Around The Garden Center™.
Last Friday's thunderstorms and rain totalled >¼", according to my GC&N's rain gauge, and it was much appreciated. The humidity and heat were oppressive, for early-May, and felt more like July/August, IMO. Then, on Saturday evening, some heavy rain-producing T-storms moved through and we got a½, which was also very needed and appreciated. Yes, we're in another 'drought year'; the third-in-a-row, by my reckoning.
I'd planned to go over to Mom & Dad's, for Mother's Day, for Pot Pie and Crabcakes, but my lower back pain flared-up on Friday at work, and had gotten progressively-worse all weekend. By Sunday morning, I was in need of a heating pad/cold pak, a "real pain pill", instead of just aspirin, and some rest, so I didn't make it over. I needed to lie down and rest. I called her and wished her Happy Mother's Day and sent an "ecard". I then spent the rest of the day on the sofa with a heating pad, resting my back. I foresee another epidural shot, in my near future; it's almost a year since I had the last one, and the two which I've had over the past 3 years, have worked very well.
I now have 3-4 pairs of nesting Canadian Geese, with 4 recently-hatched, immature goslings in each pair of mating adults, nesting on the banks of my 150ft x 35ft run-off pond, on the southside of the GC&N Complex. That's a very, very rare and most unusual scenario, in that one pair of nesting adult geese will seek to totally-control the water source, at which they nest, bear, raise, teach and care for, their young brood. They're very "territorial", IIRC. The sharing of a pond, is most unusual. But on Saturday, I discovered 3-4 pairs, with young, there. I alerted numerous staff and customers to the fact, and they watched in complete amazement. Unfortunately, I didn't have my digital camera along, in the golf cart, and didn't shoot any pics. I just wished reknowned photographer, Sue Alden, had been there, with her *magic camera*, to record and capture this amazing event, BTW. Soon, after the goslings get their feathers, the adult geese will march them down my driveway, across the road, to a much larger pond, where they'll more fully-mature into flying geese, leave the nest and go on their own ways. Nature is truly amazing. And I felt very priviledged to see that Saturday spectacle, though sorry that I didn't digitally-record it. It was that rare of an occurrence. ((sigh)))
The York (PA) Gas prices, at the pump, have increased another 3¢ this week: Unleaded Regular is still at $2.99/gal; Unleaded Plus is at $3.11/gal, and Unleaded Premium is now at $3.31/gal. Kerosene (K-1) is now $2.79/gal, but Diesel is now at $2.89/gal. With the "Summer Driving Season" just around the corner, it's going to get even more expensive, really quick. Down near the Maryland Line, prices are another 7-8¢/gallon, higher, as of last week. Breaking the "$3/gal-for-regular barrier", is going to take some doing, on The Oil Companies' part, I'd bet.
It would appear that we're well into another drought situation, as we've had for the last 3-4 years. Meager Winter snowfall, hard, infrequent rains which merely run-off into streams and don't even increase the ground's moisture level, warm winds which quickly dry-out any moisture in the ground's top 1-2", and no relief in sight. The Midwest is dealing with floods, and we're very, very dry.
We're limping along with one partial landscape crew — I should have 3 full crews — and a partial landscape maintenance crew — I should have 2 full crews — so I'm hoping that our college Summer help will soon arrive, and fill-out another crew or two. The real dilemma is that we have *no leadership* for those crews, as we lost 2 seasoned crew chiefs last Fall, and another one this Spring. That all but makes it impossible to send out untrained people, to do work on our customers' residences, with ***real leadership***. I refuse to hire illegal alien Mexicans, as many/most of the other nursery operations in Pennsylvania and Maryland have done, and are doing. I see those illegals in the convenience stores, supermarkets, gas stations, driving their low-rider ghetto shitboxes around with music blaring, and none of them speak English. (Even though I voted for him twice, I blame GWB 100% for this, and fully-support his impeachment on that issue, alone.) This might be our worst year, in a very long time.
Tuesday was Primary Voting Day, the General Election in 2008, and as a newly-registered Independent Conservative — I quit the Republican Party almost 2 years ago — I was only allowed to vote on the Referendum Issue, called "Act 1". And the voters of York County rid themselves of the two scumbag County Commissioners — Lori Mitrick (Fascist GOPer) and Doug Kilgore (Fascist demokkkRAT) — who'd stolen a man's family farm property, Lauxmont Farms, under the socialist-commie guise of "eminent domain", which I'm vehemently opposed to allowing happen.
