Surprise From Across the Pond, And From Our City

"Your garden is such a delight to look at," is nice to hear. Spoken with a French accent makes it wonderful.

We were in the front yard planting peppers and tomatoes this morning when a woman walked by and commented on our front yard. It turns out she lives most of the year in Paris. Don't have a clue why she is in dry Central CA when the other option is north central France, but we talked about the flowers and plantings. She said she loved the flowers and when told they were Sweet Peas, she repeated the name over and over to remember the name in English. She commented that the garden reminded her of her Grandmother's. Regardless of what country you are speaking of, mentioning "Grandmother's Garden" and yours in the same breath is a fine compliment.

Adding more frosting, this afternoon a local gentleman rode by on his bike and stopped to comment on the "garden the whole town talks about."

Doesn't get much better.

Life at This Time

My season as a JV baseball coach has come to an end. Last Friday we tied a team that had previously beaten us twice, a tie is a step in the right direction. It was a tough season for the players and a redemptive one for me. I started out unable to throw or hit a ball and ended by throwing batting practice and coaching with a nephew for the first time. I tire easier than before, but did things I hadn't expected to be able to do. Along the way the team improved and the players seemed to want to be at practice instead of dreading the time. I believe they walked away with more baseball knowledge than they started with, even if it only is knowing the distance from home to second base is 127 feet 3 3/8 inches.

Most of the planting is done, but Maureen would be better to address the specifics. We have less room across the street, but things are progressing there. The new driveway bed is growing. The fence in the back hasn't been finished but will be soon.

With the storage reorganized the cleaning of the white shed will commence sometime. That will free up space to rearrange the back concrete slab for better use. That will happen also with the cleaning up of the tool room. In general the cleaning and reorganizing will help us.

We now have a trailer and when we get the hitch for the Subaru we will have our version of a pickup. Or at least something that can be use to haul stuff. The idea is a compromise but a less expensive way to do the dirty work we need to do from time to time.

The replacement laying chicks are growing. They are outside now and progressing nicely. The meat birds have been outside a a bit longer and are only a few weeks away from harvest. I'm still surprised what slobs they are. At this point they are still mobile, but soon they will start waddling around slowly and spreading their manure less around the pen. Still a fun experience.

Even though I'm done with the JV baseball team, I am helping with the varsity in the playoffs. They were seeded first in their division and have a good chance to go far in the playoffs. Just depends how the ball bounces.

Wils is back in the national park. He left yesterday and is back doing what he wants in leading cave tours. He finished his job with a national coffee chain on Sunday. I wonder sometimes about how jobs for young people have changed. I worked for two different farms, a packing house, a cannery and a truck spring manufacturing plant growing up. This is in addition to the surveying and land leveling work I did for my father year round on the side. Not that manual labor is bad, but I learned that there are other types of work to be done. Clearing out a ditch with a shovel in 100 degrees will teaching you many things. Our children have had these physical jobs part time, but their jobs have been in customer service. Two have delivered pizza, the coffee serving barista is another, and one works for a national clothing chain while working two days a week as a receptionist at a dental practice. I am glad they did get to prune grapes for their uncle. I know our children have the ability to work hard and that means something.

More fun stuff is to come I'm sure. Peace. Out.

Ya Hoo!

5 May 2015, or Cinco de Mayo in some parts of the country. Contrary to what many people believe, Cinco de Mayo is not celebrating the Independence of Mexico, that is 16 September. It celebrates the victory of a group of Mexicans over the French at Puebla, a battle in which the Mexicans were greatly outnumbered.

Today I am celebrating life. Six months ago my heart and brain were stopped for hours as the doctors, PAs and nurses repaired some plumbing issues with my heart. Around noon on 5 November I was given an IV and fell asleep. I sort of woke up ten hours later and began an often strange train ride to recovery that couldn't have happened without the help of family (Garvers, Derrs and Kelloggs), Dr. Woo and the staff of the Stanford Medical Center, my local cardiologist Dr. Gupta, friends too many to name and the community I live in. Thank you all!

