Late Again

Dawn calls to tell me she'll be late getting home from work. 

"The Easter Bunny got here at 3:45. He was supposed to arrive at 3:00. I had to escort him to each resident's room.  They got tired of waiting for him in the dining room."

Insert photo of snoozing octogenarians at tables with bunny basket centerpieces..

The library in the big town is closed when Mandy and I pull up to the curb.  I walk past a white Toyota Corolla with the side window down.   A voice comes from the Corolla,

"Save yourself the walk up the stairs. It's closed for some reason." 

You could have cut his pissed off tone with a knife. I heave a sigh of relief, since the last time I stopped at the BIG Library in town a rather rotund girl dressed in a flowing purple robe asks me,

"Hello sir. You wanna buy some pot?"

Sir? Pot? 

I looked down the street for the squad car. 

"No thank you."

Back in my misguided youth many, many, many years ago we held the unofficial record for most marijuana consumption in one month. It was self awarded .We ( myself and two other stoners)  lived across the road from a hippie commune that openly advocated smoking weed. The county sheriff refused to prosecute them.  We always said we were smoking for medical reasons- preventing glaucoma, alleviating nausea from chemotherapy or fighting asthma. We might have referred to ganja as "smoke" or "wacky weed". Never, pot, tea or refer.

Until I resigned from my non-persidency (not a typo) of the liberry board in the little burg close to home, I didn't need the big'un in town. I opt out of the controversy over misbehaving kids in the back of the library. What do I know?  Eighteen years as a teacher didn't give me any skills. I've two DVD's in my paw due at another small town library two miles to the north. The parking lot is full. The librarian is hustling to help people check out.  Whatever help she used to have disappeared in the pockets of politicians.  The nice old lady at the counter who would regale you with stories of life as a cigar roller for the Kickapoo River Region Tobacco Pool is gone.  The teenager who volunteered once a week, quit.

The weather is 44 degrees, misting and gray like the picture.  One goose is standing knee deep in water and his mate is swimming in the deeper water in the pasture next to the highway.  Unable to resist the real reason for Easter, the one that precludes the current trend where everything shuts down for three hours on a Friday afternoon, women wear funny hats on Sunday and the beet sugar consortium and dentists get together in Las Vegas to plan their portfolios, I plant potatoes in my own annual pagan fertility rite.  I wrestled with this.

Insert photo of Gorgeous George, the wrestler. Hulk Hogan or Jesse Ventura will do if you don't remember George.

Dawn consults the ephemeris to find out when the moon will be in Taurus."May 2nd," she says. It is the next  window of opportunity for planting spuds, if I skip local tradition. I hope that Taurus hangs around until after May10th, another fertile time.

Unlike my second wife, Taurus is fertile sign. For her, just being a Taurus is a fertile opportunity.  I have a canceled check pinned to the nudie calendar in the garage made out to her in the amount of $10,050 which reminds me of her. My attorney says I got off cheap.

With four days of rain, cold, gray skies in the forecast, I'm asking for trouble planting potatoes according to the moon and local tradition. Two days after the full moon is propitious for root crops the almanac says.  The old Norwegians of the area planted spuds on Good Friday, had lefse(potato flat bread) and salt cod soaked in lye and went to the tavern between noon and three to wash the chemicals away.

Organic gardening is a gamble.  I look at it as an experiment. I can talk smart  because I have seven egg crates of seed potatoes stored in the summer kitchen. Therefore, I plant one row and take copious notes for 2012.  Time, temperature, soil condition,variety, size-all of which I'll never ever be able to duplicate. 2009 we store and give away 700 lbs. of Kennebecs, Pontiacs, La Rouge, Yukon Gold and Russets. 2008- 50 lbs of potatoes tops.  2010 we harvest three varieties totaling 500 lbs. A crap shoot at best.        .