I don't want to sound unkind but how hard did you look for it? I did a quick search & found a source of seeds for this variety on my first try. You can buy all sorts of diff tomato varieties at Tanager's Song Heirloom Seeds. I figured heirloom seed company would be the most likely place to have them but I didn't even specify heirloom seeds when I did the search. Scroll down the page & you'll find the seeds available at this site: http://www.tanagersongfarm.com/heirloom_seeds/tomato-paste.html I don't know where in the US you live but Emery's Garden at 2829 164th St SW, Lynnwood, WA (phone: 425 743-4555) carries the plants. A phone call would check to see if they'll have them next year too. Cook's Farm and Greenhouse, 1645 West 1600 N, Orem, UT (phone: 801 225-8271) also carries the plants. This variety is also sold in the UK but I figure a US source would probably be better for you. Hope you enjoy them. If I'm right, they're not a hybrid so you should be able to save seeds for other years & maybe even share them around so more can enjoy them!

Thanks, Mike, not only for the kind welcome but also for the generous post which accompanied it. You've given me quite a bit of information about the Allen-Browns, their books and livelihood, all of which was new to me. My copy of their The Violet Book is dated 1913. I obtained it years ago when some items from the library of the late Henry Mitchell were sold at a local event. The book thus has a double value to me. Although I became aware of the existence of something called sweet violet at an early age, I was in fact nearly thirty years old when I first held one in my fingers and inhaled for the first time the scent which has kept me faithful since. And speaking of that scent, is it only the flowers which are scented? A few weeks ago I visited a garden where sweet violets grew in abundance. The night before temperatures had dropped into the low 20s F. As I approached the house, I detected the scent of violets. It was definitely there. But search as I might, I could not find even one flower. There were so many violet plants that perhaps there was a flower there which I missed. But the experience got me wondering if non-blooming plants emit the violet scent. There are times when I am working in my garden and I catch a whiff of the violet scent. Yet when I inspect the plants, I don't always find a flower. Here again I can't be sure I have inspected every plant - they do have a way of getting around on their own and popping up in unexpected places! Has anyone else ever detected the sweet violet scent around plants not in bloom?

Thanks Jim!!!! I'm still really excited about it working!!! I have some news about my eyes. I went to the retinal specialist. They put 3 different types of drops in my eyes. I had to pry my eyes open so they could keep going with the drops. Blech. So he said that I have retinal deterioration. Do I have RP (retinitis pigmentosa - where you get tunnel vision and go blind). He said maybe. I asked if there's a chance I could go blind. He said that it isn't a matter of when, but that I'm probably legally blind ALREADY!!! So he's sending me (in a few months probably) for this procedure that's like an EKG for the eyes. If it shows that I'm legally blind, then I won't be able to drive anymore. This would be terrible, because I have trouble walking around where I live because of all of the inclines/declines - it's hard on my ankles, and I just got over having ankle tendinitis (a whole year of it). I love driving to the off-leash areas to take my dogs for a walk. It's so much fun. Anyways, the good news is that he said my vision will get gradually worse - but very slowly. So if I'm not legally blind yet, then I can probably drive for a few more years. Now, I'm asking for prayers that: a) I'm not legally blind b) that I can handle being legally blind if I am. Thanks everyone!! Carol

Marti, looking at your shower floor problem, when you put in a one-piece shower receptor floor you don't waterproof below it because there is no water getting under the shower floor. With the system I used, and with Swanstone and other solid surface wall systems, you don't even have to waterproof behind the walls. Things interlock at the bottom so that the wall is inside the lip of the shower, and the walls either interlock above or butt so that they have no water infiltration possible or they have a single caulk joint. (Often a cove molding covers the butt and then the cove is caulked, too.) So, if you use a receptor floor and solid sheet walls, no waterproofing is done. Second, the way you set a solid pan is into a bed of wet compound of some sort. Our pan said to use tile mortar. A contractor I saw years ago on Garden Web said, "We always go one step further and set our prefab pans in structolite, which not only provides added resistance to flexing, but also gives you the feel of stepping on a solid surface." MTI says of its roll-in shower floor, "Shower base is designed to be recessed into the floor to create a flat transfer surface. Add bedding compound to fully support bottom of shower base. MTI's optional Pre-Leveled Foam Base requires no additional bedding compound or support." So, there are ways of making a solid surface or even a fiberglass shower pan very sturdy and inflexible, and these are the right ways to install them. As for the foam base, Jim did our tiled bathroom floor as a sloped shower floor using a Kerdi shower floor product that was a kit of foam pieces that you put into place using tile adhesive, then covered with Kerdi membrane, then tiled over. So, my room floor is a shower, too. That is in case the shower over-flows. So foam can be made strong enough to be under the floor of a shower. The MTI company is out of Georgia, I believe, and is worker-owned. They seem pretty innovative. I have a PDF of a shower pan that they make to be sunken into the floor like you had planned, but not so deep. But like mine, it has the entire long edge open and will not accommodate your wall closing off half or more of the front side. These pans are made more for roll-in showers. The pan I am looking at is MTI's MTSB 6036BF. I don't know if it is still made, or if it is an old product. I have the PDF sheet for it that I saved some time ago. My shower pan is from Transolid and is 37.5 x 63. Transolid also makes a 36 x 60 pan with a center drain. http://transolid.com/transolid-F6036-01 Transolid 36 x 60 It also has the entire front open, though, no wall lip. One advantage that it does have for you is that it is 3" deep, so if you put leveling compound into your poured area - or if you centered the drain on this pan onto your drain, then scribed off where your pan ends, you could pour the half inch bottom and the approximately six inches of concrete you need on each side to make a recessed spot for this pan in your shower space. You still would have to have a glass shower wall and door though. Their new construction solid surface walls are pretty cool. Made with an aluminum mesh backing, they go up onto the studs, do not require drywall like a Swanstone sheet or a plain Transolid sheet requires. And they sell a dome kit with LED lights that finishes off the top nicely. Trouble is, this shower type is only 32" deep. To get the 36 x 60, you have to have the drywall. Here is the basic shower. Transolid 36 x 60 Shower This time, I linked you to the place that sells it. There you can see the prices. The white is least expensive. Carrara and Silver Mocha are most expensive. They have a wall extension for taking this model higher on the wall to the ceiling. Wall Extension, but you have to remind them it is for the ceiling and that you need corner trim at the top. If you have questions about how to use the base, call Transolid, at the first link. Again, since there is a straight front that looks meant for a curtain or glass, I doubt you can put a wall there. You can call and ask if that is do-able, though. Have you talked to Grifform.com? They make custom shower pans. Cost a pretty penny. But, when you add up the cost for redoing the shower size to accommodate a pan that won't fit it, it could be worth it. And a custom pan may be the only way you are going to get the 6 ft length that you want. They should be able to accommodate the off-center drain too. They are in far eastern Oregon, so maybe the shipping to you would not cost as much as it did for me. I think it was like $500. Custom pans can be "flimsier" than ones they already have a mold for, because the ribs and such are set and they are just changing some minor things on the semi-custom ones. That is what I was told somewhere. You might want to ask about that. Setting it into wet mortar might make that moot, anyways. I did not look at the MTI site or at Duravit to see if they make 6 ft long pans. You may want to do that. Their pans are only an inch or two high, if I recall correctly, so I did not think it was worth checking. I could be wrong though! There are the Kohler enameled cast iron shower pans to consider, too. Bellweather is one. They are all no more than 60 inches long, I believe. They all may have drains on the end, made to fit where a bathtub was removed. I hope that you find something here helpful!