I'm Wendy Weedpicker and I like the dirt. Seriously, I am a aspiring gardener who has, she feels, mastered the art of houseplants and wishes to 'branch' out into the yard. My garden this year was begun late in the season (August) because that's when we moved into our house. I've got lilies (buried under 2 feet of snow) and lots of pansies. I love heighth in a garden of flowers. In vegetable gardens I like tomatoes, carrots, lettuce and strawberries. It remains to be seen how well they do in Colorado.

You'll find out when the snow melts away right?

unfortunately yes, I have to wait awhile.

Any ethnobotany or heirloom varietal fans here? WER

What's ethnobotany?

Native plants used as medicine, etc. Datura, Echinacea, et al. WER

Do you know anything about Hyssop? Like how to pronounce it?

According to the dictionary, hissup. Nothing else off hand, but I'll look it up. WER

Thought is was hi sop. With the accent on the hi.

Hey, we're speakin da english here, probably depends upon yore accent. WER

Well the hi sop guy at the WLE (that's Whole Life Expo) said that's what it was. There are pix of him and an extradinarily cute woman from Brack's physical therapy dept on the Spring WLE slide show that we've been running periodically.

Cute is good. WER

And what is "gooder?"

Somethin' fresh and juicy and straight off the vine? WER

Mmmm, I certainly agree.

We Have Consensus WER

at times, some of us around here are a bit silly, no?

and you're just now noticing this?

just being retrospective for no good reason...

Dear Wolf, I would like to present you with this link as token of my appreciation: http://www.manufactum.de . This is a very fine german mailorder, they sell the most wonderful things that are well made. For your gardening interest, please take a look especially at http://brokat.interad.de/cgi-bin/MANUFACTUM.storefront/477340603/UserTemplate/12?urlname=brokat.interad.de/cgi-bin/MANUFACTUM.storefront/477340603/UserTemplate/30?urlname=brokat.interad.de/cgi-bin/MANUFACTUM.storefront/477340603/UserTemplate/16 Extremely fine gardening tools, seeds and plants (extra chapter: roses!!), literature, etc. ... Their server seems to be a bit slow, but it surely is worth a try! The motto is "Es gibt sie noch, die guten Dinge." And truly, they do have the good things there. Their paper catalogue is a must-read for me, all these wonderful things you would have thought thought were not available since decades (this is by the way the same company that offered the Faber-Castell slide rules mentioned in the collecting topic!). Check their Website and get the catalog (naw, you don't have to buy anything, just admire the wares like I do since at least four years... It substitutes many magazines for entertainment value - but fortunately no music magazines... ;=} ). Of course, the gorgeous stereo they offer is MY dream (full description in catalog only, sorry): vintage british amps, with record player to match, refurbished and with full manufacturer�s warranty. Aaaaah, to now that such beauty ever existed...

thanks so much for thinking of me. i've always loved germany's gardens. my opa owned a weekend house and usually when we would visit, we'd take a trip there. he was quite the gardner and unfortunately, he has had a series of strokes and can no longer visit out there. it was such a wonderful place for me. he had cherry trees, apple trees, roses, wildflowers, just everything. and a wonderful outhouse with current berry bushes all around it. i'll check the site!

oh, alex, it's a wonderful site, but my german isn't very good anymore. i can only pick up bits and pieces and can get the gyst of a subject, but other than that, i'm a complete idiot with the language. (i use translation software to speak to my grandparents, but i'm afraid it wouldn't work for the site unless i cut and paste the whole thing into a word document). perhaps you could put a buzz in their ear about offering the site in english at the click of a button (like a lot of multi-lingual websites d ). heck, i probably could do that myself. i saved it as a fave just-in-case the german language rushes back to me in a dream! (i spoke fluently as well as any 4 year old can, but lost it over time).

