Carl Wayne’s Weekly Columns and Newsletter   July 18, 2008

 

 

 

 

 

 

This week:

 

You may have noticed I took the week off last week. We and the kids and the granddarlings enjoyed staying in Phoenix V condos in Orange Beach AL, and eating all the boiled peanuts and friend seafood we wanted. It was hot! The jellyfish were bad. But we had a wonderful time together. Ginger stayed with Nana. Domino stayed at Four Paws Pet Spa with Monica, And Belle had three visits oer day by a loving dog sitter. All did well.

 

Trivia question:

Name the 6 kings of Memphis.

One is symbolic; the others are real people living or dead.

 

I’ m getting some medium size tomatoes and eggplants from my backyard containers. Mimi fixed Monday night supper fried eggplants, a cucumber-onion-tomato-oil-vinegar salad, boiled new potatoes, niblet corn, and oven BBQ’ed chicken, with my favorite dessert: frozen fruit salad with cherries, nuts, etc. YUM YUM!!!!!

 

We picked and delivered to the local Food Pantry from the Collierville Victory Garden this week 126.4 lbs  for a year-to-date total of 572.1 lbs.

 

Pix of this week’s harvest (I snuck in a few pix of my yard):

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=5jpx39n.8yolrfmb&x=0&h=1&y=-32ftx7&localeid=en_US

 

I have joined the rest of the family on www.facebook.com Carl Wayne Hardeman.

 

 

 

Column / Short Story:

 

Pocket Knives                                                 June 6, 2008

 

“A mind all logic is like a knife all blade. It makes the hand bleed that uses it.”

~Rabindrath Tagore

 

Thursday mornings we harvest from the Victory Garden for the local Food Pantry. So far this year we have harvested and donated 124+ pounds of fresh, nutritious produce to those who would otherwise only get boxes and bags and cans of food.

 

We have harvested this year cabbages, broccoli, bell peppers, and squash. Some lop eared lagomorphs (Flopsy, Mopsy, Cottontail, and Peter) “done et” all one hundred cauliflower plants and most of the broccoli plants. I’m not sure what to do except put up an expensive fence, since guns are not allowed to be used in town, and dogs must be on leashes.

 

Last year Mimi gave me the best knife I have ever had. It’s a Bear brand with blades of Damascus steel. Damascus steel is a several thousand year old process which creates a very high quality blade. Multiple plies of varying hardness are hammered together. The resultant blade combines the best of both hard and soft metals making it strong, flexible, and holds an edge.

 

It has a distinctive water pattern, water being Damascus in Arabic. Did I mention it’s not cheap? Nice present, ladies, for your favorite man.

 

This morning while relieving a stalk of broccoli of its delicious head, I demonstrated yet again some people don’t need to let near a sharp knife. Oh well. My finger stopped bleeding after being wrapped tightly with several Bandaids. It should be fine in a few weeks.

 

I have enjoyed listening to many a knife swappings my daddy-in-law, Ralph Graham, participated in. Seems to have been a fun pastime, and some people, including him, were real good at it.

 

If I got it right, both of the swapping parties will boast of having gotten the better deal and will have pulled one over on the other party. It took me a while to figure out what “giving boot” meant and what key words were used to indicate you were going to swap and were just arguing the details. There’s an art to all that.

 

I suppose that art form will fade away and probably has. Even so, I wouldn’t swap my Damascus steel blade Bear knife, though I may need to get a cheaper, duller one to harvest the garden.

 

Aint God good!

Carl Wayne Hardeman, Master Gardener, mymaters@yahoo.com

 

 

An OLD column/newsletter:

 

Picking Tomatoes                    July 11, 2007

 

“Of the seven deadly sins, surely it is pride that most  commonly afflicts the gardener.”

~ Michael Pollan

 

It’s showdown time in the Great Mater Race with Ralph Graham, my daddy-in-law in Pontotoc County MS. I had the earliest mater started indoors. He had the earliest one grown outside. He’s winning the most maters contest. I am winning the biggest mater contest.

 

Most of the early blossom end rot maters are gone by mid

July. It’s OK to cut off the leathery bottom and eat them.

 

In hot dry weather you will have some leaves turn brown and some leaf curl. If you don’t see any insect damage or black spots, the vines are probably just adjusting to available moisture and leaf area to total root area.

 

You can find basic tomato gardening information online:

http://plantanswers.tamu.edu/vegetables/tomato.html

 

My two Mortgage Lifter vines only have two or three maters  each, but they are huge. I picked the largest. It’s almost two pounds and half as big again as a slice of bologna.

 

It’s an heirloom variety developed by Radiator Charlie in the 1940’s. He sold 6,000 plants in six years at a dollar each and paid off his mortgage.

 

I picked one when it began to turn pink to beat the birds to it. It’s uglier than homemade soap, and I don’t know

how it will taste, since it’s not fully ripe.

