Not that I’d expect anyone here to know, but what are these idiots trying to accomplish? Actually, the first question should be why aren’t they in class, but after that, what is the point?

We had these in Bloomington. They’re idiots. They buy their clothes at K-Mart because they don’t have jobs and can’t afford anything else, then they protest outside Old Navy about sweatshops — never mind that they’re wearing sweatshop clothes themselves. And forget the fact that in most of these countries, those people who work in sweatshops are making comparatively good money.

Do they know how stupid they look? Are they trying to look stupid? And if so, how is that supposed to help their cause?

Or take these mouthbreathers. Do they really believe that making fools of themselves in public is going to help their agenda? Do they think we’ll see them on the news, say, “Oh, what artistic masks!” and then decide not to support our nation in time of war?

Any insight into the loony leftist mind here would be appreciated, thanks.

But not from today, cause I forgot to take the camera. The pictures are from the house-hunting trip last summer, but the places are the same.

First, we went to beautiful Victorian Bellefonte, the county seat. The following two pictures are of the Big Spring, the major water supply here.

We put an offer on a house in Bellefonte, and I wish it had worked out (the people selling wanted to sell the house, then live in it until they built another). Here are a couple of shots from the back yard of the house we wanted to buy:

And here’s one of the many lovely homes in Bellefonte, to give you an idea what the town looks like:

Then we went to Boalsburg, birthplace of Memorial Day, home of the Pennsylvania Military Museum, and Kelly’s Steak House, with the big cow on top of the building (don’t have a picture of the cow, sorry). Here are a couple of the homes in Boalsburg:

And here is a shot from the back yard of a house we thought about buying in Warrior’s Mark (too far out, fifteen minutes from the nearest grocery store, so we decided no):

It’s a beautiful day, in the 50s, bright and sunny. We’re going on a drive. Back later.

As a Catholic, I am offended by William Donohue’s idiocy, and by extension, the mis-named Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, which isn’t interested in rights, but special rights not to be offended.

When South Park was prevented from showing Mohammed by Comedy Central, Donohue demonstrated what an utter jackass he was. He may be a good Catholic, but he’s a lousy American.

However, he wasn’t content with that show of idiocy. When that Oregon student paper published the Jesus cartoons, again, he demonstrated that he has no grasp of what this nation is about, and has never read the Constitution of the United States. What’s next, rioting in the streets? Calls for beheadings?

This man and organization truly disgust me — even more than the leftist protesters disgust me.

Mr. Donohue and the Catholic League, please read your Constitution and realize that we have no right not to be offended. Then see here and here for truly Christian responses to these offensive cartoons.

Apparently, we were attacked and taken down again last night by the Saudi jihadists. Every blog on Hosting Matters was taken down by the attack yesterday morning.

I can’t see the Saudi government helping with this.

Yesterday, I went to see the first showing of United 93. As I said yesterday, every American should see this movie.

Today, now that I feel a bit better (not much), and have had time for the movie to percolate, I have more to say — about the movie, and about the memorial.

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I just got back from the theater. I saw the first showing, opening day. Four words:

Go. See. It. Now.

Not a whisper of liberal hand-wringing, no “Islam is a religion of peace” disclaimers, nothing about poor, oppressed, marginalized, disenfranchised, disempowered little brown Muslims, and no crying about all those poor homicide-bomber Palestinians. I won’t give any details, other than that everybody was silent leaving the theater.

I wouldn’t take small children. It hasn’t been sanitized — and that’s exactly as it should be. Teenagers, however, should see this movie. Every American should see this movie. My only criticism is that it’s about four years late.

I’m not sure what happened to Hosting Matters today, but it was down. Considering that they host LOTS of blogs, lots of blogs were down today.

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This is very cool. Right-click on your county on the map, then click gas prices.

Going to an eye appointment soon. I doubt I’ll be posting after I get back, since my eyes will be dilated and I won’t be able to see.

Moonbattery points to an editorial, in of all places, the NYT, which begins:

I RECENTLY did some research for a satirical novel set at a university. The idea was to have a bunch of gags about how colleges prostitute themselves to improve their U.S. News & World Report rankings and keep up a healthy supply of tuition-paying students, while wrapping their craven commercialism in high-minded-sounding academic blather.

I would keep coming up with what I thought were pretty outrageous burlesques of this stuff and then run them by one of my professor friends and he’d say, Oh, yeah, we’re doing that.

