there was sold, so he's down to 5 acres; he's pushing 90, so even that's a bit much for him to handle without his son and daughter pitching in part time on weekends.

All he grows anymore are tomatoes and squash, and those crops aren't ready, but he does have flowers, tomato plants, and herbs for sale. He'll have tomatoes and corn around the end of June, and does get in other produce from other farmers. Sweet guy. Today, we bought two cherry tomato seedlings and a four-pack of basil seedlings. Each of the containers was $1.50, but he said "Give me four dollars even." I was going to just give him a fiver and leave it at that, but he insisted on giving me a dollar change. I don't know how the guy makes any money; I suppose he ekes out a modest living given that he pays property tax at vastly reduced farm rates.

Got gas and beer while we were at it (Andy's stand was on the way home), and managed to find gas for $2.93/gal. for regular. We never see the extreme highs or lows the rest of the country experiences.

The new plants have already been planted. It's a gorgeous day, so I think I'll take the laptop out to the patio.

This is pretty darn funny. Yesterday we went to my parents' house to visit for Mother's Day. Spent about an hour there, when dad suggested we go take a walk to look at a new neighbor's McMansion going up on a lot that used to have a smallish house. I babysat there a time or two when I was a teen.

After nine months, the house is still nothing but timbers and plywood. There's a small stone out-building that's rather old, with a nice pile of rocks in front of it, near the huge dumpster. Good old-fashioned field stone, it was. Dad revealed that we were on a mission from mom. Sure we climbed around inside the house for a few minutes, but on our way out, we had to stop by the pile of rocks to look them over.

We stole a rock. Almost got caught doing so, too. I kid you not. We selected a nice large heavy one to put on the corner of my parents' lawn. All four corner lots at that particular intersection have been nailed lately by errant motor vehicles that cut the corner and drive over the edge of the lawn. The next person to do it will damage their undercarriage, at the very least.

So, yes, we stole a rock. The entire 50 yard walk home, I kept saying "I can't believe we just stole a rock."

On the other hand, it's not as if you can just buy or rent a utility pole to plop in the ground there.

Yesterday was gorgeous. Today was a bit too chilly for short sleeves, with the sun in and out all day. I made a wonderful discovery though. The azaleas will bloom after all. Over the winter the deer gave them a 6" haircut, so I thought all was lost. It won't be a spectacular bloom the way it is most years, but there are buds on them.

Everything's really late this year. Last weekend, there were no sign of my lilies of the valley. Suddenly, they're everywhere, getting ready to bloom. The rabbit-gnawed Spanish bluebells are getting ready to bloom as well, as are the columbines.

I have a patch of catnip growing in a raised rosebed. It must have seeded itself there, since I always grew the stuff in pots. A couple of weeks ago, I noticed a depression on one side of it. There's a cat that looks like mine, about the same size, that a neighbor lets out. Mine's an indoor cat. I assume the roaming cat slept and rolled in it. The plant recovered, and was fine yesterday. This morning, there was another telltale cat-sized indentation on the other side of the patch. My visitor had returned.

Ah, Spring.

Tchochkes

Today was a bit of a blow-off day. We're playing musical offices yet again, so people were boxing up possessions and files, and tossing lots of good stuff they'd collected over the years. One person suggested using the empty office next to hers for a book swap. That quickly became a "swap anything" room. A space heater, boom box, leather wallet, computer carrying case, and other assorted trinkets appeared along with the books.

I donated a couple of soccer balls I'd gotten from a Hispanic ad agency conference a few years ago. Lo and behold, I found an AOL-logo backpack that looked as if it had never been used. Score! There was also an unwanted company mug. Someone had stolen mine right off my desk one year, between Christmas and New Year's, when I was using my last few vacation days. Replacement mug--score!

As I was boxing up the contents of my former boss' office, I found something in a really large K-Mart bag. It turned out to be a seat cushion. My boss couldn't use it with his chair (no spindles on our leather executive chairs on which to tie the strings), but I had a use for it at home.

If anyone had sat on it before, it hadn't been often enough to make a tush imprint. My old one on my computer chair, which is really just a wooden kitchen table-type chair, fell apart some time ago. My chair has back spindles. I'd been sitting on a sofa pillow that had a nasty tendency to slide around on the seat. Score!

I really wanted to at least move my boxes into my new office (lost my window office, although I didn't land in a Dilbert cell), but the current occupant wasn't in today, and her door was locked. Hope she's ready to move Monday, because there are two people waiting to move into my office temporarily, until their new cubes can be built. They can't move in until I move out, and I can't do that until Janet moves out.

We all have to be moved by Tuesday, so demolition can begin. That's always fun--working in an office while construction and demolition are going on in the hallways. Try having a conference call on speaker-phone and see how long it takes for one of the other parties to tell you to hit the mute button. I'm hoping they'll let me work from home that week, and remote in to my computer. I don't even need to lug a laptop home with me to do it.

Gary, my former assistant, is going to be paid for a little consulting/freelance work. He's moved on to another employer full-time. There are a few loose ends with a database he created, he's familiar with the project, and he wants to earn a few extra bucks on the side. He came down over lunch hour to talk about it. Fortunately, since it was moving/boxing day, we had a pizza party lunch, and he got a slice of cold pizza and a soda. Actually, it was almost cold 45 minutes earlier when I had a slice. We warned him, but a hungry guy will eat just about anything.