I have to say that I never met a plant I didn't like... Until recently I had only few indoor plants, but a lot of plants in the garden - too many! and lot of potted ones that would winter outside, too. Need to control myself not to get just about everything I can. Plants I would not grow inside are because of mite/aphids magnets, and sometimes the size they want to grow to and space available, not because I don't like them. I have 2 bouganvelias, and one gets covered with bugs minute I bring it in. Other one doesn't - it's a mystery to me. Need to do something with it-it's getting on my nerves to try to keep it bug free-no other plant I ever had was so 'buggy'-poor thing ends up in solitary and chopped up every year. Does well outdoors tho. I find it amazing that from just a tiny seed, something so amazing could grow. I planted a ginko outside that was about 1.5"tall 7yrs ago, now it's taller than 2 sty house. My mother used to grow some plants in the apartment we lived. She had amazing hoya, euphorbia milii, passion vine and a begonia that was a 'forest' to me - many stems, growing upright more than 5' tall, and blooming non-stop (few other plants too). These plants were not very easy to get where we lived, and she did grow them really well. She also experimented a lot: grew palms from seeds (we got dates once a year & she would save the seeds), coffe & citrus plants from the seeds, and similar. My father had aquariums, one was about 90gal, with colorful fish. Another with betas only! There were at least 4 tanks at any time. Thinking back, they did amazing with all this flora & fauna under not very favourable conditions... Rina This post was edited by rina_ on Thu, Dec 13, 12 at 21:49

Ok! So now the dirt and the sweat is washed off, and the garden is "where it would have been at the beginning of any other olde year!" Time for a break--and a few slow walks to admire the Fruit of Your Labors! There's not many things I delight in more than walking past the things I've finished---over and over and over---to just look at what I accomplished---and the longer it took and the harder it was to do, the more fun it is! This year I decided I was gonna de-clay my veggie garden! Ok! That's not entirely true, but I decided I was at least gonna try to get the potter's clay out of it! It took me 3-4 weeks, but I went out there day after day (whenever the weather was halfway decent) and dug up one shovel full at a time, down about 8-10", and then sat down and went thru it clump by clump with my hands, breaking it up into tiny pieces, and throwing anything that changed shape rather than "breaking up" into a big pot, and lugging it to the dumpster. Had to space the crummy stuff out in the dumpster every week, 'cause clay is HEAVY, and if the truck can't pick it up, they might get out and look to see what I had in there---and I don't think we're allowed to put "dirt" in the dumpster! So for several weeks I was dumping a bunch in, and testing the weight, and dumping more in, and testing the weight---and saving the left overs in other big pots for the next week. Shovel full by shovel full, and clump by clump, I got half of the garden done! That's an area about 3 1/2 by 14 1/2, so it's really only about 50 sq. ft., but, oh, my, what a job! When I started, I was gonna do the WHOLE veggie garden (minus the tomato/eggplant area), but, uh, that's not gonna happen this year! The cukes and carrots and beets and parsnips and squash are gonna have to bide their time for one more year in the BAD clay! That side's a little bit bigger, more like 65 sq. ft., and my hands and back are simply not gonna consent to doing that this year! BUT--oh boy, is it ever FUN to walk out there now--over and over and over--to look at the good (for MY garden) soil that's on the lettuce/spinach/pea side of the garden now! And all those things are planted now, tho it's been pretty chilly since I put them in about a week ago, so definitely no action yet! But, cold or not, I have something to stare at every day now! :-) It was HARD work--when I was doing it---but it's SO much fun NOW! Next year the other side!!! With all the massive gardens you plant--every year--I have trouble believing that you're "round the bend" at all! Yeah, the bod hurts in a couple new places every year (found out a couple weeks ago I have bursitis in my hip--I already knew it hurt, but now I have a NAME for it! Woohoo! And found out last week I have four seriously deteriorated discs in my cervical spine! Woohoo?), but the joy of going out there and looking at what I've accomplished somehow seems to make the pain go away---for a while at least! And if I didn't have the garden, I wouldn't have anything to "make the pain go away!" Definitely time for a break and a chocolate Easter egg! And that's from somebody who just finished a very large piece of Marie Callender Chocolate Silk pie! (Chocolate helps with "that pain" too! LOL) Tomorrow sounds like it's gonna be a wonderful day for a long walk to look at all you've gotten done, Skybird

Aw - too bad your folks did that. I remember coming to the dinner table in tears; I'd been reading Grapes of Wrath, I was 11, and it was just way too much for me. My dad took it from me and asked me to wait a bit before I went back for it. It helped calm me a bit and gave us a chance to talk. Then he let me finish it. I don't think they ever censored anything I read. I remember reading a book about Pompei, but I was older. Very unsettling, but even more so as an adult when I got to see the remains at the Naples Archaeology Museum, and of course seeing Pompei itself. Wow.

I didn't expect to be posting another DNF so soon. I'm having bad luck picking books. I barely started The Borrowed Life of Frederick Fife by Anna Johnston. I had barely started the book when confronted with crude humor about difficulty peeing due to enlarged prostrate, constipation and farting. That was enough to stop me 8 pages in. UGH!