Swimming Upstream

The 1/2 24MEU

2012-02-05T20:21:00.001-05:00

A Visit To Roanoke

2012-01-29T11:57:00.003-05:00

Oh well...so much for formatting...looks like everything's clipped. Maybe I'll work on it.

This is a project I undertook for my niece. She's getting married in September in nearby Boone's Mill, and she wanted to know what to do in Roanoke.

I might go back and add in my pictures at some point.

A Visit to Roanoke

Nestled in the bosom of the Blue Ridge Mountains, Roanoke, Virginia and the surrounding area offer the visitor a wide-range of lodging, dining, recreational, artistic, and eclectic activities.

Hotels:

· The Hotel Roanoke

She’s the grand hotel in Roanoke. Dating back to Roanoke’s frontier days in the 1880’s. She’s withstood destruction by fire and destruction by economy. She has arisen from the ashes and returned to her former glory.

· Holiday Inn Tanglewood

A solid hotel on Roanoke’s desirable Southwest side. As an added bonus, The Elephant Walk is contained within the structure and Carlos’ Brazilian restaurant is only a short drive away.

· Cambria Suites

Located beside the smoldering remains of Roanoke Victory Stadium, Roanoke’s newest hotel shines like a beacon. One of its special amenities is that it’s only a few hundred yards away from Roanoke’s impressive medical center and complex.

· Sheraton Hotel and Conference Center

The Sheraton is located at the intersection of Hershberger and I-581. It’s an impressive hotel with a really nice lobby fireplace.

Dining:

· Alejandros Mexican Grill

The restaurant is truly a growing enterprise. The flagship is located in Roanoke’s downtown market area. Another satellite is located in Northwest Roanoke. People rave about their fish tacos.

· Carlos Brazilian International Cuisine

Probably Roanoke’s finest and most celebrated restaurant. The food is impeccable and the view of the valley from the western facing tables is unparalleled.

· Corned Beef and Company

Probably Roanoke’s bawdiest restaurant. Pool tables. Working fare. A jumping joint.

· Grace’s Pizza

People from around town know of Grace’s. It’s an unpretentious restaurant with excellent pizza and calzones for which to die.

· Isaacs

It’s hard to believe that Roanoke would have a fine Mediterranean restaurant, but Isaacs is that place. The food is excellent.

· Roanoke Weiner Stand

A locally famous place. They specialize in hot dogs. They are good.

· Mac and Bob’s

Salem’s flagship restaurant and meeting place. They serve Americans American food.

· Texas Tavern

Since The depression, the TT has served thousands of customers ten at a time. They don’t cash checks or play with bumblebees. They serve some of the most interesting chili you’ll ever fully experience from intake to outflow.

· Tazza

The Radjou family from India runs this lovely Indian restaurant. They care about their food and their customers.

· The Elephant Walk

Comes highly regarded and part of the Holiday Inn Tanglewood package.

· The Home Place

Ah well, what can you say. The Home Place is an old-fashioned family-style restaurant. People are seated and fed. The food is really good and greasy and fattening. They use butter. Located in downtown Catawba, population 12, this IS the finest place in the area to eat, or so many gloat.

Coffee

· Froth

It’s new and it serves coffee and people like it.

· Mill Mountain Coffee and Tea

A very successful coffee house. Mill Mountain Coffee and Tea has grown to offer several locations around the valley. The coffee is great and the ambiance is laid-back.

Bread

· On the Rise Bakery

Located on the City Market Square, this bakery serves up a wide variety of tasty and finely crafted breads and pastries.

· Bread Craft

Alex’s dream was to create a true French-styled bakery. With Bread Craft, he has succeeded beyond all imagination. His sourdough creations are amazing. Hint, try to olive loaf.

· The Euro Bakery

Bari and Elizabeta Sinani, refugees from Bosnia create the most delicious breads and pastries in Roanoke. Most incredible are their bureks which are light pastry-like pies filled with spinach and cheese or beef and onions. Such delights are a rare treat on Earth. Recently they expanded to a spot at the Roanoke City Market.

