I'm officially putting mosquitoes on notice

To all the mosquitoes out there, I'm officially putting you on notice. I came across an article several months ago that caught my attention. I was glad to see that Rocket Scientists are finally making a positive contribution to society. The article, "Rocket Scientists Shoot Down Mosquitoes With Lasers," states that, "In a lab in this Seattle suburb, researchers in long white coats recently stood watching a small glass box of bugs. Every few seconds, a contraption 100 feet away shot a beam that hit the buzzing mosquitoes, one by one, with a spot of red light." That pleases me to no end and I applaud their efforts.

You may be wondering why I glory in the destruction of mosquitoes or you may be thinking that mosquitoes serve a purpose of some sort, like feeding birds. But I, for one, have had it!!! Either the birds are not doing their job or we have a serious surplus of mosquitoes out here. On multiple occasions I have ventured outside for 5 or 10 minutes only to find that I have anywhere from 5 to 10 mosquito bites. These bites will often swell up to be the size of nickles and will itch for about a week. To date, I have not found an ointment, cream or remedy that seems to rid me of the incessant itching!! I hasten to add that Andy is practically immune to mosquitoes. They just don't like him...I'm so jealous!! I'm seriously considering creating a living will for the sole purpose of leaving my net worth (as paltry as it may be) to those Rocket Scientists in Bellevue.

The final straw was last Friday. After work, I decided to go outside and get a jump start on weeding the last portion of our garden so we could get our watermelons planted. I knew I would be out there for a while so I  wore long pants and sprayed Cutter all over my exposed face, neck and arms. After about 45 minutes of weeding, I noticed that my butt started to itch.  I thought maybe the cedar mulch we had put down was causing an allergic reaction of some sort (I am mildly allergic to red cedar). Then I noticed a few mosquitoes buzzing around, but not landing on, my arms. "Oh heck no!" I thought. I went inside only to discover that, sure enough, I had 6 huge mosquito bites ON MY TUSH!!!! Those nasty creatures bit me through TWO layers of clothes!!! Is there a worse place to have a mosquito bite?!?!?! Maybe up your nose, but that's highly unlikely....I hope. The bites swelled up to the size of quarters--or larger! It was like I suddenly had cellulite. The only thing I'm grateful for is that the bites have not lasted as long as they normally do. After a couple days of itching, I am now itch free.

So this is why I am putting mosquitoes on notice and why I laud the efforts of any scientist who dedicates their life to the highest of causes--killing mosquitoes with lasers. They deserve nothing less. 

My Piece of Resistance

I think that phrase sounds better in French. Oh well. I got a piece back from the kiln last night and I'm very happy with the way it turned out. I think it's my best 'donut' yet. In fact, I'm thinking about entering it in a local art competition. I figure that it is different enough that it might have a chance. I guess we'll find out. 

Feeling Afflicted and Tormented

I've been feeling afflicted and tormented by weeds lately. Over the course of a couple months, we have been trying to get our garden and various other areas in our yard cleaned up and ready to plant seeds. It's a lot of hard work, and I wish I could say that we're almost done, but something tells me that planting a garden is only the beginning of pulling even more weeds.

Here's an example of how pervasive the weeds out here are. We have an electrical outlet near our garden (which doesn't seem to work) and with the way the weeds have taken over, it looked like it could be its own little biosphere up in there. When we were in NY, Andy's friend's friends mentioned that they had been invited to so-and-so's house for a "Garden Party". Meaning that they were going to plant a few window boxes etc. on someone's roof or balcony. I had to laugh. If gardening is that much of a novelty, I should just invite all my city-slicker friends to come out for a fun and exciting weekend of pulling weeds and then laugh when they discover the turmoil of weeds that just grow right back or having sore hamstrings from bending over for hours at a time. 

Anyway...here's a patch of weeds just outside our back porch before I attacked it:

Here's how our garden looked about a month or so ago. Some of the weeds were taller than me. It took 

several weeks of work to get it in better shape. I fully realize that thorns...briars...noxious weeds etc. were all placed on earth to afflict and torment man, but why must weeds be so perfect in fulfilling their divine purpose?? It would be nice for weeds to occasionally decide to NOT grow in garden beds. I'm just saying. 

