Carl Wayne’s Weekly Columns and Newsletter    May 09, 2008

 

 

 

 

 

This week:

 

The big event this week is Mother’s Day, and men that means wife, too. Don’t forget.

 

Still raining and garden plants look waterlogged. Mine in containers in my backyard look OK since they get good draining through the straw plus I gave them each a nice dose of homemade alfalfa tea.

 

We have delivered 20 lbs of fresh nutritious tasty Romaine lettuce to the needy!!!

 

Some pix of my recent activities:

 

http://targetphoto.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=ipipyxq.62xdh76&x=0&y=-4lfpu6&localeid=en_US

 

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=5jpx39n.bygq9smb&x=0&y=y5qs86&localeid=en_US

 

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=5jpx39n.9pmwmjb7&x=0&h=1&y=4182ey&localeid=en_US

 

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=5jpx39n.6wfmz3q3&x=0&y=-xamhkq&localeid=en_US

 

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=5jpx39n.76hdaoqj&x=0&h=1&y=-ju63bh&localeid=en_US

 

 

 

 

 

Column:

 

Things My Grandkids May Never Know                   April 10, 2008

 

” We could never have loved the earth so well if we had had no childhood in it.”

 ~George Eliot, The Mill on the Floss

 

My granddarlings may never know many of the sights, sounds, and scents etched

deeply in mine and Mimi’s memories. How pleasant they are in our recall.

 

Some I remember as Belle,  Mimi’s pom-a-poo, and I rest in the recliner, planning

this year’s garden and my next column. Mimi thinks we are asleep.

 

The feel of the warm freshly plowed dirt. The smell of rain in dust. The sound of rain on a tin roof while lying abed. The laziness of napping in the hay loft of a barn.

 

Opening or closing the outhouse or shed door with its rotating wooden handle. 

Shelling corn for the chickens with the heel of your palm while walking in circles

with chickens scrambling in circles behind you.

 

The early wakeup call of all the roosters crowing nearby. A hen’s contented cluck

as she roves the yard seeking a seed or a fat worm. Her warning clucks as you

lift her with the back of your hand to gather her egg, making sure to leave the false

egg. Her jubilation after laying an egg. Chicks running under her spread wings.

Shelling corn by the backdoor then grabbing a pullet by the legs for supper.

 

Knowing what a pullet, shoat, and heifer are. Calling the hogs and cows to be

fed and put up for the night. The earthy sweaty smell of hogs and their grunts

and squeals as they snuffle up their food from the trough. The ammonia odor

when cleaning the henhouse.

 

Drinking warm milk fresh from the bucket after milking the cow. The acrid taste

of milk from cows which have eaten bitterweed.

 

A mule’s silky soft muzzle. A horse’s soft nickering. The way a horse twitches

the skin on its withers. The clop clop sound of a horse pulling a wagon.

 

The sweet juicy taste of a tomato or heart of watermelon fresh from the garden.

Washing the porch of the juice and seeds with a broom and water to reduce the

fly population. The dying buzz of flies after they eat the pink poison crystals.

 

The unforgettable aroma of hot fried tenderloin for breakfast from a hog killed

and cleaned that cold clear morning. Hot biscuits and redeye gravy.

 

The pleasant aches in one knees and back from picking peas and butterbeans.

The soreness and purple stain of your thumb from shelling those peas and beans.

 

Drinking cool water from a ladle out of a bucket hanging on the porch drawn from

your well. Trying to not put your lips where poppa and mammaw had been drinking, since they dip snuff.

 

The pleasing rasp of metal on metal while sharpening your hoe and the glint of the newly exposed metal.  The clean cut of a cockleburr plant with a sharp hoe.

 

The smoky smell and cracking of a fireplace and the heat on the back of your pants. The exciting anticipation when the fireplace is “tromping snow” when  outside temperature and barometric pressure is just right.

 

Our granddarlings may indeed never know these memories we cherish, but I know

they are building memories of their own to share with their children and grandchildren.

 

Ain’t God good!

Carl Wayne, Master Gardener

mymaters@yahoo.com

 

An OLD column/musing:

 

More Blessed To Give Than Receive        Aug 13, 2007

 

“It is more blessed to give than receive.”

~The Holy Bible

 

Many people were so good to our family when I was growing up with Momma and four more children in a shotgun house after Daddy died. Relatives shared government commodities. Friends sometimes gave us a ride to church. We shared hand-me-downs.

