...and then the most amazing thing(s) happened

I haven't blogged in forever and there is A LOT to catch up on. I'll try to be as brief as possible for, as it is written in Strunk & White's The Elements of Style, "vigorous writing is concise."

1. Congress passed the health care reform bill! F-ing Finally! Details here.

2. My five year quest to find out what's wrong with me and finally get well might finally be over. I learned today that I have Lyme Disease, four associated infections and dysfunctional ligaments in my neck, similar to what someone with whiplash might have. I also learned that all of these can be drastically improved or eliminated with less than six weeks of treatment. Score! Knowing that I might not have to feel like I'm 80 years old up until the day I turn 80 is a pretty amazing feeling for me. In addition to all the muscular pain, I've recently had a lot of fevers and an intense earache. I'll be really excited when that's gone. Try making someone a large cappuccino when it feels like your head is exploding out of your ears. I'm pretty sure I'd rather go to a Creed concert.

3. I found the neat blog of a woman named Heidi who writes about the intersection of her own food, travel and other things she likes. She started it after realizing she had 100 cookbooks and never really used them so she has put them to use and takes a lot of pretty pictures of the results. She is also vegetarian and a lot more chic than moi. I can't seem to link it to my blog but it's called "101 Cookbooks." Google it.

4. Saturday, with a little help from Wyatt, I tore my garden apart in preparation for the growing season. I'm looking at growing zucchini, cukes, peas, collards, radishes, beets, tomatoes, squash, salad greens and a few other treasures. We currently have some striped zinnia sprouts in the kitchen.

Babies in the kitchen:

An aerial view of the front yard: This is roughly three times the size of last year's growing operation. The cinder block square is a (ghetto) raised bed filled with compost from the backyard. Go Team Compost on the second floor! The white things in the other beds are milk jugs. Since we don't have a hose, the milk jugs will serve as irrigation systems. With holes punched in them, they will help deliver water under and around the different plants. One of our neighbors reportedly told Eleanor it looked like we were growing milk. From the street, it really does.

Many thanks to my Ula coworkers for helping me save all the jugs. I have a few more that I'll be using to germinate 'maters and other goodies as soon as I get some more soil.

5. Album of the week is Lou Reed's Coney Island Baby. Side A to B, that album's a gem. Listen to "Crazy Feeling."