I knew as soon as I read that that this was going to be a good read. You have to feel sorry for this guy. He was trying to write a satire, and every insane idea he came up with was already being implemented at some university or another. The prize, however, goes to Case Western, for their SAGES program:

My final straw came when a friend at Case Western Reserve University (now referred to as Case, after their consultant concluded that all great universities have single-word names) sent me a packet of information on the university’s new showcase undergraduate seminar program. Called SAGES (this supposedly stands for Seminar Approach to General Education and Scholarship), the program offers as an essential component of its core intellectual experience an upscale cafe that serves Peet’s Coffee and is “staffed by baristas whose expertise in preparing espresso is matched only by their authoritative knowledge of all things SAGES.”

As the program’s Web site explains (complete with footnotes, bibliography and quotes from the urban theorist Jane Jacobs): “In the bustling personal-but-impersonal rhythms of campus activity, as in the streets of a big city, proprietors of public establishments occupy a special position… The SAGES cafe staff are patently not interested in providing grades or passing judgment.” And, not only that, but “there are no compromises that would undermine the quality of our drinks…. Our chai latte is made not from a bottled concentrate, but from a fresh-brewed base made from scratch every day on site.”

As a model of pandering to students in the guise of lofty academic purpose, I thought that was pretty hard to top. Then I started reading the 92-page guide Case has created for teachers of these seminars.

Okay, you knew multiculturalism/diversity/identity politics idiocy had to raise its head somewhere, didn’t you?

If students fidget, talk or walk out of class, the guide advises seminar leaders not to “manage” such behaviors, but to explore their underlying causes. Instructors must remember that to such characteristically American cultural beliefs as the importance of morality, rationality and personal responsibility, there are equally valid alternatives that must be respected.

Instructors must be wary of spurious objectivity, such as a 0-100 grading scale; much better is a 0-5 scale, or, best of all, a check, check-plus, check-minus scale. And finally, if students do not contribute to discussions at all, seminar leaders should “make space for silence.”

And, no doubt, make space for failure, utter disinterest in class, refusing to do assignments, and all those other equally valid alternative non-American cultural beliefs that must be respected.

Institutionalize these nutjobs.

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This week’s carnival is posted, with some great stuff!

Everything you wanted to know, from the beginning, here.

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I keep asking the same question, why it is that I do my job, but a lot of you people in the elementary and secondary schools do not, and why is it I have to do your job for you — yet I never get a response. But I think I know.

Stories about out of control teachers who seem to believe their classrooms are for indoctrination, self-esteem building, singing kumbayah, and social engineering seem to pop up several times every week. And just so nobody can accuse me of only criticizing leftist teachers, here’s one that makes my blood boil:

Canon-Mac teacher suspended for abortion talk

Wednesday, April 19, 2006
By Crystal Ola

A fourth-grade teacher at Hills-Hendersonville Elementary School in the Canon-McMillan School District is suspended pending an investigation of a lesson about the election process during which she allegedly described abortion and adoption and asked students to vote on the issue.

The teacher has been suspended with pay since April 6, the day after the incident. James Stienstraw Jr., whose 9-year-old daughter is in the unidentified teacher’s class, brought up the issue during the school board’s meeting last night.

His daughter told him the teacher gave a detailed description of the abortion process and said she personally would give up a baby for adoption instead of having an abortion.

“My daughter’s innocence has been taken away from her,” Mr. Stienstraw said.

Principal Dawn Nicolaus sent parents a letter the next day informing them the topic of abortion had been discussed during class. Mr. Stienstraw asked the board to have the teacher fired immediately.

“This board has to follow a process and there’s nothing they can do tonight,” Solicitor Francis DiSalle said.

The board is not permitted to just fire the teacher, he said. She’s in the union and any teacher accused of misconduct is entitled to a public hearing.

The district can’t comment on the investigation, but there was no prior knowledge the subject matter would be discussed and action was taken immediately, said Superintendent Nick Bayat.

What possible excuse does this woman have for doing this in a third-grade classroom? What does the author of this story mean by “a detailed description,” or do I want to know? And why did the principal send parents a note the day following, instead of the day before, so they could keep their children away from this, if they wanted?

Most importantly, however, what’s wrong with this teacher? These are third-graders. What did she think she was doing?

At least this principal realized there was a problem, which is more than can be said about the doofus in Lexington, Massachussetts who saw no problem with this:

While two parents in Lexington, Mass., are upset about the fact their second-grade son was read a fantasy book in school about two princes getting married, what makes them even more angry is the fact the boy’s teacher said because same-sex marriage is legal in their state there is no way a mother or father can opt out a child from such experiences.

