i overhead two people talking last weekend about how their lives had taken "wrong turns" and how "they'd been dealt a bad hand". Not wanting to interject reality — about how we're all responsible for our own lives and the courses they take — into their pathetic conversation, I kept quiet and listened to their self-serving diatribe. Only liberals and other scum whine, moan and berate other people for their own problems, never wanting to fully take responsibility for their actions, always looking to blame someone else for their problems. Most bad luck is self-made; rarely are others so dominant that they can overrule your wishes. There are exceptions, however when one is so rudderless, directionless and weak that others can unduly influence and inflict their will upon others. And there are more of those types around than I'd like to believe. One has to look no further than the seamy, criminal political arena to see the scum-de-la-scum operating in a vacuum, and out of our wallets. Truly, these lowlifes do have the power to change and influence all of our lives for the worse. No one should have that much power, according to the Founding Fathers' and The US Constitution. Isn't that how it's supposed to work? Around The Garden Center. The third evening was a charm: On Friday evening, Jeff and I got my condo's SAG Electronics 450 PII upgraded to a 700 PIII, with his "old processor" and a new motherboard. I'm sure his new bride, Denise, wasn't too happy about giving up her husband's time to another evening of my recalcitrant 'puter problems, but she was graceful, as always. After installing and rebooting, we reformatted and reloaded Win98. All email was gone for now. Jeeez, I hate TV. Also, an unexpected problem developed with the internal SCSI Zip Drive: the "click of death", an Iomega problem. I removed an external Zip unit from one of the office machines and took it home after work on Saturday, to get the final file transfers completed and apps installed. There's always a handy "workaround". Well, not always. At 2am Sunday, I gave up and couldn't get the external unit working either. By Sunday evening, I realized that the machine's internal ZIP had the better of me. I couldn't get the external Zip drive installed, even after "removing (the internal's) hardware" through the Control Panel. Once again, Jeff stopped by and disconnected the power supply to the dead internal Zip, rebooted and Win98 found and installed the external Zip. Good to go. I stayed up until 2:30am copying data files and installing apps. ZZZZZZZZZ. Gaaaaawd, the mercury almost hit 103° on both Saturday and Sunday. The humdidity was oppressive. Seems like all I and the Staff did was water, water, water, in between helping customers. I was soaked with sweat just from opening the retail complex buildings at 7am, on Saturday. By the 6pm closing, I'd been through three shirts and caps; all drenched. Sunday was worse than Saturday, as far as the heat and humdidity went. The East coast was bakin' and shakin'. The front counter cash register PII 233 computer went blank during a busy rush on Saturday, as apparently two video drivers were loaded upon Win95 start-up. Re-start in "safe mode", delete one driver, reboot. Back to "normal". I've gotta get Win98 running on that unit soon. Or, better yet, move the Dell 333 to the front counter, and get my General Manager, Lynn, a new unit. Drivers may be seething and chafing at gas price increases in the Midwest and Northern areas, but here in central Pennsylvania, we're paying almost as much as they are. At $1.61.9/ gal last weekend vs their $1.75.9/ gal, we're catching up quickly, since the new, so-called clean gas was introduced June 1st. I just filled up my Jeep Grand Cherokee V8 LTD: 19.2 gals cost $31.00 at the $1.62/ gal rate. Hell, a gallon of milk costs more than gas; so do many other liquid gallon entities in any supermarket, ie gallon of olive oil, cream, vinegar etc. No complaints from here, yet. On a sad note, the tiny two faced kitten died prematurely last Saturday, after only a few days of life. I was really pulling for this little guy, but I guess some things just aren't meant to be. He'd have been a freak on exhibit, with no chance of a normal life. I guess it's probably better this way; at least he'll have some peace and rest now. Most of the week was cool and rainy, giving the plant material and humans a break from the 95-100° heat of the previous week. The Left Coast baked in 100° heat, though, and it's moving this way. Severe drought is cropping upp across the US, and wildfires are going unchecked in the Midwest and Plains States. Wednesday was Jeff's 50th B-Day, so I invited he and his new bride, Denise, over to my condo for a 6-course meal, prepared by yours truly. As I started prep work ahead of their arrival, I noticed a borer (worm) in one of the asparagus stalks; promptly bagged it back up and planned to return it to the market from whence I purchased it. Then the elephant garlic bulbs broke apart as I was prepping them for roasting. shit; that did it. I made reservations at nearby Loreto's Italian Bistro in Columbia, PA, and we had a great dinner. I took Thursday off, slept in 'til 10am, and then headed out to do some shopping for a BBQ Grill. My family's old charcoal-powered Weber Kettle isn't really the safest to use anymore, since one of the tripod legs is about ready to fall off. I'm going to be taking it to a firm in New Cumberland, PA, which refurbishes any grill for $50 plus parts, someday soon. I also did some clothes and food shopping. Not exactly the height of fun, but a change from the 7 days a week I spend at the Garden