We waste more than I like, but we do try hard not to. Any fruit or veggies we don't eat, I either feed to the chickens or feed to the compost pile, so something eats it. I didn't see the TV special you mentioned, but I read an article a while back about how many gallons of water it takes over a season in California to produce different kinds of fruits, veggies and nuts and it was astonishing. One thing that I've noticed is that we are more prone to waste purchased produce than to waste anything raised here at home into which we have invested our own blood, sweat and tears. Loretta, I don't water unless I have to, and even in drought I am stingy with watering. With two large garden plots and several smaller ones, watering is expensive even when done sparingly. Long ago, I let any ornamental plants that were water hogs just die. It was hard to let some of them go, but I wanted a landscape where watering would be minimal. So far this year, the only watering I've done in the garden was to hand water, with a watering can, to settle in the soil around new transplants. We've been very fortunate to have had plentiful rainfall every month since last June except for a brief period in part of August and part of September. Despite that, the Drought Monitor still has us classified as Abnormally Dry, which I guess shows that we are only wet on the surface and still dry down deeper. I suppose we'd be in the same type of drought and water restrictions y'all have if all that rain hadn't fallen since June. We've been in one stage of drought or another for so long that I think I have forgotten what it is like to get normal rainfall. When we get normal rainfall, I feel like we are flooded with water. When we get above-average rainfall, I worry the plants will drown and die, which is rare here, but it happened in 2007. I hope y'all get enough rainfall there this year to replenish the reservoirs and get your water restrictions eased. I doubt one year's rainfall would do it, but if it would rain consistently there all year at least you'd start seeing some improvement. At this time last year Lake Texoma was 8 or 9 ' below normal and now it is 100% full at the conservation pool level, so there's always hope.

What a lovely thread! I love and adore the birds in our yard. I never noticed the mockingbird " mocking " or singing at night but I'll listen for it. We have one in particular that is always been by my garage and twice this week gotten trapped in my SUV when I leave the trunk open to unload. I have many cardinals , a few blue jays and one downy woodpecker. Lots of mourning doves and to my delight a handful of eastern bluebirds as well . And in late summer sometimes I'm blessed to see a pair of quail . I have a cavalier spaniel who is very quick so the quail tend to move along :( lots of frogs / toads here too This middle bird: no idea what kind but one of them flew into our garage and got let into the house accidentally for 3 days! He stayed in our Christmas tree! It was hilarious. He was very hard to get out of the house Love the hawks and the herons when we catch them too . Birdwatching is a favorite hobby of mine !

The castigation can end over the wrong word choice. A quick word choice perhaps better replaced with something else. Let's call it an "annoying, unwanted nickname" that for whatever reason is disliked. Your name is Allison, you hate being called Ally, and your siblings do so when they want to annoy you. I think that's what's happened in this thread. I didn't make up the issue, it's there. I pointed out that it was odd for a local to use it. Those making a weak and childish effort to be annoying by insisting on finding multiple instances of use (that everyone knows about) are welcome to do so. It's not particularly clever but the word doesn't bother me. Call me Ally if you want. Like most people around here, I don't use "Frisco". If you want to, go ahead. What is annoying is people making an effort to be annoying.

Just have to chime in. started warching it after DD talked about it, then saw this thread, then it popped up on Netflix sceen. My view point, sappy, sappy, drama, drama and more drama, improbable soap opera plot lines. Reminds me of some Lifetime movie scenes. I’ll continue watching just to see what the fuss is all about!