Another Ringy Dingy...Flower And Veggies...

My hens and chicks and other succulents came out strong and happy to show their colors, oh joy, oh joy. Spring is coming.

Let's burst out with all our blooms to celebrate!












Let's throw out beautiful color to welcome spring...











Fifty one days later. I've never lost hens and chicks to heat and am praying that these are not truly gone but will come back next spring.


















They look like someone tried to blowtorch them... and I guess in a sense that was true.












Sunflower turning it's face up toward the sun, celebrating...















Now... they can't even hold their heads up...















Ah, beautiful lantana. So bright and vibrant in it's color.
















This plant has thrived! It has at least doubled in size and has been blooming it's branches off.














The yellow and white lantana and the beautiful blue plumbago that so delighted me with the colors looking so good together...











These also have loved the heat. I wasn't too surprised about the lantana but the plumbago did surprise me. It looks so delicate but it must be tough as iron to have survived the heat.

I'll be getting more of both those plants next year just in case we have another hot one... but I'm praying that we don't have to go through another summer like this one in my lifetime.

I've shared with you now some of the good, the bad and the ugly. I hope your summer wasn't as tough on your garden as it was on ours. The weather forecasters think we here in Oklahoma will hit the 50 days over 100 degrees F. by Saturday, but having had a break with several rounds of storms will make the rest of the summer bearable.

Ask Not For Whom The Bells Toll...

Just be glad it's not for you or me... July, 2011, saw records being broken for heat all over the country and Oklahoma won with the hottest average for the month EVER recorded in the United States. It is a record that I just as soon would not have been smack dab in the middle of and watching my garden being roasted. My good day cucumbers that started out so well are DED dead...

Before... I was having fun hunting the little baby cukes getting their start towards growing to make my day, my salads day. At about the 2oth straight 100 degree F. day Norman was put on water rationing and we were cut to even day watering and the soaker hoses and sprinklers could only be run on our day before 9 a.m. and after 6 p.m. so I did a lot of evening watering.





This picture I took today... just 51 days later. The good day cucumbers, besides trying to survive the heat, were defeated by a cut in the hose that I didn't find for four days. I had been fussed at to stay in out of the heat with all the medical crap that I had going on. I would go turn on the water to the soaker hose that I had run under some hedges, the sunflowers and the good day and bad day cucumbers. When things started looking not so good I got out and investigated and found the leak in the hose. Very little water made it to the plants for six days.


The bad day cucumbers getting their start. I have had a lot of fun doing the planting by the signs that Tipper over at Blind Pig And The Acorn started three years ago. I've always worked hard trying to insure that both groups got the same treatment, both in watering and keeping weeds and grass from taking nutrients from the plants so between the heat and me not checking the plants closer and not finding the hose problem really made me feel bad because both groups didn't get the same fair shake.


This picture I took today. These plants have survived, but barely. The break in the hose was further away and so these plants got their fair share of water. I found two cucumbers when I was looking at the plants today when I was out taking photos. I will probably say something on down the line about the cucumbers but this will be my last 'official' farm report because of the demise of the good day plants.

I was going to show you the flowers and how they are doing but I think I will make that my next post. I want to do some comparison photos for them also so I will work on that because I really do want to share with you all and help you see how decimating the heat was not only on the veggies but on the flowers. These posts will be somewhat depressing but I'm also trying to explore the optimism that all who love to garden must find to keep on keeping on with what we love to do when weather extremes mess with us...

Does that sound grandiose???

It's Not The "C" Word...

I'm not sure what it is but it's not cancer. The name of the diagnosis of the liver biopsy is as follows:

LIVER BIOPSIES: Changes suspicious for autoimmune cholangitis

Big words for a little lady... I've asked for the medico types in my family to share with me what the hell this is in layman's terms and when I get it I will share with you. Best I could understand from my doctor was that it is somewhat rare and is inflammation of the bile ducts. The doctor doesn't know what causes the change in the liver or if it can ever be cured or just managed but for the next 30 days I will be on 20mgs. of Prednisone and then he will put me on a prescription that he indicated I would probably have to take until Jesus comes home... And you all know just how much I love to take drugs with no ending. However if it makes me feel more like my old self I will gladly take it.