Wednesday was one of 'those days', which I loathe: 72°F at 6am, muggy, humid, no cooling wind to speak of, impending thunderstorms, and I just didn't feel like turning on the Office AC unit, since it's only mid-May. The T-storms arrived just after 2:30pm, and with 45-50mph winds and hail, created havoc. I'd already had thwe GC&N Staff shut-down the GH fans, button-up the GH doors, and close-down all GC&N Computers and electronics, and for their own safet, stay inside of the Main Retail Bldg, which is "grounded" against any lightening strike. During and after the T-storms, our temporary, Wild Blue Satellite dish was so slow, that I had to shut down Web access, and give up for the afternoon. I left at 4:45pm, in the hard-driving rain, and then the T-storms passed by, at 6:30pm. We got just under 1" of much-needed rainfall. Thankyousoverymuch!
Yes! "24" is back for two more seasons!
Gas prices, in Southern York County, have finally breached the $3.00/gal level. Gas prices, at the pump, have increased another 2¢ this week: Unleaded Regular is now at $3.02/gal; Unleaded Plus is at $3.12/gal, and Unleaded Premium is now at $3.32/gal. Kerosene (K-1) is at $2.89/gal, and Diesel Fuel is now at $2.99/gal. With the "Summer Driving Season" almost here, it's going to get much more expensive, really quickly. How close we come to $4.00/gal gas, remains to be seen. (((sigh)))
By Thursday, daytime temps were back in the mid-60s range, and all was right with The World, once again. It was 49°F when I left for work, instead of 72°F, and I wore a light jacket. Mmmmmm, nice. And back into the mid-60s, during the day. The 80s is just too damned hot, for mid-May.
Though it'll be a while yet, until many of these local fresh fruits come on to the market at the local orchards, there are plenty in the stores to enjoy. Caution: do not buy anything from Mexico. Check the 'label of origin', carefully. And thoroughly wash everything before you eat it, as you never know what illegal aliens in California have pissed/shit on "soiled" the fruit, before you get it. If they used "dirty, filthy water" to irrigate those crops, then the deadly bacteria is inside the fruit, and you'll get very sick if you eat it. Too bad there aren't small, hand-held "bacteria scanners" to check for potentially-deadly salmonella, ecoli etc germs. I smell everything after washing and before eating the fruits. If it smells bad, it goes back to the store. No exceptions.

Things Which Make Your Head Explode™.
To allow subhuman, murderous, lowlife, dirtbag muslim-islamic-Nigga^® filth, who are criminal garbage, heavily-armed and threatening violence against America, to live in a 70ac "islamberg" compound, in upper NY State, is freaking insanity. The Feds should do what they did to the White, Christian Branch Davidians: KILL THEM! Calling Bubba Jeffy Clinton and Janet 'Bull Dyke' Reno!
There are thousands of these "homegrown terrorist cells" already here in America, and the impotent US Homeland Security Dept isn't able to track them down, arrest and either try or execute them. IMO, they all need killing, and not trial and detention.
Awwwwww, boo-fricking-hoo, muslim filth! Go back to your turd-world hellholes!
Not content to sell-out America's border sovereignty with Mexico, President Bush is now going to sign LOST (Law Of the Sea Treaty), which will have supranational institutions (UN, etc) govern world affairs, circumscribing the freedom of action and undermining the sovereignty of the American people and those of other freedom-loving nations. I hate to say it, but GWB is a traitor to America, like his father and Clinton were/are, and his true seditionist/saboteur colors are showing. I truly regret voting 2x for him.
"Shape and size", does matter. Huh? USPS stamp prices went up another 2¢ on Monday, from 39¢ to 41¢, and the new stamps are called "Forever Stamps", which supposedly will remain valid at 41¢, forever. Bullshit. The incompetent, corrupt, badly-run USPS, by the idiot "Postmaster General", John Potter, will have many, many more price increases in the coming years, and the so-called "Forever Stamps" will once-again, be augmented by additional 1¢-2¢-3¢ stamps, to compensate for their governmental stupidity and business ineptness. He should have been fired years ago, for blatant, glaring incompetence, and he would have, if he had to exist in the "Real World" of American Business. The USPS is a freaking joke, IMO.
