Well -- I had a blog post started yesterday, but I accidentally deleted it.
What I was saying -- and wondering about -- is how hard is it for me to start and end these things. I wondered if there was a point in trying to "talk to my audience" when this really could be seen as just a published diary. I mean should I start with "Dear blog" or "Dear blog readers"? Or should I just start typing? What about the ending? I tend to find myself at the end of what I want to say, but without a closing statement. Do I really need to say -- "ok that's all for today, see you tomorrow" or something similar?
I mean, I may do those things sometimes, but it seems silly for me to do so everyday. If I just end the post abruptly, would you think there should be more?
Really my blog should be a stream of thoughts, though I do have to edit it with the idea that you may not know what I am talking about.
Here is what I'd like to do:
Yesterday (or maybe the day before) a fire broke out Northwest of Ft. Collins. It quickly grew to over 36k acres. One thing that irritated me is that 9news kept the total area of the fire at that figure - 36k acres, when it had to be changing in size. that is, I'd assume some areas would burn themselves out as other areas started. but I didn't see a change in the number of acres until the evening. So far there has been 1 death, and over 100 structures either destroyed or damaged. You can smell the smoke down here (the fire wold be a couple of hours from me) -- in fact I understand that they have smoke from this fire down in Texas! Last night it wasn't too bad -- but this morning I went outside because I needed to move some plants I bought from my car to the backyard (I had forgotten to do this yesterday) -- and I also wanted to feed the birds. It was like I walked into a wall of smoke. Not only was the smell STRONG but I could SEE the smoke.
No wonder I woke up for the 2nd night in a row with a stuffed up nose and raw throat. I took TWO Benadryl and went back to sleep. Now, I'm sitting here with burning eyes and a mild sore throat. It makes me wonder what people did 100, 200+ years ago. Here you are, and you can smell a major fire and see the smoke -- but are unaware that the fire is really 100+ miles away from you. I wonder if people panicked at all trying to figure out where the fire was and if they were safe or not?
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I just checked 9news over my lunch (around 1 or so) and the fire has grown to about 43k acres but is now 5% contained.
I'm currently adding on to this at work btw. Mainly on Lunch. I may post this on a later break -- or wait until I get home. Then I may add something else later. this might be an easier way for me to blog rather then trying to do it all at once in the evening when, by then, I don't feel like it.
An update on the yellow jackets. I think I mentioned in an earlier post that I had two little yellow jacket nests under my big table umbrella. I had power sprayed the nests off. (with water) well I caught 4 of them trying to recreate one. I closed the umbrella and put on my gardening gloves and tried to flatten them through the umbrella. I noticed one fall out and fly away kind of dizzy. I really didn't/don't want to kill them but if they don't get the hint and go somewhere else then I get more aggressive -- before their numbers get to be too big.
I found their life cycle on the web. Apparently in the spring, hibernating queens come out and establish new hives. They build a paper/wood nest and lay their eggs -- producing hundreds of drone offspring.
Then later in the year they will produce males and new queens. Most all will die off before winter, leaving the fertilized queens to hibernate and start again next year. Knowing that now, and knowing that they eat harmful insects -- I don't mind them in my yard in general. If they keep a nest out of where I'm going to be and don't get TOO numerous of course. My xeroscape plants tend to attract A LOT of different kinds of insects, including several kinds of wasps anyway.
BTW wasps/yellow jackets DO pollinate as well - though not as well as bees do. The adults are attracted to the nectar later in the season. Earlier on, they are attracted to meat in order to feed their larval stage young.
I think I'm going to re-setup my non-chemical wasp trap. Well there IS a chemical - but it doesn't kill, it attracts. Then they can't get out. I shouldn't set it up in a "people" area but I will temporarily to try to get the ones I may not have been able to smash. I will then check and hose off the underside of the 'brella again.
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Yesterday after work I also went to one of my favorite gardening stores and bought some soil, seeds and general plants. Today when I got home I re-did my lettuce and spinach area. Some seeds had come up but nothing was happening and the seedlings were disappearing. (I hope dieing from the sun and not being eaten). SO I hoed up the soil, added the new soil, mixed it up, watered the heck out of it... and mixed it some more so it was more fluffy - though I think I over saturated it. Then I replanted. I dug trenches instead of rows and put the seeds in first, then covered with a light coating of soil and put more seeds on top. In case some do better covered and some uncovered.
I replanted several kinds of lettuce, spinach, collards, onions and the chive plants I just bought. The soil was saturated so I didn't water again.
Tomorrow I'll plant some more.
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