So it's already hot, and it's crazy, people are shooting off fireworks starting like last week.  It's a recipe for accidents.  Especially drowning.  You tourists out there, don't swim in our ocean.  If the booze and lack of experience and undertows don't get you, the ecoli (or something else) will.  What do you think happens when our ancient coastal sewer systems are besieged with tons of touristal excrements?  Nothing happy I assure you.

It was a lovely day, which was wonderful considering they had predicted rain.  As you can see by all the hat holding, it was just slightly (hurricane force) windy.

We zoomed in and looked for our young blonde haired darling.  Hmmm.  This wasn't as easy as we thought.  There were TONS of blonde haired beauties.  With blue/purple robes.  We need a clue.

Then the clouds parted, the sun shone through, and the secret was revealed.  It also helped that she was an honors grad and they called her name.  Though you cannot tell by the shopped picture here, she has actually streaked her hair red.  Very little blonde showing!

Even if they hadn't called her name we would have been clued in by this next move.  Which one of these are not like the other?

For those who need a little more help. 

Congratulations Vanita!!!!!  (insert screams and confetti).

It's years like this that test the metal of local gardeners.  Long, cold, hailing, snowing, freezing winter.  Days of cool, soaking drizzle.  Jump from that to a few 100 degree days and back again.  That's our dismal weather story.  It's a wonder anything survives at all.

And yet it does.  Sure, the heat killed about 3/4 of my tomato plants.  And all 50 of my first lemon cucumbers.  But I replanted and transplanted and pinched off burned leaves, and rearranged plants for maximum protection.  It won't be the best garden year, but it will still be one.  That's where the true skill comes in.  When things aren't so easy.  If our forefathers/mothers had quit when times were hard, they would have starved to death.   And who knows, the way prices are going, if we don't improve our gardening talents we might too.

Gee, thanks Marshfield.   Another petty way to suck more bucks out of the parents.  GOOD GOING. 

The tsunami message said it was a preliminary 5.3.  Somebody tell me what that means exactly? 

Or, young boy becomes a partial Transformer.  That's what has happened to my sweet Derek.  He just got a full mouth of braces a couple of days ago, after a week of torture with rubber band spacers between his teeth.  The spacers, they say, are the worst part.  And they hurt right away.  The pain of spacers is supposed to subside within two to three days.  Ibuprofen is the drug of choice.  Oh yeah, and the spacers pop out and break alot too.  If they break and remain between the teeth, no big deal, they are still doing their job.  If they come completely out you have to replace them yourself.  Or rather, MOM is supposed to.  Well mom couldn't. 

Derek's teeth were so tight together that the orthodontist's assistant could barely get them in.  And with so much chance of slippage, (mind you, replacing them requires that you thread a couple of pieces of dental floss through them and pulling tight, then cramming the fat little rubber band between the teeth), I could not tolerate the thought of cutting my already hurting son's mouth/lips up.  So after a few tries, I pussed out.  Derek, however, brave soul that he is, was determined to do it on his own.  AND HE SUCCEEDED.  Several times because the damn thing kept popping out.  PROBLEM SOLVED.  Sort of.

We were told very little about the braces process as far as pain goes.  I think that's because they don't want to scare the victim patient.  So Derek and I turned to our knowledgeable friends.  The consensus was this:

Derek's friends:  You can really eat whatever you want.  Oh yeah, and it hurts like hell.

My friends:  You have to change your whole diet.  What do you mean they can eat what they want?  Ask them this, are YOU an orthodontist?  So what makes you smarter than one?  Oh and sure, it's two years of torture.  Lot's of blood and pain.  But SO worth it.

In the end, it was not so much about choosing what he WANTED to eat as it was choosing what it was POSSIBLE to eat.  So far that is soup, tapioca pudding, jello, and little sandwiches picked into mouse size pieces.  And mashed potatoes.  Now excuse me while I go cook something soft and mushy for the boy.