"Yffterday I refeeved m'box frmmm Mliffa,...effclooff me...(chew-chew-slurp-swallow) - Ahem,...there, that's better. Forgive me,...I received Melissa's (mellovesgardening) box yesterday and as I'm sitting here typing this I've been sampling the totally tasty sugar free, Splenda-sweetened, variety flavored "Jelly Belly" jelly beans she included (plus *regular* sugared ones as well for Elly & Roy (told Roy they're "Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans" from the wizarding world of Harry Potter)) - So, shall I tell you, now, about the rest of Melissas's marvelous box conents?! Yes?!! Right, then,... Seriously, I'll tell you what, Melissa may be a newbie, but she certainly packs a great swap box!! Item #1) A neat little hollow ceramic guy,...green with blue sneakers. Muppet representation of a green thumb critter, perhaps? Anyway, he's kewl (there are even small white shoelaces hot-glued to the sneakers) and he was stuffed with sugar free Life Savers candies and a folded-up surprise packet of Rye Grass seeds (cleverly sneaky, that!). The Life Savers have since been removed to a zip-bag and now the Muppet green thumb is next to our computer, loaded with Q-Tips. Useful, yes, although arguably not nearly as much fun. Item #2) A wonderful tin of "Badger Balm - For Hardworking Hands" organic hand balm. Elly and I are both using this already,...mostly Elly. Nice stuff! It's made-up of Extra Virgin Olive Oil, Beeswax, Castor Oil, Aloe, and Birch & Wintergreen essential oils. Smells good, not greasy. Feels great! :) Items #3) Candy-candy-candy!! Woo hoo!! For me: Sugar free chocolate crispy caramels, sugar free Life Savers, sugar free Jelly Belly jelly beans. For Elly & Roy: Sugar sweetened Jelly Belly jelly beans, Laffy Taffy. Items #4) Seeds: Holy criminey! Tons! Rye Grass, Radish: German Giant / White Icicle / Early Scarlet Globe, Bean: Kentucky Wonder, Anise, Turnip: Purple Top White Globe, Brussel Sprouts: Catskill, Parsley: Moss Curled, Pea: Burpee Early, Eggplant: Egg Tree, Spinach: Bloomsdale, Printemps Lettuce, Cilantro, Tomato: Prudens Purple / Big Rainbow / Pepper: Sweet Banana / Poblano. - Basically an entire garden's worth! Thank you so much, Melissa and Bryan! - Oh, and on a weird, fun note, (LOL!!);...tonight we were at our favorite local mom-n-pop store and in my pocket I had a small zip-full of the green plastic Easter grass you packed your/my box with. I went into the back room and seriously asked our friend, Gloria, if she wanted some really good "grass" (aka marijuana), to which she shot back "No!" But then I persisted "This is the best stuff, though! (pulling it out of my pocket) I know it is, `cause I bought it off the Easter Bunny!" Then, of course, she cracked up, realizing she'd been had! LOL!! :D So, thanks for that fun, too!! :D What a great swap/mnf-interaction this has been!

Please, see the new thread for all wish lists posted as well as games and fun... link below... Blessings, Angela Here is a link that might be useful: Secret Santa Swap, thread 3

Mark, Last season I grew 28 varieties of black/purple tomatoes out of the 256 tomato plants I had in my gardens. Although this year, (which wasn't a very good year for tomatoes in my area), the Cherokee Purple was the best tasting tomato it didn't produce well at all. Black Brandywine produced well and tasted great throughout the season. Amazon Chocolate produced larger tomatoes that tasted just about as good but didn't produce as long. Black Seaman produced lots of tomatoes that tasted darn good also. Black Krim produced plenty of tasty tomatoes but had a lot of cracking this year, (lots of cooler temperatures. Paul Robeson tasted good didn't produce as well and was hard to germinate and start. once they got a couple inches of growth they did OK. Carbon was somewhat disappointing as they didn't produce well and taste was somewhat less than expected. Purple Brandywine produced well and tasted good, somewhat creamy texture reminescent of Kelloggs Breakfast. Black Star produced 4-5 nice sized, tasty tomatoes then quit producing. reason unknown, plant looked healthy, blossoms wouldn't set, possibly colder nights. Black prince produced multitudes of tasty tomatoes, somewhat smaller than I usually look for, most went to sauce. Cherokee chocolate, although supposed to be same as Cherokee purples tasted entirely different this year, not near as good as CP's. Pruden's purple, usually a tasty producer, tasted terrible this year, almost a fishy taste to them.??? Southern night was a decent sized tomato that tasted OK, just not outstanding. Aunt Ginny's purple was quite a disappointment. produced very nice sized tomatoes in abundance, but tasted very bland. Marizol Purple, tasty sweet tomatoes, descent production. Japanese Black Trifele, produced lots of blemish free tomatoes that looked real pretty but tasted very bland. Black from Tula, also produced plenty of tomatoes but they were much too sweet tasting to be enjoyable. Black produced tasty tomatoes of a descent size but not too many of them. Bordo had good production, tasted pretty good but their color was distracting, being somewhat olive green/brownish maroon. German Black tasted great, didn't produce well at all. Eva's purple ball was the oppositte, produced hundreds of smaller tomatoes, just had very bland taste. Black cherry, which produced well and had it's usual good taste had much thicker than normal skins which detracted from it's appeal. Purple prince produced well but taste could have been better. Frankstein Black had poor production and taste. Italian Purple had good size, great taste, terrible production. Purple perfect was anything but, poor production, bland taste. Although they looked nice. Nyagous, produced lots of nice looking small-sized tomatoes that had no taste whatsoever, the only tomato that was worse was Mr. Brown Mr. Brown was a small poor producing tomato that tasted terrible, actully tasted bad! So pretty much in order of preference, this past years blacks. Hope it's helpful, remember it wasn't a good year for most of my tomatoes. Check out my tomato-year in review at IDIGMYGARDEN.COM for full report. camo

