Gadgetry

Well after four long and faithful years I'm getting my second $100 check for the ads which decorate my blog. (Yeah, ad revenue has totally changed my lifestyle. Heh.) I've combined it with a couple freelance checks and ordered a new gadget. Of course I searched around for the best price, because two freelance checks and ad revenue didn't quite add up to retail.

I'm so excited. I love gadgets. I've started packing one of those surge-protector multi-outlet thingies when I travel, just so I can plug all the chargers in neatly and in one contained area. (The building code for hotel room electrical outlets must be very different from homes, because there are never enough outlets in hotels.)

Do I need an ereader? Absolutely not. I've been reading treeware books since I was in kindergarten. I have Kindle for Mac loaded on my laptop and have even used it to read a couple publications. I would, eventually, get used to it. The problem with the laptop is that it folds; it's a little unwieldy for reading books. I can do it, but the most comfortable way to do it is sitting in a chair at a table. Which isn't really all that comfortable.

As both of you know, comfort is my racket.

I like to read in bed. And the thing I like to read in bed the most is magazines. That's why I bought the Nook Color.

Several of my favorite magazines are available for the device, and that was the tipping point. I think the list will get longer as time goes by, and I can already envision a day in which my nightstand will resemble one from a decorating magazine, instead of the cluttered mess it is right now: ripped-out recipe pages and ubiquitous subscription cards, along with the stack of publications. Oh, and a lamp and a phone and a box of tissues. I should have a coffee table beside my bed instead of a nightstand.

In other news, I worked this weekend at the garden center. The owners and regular employees were off on a field trip, but the plants still needed to be watered. It was tiring, for sure, dragging a heavy rubber hose around for five hours each day, but I got to see every single plant in the nursery, something I don't  get to do standing at a potting bench.

I have planters on either side of my front porch, with hostas and rhododendrons in them. The one to the left of the porch slopes down to a point, beginning at the edge of the house. I want to put something showy at the beginning of that slope, and there are so many options! Butterfly bush? Lilac? Crepe myrtle? That thing with all the orange berries in the fall? (I'm not good with names, heh.) I have to clean out what's in there now before I plant something new, but the wheels are turning, so to speak. Just being at the garden center again was inspiring.

I picked more tomatoes last night after dinner, bringing the yield up to 75 pounds total. The deer have found the garden. First they ate all the beet greens, then the edamame leaves and yesterday the okra was gone. I don't much care at this point. I need to get the cabbages shredded and salted for sauerkraut. I've already picked and frozen all the corn. There's more green beans and edamame to harvest (funny that the deer don't like the pods, just the leaves).

After that, all that's left are squash, and deer don't care for squash. I could take the fence down and start putting it to bed for the winter.

I wish there was an app for that.