Center & Nursery. I returned the "questionable asparagus" to the local supermarket, confronted the produce manager about it and he apologized, offered me a $100 gift certificate. I refused for myself, and asked that he give it to a less-than-fortunate elderly couple nearing the checkout lines. He did and they were most surprised and thankful that it was a "registering", in which they'd particiated. S/he did and each felt obligated to respond to the left tip. I left feeling better than I did when I arrived. Back to work today and the weekend; I gotta take 1-2 days off each month just to re-charge the (getting older) batteries. Clintonista Criminal Filth. Think everyone's too harsh on the Clinton First Bitch, Hitlery? Really?? Then read this pack of lies the First Bitch has again perpetrated upon America. Then get in line behind me with your rotten eggs and tomatoes; she's walking this way in the scumbagette parade. Another major national security breach allowed by the traitorous Clintonite slime. Hell, we might just as well have a f*cking garage sale and invite the Chi-comm chink filth over to buy the secrets outright! The hypocrisy is too much to near: here's Hitlery Clintonite talking about punishing rapists, stalkers and molesters with the "full force of the law", while her shit for brains hubby, The First Rapist In Chief has a long record of assaults and rapes and philandering. Hey, Hitlery Bitch, you have no room to speak about such things, moron. The lib-dem commie socialist scum Clintonistas are slowly beginning to take over local and state police departments as part of their communistic of The US Constitution and perverted conversion to The Third Way. Don't believe it? Read it here and weep. AlGoreBore the slum landlord, has finally been forced to fix one of the two stinking ratholes he "rents" out to basketcase, poor folks in Tennessee, living like serfs on the fringes of the GoreWhore property. In NYC and many other cities, slum landlords are arrested and properties confiscated. Equal justice for all? Hardly. The US apologize to blacks for 200 years of slavery? Bull-f*cking-shit. I'm just sorry those people ever came to the shores which has given them the best chance they'll ever have at living. Are reparations next? Huh, I don't f*cking think so. Look at the lies in this so-called news story: 20pt margin, when it's actually under 14pts. Bullshit and shit rife with lies to bolster and protect Bubba Jeff, the Liar, Rapist In Chief. f*ck ABCNews; they're lying garbage. Bed-wetting, hand-wringing, lib-dem filth are trying to enjoin the death penalty as a 2000 Campaign issue; Bush is smart to distance himself from that pathetic debate. Capitol punishment is a most fitting end to subhuman filth. Execute The Filth. I hate whining murderers and their lowlife sons of bitches who want them pardoned. White, black, brown, yellow, red or purple; the color is irrelevant. What matters is that they pay with their miserable lives for murdering another human being. Two pieces of bigoted, racist shit - Fat Al Sharpton and Movie-idiot Danny Lover — want a lowlife, subhuman murderer to be given a "conditional pardon"? Hey boys: f*ck both of you morons. The idiot fries for murder on June 22; I'll be dancing in the streets, along with the victim's family. Why is it that there are more blacks and hispanics in prison and on death row than whites? Here's why; an honest appraisal of the sentencing guidelines from a Texas psychologist. Nothing wrong with his logic. Fits perfectly. The Supremes really f*cked up by throwing out this murderous lowlife's death sentence; hell, he's had 30 appeals at Taxpayer's expense. He should die. The lib-dem, bed-wetters at the Chicago Tribune are trying to halt executions in Texas, where Dubya is leading the other pathetic, cowardly 49 states. There are 3,700+ murderous pieces of subhuman filth on death row who need execution for their crimes against humanity and society. Do it. Fry the filth! This is a load of bullshit; no innocents have ever been executed. The system works. This In-jun piece of shit murderer, Peltier should have been executed for murdering two FBI Agents in '75, and NOT given two life sentences. Hell, give me the opportunity to put a couple of bullets through the redskin's empty head. Bang-zoom Tonto dogf*cker! And now, the redskin scum is appealing to the Clintonista commie son of a bitch for leniency. What a perversion of Justice! The murder victim's family gets jailed for contempt and the murderer walks free. Read this for yourself and see if the hair on the back of your neck doesn't stand up. This kind of legal perversion infuriates me; the so-called moron judge should be disbarred and jailed. Thanks Texas, we knew you'd come through for death penalty rights. Murderers deserve to die, promptly, as did their victims. But we'll take what we can get, as long as they're dead. f*ck you, Glover racist bigot moron. The murderer's gonna die. Texas will exact Justice from that lowlife, subhuman piece of shit. Go make another low-grade movie, scumbag. What Tree Is It? An elegant and evergreen (no pun intended) tree finder designed for identifying the common trees of Ohio, the site includes many of the classic hardwoods of North America: ashes, birches, hickories, maples, and oaks. It also identifies the buckeye, the tree that gives Ohio its state nickname. If you know what the leaf or fruit of a tree looks like, simply click through the illustrated key to narrow your search and identify the tree. Excellent photos, easy instructions, and friendly pages from the Ohio Public Library Information Network and The Ohio Historical Society.