around here

Things that have happened lately:

Brent got a big box of belated bday goodies from my Mom, and he was very very excited. It was full of nuts and stuff, plus bonus Bad Boys Bail Bonds lanyards, because, as Mom put it, "your Momma wants you home." (The county office building where she works is near the county courthouse and jail, so the Bad Boys Bail Bonds guys are always around, and that's their slogan. I think it's so funny.). Here's the excited belated bday boy:

This picture was being a pain and wouldn't go upright. But it looks kind of silly like this, and you get the idea.


Lots and lots of goodies!

This week, Brent is taking a class as part of the requirements to be certified in the 2nd Oracle level... it's one below Master, which just sounds cool. To prepare, he's been doing a lot of reading about Oracle database administration, so this is how he feels (but not really, because he always seems to want to read, so I think he's pretending not to like it so he'll seem less like a computer maniac, and more like a cool dude. Which of course he already is.):


We went for our weekly ride to the farmer's market on Saturday, but I had forgotten to take my allergy meds. My allergies haven't been too bad since we moved here, so I figured it wouldn't be a big deal. Boy was I wrong!! My eye watered so much that tears ran down my cheek during the entire ride, and by the time we got back, I was having to stop every so often to blow my leaky nose. I think the culprit was cottonwood, which is blooming ALL over, and sending cottonball looking balls blowing everywhere. It started doing its thing this weekend, which conveniently corresponded with the worst allergy attack I've had in years. A picture of the (alleged) culprit is below:


And finally, my patio plants are doing great! The tomatillo has produced tons of flowers that we picked off to hopefully help the plant to continue to grow big and strong, so that in the longrun we have lots of tomatillos. The bell pepper is bigger than it was, and I'm hoping that it will have a growth spurt soon. It's now bigger than a bell pepper, but it needs to be much bigger! My lettuce has gone crazy, and it's almost ready for me to start to pick and eat. There's enough for like 2 salads now, but I don't want to pick it too early, and I have plenty of farmer's market lettuce in the fridge. The cilantro and chives are also doing well in the lettuce bowl, though I may have to keep my eye out for the lettuce to keep it from taking over.

Bell pepper.


Tomatillo. Note the cottonwood pollen stuff in the pot with it. That stuff is everywhere!


Lettuce madness!