How Does Our Garden Grow Part II

How INDEED!  We have had some not so agreeable weather lately which kind of prohibited us from venturing out back, fortunately for the plants, it was mostly rain (and one VERY awful wind storm) and that made them very happy.  Our garden is lush and green, very very green.  We have accumulated a (ahem) few weeds which will be appropriately "whacked" but our other plants are seemingly thriving.  We even have a rose growing on a rose bush that we were not sure was going to make it.  Also, our snail population has been revived!  I still cannot figure out where they get their shells from, very curious.  The tomatoes are looking good, they are about 1 foot tall and our peppers and celery are also doing great!  Also my mint is thriving but sadly our basil "bush" went onto the big green garden in the sky.

 The garden.....just a tad overgrown.

 

Our beautiful rose, hopefully with more to come.

The darling pansies.

The mint is just going wild!

The other basil and chives are doing just fine.

The front plants are peppers, doing quite well and the pot on the left, 

also peppers, the pot on the right is celery, 

looks like i will have to transplant it to the ground soon!

Last but not least the tomato plant, 

I cannot wait to taste what these 

plants will yield later in the summer.

Well Ta for now, hopefully We will be getting more good weather so that we can continue to enjoy our garden amidst the urban jungle.

~CM

How Does Our Garden Grow????

SO we did it!  We pestered our landlords enough and they finally gave in and let us use the backyard!  As you can guess we are like two kids in a candy store, we have eaten dinner outside every evening so far and today we planted veggies and flowers, it was a GREAT day!!!  Also, strangely enough, we caught enough snails to make any frenchman jealous.......what we will do with them remains to be seen but i am pretty convinced that there is a fairly large "snail-gasm" going on in the mason jars we created a little habitat in for them.  Interesting fact about snails, 1. they are hermaphrodites and 2. their sex organs are the little pointy things that stick out of the sides of their heads.  Should that ever come up in trivia - you'll be ready. (pictured right)

But I digress - we had a massive amount of clean up to do and how rewarding it was when we cleared away old branches and crap that has just been sitting there to find these tiny violet sprouts poking their heads up out of the ground along with what I believe is a rose bush, i pruned it a bit, we will see if it flowers or not.  We also were able to salvage a table and 4 chairs that with a little scrubbing were declared usable.  There are two large trees in the back yard, one in each back corner which provides the perfect amount of shade and breeze.  Today we planted some of our herbs that we have been growing hydroponically (yes the basil bush has moved outdoors) so has some mint and some cilantro and thyme which may not make it, we shall see.  We also bought a couple of tomato plants, some jalapeno pepper plants, celery plants and a half flat of pansies too, oh, also ivy (we have an ugly fence and very little privacy and some sort of flowering bush that seems like it will look nice.

My good friend is a gardner in NJ and has been taking pics of her garden an posting them, i like the idea, it's kind of an online journal and will help me remember what i did next year and what worked and what failed.  Below are the pics i took today, enjoy :)

our little pansies (see the ugly fence???)
Planted 4-11-10

Three Beefsteak Tomatoes (mmmmm)
Planted 4-11-10

Our Jalapeno Pepper plants
Planted 4-11-10

Celery
Planted 4-11-10

More Jalapenos
Planted 4-11-10

The left is the basil "tree" and the right is my Cilantro, Thyme and Mint (left to right)
Moved outdoors 4-11-10

Close up of the pansies, they are so cute!
Planted 4-11-10














I guess i should mention one last tidbit.  The neighborhood we live in, Greenpoint, was the sight of the largest oil spill that ever happened in the U.S. (yes, bigger than exxon valdez).  Although I feel that our soil is most likely fine we are going to send it in to a lab to be tested mostly out of curiosity but I suppose it would be the better to know than not know.  Once we have the results I will be posting them here :)

ok i have to run

~City Mouse.........or should I say......COUNTRY MOUSE??????