 

I’m getting tasty maters from my heirloom varieties:

Arkansas Traveler, Abe Lincoln, Brandywine,

Cherokee Purple, Homestead, and Good Old Fashion Red.

 

The best way to avoid birds getting to maters is to pick them when they have begun to ripen. Another reason to pick early is to avoid uneven ripening caused by excessive heat.  That’s when they look ripe but have hard yellow insides.

 

Maters will ripen just fine on the kitchen counter or even

better in a paper sack. I have used bird netting but find  this method just as effective. I don’t begrudge the birds an occasional mater. I cut off the pecked spot and eat

the rest when Mimi isn’t looking.

 

 

 

Someone came up with the idea of frustrating birds with red Christmas tree balls on the vines, but I don’t want my granddarlings excited too early either. Tinfoil pie pans, scarecrows, and computer CD’s will scare them, too.

 

Ralph may have the best way of keeping birds away. He sits on the porch with Little Bit, his feist terrier, Tom, Opal’s cat, and his trusty 22 caliber rifle. At least one of those will do the trick.

 

My fennel and parsley were covered in tiny swallowtail

butterfly caterpillars earlier this week. They were cuter

than a basket of new puppies. But they were all gone this

morning. So much for trying to raise caterpillars and feeding the birds in the same backyard.

 

Ain’t God good!

Carl Wayne, Master Gardener

mymaters@yahoo.com

 

 

Web Gleanings:

 

Quotes:

 

Carl: Someday your watch or cell phone will be a platform and not just an application.

 

Carl:  World’s top destroyer of the environment. It is not the car, or the plane; it is the cow:

http://www.ccchina.gov.cn/en/NewsInfo.asp?NewsId=6564

 

Carl: next big energy savings thang will be geothermal sinks:

          http://www.igshpa.okstate.edu/geothermal/residential.htm

          http://www.heatfromtheearth.com/

 

and tankless water heaters:

          http://www.gotankless.com/

 

          and insulated sheets for rooftops and walls:

          http://www.mascoat.com/weatherbloc.php

          http://www.roofingcontractor.com/CDA/Articles/Cool_Roof/47887df78b7ad010VgnVCM100000f932a8c0____

 

          water runoff prevention (1 inch rain = 17.38 million gallons per square mile):

          http://ga.water.usgs.gov/edu/earthrain.html

           My yard = 100 X 165 = 16,500 square feet = just over 1/4^th acre.

          One inch rainfall over one acre = 27,143 / 4 = 6,785 gallons on my yard.

         

 

 

Humor:

 

Lady and the wasp:

http://www.freshplaza.com/news_detail.asp?id=25021

 

Campaign spoof:

http://blogs.usatoday.com/onpolitics/2008/07/jibjabs-time-fo.html

 

 

 

 

Science & Ecology & Medicine:

 

Germany to build 30 offshore wind farms:

http://www.physorg.com/news134557678.html

 

Ferrari to slash cars’ carbon emmisions:

http://www.physorg.com/news134531759.html

 

 

 

 

Biofuels have caused world food prices to increase by 75 percent:

http://us.mg1.mail.yahoo.com/dc/launch?.rand=cs4fo30057j8p

 

Exploding asteroid over Canada may have caused end of the last Ice Age:

http://www.physorg.com/news134233301.html

 

Improved treatment for children with ADHD:

http://www.physorg.com/news134617797.html

 

MLG&W meter intelligence:

http://www.mlgw.com/SubView.php?key=comm_meterintelligence

 

New Smart Pen records audio and writing:

http://www.livescribe.com/press/releases/release_070530.html

 

 

Conservative News:

 

All the oil we need for 200 years:

http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/gull_island_oil.html

 

Short video about John McCain:

http://www.johnmccain.com/videolanding/love.htm

 

 

 

 

 

Apparently winning in Iraq isn’t news:

http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=300324023809577

 

George W’s War:

http://washingtoncountyrepublicanparty.blogspot.com/2008/07/george-ws-war.html

 

T. Boone Pickens much need energy plan:

http://www.pickensplan.com/

 

What I Am ad in Washington Post, by a Republican:

http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/whatiam.asp

 

Obama to put Hillary on the Supreme Court???:

http://bsimmons.wordpress.com/2008/06/11/jerry-molen-on-obama-pass-it-along/

 

 

 

Gardening & Eating:

 

Yes its real lettuce on that McDonald’s billboard sign:

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/06/lettuce-billboard.php

 

 

 

Miscellaneous:

 

IRS Taxpayer Advocacy Office:

http://www.irs.gov/advocate/index.html

 

40 Ways to Live a Better Life:

http://www.ehow.com/how_2279765_live-better-life.html

 

Free Online office apps: Google Docs vs. ThinkFree vs Zoho: http://cwflyris.computerworld.com/t/3358002/216481/126148/2/

…the end…