Carol, You always make me laugh. I almost feel guilty when I start in the spring because y'all can't start yet, but I guess it evens out because y'all will be doing your fall planting while I'm still out in the yard stomping grasshoppers to death. Because I succession plant, it seems like I never stop planting...I go straight from succession plantings of bush beans and southern peas right into seed-starting for fall. Some years, I don't do as much for fall because the spring garden is performing so well. I have an odd feeling this will NOT be one of those years. The heat is killing us down here...and it isn't even the heat, it is the humidity. It isn't fair you know. We are not getting the rain y'all are having, but our dew points and humidity are as high as yours or higher. There's just something wrong with that. My bush bean plants haven't set new beans in a week or two and probably won't until it cools down. Maybe the coming cool spell (due to arrive here at our house on Monday I think) will help. I hope so because Tanya's Pink Pod is just beginning to bloom and I'm hoping to get beans to try instead of blossom drop. Marcy, Just remember that I am so far south that I'm surrounded on three sides by Texas, so I'm way ahead of y'all in the spring. Maybe that will help you to remember that you shouldn't be starting things or planting them when I am because you'll likely have colder weather a while longer than I will. On the other hand, we're way down low in the Red River Valley and often have our last freeze/frost after Carol and some of the others. The last two years we've had a frosty morning the first week in May even though our 'average' last frost date in March 27th. I think our weather is 'broken' and someone needs to fix it! Seeds amaze me. I think they have brains and they plot against us. The first time I planted Laura Bush petunias from seed, the seeds were teeny-tiny like poppyseeds. So, I dumped a whole packet of pink ones and a whole packet of purple ones into a flat and all 400 of those little suckers sprouted. Once they were large enough to prick out of the starter flat and move up to small paper cups, it took me days and days to get all of them done. Then it took me days to plant them all. I've discovered that if a seed actually sprouts and grows, I am incapable of tossing the plant on the compost pile and feel compelled to plant every one that sprouts. It is an illness....compulsive planting mania. I don't even grow petunias from seed any more because they self-sow all over creation. I just dig 'em up and move them wherever. I wish I'd known how easy they were from seed...I would have direct sown them instead of spending oodles of time growing them indoors and babying them. Live and learn. Carol, I was a compulsive pickler last year and made oodles of pickles of all kinds. I made two years worth, so I didn't even plant picking cukes this spring. I might plant some for fall so I can make some fermented pickles of some kind. Paula, It has to be the weather that has made your broccoli nuts. (Hey, you're having heat just like ours. Isn't it awful?) I think the broccoli watched all those severe Tstorms, hail and tornadoes flying overhead near you and got scared. That's why it is acting odd...it was just plain terrified by the weather. So, now that the weather has settled down a little, it's making heads. Let's just blame everything on the weather, because this year the weather has been odd and the gardens have behaved oddly too. Joellen, ONLY in winter/spring should you be watching what I plant and when. For mid-summer and fall planting, focus your beady little eyes on someone like Carol or Marcy or Ilene or George or Paula or Seedmama. I'm earlier than y'all in spring and later than y'all in fall and it is hard to know "what's up" half the time because the weather isn't necessarily real consistent any way. Planning and planting for fall is SO hard. In the 11 years we've been here, we've had our first fall freeze as early as September 29th and as late as about December 14th. How in the world do you plan for that? Most years, though, it is in latest October through mid-November here in southcentral OK. Some years, the fall garden gets shut down by early freezing weather and I decide it really wasn't worth planting it, but then in other years, I am still harvesting everything including tomatoes in December. So, I guess that's why I do it....in case it is a late freeze year instead of an early freeze year. Dawn