Here's what things are looking like now. Here's the patch (pictured above) now. I planted come Calla Lillies and I'm a little unsure if they will survive through the winter, but at least they look good now. 

A lady I visit teach (and who happens to be a Master Gardner) gave me a bunch of cuttings of iris and other plants, so I fixed up the area outside our bedroom window. I'm hoping that by next year they will have grown in a bit more and I will be able to have a variety of fresh-cut flowers in some of the pots I make in ceramics class.

Our garden, which has been a nightmare of sorts is finally starting to look like it has potential. We have been more than a little discouraged with how well the weeds seem to grow out there, but hopefully that just means that our vegetables will have no choice but to thrive. After spending several weekends weeding and turning the soil, this is what it looked like a couple weeks ago:

This is what it looks like now that we've planted a few seedlings, lain down a weed-growth inhibitor and have put mulch around the walkway. We already have rosemary growing and have planted our beans, tomatoes, carrots and green onions. I hope those things grow well next to eachother. If not, we're toast!!

I'm also hoping that our dwarf fruit trees start making some serious headway. They have leaves, but I wonder when we'll actually start seeing some apples, peaches and pears. The fig tree we planted last year seems to be doing well. No figs yet, but I'm looking forward to them already. 

I now understand why some people have full-time gardners. It's a lot of work!!

The Big Apple

Over the long Easter weekend, Andy and I went to New York for a little vacation and to see some family and friends who live there. I'm only now getting around to posting about it because it seems like April has absolutely FLOWN by! We had a great time, but wished that the weather had been better. It was wet, cold, windy and rainy for most of the weekend.

We arrived early Friday morning and went to the Manhattan temple to do a session. We then stopped by a vendor and got me a New York hot dog. Mmmmm sauerkraut. We then went to the Natural History Museum and walked through Central Park to get to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Natural History Museum has not changed much over the last 20-30 years--not that I would know from having been there 20-30 years ago, but because most of the displays just looked OLD. I was pretty bothered by how much dust was on everything. I guess only the special exhibits get any attention. 

The Met, however, is very well maintained and has a wonderful collection of paintings and sculptures. We met up with Andy's friend Vanya and went to dinner with her, Ryan and a bunch of his friends. 

On Saturday, Andy's friend, Ryan took us around to go sightseeing. We had a great time, but it was really cold and wet. I, for one, was ill prepared for how cold it was. Regardless, we were able to see everything we wanted to see. I got to see the New York Stock Exchange and the bull statue (I aksed him nicely if he would please come back). So I think I am responsible for the rally we've had in April. 

We went to the "Seinfeld Diner", Tom's Restaurant (below) for lunch. 

We also went to the "Top of the Rock" (Rockefeller) so we could look out and see all of New York. It sure is a concrete jungle. 

We had dinner with Debbie (Andy's cousin), Jared, Kiasa (my roommate from BYU), Brian and their daughter Isabella. One of the nice things about New York is that just about every restaurant has fantastic food. Even the vendors are not too shabby. We had Indian food then rushed off to see a Broadway play; West Side Story. My siblings are probably all thinking, "Don't. You. Touch. Him!!!" right about now. 

After the musical, we took a quick look around Times Square and headed to my friend Kiasa's house. On Easter morning, she made some amazing waffles with blueberries etc. and we went to church with them in Harlem. The building is really cool (about 4 stories) and is relatively new.  

On Sunday afternoon, we went to the Cloisters (a museum of sorts)--which was very beautiful. The architecture was very interesting and I was quite taken by all the doors. They had some carved and wrought-iron doors as well as other artifacts. 

We then went over to Jared and Debbie's house and they prepared a WONDERFUL Easter dinner. Mmmm. Not only did it taste good, but it looked fabulous too! We had to wake up the next morning at like 4am to get to the airport. We had  a wonderful time and are so thankful to all of our friends and family who made the trip so great.