Official NaBloPoMo Boycott

I didn’t post here during the month of November.  That was on purpose.

For the 2 years before this one I watched as blogs around the world participated in NaBloPoMo, National Blog Posting Month. I guess the idea is to post at least one entry every day in November. It gets you in the habit of daily blog posting, drives traffic to your site through cross-linking, and gets you entered to win prizes.

For the last 2 years I had a guilty knee-jerk reaction. “Yeah,” I said, “why don’t I post every day? I must be a really sucky blogger.” Then I felt like I wasn’t doing my job as a blogger very well. Last year I even considered giving NaBloPoMo a try for a year.

But by the beginning of November 2009 enough time had passed that instead of feeling guilty I was just determined. I won’t let some event, some group of folks, make me feel like I am doing something wrong. If I’m not in the mood to blog during November, I won’t. I need a rest from this garden (and I haven’t even finished cleaning it up yet!)  In fact, I pledge to purposefully NOT post anything this November.

And I didn’t.

If you participated in NaBloPoMo this November, last November, in ‘07, or all of the above…I truly hope that it made you feel better about the whole thing. I hope that making sure you had a post ready for every day didn’t stress you out or wear you thin during a busy month. I pray that it improved things for you. Because that seems to be the intent of the program.

For me, I did have a restful November. Now I’m ready to get back at it! I’ll be starting indoor winter lettuce and herbs within the next week or two.

Can I ever go back?

Today’s post is a piece written by Farmer’s Daughter, republished here with her permission.  I have been feeling exactly the same way for a couple years now.

Posted on September 19, 2009 by Farmer’s Daughter

Walking around the fair today, I was repeatedly reminded of my eco-conscience.

I drank bottled water and wished I had thought to bring my reusable stainless steel bottle.  I didn’t want to use the plastic, but it was hot and I was thirsty.  Plus I’m still trying to skip HFCS (that’s another story), so I didn’t want to get a soda in a paper cup.  I was happy at least that recycling was easy.

I spotted all the litter on the ground and wanted to pick it up (but of course I didn’t).  I wondered how much litter and trash would be generated by the end of the fair and where it would go.

I watched the tractor pull and thought about carbon emissions.  I thought about how much energy went into pulling that sled of weights back and forth.  But I was still proud of my brother for pulling about 8,000lbs with his tractor.

I pondered, while skipping the line to the ladies’ room and heading to the portapotty, which is better for the environment? The portapotty uses less water but more chemicals, so I couldn’t decide which was better, but there wasn’t a line there.  I worried about creating a super-bug as I used the hand sanitizer, but didn’t want to skip it either.

I browsed through dresses at a vendor’s tent and commented that they’re probably made in sweatshops.  How else could they be so cheap?

I watched the horse pull and felt bad for the jumpy horses, getting yelled at and slapped on the butt.  My dad has always said that competitive pulling is cruel to the horses and I would tend to agree, but I still like to watch for a little while and check out the pretty animals.

I saw a lot of parents smoking around their kids and wondered what they were thinking.  It’s not BPA people, it’s not debatable or new science.  Cigarettes kill.

I looked at agricultural exhibits, animals, food preservation, crafts, photography, and the baking competition.  This glimpse of a simpler way of life was juxtaposed with the midway’s spinning rides and shouting carnies.  I wish the midway wasn’t there, but felt a sadness knowing that most people wouldn’t go if there weren’t rides and cheap prizes to win.

When I got home, I couldn’t help but wonder if I could ever go back.  Go back to the way things used to be, when I could enjoy an event without the stream of eco-consciousness running through the back of my mind.  Although I didn’t make all of the best eco-choices while I was there, I was keenly aware of what I was choosing to do: throw out paper plates and napkins, recycle water bottles, and take breaths of second-hand smoke simply because I couldn’t get away from it.