The Hershey Company is cutting more jobs, this time in Lancaster County. Hershey is eliminating 80 to 100 positions at Y and S Candies Co. The plant, which has 520 workers, manufactures Twizzlers licorice. The shitheads at Hershey, are sending the jobs to Mexico and other turd-world hellholes, to cut costs and boost profits. Although I will miss their chocolate products terribly, I will never buy another. Never. Here's what they've done to pennsylvania and America, so far: here's a rundown of the other cuts already decided: 600 to 650 jobs will be lost at the two Derry Township (PA) plants; 250 jobs will be lost at Reese's Derry Township plant; the Ottawa, Canada, plant will lose 500 jobs; 200 jobs will be lost in Reading's (PA) plant; 200 jobs will be cut at the Naugatuck, CT plant, however most are expected to be transferred to another plant in Virginia; 575 jobs will be lost at the Oakdale, California plant. F*ck Hershey!
The headline hit me in the face, like a clenched fist: "GOP hopefuls keep distance on immigration". All of them are gutless, spineless, cowardly assholes, afraid to do what's right and what needs to be done, to get the 25-30 million criminal, illegal alien filth out of America!
No, I didn't watch the so-called "GOPer-RINO Debates", on Tuesday evening, but when I heard that asshole Ron Paul (Rep-TX) say, to the effect, that "we got what we deserved on 9-11 for bombing Iraq for all those years", I about punched-out the computer screen. Paul's a lowlife dirtbag, for denigrating Our US Military. But he's 100% correct, in saying that America shouldn't bde doing the corruopt, criminal UN's 'work', and that if America's going to war, we should take the proper Constitution Steps. Declare war, go into that country, kill them and bring them to their knees, make them completely surrender, and leave victorious. No peace-keeping and nation-building. Dammit! We had Afghanistan defeated in a 8-10 weeks (the USSR got their asses kicked for 8yrs); Iraq in 2-3 weeks (but the "pacification and nation-building" with those muslim-islamist-arab filth, will go on for 1,000 years), and we should have already wiped-out Syria, Iran, North Korea, and been back home, repainting the tanks and ships, for China's total and complete destruction, IMO.
A $2.9 trillion budget? What are those 535 criminal, corrupt Members of The US Congress, thinking, anyway? We should be "getting smaller, not bigger", dammit!
RIP, Heroic, Brave, US Military... And Hoooooooooo-Raaaaaaaaaaaaah, Ft Drum Soldiers!
Sooooooooo, herpes has an upside? Like anyone should trust the liberal-biased media, who want "anything goes; do it in the road" for future American Children, inculcated against America. No, I don't have Herpes Simplex-1, or Herpes Complex-2, but am intrigued by "anti-body implications, without the disease indications". Great R&D, IMO
RIP, Bo Diddley.

The Great Global Warming Scam™.
If you want ***The Truth About Global Warming***, watch this 1hr:16min film by the BBC — The Great Global Warming Swindle — about what's really happening. The leftist, socialist-commie, verminous cowards at YouTube, have banned the film. I have it on DVD, and will upload it to my corporate server, for all to see, when Google drops it, due to pressure from the wacko, leftist, subhuman, fascist, socialist, commie, enviro-filth. I won't allow this truth to die or disappear. Watch all these videos, dammit.
As cities all over the world consider how to address climate change, a global summit of leftist, socialist, commie, wacko "leaders" including failed, disgraced lowlife dirtbags, impeached, ex-president Bubba Jeffy Clinton and New York Mayor Asshole Mikey Bloomberg, will convene this week to trade false ideas, dogma and lies.
A former chief of the UN World Health Organization who also is a former prime minister of Norway and a medical doctor has declared an end to the climate-change debate. Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland, one of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's three new special envoys on climate change, also headed up the 1987 UN World Commission on Environment and Development where the concept of sustainable development was first floated. Total, complete and absolute BULLSHIT! IMO, it's just getting statred. Watch this refutation of their lies.
Carbon taxes? A consumption tax on the use of carbon dioxide, is about to impact the malleable canadians, and will probably be forced upon Americans, soon afterward.