Ethel Huey bought me clothes when she bought for her son. I will forever appreciate those kindnesses.

 

It has been my joy to be blessed this year along with several other volunteers. We have grown a garden and given most of the the produce to the local Food Pantry, some to the Page-Robbins Adult Day Care Center, and small quantities to needy neighbors, the rehab center, and to a firehouse.

 

As of Aug 13, we have grown and donated 1,723 pounds of first class produce: corn, potatoes, sweetpeas, onions, cabbages, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, beets, squash, zucchini, peppers, eggplants, peas, beans, tomatoes, okra, and watermelons. Lord willing, we will continue to grow and donate from our fall garden.

 

We have given our first fruits and taken only a few small samples ourselves to test the quality. We have donated large beautiful red, pink, and mahogany tomatoes we could just

taste, but had promised to charity.

 

A lady at the Food Pantry told us about a client who was given one of our watermelons. He broke it open right there,  sat down, and ate half of it. That’s what keeps us going!

 

Herbie Krisle of Page-Robbins says:

“..Though none of our clients are physically hungry, they are hungry to be productive and active. And that is where this fresh produce has come in. We have enjoyed shucking corn, and cutting it off with plastic knives; shelling peas and snapping beans; making homemade salsa. All while talking and reminiscing about  days gone by…” This, too, keeps us going.

 

Several good souls contributed money and services this year, and deserve as much credit as those who worked in the dirt.

 

We can always use more volunteers and donations for seeds, settings, fertilizer, and the water bill. Make checks out to the Food Pantry. Or bring us newspapers, grass clippings,

tomato cages, stakes, and pea vine poles.

 

Many hands make small work. We use sustainable gardening practices to reduce need for water, tilling, weeding, and insecticides. While we have had twenty volunteers, there were from three to seven most weeks. We would love to grow even more next year if we have enough volunteers and supplies.

 

Ain’t God good!

Carl Wayne

mailto:mymaters@yahoo.com

 

Editorial opinion:

 

A friend asked me this question that made me ponder:

 

What happens when a large percentage of Americans max out they credit cards and have to reduce they spending? Will that be worse than the subprime mortgage problem?

 

I don’t know the answer.

 

Anyone have an opinion?

Latest web gleanings clickable links:

 

Humor:

 

Annoying car:

http://www.freshplaza.com/news_detail.asp?id=21203

 

Top 10 “Yo momma is so…” lines from Reader’s Digest:

http://www.rd.com/yo-momma/article39993.html?trkid=LAUGH1015

 

 

 

Gardening & Eating:

 

 

Nothing this week.

 

 

 

Science and Technology:

 

Maybe biochar (charcoal) in the soil has negative sequestration effect:

http://www.physorg.com/news128925813.html

 

Almost free government health insurance plan (pig in a poke):

http://www.physorg.com/news128926184.html

 

 

Conservative News:

 

Senator Obama’s S.2433 Bill to tax US citizens for overseas aid $845billion:

http://www.americandaily.com/article/22065

http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=184728&src=

 

Chuck Norris on Oprah’s New Religion:

http://www.townhall.com/Columnists/ChuckNorris/2008/03/04/oprahs_new_easter

 

New book: The Energy Non Crisis:

http://www.reformation.org/energy-non-crisis.html   (links to all chapters)

Chapter 1:

http://www.reformation.org/energy-non-crisis-ch1.html

 

John McCain: where he came from and who he is in his own words:

http://www.standardnewswire.com/news/697512490.html

 

 

Miscellaneous:

 

Amazing strings band video:

http://www.bowfire.com/

 

Jay Jay’s (next door neighbor) new puppy:

http://www.dogbreedinfo.com/mountainfeist.htm

 

Corey roller hockey pix; he got 5 of our 9; we won 9-7:

He’s no 5 white helmet  Pic 4, 20-25 turn shoot,  30-38 steal, 47-48 defense.

http://picasaweb.google.com/aaroncichocki/HurricanesVsLightningPlayoffs1?authkey=a8Yp1NfiAM4 

 

I see I am on public record in PA for having contributed to my company’s PAC:

http://www.campaignfinance.state.pa.us/CFReport.aspx?CFReportID=58057&Section=IB&StartRow=4001&RowsPerPage=1000

 

—the end—