I have had an 2 unsuccessful hip replacements and going for 2 more....just read below. I have been in pain since Oct 2007 when the 1st surgery was done. Here is my story: In Oct 2007 I had a full hip replacement the Dr that did the surgery positioned a stainless steel cable around the femur due to the leg being cracked either before surgery or during surgery (even though I told the Dr before surgery I was allergic to stainless steel). I continued to have alot of pain after surgery and the dr had no idea why so he referred me to a pain management clinic. The pain management clinic after several months referred me to a Dr who specializes in revisions of implants. He found the bone and the hip were not growing together at all spots but I explained about being allergic to stainless steel. The new ortho decided to take the stainless steel cable out to possibly solve the pain issue on March 5, 2009. This was a simple surgery w/ an approx 3 1/2" incision. On March 12 the hip started to swell. It swelled to the size of a softball at the hip. On March 16th I went into surgery for an I&D (incision and draining) for the swelling. The Dr said there was no infection just a clear fluid buildup. On approx April 6, 2009 the hip started to swell again and the Dr said go, stay off of it and keep ice on it. On April 14th I saw the Dr at his office because the swelling kept increasing and the pain was horrible too. He stated he would put me into surgery on April 15th and he would go back in and do an I&D this time all the way to the hip joint and if needed he would replace the cup that may possibly be loose and was not growing to the bone as stated above. The Dr said he would keep me for a few days this time so he could watch it and keep the IV antibiotics running longer.I lost alot of blood and he transfused me 2x (by Sat April 18, 2009 my blood level dropped to 23). This time the Dr said it was again a clear fluid that grew nothing on cultures and he replaced the ball and socket so no infection or anything could grow out of those areas. He released me on April 20, 2009. On April 21 the day after being released for the 3rd time from the hospital, my hip started to swell again. It swelled fast and very hard and even more painful than before. The Dr wanted me to sit with the swelling over the weekend of April 24, 25, 26th. By Fri the 24th I was vomiting as the pain was so bad and the swelling was the size of a small watermelon cut in 1/2. My ins co. and home health care workers said to go to Vanderbilt hosp instead of St Thomas where I had been treated cause my Dr did not want to see me. I went to Vanderbilt around 6pm Fri4/24/09. (This is another story on how Vanderbilt dumped me and sent me back to St Thomas). Vanderbilt was confident of the work my Dr was doing and would not treat me and said I should go back to my Dr at St Thomas Hospital. I was back at St Thomas hospital by 10am and admitted to a room by approx 3pm on Sat 4/25/09. It was determined a vein was bleeding out and my kumadin was stopped, Vencomycin was started again and pain meds were started. The bleeding was stopped by approx Mon 4/27/09. They continued to treat the pain, run the antibiotics etc. I was released again on Wed 4/27/09 after the pain meds had been adjusted in a fashion to possibly keep me from vomiting and allow me to function at home. Note: This is another issue as well** I was released and instructed by my case manager at the hospital that home health care would be at my house at 6pm on Wed 4/27/09 to run my iv antibiotics as per my discharge instructions that I am to have iv vencomycin 2x a day. Home health care never showed due to the hospital not giving them correct information and instructions. That as I stated is another story. before discharge the Dr stated he felt the clear fluid pockets that he had done the 2 I&D's on were from a staph infection that I have had since the hip was put in back in Oct 2007 and after the iv antibiotics and the Cipro antibiotics are stopped on June 1, 2009 there is a chance that the pockets of clear fluid may come back again since it a staph infection. He labeled my diagnosis to the home health care agency as MRSA. For my ins co he labeled it infection and inflammatory reaction. On Tues 5/19/09 I went back to the Dr because though some of the blood swelling had dissepated, the swelling started again like before. The Dr finally stated it was a staph infection and the only way to fix it would be to take the ENTIRE hip out that had been installed in 2007 and insert a spacer w/ antibiotics in it that would course thru the body for 3 mths. I will be able to drive when im ready but I will be on cruthches the whole time. He feels this should cure the infection. In 3 mths from now I have to go back to surgery and take the spacer out and insert a whole new hip again.He has taken me off the IV antibiotics for the next 2 weeks to hopefully get something to grow on the cultures but w/ it being a very slow growing staph infection it may never do that. I have been told by otho chief of staffs at other hospitals along w/ several other drs that if the antibiotics were stopped it left me w/ a 10% chance of surviving. I continue to pray and pay attention to how I feel because even a slight chance of sickness i will be on my way to the hospital. I am only 48 w/ a GREAT life and am not ready to die by any means. I feel that a staph infection was presented into my body in either Oct 2007 during the 1st hip replacement or in March 2009 when the stainless steel cable was removed. I really do feel for you and your situation as this will be my 5th hospital stay and 4 surgeries since March 2009 for this infection due to someone's negligence! When you have it replaced if you must again they must place a temporary hip that has antibiotics that will release into your body throughput several mths to rid you of this infection. To simply replace the hip is not enough. IV Antibiotics 1500mg 2x a day....cipro antibiotics 500mg 2x a day was not enough to fix this. But they will do that same course of treatment for 3 mths along with the insertion of a spacer/temporary hip loaded w/ antibiotics should do it. I can let you know how I do if you want to send me your email address. Talking w/ people and research into this is very important for you. Best Regards, Margaret