What $100 Will Buy You In. . .

http://taxfoundation.org/blog/real-value-100-metropolitan-areas

This is a map of what $100 will buy you by metropolitan regions in the U.S. We can buy a bit over $104 worth of goods while a few hours north our relatives can buy $84 worth of stuff.

More food for thought.

A Few Thoughts From Today's Paper

As I was reading the newspaper today as I usually do, I came across an editorial that made me think a bit. The editorial was about the middle class, how it was shrinking and what the political fallout might be for candidates in the 2016 elections regarding the middle class. At least that is where the article started for me. Close to 80% of the article was about the housing market, how the middle class was affected by the current mortgage rates and how a larger and larger percentage of middle class incomes are going to pay mortgage payments. The article went on to describe the effects of the Obama refinance program to help homebuyers and how banks and investors are calling for more foreclosures so they may get their investment returns faster. If a bank refinances a house, it stretches out the mortgage and the return comes to the investors later rather than sooner.

What struck me more than this typical greed though were thoughts about the statistics regarding the percentage of income spent by the middle class on mortgages: New York is now 32%, California 44%, Florida nearly 40% and Texas about 33%. Maybe it's just me, but I have no problem with the numbers. What I have a problem with is the assumption that the houses bought today are the equivalent of the houses bought in previous decades. Is this an apples and oranges comparison?

The house we live in was considered a middle class family home when it was built and for decades afterwards. It was probably thought of as a lower middle class home when we bought it in 1986. It was built in the late 1920's with two bedrooms and one bath. It now has three bedrooms and one bath with a converted studio apartment in the back. Today it is not considered a middle class home unless you like older houses near the town center. The middle class home in our small town have either three or four bedrooms and at least two bathrooms. They also have a mortgage payment two to three times ours.

Could it be that Americans are paying higher mortgage payments because they are buying larger homes? Larger homes than they really need? Larger homes to keep up with the Joneses? Maybe they are middle class, but they are choosing to spend their money on homes instead of a quality life.

More Land, More Vegetables

Last year we had our 50 foot pecan tree trimmed. It was a year-round mess and greatly shaded our backyard. That was welcome in the 100 plus degrees of summer, but the shade made it difficult growing vegetables. After the trimming, we had much better light and growing was easier. It was also an eye opener of sorts in that we realized we were running out of places to grow vegetables and fruits on our 50 by 150 foot lot. We stubbled upon Joel Salatin's Hoop House 5 and the concrete floor.

As we have concrete pads in a few places, we thought this would be the next place to expand our growing into, and some of the only ground left. But as we looked and talked about the back pad we realized for now it could be better utilized for wine barrel plantings and shop and storage space. That left the front driveway.

Last week friend Tim helped us cut a 3 1/2 by 11 1/2 foot space out of our front drive. Now you need to realize that we have one of few driveways on our block. Parking may eventually be an issue, but we forged ahead. We also chose 3 1/2 feet because a car can fit over the bed if the bed is fallow.

After the cutting, the concrete was broken up, pried up and hauled away.

We brought in some of our chicken yard deep bedding to mix with the soil. We have moved away from the double digging we've done in the past. We are mulching now. But with this soil sitting under concrete for close to 30 years we found no life in it and we dug away mixing compost, bedding and soil together.

We added a wooden planter box to define the area and allow for the mulch later.

We are planning some sort of fencing to separate the bed from the sidewalk and define our yard a bit. I'll have more photos when we plant.

Books and a Reason to Read

Years ago I found the Chism Heritage Farms blog while looking for farming info. I have followed since and get into lively discussions with Chris. I have learned much and I hope he has learned at least something.

He recently started a log and report about what he read in the previous week, here is the latest example. We, and others, talk books and thoughts and to me is a wonderful example of what the internet can be. With that in mind here is what I am reading now.

Daily I try to read Listening to Your Life by Frederick Buechner. It's a collection of his writings that have been broken up into daily segments. Two friends have been recommending Buechner for years and gave me this book to get me started. Great thoughts to help this average mind.

Before I went into the hospital for my recent surgery, I put out a call to family and friends for their suggestions of must read books. One of our sons suggested Dune by Frank Herbert. I've read science fiction in the past, but not this one. He raved about it so I am starting it in homage to his wisdom. So far it's been good.