;)

A Tree Grows In Brooklyn

Yes, the basil tree is still alive and well.  Yesterday I had to remove it from my hydroponic garden and put it into dirt.  I did not have a pot big enough so he ended up in a delivery container and even that is probably not big enough.  The root system on this plant is phenomenal it is probably 1" in diameter and as deep as the pot itself.  We have other plants who are doing great as well, the basil was blocking them and i did not even know that they were alive.  Yesterday I transplanted cilantro, mint, thyme, chives and a second basil plant.  I was unaware of the existence of the cilantro or mint so that was fun to find.  


What shall we do with all of these herbs???  I really do not know, with the warm weather coming we are hoping to get back to basics and focus on our old eating habits which were much healthier than what we are currently doing.  Regardless, they make the kitchen smell wonderful and I love having plants in the house, the next things we are working on growing is salad greens, it would be so much fun to just pick my salad greens from the "salad bar."  we shall see how that goes perhaps I should try for tomatoes too.....


Well here's to the salad bar I suppose.


~CM

How to spot a craigslist scam

At least how to spot a craigslist real estate ad scam.  In New York as many people know there are more rental properties than single family homes so brokers here specialize in rental's generally as their income source.  Now I cannot fault the broker's entirely though through personal and professional experience they are very creative in their ad making and how they attract customers.  We are thinking of moving here in NY and I was doing a little searching and I just keep coming across the absolute worst scams.  The newest one that i have run into most often is one where the person will respond to me questions telling me that i need to run my credit before we go any further......um.....excuse me?  NO!  Sorry bud, that's not how it works bad economic times or not (by they way the recession has ended, maybe i should have mentioned that.....)


Here are a few hints that an ad is probably a scam:
1. Incorrect spelling or grammar (obviously)
2. All caps (this is just a personal observation, either it's a scam or the person on the other end is too stupid to know how to work the caps lock button)
3. Only exterior photos of the house/condo/apartment are shown (because they don't have access to the inside - duh!) this one took me awhile, but it's a consistent pattern.
4. not leaving a real email address but using the craigslist created one also seems to point me in the direction of a scam.


So what can we do about this nonsense?  Flag them - every friggin one of them, let's take craigslist back to its original purpose which was for people to find and exchange goods and services for monetary or barter trade.  

Here is an example of my most recent finding:

$1500 / 2br - Lovely Waterfront Condo For Rent (Long Beach)

---

Date: 2010-02-18, 4:33PM EST
Reply to: hous-fd44k-1607044124@craigslist.org ^{[Errors when replying to ads?]}

---

LOVELY WATERFRONT CONDO IN LONG BEACH IS CONVENIENT LOCATION NEAR BEACH.
THE UNIT FEATURES 2BR, 1FULL BATH, FDR, KITCHEN, CAC AND PARKING SPOTS.
NO FEE REQUIRED. PETS ARE WELCOME. LEASE TERMS ARE FLEXIBLE. CONTACT TODAY..

• cats are OK - purrr
• dogs are OK - wooof
• Location: Long Beach
• it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests
• Fee Disclosure: credit check
• Listed By:

PostingID: 1607044124
....well this one did have an interior photo but the rest was pretty consistent, so was the response (below)


Hello,

Thanks for contacting us regarding the apartment rental.  We know you must have many questions about the apartment rental.
But before answering any questions, we need to know if you are currently up-to-date with your credit report to save you and I time.

Here is a link to a free, safe and recommended credit report checker : https://secure.keycreditreport.com/?ai=10421

Also, this application will only take two minutes!
The particular reason for this credit check is because, with the declining economy, there has been a large number of defaulting tenants --
we don't have any reason to believe you aren't a good tenant, but we just need to protect ourselves in this economic environment.

Don't forget to email me back after completing the application so we can set up an appointment for you to view the apartment.

Thank you.


........*sigh* so the search continues......


Ta
~CM

Craigslist Post of the day

No joke, i was cruising through craigslist the other day looking for something and stumbled across the below ad.......i am dying to know if anyone replied to this! 


Nude Housekeeper Wanted (E. New York,Brownsville)
Date: 2010-02-17, 7:43PM EST
Reply To This Post

Looking for mature females 21-35 to do nude housekeeping and run errands must know how to cook meals and clean if interested contact email address or leave a message. Room and board available serious inquires interviews will be conducted leave description of yourself and a pic. Good luck on your search.