My hip is still doing good after the last injection and now I know my liver hasn't rotted away and is something I can live with maybe the medicine I'll be taking will help get me back somewhere in the vicinity of feeling human again.

Pardon me while I wipe my brow and say"Phew! Thank you, Lord!" Now maybe I can shed the stress that has had me tied in knots, making me hurt and only want to sleep.

I've got to get out and take photos for the final farm report so I'll be back in a day or two. If I get my layman's interpretation of autoimmune cholangitis I'll share it with you.

The Debate Continues...

Whoda thunk that grannie panties and Daisy Dukes would get such a discussion going? The reason for me breaking down and buying grannies is that when you get older and have a tendency to, well, ummm, how do I say this graciously... to leak a bit if you laugh, sneeze, cough and various other reasons... I just couldn't get myself to go commando. My bikinis that I have worn for years rode my hip in just the wrong place and were aggravating my aching hip. I fought it as long as I could stand but finally had to bite the bullet and buy the grannies. I can tell you that if you hurt bad enough you will do what is necessary to ease the pain.

It is true that I didn't have panty lines when I wore my DDs however... DDs tend to ride low on one's hips and unless you wear a t-shirt or blouse over them... the grannies show above the waist band of the DDs making me feel that I looked more like Erkel than just an aging Daisy Duke wannabe. Of course the t-shirts also cover the, ahem, muffin top around the top of the waist band or the love handles that also hang over the sides. I have never had to worry about my gams... I got someone else's legs. My brother has called them chicken bird legs among other things. Just being raised in a climate where shorts are more of a necessity as opposed to a luxury in the summertime I have all my life worn shorts and never paid much attention to how I looked in them until the GPs (Grannie pants so I don't have to keep spelling it out) problem. And to be real honest with y'all I mostly wore my DDs around the house and in the garden... not like going to the Golden Corral for the all you can eat buffet, although I have worn them to Lowe's to pick up paint or to visit the garden center and maybe to run to the WalMart for something I needed for right then, not for the whole food shopping thing. I didn't want to be in WallyWorld too long in case someone had the camera out looking for another one of our much loved WalMart shopper photos. And I must say even in my DDs I was dressed better than a lot of folks I saw doing their shopping... just sayin'.

I'll try to do some further clarification on this subject in another post. Just wanted to let you know that I'm enjoying all the chatter on this DD and GP subject. Goodnight and sleep tight... in grannies or whatever...

DumDumDaDumDumDaDaDumDumDaDum...

This is a post that hurts my heart to write... It is an end of an era. It is an admission that I never thought I would have to make. As we grow older we have these revelations smack us upside the head, things we never thought would be revealed to us in our lifetimes. The layers of innocence that have been peeled away from me over the years have not prepared me for this last layer of innocence to be ripped from my very innards.

All my life I have been a people watcher. I've learned many valuable lessons from watching people and the most valuable lesson that I learned was that I didn't plan or wish to get old like a lot of the people I knew... I would see them in their old people clothes and make sure that I didn't shop in the matron areas of different department stores... I wouldn't be caught dead in those areas. I didn't feel old so therefore I refuse to dress old.





Now comes the end of an era... at least part of an era...








R.
I.
P.

M
y

D
a
i
s
e
y


D
u
k
e
s





They don't look like much laid out here on the bed but when I slipped them on and rolled up the frayed bottom into cuff, an attitude just automatically came over my body.

I was ready for anything and I was sassy enough to get whatever I put them on to do was gonna get done with FLAIR, baby. With pizazz!!!

There was just something for me about my Dukes. For one thing, not many people my age had the confidence, the balls to wear them. I thought nothing about it. I had my projects that I like to wear them for mostly as you can tell for painting jobs around the house.

Then the revelation... and realization. Somehow for me...Daisey Dukes and granny panties just don't jive. It is a totally incongruous juxtaposition in my mind, a total oxymoron and I just can't get my mind past it.