IMO, your father is playing both of you like a fiddle. As long as each of you are complaining about the other one, all focus is off of him. Brilliant! Golddust.. I agree. I've started replying 3 times and deleted all of them. I think there's more to the story & doubt it's just the girlfriend. Reading her letter, she probably thinks she's helping her man. Danielle, the best advice I can give you is to try to understand where she is coming from; but don't let her walk all over you. This is a very touchy situation; you know what your dad was like when you were growing up & she came into the picture after he was out of his "unhappy" marriage. While he's probably told her his side; she's never going to know what really happened because she wasn't there and IMO.. she needs to respect your feelings & how hurt you were by him but try to respect her for trying to be there for your dad now. I have issues with my step son. He likes to go back to his father & say that I said this or I said that. When my hubby fell off of his truck I sent him an email because he stopped speaking to my hub & wouldn't you know it, he twisted my email around trying to start a fight between my hub & I. Thankfully my hub knew about the email before I sent it; it was a rude awakening to my hub of just what his son would do to get me out of the picture. This is all in SS's head, not mine because I can be grown up about it & smile like nothing ever happened but he can't. The best advice I can give you is to try to have a relationship with your dad without the GF around every time. You still need father/daughter time. I encourage hub to call his son or go golfing with him because even though we can't see eye to eye, it's still his son. My hub does not talk about me when they are together & if the kid starts, he says it's between you 2 and not me. SS's mother was an alcoholic - probably why he hates me so much because we have the life he never had growing up & his father has been raising my 2 kids for the last 10 years.. so he's bitter; but he's also an adult man in his 30's & a divorced father. I don't feel that the GF was trying to place "blame" on any of the kids for the marriage/drinking problems, I read it as her just stating why he was drinking. My dad stayed in a bad marriage because "It was cheaper to keep her" & we kids suffered with the fighting. Dad was not around most times, he chose to work as much as he could.

We almost lost our 15 month old Cockapoo and we fear it was due to this drug 'Metacam'. We brought our dog to the vet with a slightly sore paw, nothing we were overly concerned about as he was putting weight on the foot and in good spirits. Reluctantly we agreed to our dog being given an antibiotic and an injection of Metacam (we felt this was a bit unnecessary but we trusted the vets opinion and that we were doing the best for our dog). That same day the dog was groggy and lethargic. By that same night our dog was groaning with pain so we gave him half a painkiller prescribed by the vet. The next morning our poor dog couldn't move, he lay unresponsive and couldn't lift his body weight upright. He wasn't eating or drinking a thing! If we touched any part of his body he was in severe pain. Our dog is very energetic with a great appetite and we were very worried! We returned to the vet and found our dog was running a very high temperature. The vet was adamant that this was as a result of his sore paw and possible bone infection and was very critical of the dog breed. Our dog was kept in over night and medicated with paracetamol and an IV antibiotic. Within 24hours our dog was returning to normal. The vet insisted we do an x-ray and nothing showed up. Thankfully we were able to discharge our pet after two nights but found the vet very reluctant to talk about what and how much medication he had prescribed our dog. We have no way to ever know for sure the reason our dog fell unresponsive within a couple of hours but we can't shake the feeling that it has a strong connection with the Metacam he was administered on first meeting the vet. We have also noticed our dog's weight is not correct on his medication label - it is double his weight! Finally, when leaving the vet practice with the prescribed medications, the vet had to call us back as he has prescribed double painkiller doses. The vet carried out a blood test without our knowledge and still has not disclosed the result of this blood test. When asked to discuss our concerns the vet became extremely defensive and condescending towards us. We would love to put our minds at ease and find out if any other dog owners experienced this reaction to Metacam or if it sounds like a over dosage of Metacam?

Neapolitan Mastiff is 5000 years old. The first images of it found in caves are dated 3000 B.C. Alexander the Great had 300 dogs in his army, he went on Persians with them. In fact, Neapolitans have the most powerful bite in the dog world! The dog is very serious and can be dangerous in wrong hands. This dog is definitely not for everyone, it is for very dedicated people and I do not recommend as a family dog. Even though these dogs will love all the members of the family, they usually pick one person, whom they love the most. Neapolitans need human company and attention, otherwise they suffer a lot. There are also some health issues like displasia, that need extra attention from the very first months of a puppy's life, which makes this dogs very difficult to raise. This dog is not for you, if you are not ready to have a newborn baby for the first 2 years of life and a 2-year old for the rest of your dog's life. They are big babies! One of the problems is also that these dogs mature (physically and psychologically) very slowly - the growing process takes up to 4 years, but they don't live long, especially when overweight. I am a fanatic! Despite all the problems I will never get another dog for myself - I love this huge and fearless giant, which is at the same time so loving and gentle! My dog was everything for me since the very first days that I got her. And I believe, that it is due to my love of breed and dedication, that today my baby is 9 years old and people think she is only 1, vets can't believe in what amazing shape she is. Of course, this is a fighting breed and it is very easy to raise a monster, but if you are responsible and dedicated enough, you will definitely get an extremely true, gentle and loving you to death friend.