I realize of course that I can never go back.  I can never un-learn what I know about the environment and how my everyday actions impact the earth.  With that knowledge comes a responsibility to act, to make good choices.  And I feel like I do make good choices most of the time, but I need to accept that I can’t choose the best option all of the time and I can’t be so hard on myself, or on others.

Please direct all your comments to the original post written by Farmer’s Daughter.

Pole bean reseeding itself

Pole bean reseeding

One bunch of pole beans at the community garden weighed down their corn stalk poles so much that they bent over and touched the ground. They got moist enough after some rains that this happened. Very beautiful effect.

Best friends and giant tomatoes

M & S have been inseparable summer 2009

M & S

They had lost interest in picking green beans.

Far more fun to explore the weeds and junk

To be that curious again...

Or even a fraction as innocent. *sigh*

A bit later they came inside to see how big this tomato was.

M. & S. pose with the scales

1.9 pounds / 870 grams

What the heck?

Well, I’ve been too busy to post!

I have canned salsa for 3 nights, pickles for 3 nights, fruit jam for 3 nights, ketchup for 1 night, sauerkraut for 1 night (plus 1 night to put it in the crock and nightly checks for 10 days), tomatoes for 1 night (so far), pizza sauce for 1 night, and . . .

We have been camping with good friends (completely sans rectangles, so no pictures), tending the garden and practicing for this weekend’s upcoming Amateur Chef competition!

I do have a few pictures of this and that, taken over the course of the last month. They’ll be posted eventually, but for now . . .

There is a bushel of peaches in my kitchen and I still haven’t saved seeds from any of my tomatoes.

Pole Bean Tepee Hideaway

Pole Bean Teepee Hideaway

Right before we went on vacation, we started a project that will be fun for the boys if it works out as planned. We tied some poles together, laced them up with twine, and dug out a trench from our yard around the base of the thing.

Pole beans growing

We planted pole bean seeds in the little trench.  The intention is that the pole beans will climb the tepee and completely cover it, making a little tent for the boys to not only play in, but also snack in, straight from the garden!

View from the back

The conclusion of this project can be found in this post.

Double? Triple? Sextuple tomato blossom.

Multiple tomato flower blossom

When your tomato plants grow these massive conjoined flowers, and when those flowers get properly pollinated, you will grow a huge bumpy conjoined tomato.  I have these flowers on my Beefmaster plants right now.  I’ll update with pictures if I get tomatoes from these monster blossoms.

Siamese tomato blossom. Yeah, I know, that term is no longer P.C.

We had fun in Branson!

 

Marvel Cave's entrance

We had fun in Branson, Missouri!  The cave pictures are blurry because I didn’t have a tripod.  These are 2 or 3 second exposures leaning against a railing.

 

Illuminated Waterfall in Marvel Cave

 

There was Fire

...and water...

 

...and dem Duke boys! Ghu ghu ghu!

Vacation

I’ll be back next week folks!  I have to show you my tomato trellises, my big green tomatoes, how well the 3 sisters garden is growing, and lots more. 

But now I get a few days R&R!  I’ll be back.

Skill added…cleaning chickens

Saturday a good friend of my wife’s told me that her husband was willing to let me watch/help/learn the process of butchering and cleaning some meat chickens.  She has been providing us with 75% of the eggs we need for 9 months or so now, but they also raise meat birds once in a while.

I wish I had some pictures, which I don’t, but it was a good educational day.  He taught me everything, step by step, from the hen house (where the chickens had been fasting for 24 hours) to the freezer and I got to do it all myself, twice.  It took 3 hours.

It feels good to learn something so basic…like I’m reconnecting with a process that most people would have known 100 years ago or so.  I have a new appreciation and respect for the animal and the meal.   I also have a new determination to understand how local big-box stores can sell me a prepared rotisserie chicken for $2.50.  It doesn’t make sense.

He let me take home one of the two meat birds that I butchered and cleaned.  We’ll be preparing it tonight and we already plan a chicken barley soup for the leftovers.  To thank him I brought over two bags of feed for the egg layers.