Carbon offsets? Just more lies, bullshit, and scams to generate money for the leftist, socialist-commie wackos, perpetrating this "Kyoto scam", on the world's economies.
Hmmmmmmmmmm, only "5 years left to save the Planet"? What freaking BULLSHIT, IMO! These scientific Skeptics, don't think so, you mentally-ill, al-Goron asshole scammers and liars!

Lowlife, Subhuman Filth™.
Theresa Sparks, 58, a lowlife, subhuman piece-of-dirtbag-shit, who used to be a man and went from riches (traveling in a corporate jet) to rags (driving a taxi and sleeping on friends' couches) to prominence again by becoming a pioneering transgender activist and the chief executive officer of a multimillion-dollar sex-toy company, needs a heart attack, stroke or cancer, to rid the world of such filth/garbage/trash/scum. This is the sodom-gomorrah, turd-world hellhole of San Fran-Sicko, which I truly hope the murderous, subhuman muslim-islamist-arab terrorists, hit with a nuclear weapon, after my Sister leaves, and completely destroy. We can rebuild it in 35-50 years.

Some People Just Need Killing™.
Richard Steve Goldberg, a serial child molester, needs killing, ASAP, right after trial and conviction. No appeals. Kill him!
Traitor, seditionist and saboteur, v, needs killing, NOW! Jurors on Thursday, convicted a Chinese-born engineer of conspiring to export US defense technology to China, including data on an electronic propulsion system that could make submarines virtually undetectable. Chi Mak also was found guilty of being an unregistered foreign agent, attempting to violate export control laws and making false statements to the FBI. Prosecutors had dropped a charge of actually exporting defense articles. get all this chink/gook/dink/slope filth out of the US Defense Industry, and summarily execute anyone convicted of treason, IMO, dammit!
A cousin of skiing star alcoholic/drug-addict, lowlife, whining dirtbag, Bode Miller, fatally shot and ran over a police officer, then was killed by a passer-by who grabbed the officer's gun. Liko Kenney shot Cpl Bruce McKay four times and ran over him after a traffic stop Friday evening, state Attorney General Kelly Ayotte said. Gregory Floyd, who was driving by with his son, grabbed McKay's gun and shot Kenney when he refused to put his gun down, Ayotte said. Mr Floyd should get a medal, for killing the subhuman Kenney garbage, IMO!
Piece-of-lowlife-subhuman-shit, nobody, never-was, nothing, asshole, alcoholic, drug-addict, murderer, Phil Spector, should be sent to prison, gang-raped nightly, by the GP (general population), and either beaten to death, or executed, ala Jeffrey Dahmer. IMO. He's subhuman and richly deserves death. Die, asshole!
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: the subhuman, lowlife filth from the "Critical Mass" biker homo-sodomite-faggot punks, should be duly-charged, arrested, tried, convicted, sentenced to death, and promptly executed, IMO. I'd happily volunteer to headshoot each and everyone of the libera-demokkkRAT garbage/shit/trash/filth/scum assholes. The fact that the homo-sodomite-faggotfilth in San Fran-sicko tolerate and encourage such subhumans, is reason enough to nuke and obliterate that shithole city, a once-beautiful and proud city, which is now a sewer and needs to be 'flushed' of all living things, and re-populated, IMO.
Kill this Hilton lowlife, subhuman, bitch filth, IMO. Remove the skank, whorefilth, dirtbag from America's Society, IMO.

BibliOdyssey
Though Paul, the curator of this fantastical website, claims that he's "not a mysterious persona by intent," his site brims with baffling images and mesmerizing, inexplicable creatures. ("If it looks like I know anything then the mirrors are working.") In weekly or semi-weekly dispatches, this Aussie persona posts etchings, illustrations, posters, and other "visual materia obscura" from around the globe and across time. Machines brush up against monsters. Sartorial skeletons from one century pass Polish children's illustrations from another. A Russian illustrator indulges in "retro fantasy folk whimsy." Winged humans swoop overhead; rare Japanese medical texts sit in wonder; "zoomorphic" Sudanese calligraphy romps past. Elephants and tigers and bears; oh my! The Web is rich in snarky celebrity gossip and fast-breaking news, but a visit to Paul's cabinet of curiosities leaves me satisfied and enthralled. The mirrors are definitely working.