This is almost as bad — I’m assuming the worst about that phrase, “detailed descriptions” above — and every bit as outrageous. Second-graders? What in the name of God Almighty could be an excuse for reading this in a second-grade classroom? And to make it even more infuriating, the teacher was perfectly aware that she was not doing her job, and that the story had nothing to do with the class, yet went right ahead and did it anyway:

The Wirthlins say they immediately contacted the teacher, Heather Kramer, who acknowledged she had read the book to the class and admitted that it was not part of the curriculum.

Did you see that? Did you let it sink in? Let’s repeat it:

The Wirthlins say they immediately contacted the teacher, Heather Kramer, who acknowledged she had read the book to the class and admitted that it was not part of the curriculum.

Then why did she read it, if it had nothing to do with the curriculum? Why did she read it, if it had nothing to do with the curriculum, to a second-grade class? Why do teachers feel entitled to libel the President, refer to their own nation as a Nazi state, denigrate their students and their students’ parents as stupid, and otherwise do everything to push their social agenda — and not do their jobs? How is it that a single teacher at a Catholic school can get pregnant, tell her administration that she has no intention of marrying the father, and be surprised when she is fired? What’s going on here?

Even curriculum is being subverted for the sake of a touchy-feely, I’m okay, you’re okay, we’re all okay, just be happy agenda (unsurprisingly, in the Peoples’ Republic of Californistan), and the truth be damned (hat tip Joanne Jacobs):

One by one, California’s many ethnic and cultural communities have sought legislation that requires schoolchildren to be taught about their “role and contributions” in the state’s history, and also bans instruction that depicts them negatively.

To date the list singled out for mandatory attention are “men and women, black Americans, American Indians, Mexicans, Asians, Pacific Island people and other ethnic groups” while another section of state school law bans instruction “which reflects adversely upon persons because of their race, sex, color, creed, handicap, national origin or ancestry” and still another prohibits textbooks or other materials “reflecting adversely” on the same grounds.

Essentially, therefore, students must be told about certain groups, but cannot receive any instruction deemed to be negative, which is why, for instance, the Hindu American Foundation is now suing the state to block printing and distribution of new sixth-grade textbooks that are, the group maintains, demeaning to Hindus. Specifically, the foundation doesn’t like the textbooks’ depiction of women’s historically inferior status, the treatment of “untouchables” in the Indian caste system and the theory that Aryan migration played a major role in Indian cultural development.

Implicitly, the suit is telling state officials that the textbooks must be altered to reflect the Hindu American Foundation’s version of the ethnic group’s history - regardless of what that history may truly be.

It’s certainly not the first time that the classroom depiction of ethnic or cultural subgroups has become controversial, and it will not be the last, especially if a bill pending on the Senate floor, Senate Bill 1437, becomes law.

The measure, carried by Sen. Sheila Kuehl, D-Santa Monica, would add “people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender” to the list of cultural subgroups about which California’s school children must be instructed and also add “sexual orientation” to the lists of those about which nothing that “reflects adversely” will be tolerated.

So history be damned, truth be damned, the only thing that matters is the students’ feelings? And this is not some moonbat teacher; this is a state bill that would define the state’s history curriculum.

What kind of drugs are these people on? What’s wrong with them? When did schools cease being places of learning, and transform into feel-good therapy sessions for turning out self-obsessed, narcissistic little idiots who believe how they feel is more important than anything else?

What’s next? A student whose feelings are hurt by 2+2=4 and a subsequent math curriculum change? Will we start teaching “alternative medicine” and crystals and other kinds of trendy voodoo nonsense in medical schools, just to make people feel good?

Ideology — ideology that the data show does not work — is paramount, and teaching and learning have been relegated to the trash heap.

Here’s a newsflash: Education is not a psychotropic drug. Education is about the truth, however ugly it may be, and whoever’s feelings may be hurt. But that’s really beside the point.

Apparently, schools are doing everything but what they’re supposed to be doing — and that jives with the lamentable test scores reported across the United States. That doesn’t surprise me, given the courses that are taught in education schools, very few of which have anything to do with teaching or actual course content, and instead deal with post-modernist gushy-gooey crap.

It’s not like teachers don’t realize what a mess education has become:

In the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD), based on a Fordham Foundation’s analysis of 2000 Census data, 24.5% of public school teachers enroll their own children in private schools, versus only 15.7% of the general public.