My dear Wolf, in this case order the print catalogue, be assured of it's incredible merits! Nice pictures and very well-written captions, that just might bring it all back to you! Plus great show-off item! Too bad to hear about your Opa, I hope he's not too old for successful rehabilitation. Does he do something? Anyway, labor will be out of the question, right? Just happened to a former teacher of mine in college, he got a stroke. And that one year away from retirement... He always loved gardening, too, and one day several years past, I met him and his wife in the village I live in, where they were choosing what roses to buy (where I'm from, they breed 'em like yall folks yonder Texas way do with cattle...). I thought I might buy some nice rose plant and have it sent to him, as soon as it's not freezing anymore at nights, with best wishes etc., implication being that he may enjoy it's flowers many a year to come. What do you think, too pathetic?

no, i love the gesture. my grandparents live in a retirement apartment complex. i asked oma about the weekend house (maybe i'd like to purchase it from them someday). they haven't sold it as yet. opa is turning 75 this month. they have no space in their apartment for anything really, so i have to be careful with gifts i send. he used to take me to the cememtary in zuffenhausen to take care of a family plot. i loved the way you could get away from the city just walking through the gate to that place. nd the water wells with the big watering cans left there for you to use. you don't see that here in the states. cemetaries are just plots of land with markers and fake flowers all over the place. no one takes the time to plant anything, it seems.

Oooh, one of my favorite topics - cemetaries! Since I was a child, I knew where I wanted to be buried (nice old cemetary, some sculpture work - pathetic, though, but still -, big old trees). But now I live in a different community, and if I stay here, will stay on this villages lot. Not too bad a place, as here people really care for their families graves (sometimes too much, giving people a hard time on their decorations, etc.). The watering cans: not all communities have them for free, as they somehow vanish... my village has them, though. If you take two in summer, so you don't have to walk to often, some people get upset. Games people play... and they don't always tell you their rules. If you figure out, you can be happy, still. Yes, I guess I will stay there. What better place for a late music magazine publisher, than being on the cemetary where THE KING moved a memorial to the dead of the wars JUST WITH HIS SONG! (And was driven to the site "in einem wei�en Ami-Schlitten mit 'nem schwarzen Fahrer", as I've heard it told.)

I'll bet your neighbors do not put rice cakes on the graves as they do here ...and flowers, too. Great care and patience is taken with graves... Shinto is ancestor worship (put in very simplest terms), so they do not do these grave adornments idly. Great care is paid with food and flowers.

Here, it's flowers and water - as in watering the flowers. ;=} And a red candle light on some occasions (catholic families, All Saints day, some all year round...) Rice cakes - yep, ancestor worship. Leftovers from shamanistic rites still inherent in many Asian cult's rites. I always admired especially the Chinese on their pragmatic use of these rites; while the start of this exchange was burial grounds, I do not admire the "eternal" resting plots that stole this people much fertile land throughout the centuries.

I plan to come back and haunt anyone who plants me in the ground. Ashes are good replenishment for the soil, and I plan to replenish.

so are bodies if you don't put them in coffins! just have to bury you deep enough so wild animals and lunatics don't dig ya up!

This is true...pushing up the daisies...?!

difficult to do in the bayous, no?

*Roaring Laughter* You people are priceless!

yupper, why do ya think the alligator population is so high!

Hmmm...might make one worry about consuming an alligator steak. You never know who it might be!

everybody, i'd like to host this conference. what do you think?

I think you certainly deserve to do so. *Applause* Now, if I had cdfam's pointy hat I go *poof* and you would be Hosta of the conference *grin*

I am defacto but not listed as host of History conf, so while they're at it, please add my name to the History conference...which is wide open, anyway. Guess it does not matter. Wolfie, don't change the wallpaper here. I love it. Call me sentimental....*sigh*

i wouldn't! it's ideal (and by a special person)

*smile* UmmHmm...!

i remembered *grin*

Go for it Wolf! I'm not offering to do anything cos I'm not really capable and I'll be off soon, but I'll support those who do!

Now, where's that guy with the pointy hat and the magic...?!

Wolf and Marcia are now on the host list of this conference. Maybe it will start growing now. Lots of interesting topics to start with, I'm sure there will be more.

Thank you and Mahalo *hugs* from both of us. Time to get down and dirty!

I used marciah and marcia as your host ids.

Thank you and it appears for me now that I am also host. I am most grateful!

Yep, changed it to MarciaH

You did, indeed. I peeked!

thanks, terry, for the hosting priviledges. i love gardening!

Me too...providing it does not come complete with vampire mosquitos year round. But, mine does (thanks to the crew of a Mexican whaling ship whose favoite houses of ill repute were closed by missionaries just before they came into port..)

Btw, Wolfie, I sneeked into the rc file and made us hostas of this conference =)