15" x 12" clump and the leaves are 4" wide. Well, if that was right, then it would only be 3 leaves across ==>>> somehow..we arent communicating.. so my default is how we are using words ... clump width.. has NOTHING to do with leaf size ... its the width of the celery stalks at the ground ... 3 leaves.. would be about an inch an a half at most ... so then picture.. a foot wide clump of petioles ... with the canopy up above .... you cant use width of leaf.. to gauge width of clump??? height is theoretically.. genetic.... even if the plant is 2 miles wide.. height should be consistent... subject to extreme hyper-fertilization ... aka the van wade system ... if you look at the library pix.. to MY EYE... they all look consistently the same height ... and as no one seemed to throw in a scale.. who knows what that is .... but it doesnt look a foot and a half.. 18 ... nor 8 .... width of the CLUMP ... is an age thing... in theory.. the crown can continue to expand forever .... the only thing stopping it.. is fairy ring.. and the growers ability to maintain such ... ===>>> OK.. i have re-read this 3 times.. i am not even sure.. i am communicating with myself.. lol ... maybe others can 'see' where i am trying to go.... and clarify this ... like good butter... nummmmm.. butter and sauteed hosta petiole.... and maybe a clove of garlic ... of course.. my boot would probably taste favorable.. done up this way.. but apparently i digress.... WAD .. lol .... ken ps: is there bad butter .... and why hasnt anyone come up with a butter and bacon recipe ....???

Game bird, This is the first year any of us have tried Candy Apple Red since it is the first year Dixondale has offered them, so I am curious to see how they do. Mine are about the same size as yours, but I haven't harvested yet, so they might get a bit larger. Of course, nothing in my garden is a good indicator this year because the 12" of rain that fell in one day at the end of April absolutely halted all apparent growth for 4 weeks or longer, so my entire garden is stunted compared to last year. Still, as long they they taste good, that's what matters. I intend to try them again next year and will hope for a more typical spring growing season so I'll know how they perform under "average" conditions. When Ruth Stout was trying to interest people in mulch gardening, she was sort of out there on her own. I sort of thought of her as "a lone voice crying in the wilderness". Now, of course, she looks positively phophetic During her time, the gardening fad was all the chemicals developed after WWII---chemical pesticides, chemical fertilizers, etc. She persevered and stuck to her guns about soil improvement and mulching, and she was right. I think Jay must have fantastic soil too, plus he works very, very hard. I cannot imagine trying to grow everything he grows in his semi-desert conditions. We are in our 11th year here and the areas that I've been improving and mulching for that time frame do not even look like the soil I started with, and that is despite repeated droughts that have baked the ground to a concrete-hard consistency over and over and over again. Except for the first 2 or 3 years when I amended heavily, all I've done is mulch, mulch, mulch. The difference in the soil is amazing. The formerly red clay that was so hard and sticky that you couldn't even break it up with a fork or mattock is now a milk chocolate brown colored sandy loam and has improved beyond my wildest dreams. Even in the pathways where I routinely mulch, the soil is so different from what we started with. Nowadays, I only improve soil by adding amendments the first year that I break up new ground. After that, it is all just stuff that's layered on top of the ground as mulch and time, Mother Nature and the earthworms do the rest. When we moved here, we had a tremendous issue with Cotton Root Rot, a soil-borne disease that affects thousands of different plants and folks who live here told me I'd never be able to overcome it and grow what I wanted to grow. After the first three years of soil amending, though, the CRR has never reared its ugly head again and I plant what I want in that soil, including many plants that you "cannot" grow if you have CRR. So, I think well-amended and well-enriched soil can overcome almost anything. Like you with the wood chips, I find that no matter how much mulch I put out, pile up and spread around, it is never enough and I always want more. We have to remember that "heat eats compost" and here in OK, it gobbles it up and breaks it down almost more quickly than we can add it. So, mulching is just a great way to keep replenishing what is being used up, and it keeps the soil so much cooler underneath the mulch which helps the plants too. Wheelbarrow time will build muscles and help give you a tan! Of course, the front end loaded was a mulch more efficient way to do it. Jay, I can relate! When the drought of 2005-2006 finally broke and we had a simply luscious summertime late afternoon thunderstorm, Tim and I sat out on the covered patio for 2 or 3 hours and watching it rain and listened to the thunder and watching the lightning. We also watched the frogs come out of "hiding" and play all over the yard and in the puddles. Later on, we spoke to several different neighbors and discovered they all were doing pretty much the same thing....watching the rain and the frogs. We all joked that it doesn't take much to entertain us here in Love County, but I'm telling you, we were so starved for rain at that point that nothing was more important than seeing that rain fall. I hope you get to enjoy every minute of the rain and hope it is falling at your mom's place too. I'm looking forward to hearing about your onion results. Except for being too dry, you've probably had the most "typical" or "average" weather of all of us. I don't know what the rain has done to everyone else's onions, but it almost killed mine. I was just looking at the garden earlier this week and marveling at how good it looks, considering that I thought the flooding rains might kill everything in it. I hope you're out playing or working in the rain, or at least spent some time sitting on the porch with a cup of coffee enjoying that strange phenomenon of liquid falling from the sky! Dawn