And some parents have figured out where the responsibility lies, and are taking action, and “filed legal actions in California against the Los Angeles and Compton Unified School Districts for their failure to make school choice available for children in failing schools.” But with a powerful union structure that fights every attempt to save the schools, and spends its time drafting statements on every topic except educational ones, it’s not enough.

So when will it end? When will parents, voters, and legislatures finally have had enough, and take back the asylums from the nutjobs currently in charge? And how bad will it have to get before that happens?

First, the front of the house:

And the Japanese maple is putting out leaves:

Then around to the side of the garage, the only shade on the property. Living in Bloomington, where there are so many mature trees that full sun is a luxury, you get used to planting in partial sun and shade — and those shade plants that make up most of your gardening, like hostas and caladiums:

Then that flowering plum:

And finally, the vegetable and herb garden: roma tomatoes, basil, greek oregano, and rosemary:

“Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s; and to God, the things that are God’s.”
The Gospel According to St. Matthew, 22:21

This was spawned in part by an article on The Cafeteria is Closed, supporting the ecclesiastical discipline of Catholic legislators who support abortion, and an article on Gay Patriot, about the University of the Cumberlands receiving tax monies from the Commonwealth of Kentucky.

No matter whether I support the stance or not, I strongly disagree with the ecclesiastical discipline of politicians for their voting patterns on issues — and I question whether the Church even has the authority to do so. After all, one who votes for a pro-abortion bill has not, technically, violated any precept over which the Church has authority; were a politician to have an abortion, that would be an entirely different situation, and the Church would have the authority to discipline her.

I question whether one can be a good, practicing Catholic and support abortion, but that is a matter of conscience (and one of ecclesiastical function). That does not mean, however, that I think Kerry or Kennedy, or whoever should be excommunicated because of his stance on abortion law in the United States.

The problem I have with this is that anti-Catholicism is alive and well, and for two hundred years here in the United States it was fueled by the belief that Roman Catholics would put their allegiance to Rome before their allegiance to the United States. This, after all, was the primary reason the Knights of Columbus campaigned for “one nation under God” to be included in the Pledge of Allegiance, and this belief was alive and well as recently as the campaign of John F. Kennedy (this is also why I sympathize with Mitt Romney, who is being put through the same questions Kennedy was).

If the Church starts excommunicating politicians who support abortion, then that belief will again rear its ugly head. And if politicians vote against abortion solely because they fear the discipline of the Church, then that belief is justified, and those politicians should be kicked out of office.

I use abortion here only because it is the key Catholic political hot button, but immigration or gay marriage would be equally applicable.

I am a practicing Catholic, and not a liberal kumbayah Catholic. But I would vote for no politician who would put his allegiance to the Vatican over his allegiance to the United States. And I would encourage other conservative Catholics to ponder this issue deeply before giving it their support. Such things have a way of biting back.

We see this in an incidental point Gay Patriot makes when he discusses the University of the Cumberlands, and whether the university should receive taxpayer funds. He says:

How ironic though that the Blaine Amendment adopted to the Kentucky Constitution, and indeed most state constitutions, during the height of anti-Catholic hysteria in the late 19th-century could now come back to bite them in the ass.

Indeed. The Blaine Amendment, more appropriately termed Blaine Amendments, since the Amendment was never ratified by the Senate but was adopted by all but eleven of the states, was fueled by anti-Catholic hysteria in the 19th century, in response to the large number of Catholic schools that had been established in the United States. Because there were quite a few individual state amendments, I cannot cite the text, but Blaine Amendments denied funding to Catholic students or schools (depending on which one of the various amendments passed).

The Blaine Amendments were pushed by Protestants and Protestant churches and organizations. They were, in fact, the beginning of the “wall of separation between Church and state,” at least in the realm of education.

Here we have an example of how legislation can bite back. The Blaine Amendments, or the “wall of separation” that descended from those amendments, are now being used against Protestants, and they don’t like it. Now, we see Protestants — some of whom feel the same way about Catholics as did their forbears who passed the Blaine Amendments — doing everything they can to undo the damage they created. And though I sympathize, part of me cannot help but feel that they brought it on themselves.

Be careful what you legislate — in Church or state — lest you become a victim of your legislations. As they say, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

The USAF has responded to the battle between Michelle Malkin and the UC Santa Cruz peaceniks (hat tip to Misha):

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Remember that wackjob Mark Leno, the SF supervisor who believes everybody should have a right to 24 pieces of child pornography, who said that having taxpayers fund sex change operations is “very much a civil rights issue. This is about equal benefits for equal work,” and who campaigned to keep the USS Iowa out of San Francisco, that wackjob Leno?

