All Vaxed Up

After some frenetic scheduling and multiple trips to the Health Department over the last couple of days, we've now got everyone* immunized against both seasonal flu and swine flu, and Princess and I had tetanus shots as well.


* Except Knuckles, who is allergic to eggs and therefore can't have any of the flu immunizations. There actually is a protocol for immunizing the egg-allergic for flu, but it's kind of involved and would take all day long and I don't think our health department can handle it. Since we've got everyone in the family immunized now, which covers the most likely route by which he would get the flu, I think he'll be fine. Oh, and they were only giving swine flu vax to people under 24, so FH and I couldn't get it (we're just slightly too old). But everybody's got every flu vax available to them.


Standard Disclaimer For Blogging About Vaccines: Please do not contact me regarding the danger of my children getting autism from vaccines. Besides the fact that there's no conclusive proof of a link, there's also the fact that half of them already have autism, so I don't really have much to lose. ;) Seriously, I understand about risks, probably better than a lot of the people out there who talk about them, since I've taken coursework in probability and statistics. And better than most anti-vaxers, I also understand why scientific studies can't conclusively prove there is no link, and it has nothing to do with the New World Order or the Bilderbergers. So I hereby ward off the anti-vax crowd by beating them over the head with my diploma. It's crude, but it works. And hey, at least I can use it for something!

My Idea To Improve Washington DC

Here is my brilliant idea to improve Washington DC.

First, we find a cooperative legislator willing to take part in this plan.
Then we have this legislator insert language into bills requiring Nancy Pelosi's underwear to be run up the Capitol flagpole the day after the law is signed by President Obama. He might have to do it in more than one piece, so that nobody cottons on to what he's doing. They don't read the bills anyway, but in case one of them actually does read it, we don't want them tipping everyone off.
Once the law is passed and signed, we have someone inform Speaker Pelosi what the law entails. Then we watch and enjoy!

After that, I would hope that everyone in Congress would start reading the bills, if only to make sure it's not their underwear up next. If the problem persists, we could always do it again, targeting a different legislator each time, until they start reading the bills.

First Frost

The temperature, which as lately as this past weekend has been in the 80's, suddenly dropped down to the 50's. Yesterday morning half the leaves on our gay squash plant were dead, and it wasn't any warmer during the day, so I knew it would frost. And last night we had our first frost.

Princess and I went out last night and pulled everything we could salvage from the garden. We have three carrots, a bunch of tiny zucchinis, and a whole towel full of collard greens. That's it; that's what we got from our garden. We got scarcely any tomatoes this year, which bothered me. Not getting but three carrots is one thing; I've never grown carrots before as an adult (I had them when I was a kid). But tomatoes? I thought I knew all the tricks. I used to grow them in Logan and the bushes were so big that we couldn't plant anything else in a 4'x8' bed that had 2-3 plants in it. They were so productive that I used to send Princess and Sonshine outside to pick themselves a snack all the time. This year the plants were so scraggly and unproductive; they set flowers but not fruits for a long time, and when they finally did start setting fruits there were only a few.

The rabbits have a nest box to snuggle up in. We had to move them outside because I got sick of the fights they caused; Princess wouldn't clean out the cage and it set off FH's sensitive nose. I'm hoping we can move the rabbits' cage over the garden beds after we rip out what's left of our garden plants, so that they can, ahem, produce fertilizer for next year.

What to plant next year? Well, I want to try the carrots again. They're authentically medieval purple carrots, and I still have seeds left. Collard greens were very successful, but I'd like to maybe add lettuce or spinach. I'm thinking of trying to turn my window well into a greenhouse, or maybe building a small one out of a recycled window to start seeds in outdoors.