zenfoodist - I hear you...I was a mess about my stove, but honestly I think you are looking at well loved products and short of any really ugly feedback about repairs or service on the stoves, I think you will be in good shape (that is without knowing what your priorities are :) I had decided upfront that I didn't want to spend $5 K on my stove (I have a pretty bad tile and stone addiction that I had to feed and it would really be overkill where I live :) and had read about the stoves that were not as standard issue (electronic controls on the back), but were better priced than the Wolf and Viking. I checked out the American Range, the Capitol and the Bluestar, all in one (long) night. After all that research and obsessing I realized they were all good products with their pros and cons and picked the one I thought I would be the most comfortable with. I wanted something simple that I could just turn on and get flame (but also a convection oven :) I got the 30" RCS - I didn't want to pay the extra $ for the additional BTU for the Nova burner (all my past cooking experience had been on standard issue gas stoves so the RCS power burner blew that out of the water.) ebean is right - it is a 'box of fire' and I know people say that a good cook can use any stove, but I really do prefer cooking on this to my previous low end stoves. I cook, alot, and bake no complaints about the results. I am trying to adjust to the "woosh" - power I am not used to but getting there. Honestly as I try to remember the difference between the three products I can't other than the open versus sealed burners (but I think Capitol was coming out with an open burner.) I really have enjoyed the open burner. For me it is easier to keep clean - or maybe the cast iron looks fine when it is not perfect versus stainless. The best is it just doesn't give me a minute of thought - it just works. But that is only my experience and I have only been using it for 3 months. If you love the wolf or the la c (pretty french thing :) get it, but if you don't love them save yourself a few dollars and go with the blue star. Unless you live in a upscale neighborhood and people expect a wolf. I live in an area that is slowly gentrifying and nobody even knows what the blue star is (and I don't care :) Good luck.

I agree that all distracted drivers should be more careful, but I've seen way too many go through red lights, not look when they turn in front of me because they're on their cell phone. I've also seen people driving too slow, swerving, etc...while talking or fighting? with a passenger. Cell phones just annoy me, I guess. People bring them to work and spend half their time on their phones instead of doing their jobs. Lauren and I had to listen to some loud-mouthed woman on her cell phone last week in a doctor's office when Alex was in the back. I was trying to read a magazine but instead I got to listen to her "private" conversation. People blocking aisles at the grocery store and totally oblivious to what they're doing because they're so immersed in their private conversation on their cell phone. Once I was in a restroom stall and a woman next to me was talking on her phone. At first I thought she was talking to me! LOL! It's just getting ridiculous. People texting in movie theaters, the light is really annoying when you're trying to watch the movie. Why did you pay all that money to watch a movie and then turn around and play with your phone? I wish they would outlaw them while driving and maybe in restaurants and movie theaters too. I do have a cell phone but keep it in my car for emergencies only...or to call the kids occationally if I'm out somewhere. Never while I'm driving and I don't take it with me into stores or restaurants. I don't understand why people want to be available 24-7 like that. It would drive me crazy. Maybe I'm just getting old.