"...to turn the garden shed back into a garage..." LOL, Molly, that is how I view my garage too. In the dozen years we've lived here, we have never parked our cars in the garage. We don't have automatic openers, so if you had to park the car, get out and unlock the garage door, open it, get back in the car, re-start it, and drive it in.... well, then, it was just easier to leave the car parked in front of the garage. And since we never parked in there, well, things inside just kind of took over the space. I tell everyone I'm the only person I know who has such a big potting shed - two storeys, no less, lol! Sooey, I've thought of you often as the annual oh-my-goodness-I-just-HAVE-to-clean-out-the-garage panic sets in. I've been trying to get some inspiration from you, but only seem to conjure up sighing envy, lol. And yesterday, when I hauled open one of the garage doors, a pile of cocoa hull mulch just spilled out on my feet, lol. Seems the squirrels found one of the bags I had tossed just inside, and made a nice hole in it. I guess the garage door was the only thing holding the mulch up and when I opened it... Couldn't even close the door all the way, lol. I know what I'm doing this morning.... :) Dee

I just put my house on the market this week and if I only had 5 showings in almost 4 weeks I am pretty sure I would reduce the price particularly if there was nothing else negative about the house. The last house I sold (in a good, but not bubble market, 4 years ago) we probably had 20 showings before we received a very good offer. But we steadily had a lot of showings and good feedback. I disagree that a reduction from $625 to $600k wouldn't have an impact. I know that when I've looked at houses I pick a number that I won't look higher than. In fact when we bought the house we are selling I would have looked at a house listed at $600k but not one listed at $625. I think a price reduction has more impact than a higher commission. For the past 2 houses we bought, we found them ourselves on the MLS listings and had our agent show them to us. A higher commission would have been a total waste as we were driving the bus on what houses we wanted to see, not the agent. Most people I know are the same....they now do their own looking instead of just relying on the realtor.

Actually the term "open burner" typically refers to the space that is left around the burners on older (and current commercial) stoves that leads to a drip tray underneath. Prior to the emergence of sealed burner cooktops, open burner stoves ruled the market. In terms of performance, they were actually superior to the current sealed burner due to better oxygenation of the burner. While burning, they were supported by an oxygen updraft from underneath the cooktop. Nowadays the burner is sealed off and once the flame has consumed all oxygen under your pan the flame reaches out to the sides of your cooking vessel to find its oxygen to burn, thereby reducing its effectiveness at heating. This is why the sole use of BTU ratings to determine performance can be misleading when it comes to cooking. How much heat a burner generates and how much of that heat actually ends up transferring to your pan, well... those are two different things.

I've been watering every 10 days, and it seems to have been ok. I didn't think a few more days without watering would cause disparate results! The cold, dry air sounds like it may have been the culprit. My apartment has a draft and it seems to have cooled down in temps in my area last week. My Meyer lemon was next to this satsuma...and it has gone to citrus heaven. All my other citrus in a different part of the apartment were ok. I have a heating mat underneath because it tends to get cold in my apartment. I used to have some Bears limes that did very well after I put a heating mat underneath. After reading these comments, I moved the satsuma with my other citrus. Hope that may help! thanks!