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Enough is Enough!!!

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Blizzards Suck

A Warrior Breed

I watched a history channel show last night about our revolutionary war. My great grandfathers many times removed fought in that war. A father and son, William and Warner White, who lived in northern Virginia. It took a great deal of courage for our forfathers to take up arms against the country from which many had come, but we should remember that the main reason many came to this country to begin with, was to get out from under the English suppresion. Since then our White family has fought in almost every war this country has had. Including a great-great uncle who fought and died at the Alamo. My grandfather, above, fought in WWI, my father,above, fought in the Pacific in WWII. And I fought in Vietnam. The Civil war saw the White family on both sides. Despite the fact that it was mainly about slavery, there were others reasons people chose a side to fight on. States rights and family & peer pressure played major rolls in how men chose allegance. When it came my time to decide, there was no question or hesitation. It was a family tradition and something much deeper than that. It was at the core of my being, a natural choice if you will. I am not ashamed of what I am. There are many out there who know what I am talking about. One thing that I am concerned about today is that there seem to be fewer and fewer of my breed left. And that the long, hard fought battles to gain and maintain our freedom are in jeopardy. X.

Happy Valentines Day! X.

Gi Gi's Elephant Ear Birdbath

Last summer Gi Gi read about making a bird bath using a large leaf from one of her Elephant Ear plants. She is quite crafty, so it wasn't long before she made one. I just snapped this photo of the bird bath leaning against our fence. This is to prevent it from gathering water, freezing and bursting. You can check out this site which shows how to make one. Elephant Ear Birdbath X.

Bogaman (old celtic word for Bowman)

I've talked about this before, just touching base on how I got the 'handle' of Bogaman. In the mid 90's I started making primitive bows and arrows. I have been an archer all my life. This love and my love of working with wood culminated in learning the craft as a bowyer (someone who makes bows). This picture was taken at a folklife festival at Florida Mo. which is the childhood home of Samuel Clemens aka Mark Twain. Shortly after I started making bows I acquired the nickname of 'Bogaman'. SXW aka Bogaman

Killer Compost

This post is directed at anyone who likes to garden. I'm a big fan of Mother Earth News, the magazine whose focus is for a more natural world. They had an article in the April/May issue 2011 and another just recently in the February/March issue 2013 about contaminated compost.
I 'm going to present the short story of this problem, If you are sincerely interested in it I suggest that you read thier articles.
Herbicides and pesticides made by Dow and Dupont are finding thier way into the food chain. In this case ending up in private and commercail compost. In one case horse manure was being contaminated  because the the horses were eating a commercail horse feed made by Purina which had pesticide residue in it. The horse manure was then sold to a company who made compost. Bottom line here is that contaminated compost will then kill plants that it is applied to.
This isn't just a commercail problem. Any compost that one gets from a private individual may be contaminated. If you get manure from someone be sure and check that source. Ask anyone who also uses that source if they have had any problems.
It's hard enough raising a good crop with extreme weather conditions the last few years. And it would be very disheartening to have a bunch of fruit trees killed off. Just saying that even seemingly safe sources may be something to keep an eye on. X