since i've graduated, the days have been good to me. don't get me wrong, job hunting is a full time job in and of itself but, the results are worth it. and sometimes when the results aren't as worth it, you've got to find some other stress-reliever outlets, and i really find that planting can do that for me.
so i've been planting with my other half lately and being the dork that i am, i feel the need to name our little patch of farm. but when i use our initials i get these really weird (to me) inklings in my head. if i use BK i think of burger king and KB reminds me of KB Toys. BCKW makes me think of bac-kaw! - you know, like a chicken. so for now, i've decided to let that go.
but other than having the problem of naming the real farm, we've had something else. a bear - we nicknamed the thing, bear. i think it's a gopher. i don't really know, i'm not the one who spots it every afternoon chomping on our flowers. so we've been looking online for ways to get rid of this bear and some of the ones that i've come across are really just weird.

TIP one:
stick a piece of gum in the hole. but they didn't say what kind of gum. so what if i put a fruity gum like that multilayer trident gum that people want to get paid with. heck, if people were choosing to feed me tasty gum i'd come back and eat it every day. i wouldn't mind some big red either.

TIP two:
bring a barn owl into your garden. at first when i saw this tip, i wondered where in the world you could buy barn owls. after all, we're not in harry potter world. but apparently you're supposed to attract them to your garden. by doing that, you'd have to bring in little garden snakes, mice/rats, birds, whatever else owls like to eat. and we were just thinking, we'll have enough animals by the time we lure the owl to the garden to make our own zoo...forget about the garden at that point!

TIP three:
use pest control. i understand that pest control can probably kill the gopher. but it can possibly kill the dog or any other domesticated animal. and it can kill us. so, never mind with this one.

TIP four:
dig trenches that are 18 to 24 inches deep then place hardware cloth in them. do they know how much digging you'd have to do to get to 18 to 24 inches?? considering that most normal people are usually using shovels and not heavy duty machinery. and what's to say that i can think like a gopher and predict that he'll dig where i've put my trench? i think at that rate, that trench will become where i will lay, thank you very much.

i personally think the strawberries have gotten to this size because they aren't juicy and red enough for the darn bear. 

i was taking a nature hike with my mother the other day and she was, you know, catching her breath and trying to talk to me at the same time. typical. so she starts talking about how young people (that's us) are now such bums and no one wants to get off their couches to do exercise. and she finally touches on someone specific in my life and says:

mom: [friend] is very athletic. he looks good.


i nod. not really knowing what else to say. i just want to keep walking and get out of the forest. i felt like i was on the set of LOST. but, she keeps talking...


mom: you know, i bet you [friend] can walk and run like a horse. 

me: ...i don't know what that means. 

no inspiration? yeah...that was pretty much the reason for the hiatus of this blog :) or rather, honestly, a lack of motivation to write. haha, but i'm trying. 

so, the newest thing i've learned since like, two days ago, is that there are multiple meanings to the word 'farmer's market.' that's right. when i thought it was universal, it wasn't. 

farmer's market one

scenario: various vendors of vegetables, fruits, flowers, jams, honey, etc. it's essentially a place where you can buy things for that night's dinner or the next morning's bread and jam. it's also a place where you can taste the freshest fruits and vegetables of that day's harvest from the farmers. 

diagnosis: this is what i think of when you tell me farmer's market. nothing else. 

farmer's market two

scenario: various vendors along a street with a mix of fruits, vegetables, and homemade craft items or scary looking dolls. this is where your mother bought your aunt that 'i-love-my-sister' picture frame with someone else's picture in it, or where your sister is begging your mother for that tacky looking bracelet made out of rocks someone found on the floor from texas. 

diagnosis: this is definitely a flea market to me. i don't know why it's named 'flea' instead of 'flee' because it would make more sense to me that these people would be trying to flee the cops because you know that someone in there somewhere is selling something someone else stole. 

farmer's market three

scenario: blow up castles, slides, obstacle courses crowd one end of the street and down the other end of the street are vendors that specialize in face painting, little knick-knacks someone definitely saved from countless mcdonald's kid's meal toys, popcorn, worms in dirt, an officer and his buddy teaching how to ride a bike with a helmet, etc. this place is usually swarmed with kids who are 9 and below with their parents. you're bound to hear a parent scream 'no shoes in the castle!!!'

diagnosis: i was recently tricked into going to this so called farmer's market, which prompted this post. this is not a farmer's market. this is a carnival, or something close to it. i'm 22. i don't want my face painted and i don't want a reflective snap on bracelet, which my mom actually got for me. it's bright yellow.