Tail ends and year end tales

December 28th and cold - no, not cold by Mid West standards, but for Austin, it's bloody cold! Theere are squirrels everywhere, caught between emptying every one of the 8 birdfeeders in the yard and scavenging for acorns on the ground. When this winter is over, I will have plenty of photos of the way it used to look and no memory of why I took so many pictures of how bad it is without plants.

This is apparently one of the coldest winters on record for Austin. I am trying to use the time for good, enriching myself with other things beside digging in the dirt. I'm a fairweather sailor and obviously a fairweather gardener, since I can't bring myself to sit outside and pull weeds until the temperature makes it into the higher 60s. I did get outside on Christmas Day and plant the ten Bearded Irises that I got from Schreiner's http://www.schreinersgardens.com/ When we first moved in here, I must have ordered one of those already put together collections just so I would have irises by the next spring. Of the six or so I have, there is only one deep purple that I really love. The others are of the insipid pastel that I would either have to be depressed or drugged to have ordered. Drugged isn't likely these days, though there are a few fragmented memories of other times, other places, so depressed seems to be the answer. I was depressed - and scared all to hell - when we first moved here. I was terrified that if we didn't have a turn around pretty soon, I'd be trying to figure out how two humans, two dogs and two cats were going to survive living under a bridge somewhere. Thankfully, this was a really good place for us to land and this Springtime the garden should begin to show some promise and possibly some direction.


This is the newest attempt to create my own oasis out of the flat tract yard. My garden helper, Frank Ngoc, brought his crew in and built this quickie planter from Home Depot landscape blocks. Yes, I paid to have the blocks delivered and the garden spot put together, but it took Frank and his crew two and a half hours to put it all together, fill it with topsoil and compost. Suddenly I had a spot for daffodils, tulips and those Bearded Iris. Pictures of Spring blooms will follow later in the year! If I had done the work myself, you'd be looking at five blocks in place, probably not level and my bulbs would be in the garage begging for soil.

The aloe plant has survived several days of temperatures below 32 degrees. I ought to move it, but there is something perversely intriguing about seeing what is going to survive this year. This corner of the front has almost everything working against it- no way to access rainwater, too much shade once those monsters in the front lawn leaf out, rock and more rock from the septic tank leach field - or the horrid way the lot's slope allows everything possibly beneficial to wash away as soon as there is rain. The abutilon thrives and is double in size what it was when Sister Ane and I got it from Natural Gardener over a year ago. The giant forsythia sage is a huge success and this winter had five foot yellow flower spikes - even if they were stretching for sunlight. I've moved two shoots of the sage into the new garden in the center. It would be wonderful if they took off and were autumn color in the center next year.

This is it-TKR DAY

It's finally here! TKR DAY-in a half hour I leave for the able hands of Dr. Shelby Carter and the miracles of the Stryker Triathalon titanium knee.

I am being unusually cossetted. Tim insists that I shouldn't do anything- I think we're both afraid of anything that could get in the way of the surgery.

From here on out, life will be different in such a good way. In exchange for a truly awful scar, I will have a leg that is straight. I will walk up stairs, take the dogs for walks, leap tall buildings and take Salsa dancing lessons. While the actual operation piece is something I'm refusing to dwell on, the rehab and reactivity piece is something I am really anticipating with joy . Have you seen those compression stocking? So not a fashion statement. The more I concentrate on rehab, the sooner I can trade them for something more trendy.

I've pulled the camera out. Regardless of how unflattering it may be, I want one picture of this "BEFORE" so I will have the comparisons for the next leg of the journey. I'm not scared, but I am getting hungry and it's going to be a long time before I get to eat. Someone else undergoing surgery this morning said she was sure she wouldn't want to eat and couldn't imagine thinking about food. I can't remember ever not thinking about food. On that note, I'll sign off on my last bent knee day. Heeeeeeeeere we go!!!!

Another Chorus in the Health Insurance Song.

The debate on reforming health care has become a shouting match that stifles honest debate by intimidation, a concentrated effort to derail any real change to a very broken system. Regardless of where the political or social motives behind this comes from, the fact is that the current system does not work for the majority of wage-earners, past and future, of this country.
At dinner parties, in the elevators, grabbing a soda at the local mini-mart, I have heard people proclaim that responsible citizens take care of their own insurance needs, that they don't trust reform that begins with the government, that it is up to the individual to make sure they have adequate health insurance. The arguments range from issues of personal responsibility to conviction that health care is not an entitlement, that you can have what you pay for. The voices are loud, drowning out reasonable discussion. Yet, without reasonable discussion, we will continue going in the same direction and getting to the same pile of quicksand that is sucking us into financial disaster.
Currently, the majority of American workers have health insurance through their employers. The cost of this is driving employers to drastic measures as they work to keep costs in line. Benefits get cut, deductibles get increased. I am not a statistician. i am an employee of a small Austin company and I am 60 years old. i would like to retire within five years but in order to have health insurance, I need to keep working until I am 70. The costs associated with this have a system-wide effect that is highly illustrative of how badly we need to fix the entire health care system.
In one year, the difference between my health insurance and that paid for a 30 year old co-worker is $16,800. Over the next ten years, the overall difference for my employer will amount to $294,819. This is based on the assumption that costs will rise 12% a year. With the failures of large companies like AIG, that increase could be 25%. There were sound economic reasons why certain primitive tribes drove their elders out to die or survive on their own. They were an economic drain that threatened the continued existence of the tribe. At what point will the continued spiraling of costs force small employers to make those same kinds of decisions? As long as I can work I will do so and the price of that decision reaches far past healthcare. There will be a younger person who will not rise in position because I am in the way, and another position beneath her that will not open up. The higher cost overall will be the loss of talent to a small business because there is no room for younger staff to grow into more lucrative, senior positions.
Many employers have already made those decisions and do not offer affordable healthcare to their employees. Others have reduced the health care coverage available so they can offer lower consumer prices. A worker at minimum wage may work two jobs a day, each at 5 hours, not covered by health insurance because they work under the minimum hours. That person, after paying for housing, food and necessary living expenses, has about $60 a month left over if it has been a great month with no surprises. There is no cushion for health care coverage. Whether you look at the cost of emergency room medical treatment or the continued cost of health insurance as it exists today, the system is insanely expensive already. Fixing it could easily result in overall cost reduction. We are all paying for increases now through higher hospitalization costs, tiered payments and escalating premium costs.
This subject is too important to mire it down in faulty arguments and selfish viewpoints. Healthcare, like food, is not an entitlement-it is a crucial piece of survival. The lucky and the rich do not have an exclusive right to medical treatment at the expense of others. Follow the trail of your money and you will see that each of us interacts with every other person in this society and that what makes one of us better makes us all better. You are not willing to pay for my health insurance? I'm paying for yours and mine. We all are, through higher premiums, tiered payment arrangements and over-use of emergency rooms. Frankly, I'd like to pay less by sharing the burden in a system better designed.

