Thanks Chelone,most of my color is from my container plants. I will appreciate your peony pics. Out of 12 plants 7 had no blooms, 2 had only one each. I am sure it was because of the hard freeze after they were up. I made woven wire rings to set around my plants. They 'disappear' when the plant grows back up. My 'full sun' is becoming more and more scarce...:-( I really like the shade in our hot summers, and our place is several degrees cooler since the trees have grown, but I do miss having sunny spots for sun lovers. This morning I was awakened around 5, and detected the faint essence of skunk coming through my open bedroom window. So far there has been no damage to my potted plants, but this morning there was a tiny bit of digging in 2 pots. I think I'll get some cayenne pepper to sprinkle on the soil in susceptible containers. I sure do not want to have to 'cage' everything as I did last year after the damage. Wildlife certainly abounds in our woods. Nolon heard a turkey gobbler this morning, and reported it to me, but I didn't hear it when I went out. I'm sure at least one doe has a fawn in our woods, but we haven't seen it yet. The rabbits are multiplying rapidly, but the cats are keeping the population down to more managable levels. Lots of squirrels are both seen and heard. A rather crippled, very light gray, small opposum was on the deck drinking from the cat's water bucket the other night when I flipped on the light. It looked like it had had a broken back.... I am not too fond of them, but don't like to see such injuries. Raccoons of all sizes are common. Chipmunks are frequently seen. We may not have many human visiters, but plenty of four-legged ones. :-) And of course there are all the birds. A tuffed titmouse is voicing it's disapointment at the fact that the cat dish is not on the front porch. I keep bringing it back in as soon as Miss Calliecat leaves the porch ( it is her dish). I am getting tired of feeding all the birds cat food ! I put out mixed bird feed, sunflower seed, and cracked corn for them...besides the left over biscuits, but some of them prefer the cat food ! I am thinking of buying the really cheap cat or dog food just for them. Our phone rang around 10 last night. It was a rather distant 'neighbor' wondering if her 81 year old brother had come by our place. He had decided to go visiting,( he lives about 60 miles from here...the sister lives much closer).He took clothing and other necessities, and mentioned visiting Nolon. I imagine she had called everyone she could think of before calling us. I hope he has shown up, and is safe.He has several relatives in this area.

DavidAndKasie is correct. Heat pumps CAN be set back (turned down) effectively with a setback thermostat that has smart recovery. First, since you say that you don't understand much about how heat pumps work, let's cover that. A heat pump basically is the same as an ordinary airconditioner, with the addition of a reversing valve that changes its functioning to HEAT the indoors instead of cooling. Air conditioners don't so much MAKE cold as they MOVE heat from one place to another. In cooling mode, heat is moved from inside to outside. That's the hot air you feel blowing from the unit outside (the inside blows cool air). In heating mode, the unit picks up heat from outside and moves it IN (the outside unit blows COLD air, the inside WARM). There technically is heat in the air (or an object) down to scientific absolute zero (-459.67F) when molecular motion stops. It's cheaper from an electric energy expenditure point-of-view to MOVE heat than to CREATE heat. Thus heat pumps are cheaper to operate electrically than glowing-red heating elements. However, when the outdoor temperature drops, particularly to the point of ice/frosting, it's harder for the heat pump to pick up the heat and move it inside. So all heat pump system have an auxiliary heat source, typically standard electric heating elements, that activate as needed when it can't maintain the desired indoor temperature without help. This is called the "balance point" -- the point at which the heat pump can't move heat in fast enough from outside to counteract the heat loss that's occurring through doors, windows, walls, etc. Every system and house is different in that respect. The indoor temp drops below the setpoint (thermostat set on 70°F, room temp is 68°F for example), and a 2nd pair of contacts trigger in the thermostat which turns on the heating elements. Electronic thermostats may also do this based on time. If the system can't reach the setpoint (70°F) within a specific time period, or the thermostat senses that the indoor temperature isn't increasing or isn't increasing fast enough, the elements turn on. Of course, the heating elements pull a lot more electricity and aren't as efficient as the heat pump. So the trick after a setback (or having turned the system completely off) is to raise the temperature SLOWLY so the heating elements DON'T turn on. Electronic setback thermostats designed for heat pumps do this automatically. The computer figures out how soon to start the recovery process so it can raise the temp slowly and hit the target at the specified time without using the auxiliary elements (or minimizing use of them). It may take a few cycles for the computer to "learn" the characteristics of a particular system and get the timing right. You can also do it manually, but you have to PAY ATTENTION and not raise the temp too fast or too high at a time. This may take a couple hours at lower outdoor temps. Beware also that if the outdoor temp is well below the aforementioned "balance point" the system may NOT be able to recover the desired indoor temp at all without use of the auxiliary heating elements. Another aspect of heat pumps that you should know about is defrosting. As mentioned earlier, the outdoor unit in heating mode is basically cooling the outside. During some conditions, particularly wet/freezing weather, the coils can ice-up, like a food freezer that needs defrosting. Air can't blow through the coils when they're clogged with ice, so like a freezer they must be defrosted. The system does that by switching back to AIR CONDITIONING mode for a few mins so the outside coils get warm and melt the ice. Now remember that when running as an air conditioner, the system blows COLD air inside the house. During defrost, the auxiliary heating elements turn on, NOT for the purpose of melting the ice on the coils outside, but to warm up the cold air that would otherwise be blowing in the house. There's no way to prevent defrost from happening, the system does that automatically as needed. Some people say that if the outdoor temp is so low for an extended period that the system is running continuously, the outdoor unit is repeatedly icing over and defrosting, then it's best to set the thermostat to Emergency Heat, which shuts off the heat pump and runs ONLY the heating elements ... since they're being used a lot anyway during the frequent defrost cycles.

Tell us the make and model of the breakers. That may indicate that the panel was swapped after the house was initially built. The condition is dangerous for multiple reasons. When I have found this problem, it often was that two circuits went to a wall box and got tied together. In cases like this both circuits feeding that fixture(s) must be on the same pole of the service in order not to create a dead short circuit. Find and discontinue the interconnection.

I can't imagine someone saving up all their organic crud until they have the appropriate layer depth of each type of item. Take what you have, throw it in a pile. If you have a lot of energy, or it smells funny, turn the pile. Otherwise, don't. It will all rot no matter what! People make up all sorts of guidelines to make fast compost in the perfect ratio but seriously, in real life that makes no sense. Layer but turn often? Then what is the point of the layers? Just aim to have more browns than greens and you should be fine. If you are trying to smother, I wouldn't turn it over unless it smells creepy and needs more air.