Diane....... My younger brain just hasn't recognized that it is working with a less efficient tool ... my older body. My timing is off... everything takes longer to get done than it used to take. I think this is the last year I am going to take on any major planting projects. My older body is demanding that I take things in smaller bites ! I do need to figure out the drip irrigation thing. I have a start, but the way it is currently set up, even when I leave the system on for four hours, the whole root mass does not get enough water. Carol ... now that everything has had its deep watering, I am going to try follow your example and stay inside as much as possible. I do need to finish mulching the rose beds, but there is no way I am going to get all of that done in this heat. Brittie ... no crispy blooms for this heat spell as I have been disbudding all of the roses for the last four weeks to keep rose curculios from breeding in my garden. Disbudding ends today ! The other good news is that disbudding triggers the roses to put out more foliage, so they are more heat tolerant. Ingrid ...I've read that more birds die of thirst than from lack of food. Lots of people put out bird feeders but never put out water for the birds. Good for you. Josh ... thanks for being a cheerleader and reminding us that we will get through this. Smiles, Lyn

What a great thread! I'm so happy to have found this wonderful community. I'm Tina, we moved to Castle Pines (south of Highlands Ranch, north of Castle Rock) from Minneapolis three years ago. I can tell you, gardening at 6600' is quite a 'culture' shock as compared to 830' and 10,000+ lakes! Everything did well in my perennial and vegetable garden in south Minneapolis. Not so much here, but, I am committed to learning, experimenting and growing. ☺ Like many of our members here, my roots go back to a very early farming family (emigrated from Norway & Sweden) in MN. My childhood memories include splitting irises with my mormor (grandma), she fancied the old fashioned beautiful blue and yellow (like the Swedish flag, go figure) varieties. She also had a huge raspberry patch in her yard which she carefully covered every season with netting. Rather than pulling weeds, I could often be found hiding under the netting eating the raspberries in the summer. Before my mormor passed away, my mom retrieved the beloved blue & yellow irises and divided them among family members. I have one blue one and two yellow ones that I transplanted from my Minneapolis garden into my garden here in Castle Pines. They are planted in fairly poor clay soil that I've doggedly tried to amend. So far, so good! It makes me so happy each spring that they come up, really warms my heart. Today (Easter Sunday) I can see the green leaves and am looking forward to the blooms soon. Our home is on a corner lot, and is a focal point as one enters our small neighborhood. So, I am thoughtful about making it pleasing to the eye. Unfortunately, I've apparently made it pleasing to the deer and elk as well! So, have been researching and studying plants that are resistant to our four-legged visitors as well as waterwise and full sun capable. I've been successful with native perennials, including columbine, hummingbird mint, colorful yarrow and others. I put in a large coneflower last year, I hope it will return. Also happily visible this spring are my large white phlox and chocolate cosmos that are on the east (front) side of the house. YAY! I look forward to being a part of this group and learning so much! ~Tina

Jerseygirl gives some good info. I recently hired 7 people and despite the large number of resumes I received, it took months to do so-- I had very little luck with posting to dice.com. The FLOOD of resumes was unmanageable and very few received the personal attention they deserve. I did, however, search the dice listings-- and that is what the services are suggesting employers do. Definitely post your resume if you have not already. I hired 1 of the 7 employees from Dice. All the other new hires came through personal connections (2) and a local staffing company (4 contract to hire). I recommend that you NETWORK and check out some of your local staffing companies. More and more organizations are using the staffing orgs. Research them-- who is placing the most people right now? My company works with just one (Tek Systems) and we have for years. While we complain about their rates, the reality is that their screening saves us a lot of valuable time (and likewise, saves the candidates a lot of time). While it is frustrating for you sending out your resumes and getting no response, it is just as frustrating for understaffed employers to read them all and to go through numerous interviews. These staffing services really help push the process along for all parties. And if you use one, be sure to make a good impression with your recruiter-- they are very involved with placing the right person in the right job and tend to push their best candidates to their most reliable companies. One more thought on staffing companies-- many offer training courses. Use your downtime now to beef up your skills. What skills are being sought after in your area? I wish you luck-- but the reality is that in the good times finding a job is a full-time job. In these times, you absolutely need to put ALL the energy you can spare into your search. Don't look for the perfect match or the work from home gigs-- look for the companies that are hiring and impress them-- then try to find the best match for you in their organization. I, for instance, am very generous with my work from home policy with my staff-- but I absolutely would not hire someone who walked into an interview asking about telecommuting/working from home. I need a team player-- if I hire someone who has all the skills and characteristics I need for a position then I would absolutely trust them to work from home. If someone walks in the door asking to work from home, my first impression is that they are either a slacker or not interested in being a part of the organization-- neither of which would encourage me to hire the individual over the next guy or gal. Finally, make SURE your resume and cover letter are well written and contain no spelling or grammatical errors. This sounds like a no brainer but I can't tell you how many resumes and cover letters are littered with errors. Nothing moves a resume or application to the "no, thank you" list faster than poor grammar/spelling errors. Good luck to you and all others looking for work.

In cased you missed the map that was shown on TV for days following the 2004 election, most states are shaded red and only a few are shaded in blue. The blue states are shoved off into a corner and they are very expensive places to live and not overloaded with opportunities. So if you are like me, you have to find a place where you can enjoy the what the area has to offer and not let the political views of the majority get to you. The OP's viewpoints seem somewhat libertarian and then somewhat republican but who cares? Nobody. You can move to just about anywhere and nobody will shove their political views down your throat. Not even here do they do that. If I wanted to I could meet up with anoy political party that interested me but since I am not into politics I will go back to just enjoying the scenery and low cost of living, being close to good shopping and relatively OK driving distance to the big urban core where I can walk around for a few minutes or have a nice meal, feel like I stepped into the twilight zone then hop in the truck come back home where you can have a big property with horses and fire guns and play cowboys & indians and do whatever it is you please til the cows come home. The Knoxville area does come across as an area where this would be possible too so I'd say look at Knoxville.