Well, I have an introduction to make. San Francisco, meet America:

America, meet San Francisco:

Apparently, an ex-air traffic controller claims that a comet is going to hit the earth:

KEALAKEKUA, Hawaii, April 13 /U.S. Newswire/ — Eric Julien, a former French military air traffic controller and senior airport manager, has completed a study of the comet 73P Schwassmann- Wachmann and declared that a fragment is highly likely to impact the Earth on or around May 25, 2006.

Okay so far. But not so fast:

Comet Schwassman-Wachmann follows a five-year orbit that crosses the solar system’s ecliptic plane. It has followed its five year orbit intact for centuries; but, in 1995, mysteriously fragmented. According to Julien, this is the same year that a crop circle appeared showing the inner solar system with the Earth missing from its orbit. He argues the “Missing Earth” crop circle was a message from higher intelligences warning humanity of the consequences of its destructive nuclear policies. He links this crop circle to May 25, 2006, and identifies the comet Schwassmann-Wachman as the subject of higher intelligence communications.

 [ . . .]

Julien argues that the kinetic energy of even a ‘car sized’ fragment will impact the Earth with devastating effect. He concludes the May 25 event is tied in to the Bush administration’s policy of preemptive use of nuclear weapons against Iran, and the effect of nuclear weapons on the realms of higher intelligences.

He must be one of Al-Gore’s Global Warming buddies. Think the Democrats will run this nutjob for President in 08?

If you find our academic moonbat’s censorship and terrorist appeasement offensive, I dug up his email address. Charles Garoian, or you can paste his email addy into your software: crg2@psu.edu. Be polite, and don’t use profanity, but get your point across. For more info, see Michelle Malkin and follow the links.

Misha has a good rant about the most recent example of dhimmitude on campus, a Jewish student’s art exhibit being canceled because it isn’t pro-terrorist (Michelle Malkin also covers it here). Both miss the most important piece, though they can be forgiven, since neither is likely to have looked up the censor’s CV.

The censor is one Charles Garoian, academic moonbat extraordinaire, and like all leftists, sees free speech as wholly a one-sided issue. If you find his CV, you’ll find this publication (emphasis mine):

Garoian, C.R., Fighting censorship in the art classroom. School Arts: Inspiring Creativity in Teaching, Vol. 95, No. 14, December 1996 (with Albert A. Anderson).

Ah, irony! Of course, “censorship” means not allowing him to push his moonbatty horseshit in the classroom, and forcing him to do his job. But that’s hardly the only interesting publication:

Garoian, C.R. (1999). Performing Pedagogy: Towards an Art of Politics. Albany: State University of New York Press.

Ah, yes, piss Christ, that sort of thing, you know.

Review of book Performing Pedagogy: Toward an Art of Politics: Spencer, J.S. “Performance Art as Progressive Education, Art Journal, Vol. 60, No. 1, Spring 2001.

And “performance art” would no doubt include the Vagina Monologues, the ultimate feminist idiocy.

Garoian, C.R. (2003). Diversity Initiatives for department heads and deans. In E. Farmer, J.W. Rojewski, & B.W. Farmer (Eds.), Diversity in America: Visions of the future. Dubuque: Kendall/Hunt.

Of course, and you know “diversity” does not include Jews (except for anti-Semitic Jews), or anyone who has issues with terrorism.

Garoian, C.R. & Gaudelius, Y.M. (2004). The embodied pedagogy of war. Journal of Social Theory in Art Education, No. 27, pp. 62-80.

Get your boots on, folks, it’s getting deep in here.

Garoian, C.R. & Gaudelius, Y.M. (Summer 2001). Cyborg Pedagogy: Performing Resistance in the Digital Age, Studies in Art Education: A Journal of Issues and Research in Art Education, Vol. 42, No. 4, pp. 333-347.

Resistance, eh? Power to the people, that sort of thing, I imagine.

Go see for yourself. I’d certainly be willing to bet a great deal that not one of the publications is based on any data, or has anything to do with the real world.

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Can you build Wal-Marts on glass?

Well, almost. Put topsoil in, planted cannas, black-eyed susans and ecinaceas, caladiums and hostas (next to the garage, the only shade on the property). Tomorrow, the dahlias.