So it is with deep sadness that I'm putting my Dukes away... I can't just pitch them yet. They will go deep in the drawer to R.I.P. until I can either get rid of them or use them in some sort of craft thing or maybe just to stay there until I go up in the sky and they will be someone else's problem...

Damn It's Hot!

Y'all are probably real tired of this heat song and dance... We were cooler today than yesterday however, 103 as opposed to 107 yesterday. All temps you read here are Fahrenheit because I was a generation late to learn Celsius as well as Fahrenheit and too damn lazy to remember the conversion ratio. All I know is the heat is wiping out our garden.

We are on water rationing and can only water every other day except on Wednesday and Thursday then no one is to water on those days. We can run the sprinklers on our day until 9 a.m. and after 6 p.m. We can hand water on any day if you can stand to stay out and water long enough to do some good. I got up yesterday at 7 a.m. to let the girls out and stayed up and watered and even did some weed eating around the fence and the trailer. I just am about to get on my own last nerve with being cooped up between the heat and the feeling lousy so I just said to heck with it and way overdid yesterday. I am paying for it today but the good news is that I think they finally got the injection in the right spot in my hip as I've been able to get up without the quick hitch of pain and trying to get straightened up to walk without looking like Grandpa McCoy... It is so nice to move without pain grabbing me.

So this is my basic report for today. It is also nice to WANT to sit down and drop you all a note so that is a good sign. Of what I'm not sure other than it is nice to want to do something.

Oh yes, I wanted to tell you that the cucumber that had hidden from me long enough to take on the reddish hue, for those of you that wanted to know, it had taken on a bit of a bitter, strong taste so it didn't make it into a salad.

You all try to stay cool... or stay warm for you all that are down under. Catch you next post!

Good News, Bad News...

Today was the day I went to see the orthopedist for the results of my MRI. The good news is that there is NOT a tear in the cartilage like the nurse told me. I have a cyst. I was surprised by that and didn't think to ask how big the cyst was and was it in the cartilage. I have to assume that it was not at all big because he didn't say we need to get it out of there. He said we could try another injection or he could order an abdominal/pelvic cat scan to try to get a different look at the area to see if there was something else he wasn't seeing. I told him that they had done that test when they were first trying to figure out what caused the liver readings to go up. Since it was done at Norman Regional Hospital he said he could get those and go over them.

I told him that my GI had ordered a liver biopsy because, while two of the enzymes or whatever they are called had headed back down, the one the GI was concerned the most about had gone up some more. I told him that the GI had said this particular enzyme could be elevated by a problem in either the liver or bone and he said the name right off the bat. And naturally since I didn't write it down I can't remember what he called it but he is going to look at the lab results also. What we decided to do was inject me again because they obviously missed the hot spot the first time and I'm to call him after I get the liver biopsy results to remind him to pull those up and see if they might give him a clue as to whether or not it might be bone/hip related.

I told him that we needed to figure out something because I had to go buy me some granny panties because where my bikinis like I prefer to wear rode in the area of the hot spot and would often make the pain worse and I was too young to be having to wear granny panties. He and his PA that was in the room getting the shot drawn up both cracked up and she allowed as how she hadn't heard that term in a long time. You know me, when I'm fretting about something I have to pop a funny.

So not having a tear is good news but the bad news is I don't have a tear and don't know yet what is causing the pain so it is more hurry up and wait for the liver test results. So that is what we are gonna do. I told Carol that I've about had it with all this crap. I've been very cautious about how I walk, not carrying heavier stuff, not digging in the garden and I'm about to say screw it. If I'm hurting I might as well carry on with my life and do some of the things I haven't been doing but have been wanting to do. If I hurt, I hurt. If I hurt too bad I'll take pain drugs but I hate feeling useless and not making my keep around here.

So I'm putting all this on the back burner of my mind and all I'm going to worry about now is whether or not I'm gonna get my social security check next month. In fact I think, just for the hell of it, I'll blame all this crap on the politicians. After all they are the ones stressing me out now...

I'll keep you posted on it all.