Knee in Waiting

There are 15 days left until I have my Total Knee Replacement. Surgery is set for 9/1/09 at 2:30 PM. While I am scrambling to get all my work lined up and organized for the three weeks I will be unavailable, I feel like I am personally on hold with the universe. I have shifted from "When is it going to happen" to "What I will do when it has happened." In the meantime...i cook.

Julia and Julie was such an amazing influence- and not necessarily a good one. Friday morning, I wanted an egg on toast for breakfast. After all these years of Pam in a Non-Stick Pan, I got out -no, not a knob of butter- really just a teaspoon. As it melted slowly, I put in one fresh egg and cooked it just till the white was mostly solid. I pulled it off the heat, dropped in a little cotija cheese and gently folded the egg over the cheese, stirring easily till it all became one. I glowed from the taste all day.

Last night, a friend came for dinner. I had thought about the meal all week. There was the Columbian flank steak marinated in beer, with cumin, oregano and green onions. The lovely Aji sauce should have been too hot with jalapenos but was instead perfect, the Texas caviar and fresh corn rounded out the edges. And for dessert? Yeaaaahhhhhhh!!!! Chocolate cake with chocolate ganache and praline topping. No, I didn't take a picture, but hopefully, this will lead you there.
http://www.bonappetit.com/magazine/2009/07/chocolate_cake_with_ganache_and_praline_topping

Not satisfied with that evening of indulgence, this morning I watched a YouTube video of Gordon Ramsey making scrambled eggs. This was a whole different Gordon Ramsey from the obnoxious screamer on Hell's Kitchen. This was a laid back charming Brit who amde vaguely risque comments regarding taking beautifully scrambled eggs to the missus in bed. So what did I do? I went back to the stove and proceeded to put his ideas into practice, treating scrambled eggs like risotto and at the last minute folding in a few tablespoons of cheese and chives. Oh, sublime. No, I'm not drowning them in butter, though there is certainly some in there. At any rate, cooking is almost all I can do right now and I am probably doing too much of it. In September, it will all be leftovers and simple things Tim can do without stress. Maybe that will be an incentive all on it's own.

Garden Catalogs & Big Dreams

The reminder popped up on my calendar this morning-order bulbs from Breck's. Yesterday's mail brought the Irish Eyes catalog in with all the pretty pictures of potatoes. I know what's going to happen-I'll order several hundred bulbs to fill every spot where I seem to remember no flowers this year. In my head, I will see blankets of yellow daffs running everywhere I look. Never mind that my soil is rock covered by more rock on top of a thin layer of dust that is currently baking in triple digit heat that has been going on since June. I will see a spring time where our yard looks like the front cover of White Flower Farms. My central Texas yard will suddenly transform into Connecticut or Oregon and we will all forget we live on the face of the sun. Actually, this spring, for some reason, every bulb I ever planted threw riotous flowers everywhere and for three wonderful weeks, it did look like a photo shoot. So, for the three wek reward, I will order the biggest, brightest, most unusual flowers I can find that might possibly grow here. At least bulbs require only that you make a hole, drop in the bulb and pray for rain.

Potatoes on the other hand, require a commitment -first I need to build a growing space. I'm thinking several cages makes a whole lot more sense than trying to make more permanent beds. The Irish Eyes website has a step-by-step plan for a cage where you harvest from the bottom up. I'm a little confused by the logistics, but I have a couple of months to figure it out. The problem will be that by the time I choose one pound of potatoes of each color, I'm going to end up with five to eight pounds of tubers, which means fifty to eighty tubers that will need to be planted somewhere. Last year I gave them all away because I hurt too much to do any gardening. This year, with the new knee scheduled for September 1st, I expect to turn into Ms. Greenjeans by November 1st.

Early Sunday with my coffee

Sunday morning watching the birds all around the yard. Yesterday a hawk cruised in to drink from the birdbath. S/He caused a bit of an upset with the rest of the patrons but it was a thrill for us. This drought makes our birdbaths and dog dishes into water sources for all of the critters, but until the hawk cruised in, I hadn't really thought about how hard this is for all of them. October seems so far away, when El Nino is supposed to start. A few weeks ago we had a deer in the back of the yard but it is difficult to get to and probably she decided that there were easier meals in other places. The fences make it awkward for the deer to get away quickly.