Museums

· Taubman Museum

Considered by some to be Roanoke’s albatross while others view it as our great flying train, The Taubman Museum , designed by Randall Stout, is the home of a fantastic Thomas Eakin collection as well as all sorts of other art sorta stuff. One exhibit, a life-sized sculpture of King Kong, is currently plastered onto the side of the structure, complete with a biplane in his mitts.

· O.Winston Link Museum

Once upon a time, steam engines ruled the rails. Then they didn’t. But before they went away, there was O. Winston Link. This photo artist captured the era of steam and juxtaposed it against the coming storm of progress. Link’s photo’s were almost taken from Roanoke by his greedy second wife. Twice she was imprisoned for stealing his works. Yet her greatest crime, imprisoning a frail old man went unpunished.

· Vriginia Museum of Transportation

Lots and lots of locomotives. The 611-J, the most advanced steam locomotive, is the resident master of the house along with the Class A 1218. Technical talk to be sure, but the collection also has a few planes, a quirky model train Barnum and Bailey Circus lay-out, and inexplicably, a Jupiter rocket, you know, the same kind of rocket that in May 1959 was home to space monkeys, Able and Baker, as they vaulted into space and returned alive to tell the tale. They were the first space monkeys to survive a trip to space. Sadly, Able died a couple of months later from an infected brain electrode, but Miss Baker lived 27 years and is buried at the NASA complex in Huntsville, Alabama. Able’s body was preserved and you can see him any day you want at the National Air and Space Museum. You really can’t make this stuff up.

Entertainment

· Kirk Avenue Music Hall

Roanoke’s premiere eclectic live music venue. Out of the pavement of a cold, hard city depression, Kirk Avenue Music Hall rescued Roanoke’s music scene. Now, this fledgling musical arts center is attracting some incredible underground talent like Shawn Mullins.

· The Jefferson Center

Jefferson High School was the home of The Magicians. Then the school closed. Its shell sat abandoned for many years; water finding its way inside. Then it was rescued and turned into an incredible musical arts center. Many of today’s greatest performers have played there, including BB King and Richard Thompson.

· Roanoke Civic Center

With all the charm of a Chernobyl-style nuclear reactor, The Roanoke Civic Center from time to time has some interesting shows, from Broadway traveling circuses to Elton John.

· 202 Market

Uniquely famous after local megla-media star, River Laker, performed a striptease at a fund-raiser causing the 202 to lose its ABC license, It’s still a destination on the city market.

· Martin’s Downtown

This is where the local music scene makes its presence felt. Local bands cut their musical chops there.

Roanoke-Centric

· Roanoke City Market

Roanoke is blessed with a classic market square. Over the past few years, the city’s done its best to destroy it. Yet somehow, out of the ashes of discontent, irresponsibility, and corporate greed, the square has survived and has been reborn. As long as the city doesn’t renege on its lease of ten feet of public sidewalk for silent monthly Plowshares anti-war protests, peace and prosperity will reign.

· Mill Mountain Star

Without a doubt, The Mill Mountain Star is Roanoke’s claim to fame. The huge man-made star, originally lit in 1949 by a forward-thinking Chamber of Commerce has shown brightly over the Valley ever since. Back in the day, the star used to shine red whenever someone in the valley died in a traffic accident. Later, the colors were switched to red, white, and blue to honor our nation’s 200^th birthday. These days, the star shines white in honor of the fallen in the 9/11 attacks.

· Mill Mountain Zoo

Mill Mountain Zoo sits atop Mill Mountain and guards our valley. Snow Leopards, red wolves and prairie dogs abound. A trip on “The Zoo Choo” is strongly recommended.

· Dr. Pepper and H&C Coffee Signs

Only in Roanoke would one of the star attractions be two neon signs from the 1940’s. Yet, there you go. Residents are mesmerized and comforted by the electronic coffee pouring from the electric pot to the glowing cup. Dr. Pepper’s 10-2-4 sign reminds us always to drink our Dr. Peppers at 10am, 2pm, and 4pm; doctor’s orders. Roanokers take such prescriptions to heart as Roanoke leads the nation in consumption of Dr. Pepper per capita.

· Mini Graceland

It’s hard to explain and even harder to understand. Over the years, Elvis’ miniature home had fallen into disrepair. In fact, it may not be there anymore. That would be a true loss.