Since I had yet another encounter with her, I thought I’d repost my earlier rant.

Liberals are astounding for the twists and turns and irrational and illogical leaps they have to take. Astounding.

Let’s take this one liberal I know. I dearly love her, but she lives in this dense surreal fog that you can’t break through. Recently, she insisted that she does not support a nanny state, but she feels strongly that we must have laws to protect the environment. Uh, okay.

The problem is, no matter what the issue, she *always* feel strongly that we need to pass a law to control what people do–you know, for the “greater good” or “the environment” or “the children” or whatever socialist excuse. Every issue, she always thinks we need laws.

AlphaPatriot has an article up about gasoline prices, with some good ideas. One of his ideas, while good, I can improve:

Using the Interstate Commerce Clause of the federal constitution, create a national standard for gasoline formulation and require every state to honor it — even California.

State and federal regulations force manufacturers to produce over 40 different fuel blends (boutique fuels), with different blends required between summer and winter. The burdonsome need to meet custom fuel specifications has cost consumers $47 billion over the last ten years and made it impossible to meet supply demands with excesses in other parts of the country.

Some refineries overseas have stopped shipping gasoline to the United States because they don’t want the headache of changing processes nor risk getting stuck with excess supplies when out of season.

Create one formulation for the entire nation and stick to it.

A superior alternative is, I believe, to place the burden of requiring boutique blends on the voters, where it belongs, and remove it from the oil companies. It would work something like this:

• Envirowacko voters in California want seven boutique blends to protect the desert, and pass legislation requiring the blends
• The State of California is then responsible for producing these boutique blends from oil bought from the companies
• California will have to build refineries to produce the blends at (envirowacko) voter expense
• The price of gasoline will skyrocket in California, not only because of the added cost of producing envirowacko blends, but also because the government, and not the private sector, is producing them in that grossly inefficient, expensive way only government can

The advantages of this alternative are many. The first is fairness: you envirowackos want super expensive special blends, fine, but you pay for it, not me. The second is deregulation: the oil companies have less regulation to drive up costs, and we all win (except for the envirowacko voters). And the third is a great big cluebat for liberals: the envirowackos will howl and scream, and maybe, just maybe, they will see how their idiotic regulations drive up costs for the whole nation. And maybe, just maybe, they’ll reassess their ideas about how the market works.

Most advantageous of all, though, is that it would bankrupt any envirowacko state. That’s another great big heavy cluebat for liberals.

Back in Indiana, whenever it rains somebody inevitably says, “We needed the rain,” when 99% of the time, no, we did not need the rain. People will say that on the sixth day of rain. It’s amazing — sort of like, “it’s not the heat, it’s the humidity,” which anyone who has been to Arizona in the summer knows is utter crap, just a feeble attempt to make people feel better about icky weather.

Here is another story. At least when it comes to rain, because it doesn’t. They’ve already been talking about water rationing, and it’s the spring. I mean, if it doesn’t rain in the spring, it doesn’t period. And it doesn’t. Period. It’s rained once this spring — until now.

The rain — not what I think of as spring rain, but showers (spring rain is when it comes down so hard you have to pull over to the side of the road cause you can’t see) — started last night. Showers now. Showers all day. Showers tomorrow. Chance of showers all week, until Thursday. Thank God.

Yes, it’s cloudly and gloomy, but we really do need it. In places with normal weather, rain in the fall and winter beats down the summer’s growth and you can turn it over and plant. Here, last summer’s growth is dried and sort of petrified, and forget turning it under. If I’d known that, I would have pulled up all those black-eyed susans from the summer. Instead, I had to clip them last week. Forget the mower (I thought of that), because there’s a soaker hose.

I was talking to one of the neighbors, and she said you can water your garden, but people give you dirty looks if you water your lawn. Now I know why.

Speaking of, this means we’ll have to mow soon, but that’s okay, considering that we’ll probably need to mow twice all summer long. Crunch, crunch, crunch.

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If you can stomach it, hop on over to Dummycratic Underwear and check out this thread: Jane Fonda’s message to DU about how to stop the war. My favorite from the comments, referring of course to President Bush:

F*ckface is just F*ckface - a murderous, delusional, megalomaniacal monster - and needs to be introduced to the finer points of how the Khmer Rouge operated during what is known over there as the “American War” - summary execution.

Efficient. Gotta love them KR.

Insane.

First, our backporch:

Then, the front:

There was no lilac, so I took care of that:

Then flanking the porch in front of the front door: