Or do I live with the reality of a so so yard, given that I'm not going to dump loads of chemicals on it? Certainly not. Organically maintained lawns don't look worse than synthetics, and frequently better. Part of the reason is that if you're organic, you're probably interested in the way your lawn looks and you work at it. Perfect...no. Very good, yes. I'm assuming it was a spring seeding, which is always weedy and never looks that great at first. For this summer, keep the weeds down with a Weed Hound, feed it well (young grass needs lots of nutrients), and hope for rain. Water as you can with your well. Seed it again in September, keep that damp, and you'll do a lot better than 10% junk by next spring--it should be closer to 0.5%. Feeding this year...I can't over-emphasize that (and next year if you fall seed). Four times might be a little trim, but I'll let the TTTF experts weigh in on that. I have KBG, which really wants 6 lbs of nitrogen per thousand square feet per year its first year. I think TTTF is considerably less.

We just got a top loader Maytag Bravo MVWX500 and so far I'm really loving it...but I've only done one load of wash in it so far. The MVWX500 is a High-Efficiency machine with a very large drum/capacity (4.3 cubic feet, no center agitator). About the "tangling" issue: I read the whole entire Maytag manual today and noticed that in the "Soil Level" section, it says "Lower soil level setting will help reduce tangling and wrinkling." Under the Spin Speed" section, the manual says "Faster spin speeds mean shorter drying times, but may increase wrinkling in your load." The manual also says, "When loading the washer with dirty laundry, fill it evenly around the basket wall," and "do not wrap large items such as sheets around the washplate; load them in loose piles around the sides of the basket. Try mixing different sized items to reduce tangling". There is also a little picture in the manual that shows how to load the dirty laundry into the washer. This evening I washed two huge (3 feet x 6 feet) towels and one smaller bath towel all in the same load, and everything was clean and fresh, and extremely well-spun. I had the washer set on: Load Type: Heavy Duty Soil Level: Extra Heavy Spin Speed: High It did spin the towels quite intensely. But with these huge towels we have, that's a good thing. With our old washer, sometimes I had to actually wring the towels out by hand because they were drippy when they came out of the washer (an old Kenmore). I also could only wash one of these huge towels at a time in our old washer, because the washer was just so small and wouldn't spin everything well enough with two towels in there. The Maytag Bravo seems extremely quiet to me so far, but I'm used to our old Kenmore (non-digital/with the old-style knobs) which was pretty loud. Went with a top loader because of the mold/mildew issues that I've read about with the front loaders. I think the thing with the front loaders is that you're supposed to leave the door open for at least an entire hour between every load of wash. Since I do multiple loads of wash on laundry day (I dry half of them on the outdoor clothesline) I don't really have the time to wait a whole hour in between each load! Also, I just was scared off by the word "mildew" or "mold" in the same sentence as the word "washing machine". I also read that the top loaders last longer with fewer repairs needed than the front loaders. However, front loader vs. top loader also depends on your lifestyle/laundry habits and how mobile the person doing the laundry is. I can imagine that if one is in a wheelchair that a front loader would be better, for instance. I'll report back once I do a normal type of load in the Maytag Bravo MVWX500 with garments with sleeves and things that can tangle...will set the washer on "Normal" and the Soil Level on "Medium" for that load. Will also try some delicates on the "Hand Wash" cycle and see how that goes. That's my two cents for now.

The older optics of both Canon and Nikon are excellent. What you need to look for is do these older lensses have features that will interface with the lens controls in the new camera. Can it auto-focus? Or will it be a 'manual only' lense? What about anti-shake? Automatic aperature setting? Face recognition and a host of other features found in Digital camera. Will the lens and speed settings appear in the view finder? The most important feature is does the focus field completely cover the sensor. The camera maufacture can guide you on this. They should supply a list of lenses that are comaptible with the new camera. What you could do is purchase the body only and use your existing lens. It may be a "manual only" for speed and arperature settings. However, that may be a good thing. One of the things that I miss in the lower cost class of digital cameras is easy manual control. There are many times when I wish to grab the lens barrel and control the focus and adjust the exposure too. There are many instances where complete automation misses the mark for me. Use the camera for awhile, and then decide on which lens to buy.

Oh, I'm so glad to hear that catlady!! Sure was wondering what had happened to you. Did you get to have that vacation too? Thanks very much for posting.