· The Coffee Pot

All across America in the 1930’s, Coffee Pot restaurants ruled the roadsides along with giant balls of yard, giant corkscrews, giant reptile sculptures, and corn mazes. This icon is still here.

· Texas Tavern

A bowl with and a Cheesy Western. Roanoke’s Millionaire Club.

· Roanoke Weiner Stand

Hot dog! People travel from all over the world to eat these slippery dogs. One man actually flies his own Cessna in from Northern Virginia just to get a tasty dog.

· St. Andrews’ Catholic Church

Completed in 1902, St. Andrews Catholic Church lords over Roanoke City. It’s a true gothic-styled gem of a church complete with imported, stunning German stained glass windows.

· D-Day Memorial

About twenty miles from Roanoke is the sleepy city of Bedford. Bedford, VA lost more people per capita than any other place in the country on D-Day. A grand memorial has been built to honor all the fallen. The Overlord Arch is something to behold.

Recreation

· Peaks of Otter

Nestled north of Roanoke along the Blue Ridge Parkway, two mountains share a space, Sharp Top and Flat Top. Sharp Top is the rock star of the two. You can take the shuttle to the top or brave the strenuous hike. At the top, you’ll be rewarded with a 360 degree view of the area from Roanoke to deep into the piedmont of Virginia. At the base of the mountains you can lodge, picnic, or dine in a pristine environment.

· Mabry Mill

Situated about an hour south along the Blue Ridge Parkway, Mabry Mill is a picturesque mill from the mountain days. You can eat some incredible pancakes at the restaurant onsite.

· Blue Ridge Parkway

This famous Depression era project rolls through The Roanoke Valley. Scenic drives can be made to the north or south.

· The Cascades

The Cascades are located near the town of Pembroke in Giles County or about 45 minutes from Roanoke along I-81 south/Rt 460West. An easy half hour hike along a bubbling stream leads to a beautiful waterfall.

· Mountain Lake

Marketed as “The Home of Dirty Dancing,” this beautiful mountaintop resort in Giles County is stunning. Yes, Patrick Swayze did some of his greatest acting there. The resort is dimmed a little since the natural lake inexplicably drained a few years ago.

· Virginia Tech

Home of the Fightin’ Gobblers, Virginia tech is one of Virginia’s largest universities. Located in Blacksburg, just 30 minutes from Roanoke along I-81 South, VT is a beautiful rural campus with stunning limestone (Hokiestone) buildings.

· The New River

Oddly, the New River is the oldest river in the world next to the Nile. Around these parts, people like to toss an inner tube in, hop on it and float the day away through Montgomery and Giles Counties.

· McAfee’s Knob

The hike that people talk about. McAfee’s Knob can be reached via the Rt 311 parking lot atop Catawba Mountain. The hike is about 4 miles each way and is quite strenuous for the last mile up to the summit. The view, however, is beyond worth the pain. You can see ridge after ridge out to the west into West Virginia. To the north and east you can see to and beyond The Peaks of Otter. To the East and South you can see the entire Roanoke Valley and beyond. McAfee’s Knob is truly a destination.

· Read Mountain

A unique and short suburban hike up a mountain. The hike is a moderate climb up an ordinary small mountain. At the top, the cliff view of the Roanoke Valley is breath-taking as you look down on the Roanoke Regional Airport.

· Dragon’s Tooth

This is a strenuous hike that begins at the Dragon’s Tooth parking area along Rt 311 just west of Catawba. The hike is about 4 miles each way and summits at a strange tooth-like formation of massive rocks. The vista on a clear day offers looks into the Roanoke Valley and beyond as well as Blacksburg to the south.

· Roanoke Valley Greenway

o Roanoke River Greenway-Roanoke City

By parking at River’s edge park in downtown Roanoke, you can either head a few miles to the east into Vinton or a few miles to the west deeper into Roanoke City. Whichever way you go, the river will be your friend.

o Roanoke River Greenway-Salem

The Roanoke River is normally gentle meanders through an industrial base. This stretch is relaxed and uniquely beautiful.

o Hanging Rock Greenway

A strange little three mile round trip. Along a cinder trail, you cover an old train route through Roanoke’s rail history. Also, you get a solid dose of Civil War history, by learning of the epic Battle of Hanging Rock.

o Lick Run Greenway

Stroll a paved path from Valley View Mall in front of the Target store all the way into the heart of downtown Roanoke. The trail offers solitude and babbling streams as well as cityscape vistas.

o Wolf Creek Greenway-Vinton

A unique hike through suburbia. The highlight is crouching and easing your way through a make-shift pedestrian tunnel under a major highway eventually ending at the Blue Ridge Parkway.

