continuing strange

I'm continuing to work on my knitting projects. I haven't finessed any of them yet. I need to photograph the baby hat, the cloth hobo bag and the off-the-shoulder sweater that I've made for the knitty.com calender contest. Three photos are due by the end of the month, so I really don't have much time, but with 1-hour photo, I have enough... As long as I get film tomorrow and get the pictures back by the next day, I'll be fine. They want real photos of knitted items from patterns on their site... and by "real," I mean "fine art." I really like that idea. And thanks to Adobe PhotoShop 6.0, I'll be able to get them to look exactly like I want them to look without processing and printing them myself. Yay!! So that's my # 1 priority for today.

Priority #2 is getting some of the peanuts harvested. There are several plants that are ready. The rest of them need to be fertilized. Thankfully, they have been doing well this season. ::fake spit, fake spit:: (Don't want to jinx it.) Apparently, we have ideal soil for them... Strange when it's not ideal for almost anything else. Usually have to amend it like crazy! It drains just fine, but doesn't have enough organic material... little too sandy. But peanuts like sandy, so I like growing peanuts.

The roses are also doing much better. The rain still comes in the very late afternoon almost everyday, but the fungicide finally seems to be controlling it. The okra is another matter. We're pretty sure it's got some sort of blight. And the eggplants are right next to the okra... For some reason, they aren't putting on any fruit though. We can't figure out why. The leaves are all perfectly green and healthy looking. They'll get flowers every week or so, but the fruit just isn't taking. Strange, because they usually do better in hot weather according to Mom. If anyone has any idea as to what's going on, I'd surely appreciate any info you have.

I really feel for people living further north who are getting the disgustingly hot weather that we usually have to contend with here. Whether humidity is at 0%, 50% or 100% (which doesn't always mean it's raining, contrary to popular belief... The humidity has been at 100% for days before without any rain, just air as thick as pea soup), 95 degrees F is still hotter than hell. And 103, oh, forget about it and just stay inside! It's ridiculous, this weather. Some say it's because of global warming... I don't think I buy it. 1.) We're in a cold period for the earth's history... still crawling out of the last ice age, really. 2.) We really don't have enough data to prove that it's due to green-house gases that temperatures are rising, which fluctuate naturally over time. 3.) The 13th century had weird weather patterns similar to those we're experiencing now. On the other hand, 4.) There is more CO2 being deposited in glacial ice now than there has been in the last 2.5 million years... in fact, it's exactly double it's highest concentration in that period. We've been on an exponential upswing for the last 10,000 years (or was it 100,000?... something like that anyway), but around industrialization, CO2 reached the highest 2.5 million year level, and at present has surpassed it by 100%. Worrisome, but at the same time, I'm not particularly worried... We're likely worrying over something we can't do a thing about, and certainly nothing quick. Now, this is not to say that I don't fully support that cars and factories should be cleaner... Just because I don't buy that it's a long-term problem, doesn't mean that I don't think it's a short-term one. I certainly think we could improve world health if we cut down on fossil fuels or eliminated them entirely. I just don't think that it would significantly impact global warming.

My goodness, that was a tangent!

Anyway, here in Tampa, we have the rains almost every afternoon, but it doesn't cool anything down significantly, just keeps enough moisture in the air to prevent it from getting hotter than it already does... and of course, encourages the mosquitoes to breed like mad. I want to put a bat house out on the back part of our property to get them to stay around and eat the mosquitoes, but Mom seems to think that's a bad idea. She doesn't like bats, but I know we have them around here anyway. Every evening there will be at least 4 or 5 flying around directly above the house snapping up mosquitoes as fast are their radar can find them. I like bats. As far as I'm concerned, they can stay. And soon we'll have even more because I'm planting a banana tree... somewhere. We haven't picked out a spot yet, but it's sitting out on the front walk right now. According to what I've heard, if it weren't for fruit bats, banana trees wouldn't be able to pollinate. So yay for them!

Priority #3 for the day is continuing to organize my room because Josh is coming home from Los Angeles next week and I can't continue using his room as my personal storage space. And priority #4 is planting the roses that are potted, the banana tree and a hydrangea that I got at Home Depot 2 months ago (It's doing quite well evenso.) I probably won't get around to that until later in the week though.