A Saturday Morning Visit to WalMart

2011-10-15T10:39:00.001-04:00

A Saturday Morning Visit to WalMart

We just got back from our weekly Saturday morning WalMart visitation. After quickly gathering our goods, we chose the shorter of the two long checkout lines. The lady in front of us was a friendly line-talker. Tall, grey-streaked hair (“earned every one of them”),dressed in faded denim overalls and hiking boots, she asked me for help with a universal battery charger for her cell phone. As is usual in technological matters of late, I was of no help. Meanwhile she kept up interesting conversation with my wife and me as we waited for the non-English-speaking middle-aged couple to finish their check-out.

The couple was finally done being ringed up and their basket was full of food when the husband slid his card to pay. The line had grown very long with many frowning people channeling their disgust in laser-dart stares. The cashier frowned and motioned for him to slide the card again. She frowned again and gestured to the man that the card didn't work. A hand-signed conversation began with no good end in sight. The couple looked perplexed and scared. It was obvious that this was a huge setback for them. They had no currency and their card didn't work. They began to park their cart and were about to leave when the friendly lady with whom we had been conversing, stepped up to the card scanner and ran her debit card through, paying for their groceries. The cashier turned to her and said, "Are you sure you want to do this?" She affirmed. I didn't see the final total, but the basket was full -easily a $150 cart.

The man and woman looked shocked and didn't know what to say. After a moment they gathered themselves and thanked her in some language I didn't recognize. The man came over to her, took her hand, held it firmly, and looked directly at her with tears in his eyes.

As the couple walked away with their basket of food, both my wife and I told the angel what a beautiful gesture that was. She responded, "I really hate to see people embarrassed that way."

Touchdown?

2011-10-10T19:13:00.001-04:00

I think not.

An Amazing Deal!

2011-08-09T16:26:00.000-04:00

Read carefully.

Save Our Schools and The State of Education Today

2011-08-03T22:05:00.007-04:00

What follows is a response to a message board post by Valencia Hokie that I wrote today. I hope you can figure out what the original poster questioned. I share this to prove to my readers that I actually am alive and still can write sometimes.

Valencia, I’m glad you brought up Matt Damon and the Save Our Schools March. The march and rally took place this past Saturday on The Ellipse in front of the White House. About 5,000 education supporters (and a few non-supporters) attended including my wife and me. We stood out in the baking sun for hours listening to speeches from nationally renowned education experts and partisans. Linda Darling-Hammond (once Obama’s top education adviser), Jonathan Kozol, author of “Savage Inequalities” among many other books, Diane Ravitch, HW Bush’s Deputy Education Secretary, and Matt Damon, son of a teacher all spoke at the rally among many others. Coverage of the rally was drowned out by the debt crisis, but it was loud none-the-less. I’m so very glad I went.

Here's a look at a video collection I made from the rally.

In Virginia, SOL’s really aren’t the problem. SOL accountability measures are. First a little history…

Basically, the SOL’s in Virginia (other states have different accountability systems) are quite an improvement over what was in place back in the early 1980’s. Back then, there were no state standards. Hence, if a fourth grade teacher decided that she would like to teach about plants, then she’d do that, even if the first, second, and third grade teachers had already covered the topic. In that age before electronic communication, there was little contact between classrooms. The teacher ruled her four walls. Additionally, if a child transferred from one state school district to another, they’d most likely encounter huge gaps in their educations, since there was no core standard curriculum. The SOL’s in Virginia, first developed in 1988, were a serious attempt to standardize the core curriculum across the entire state, which was wildly successful.

In 1994, George Allen was elected Governor. One of his first moves as Governor was to implement a test accountability system to become effective in 1997. Secrecy shrouded these tests. No one knew what exactly would be tested, only that they would cover the SOL’s. When the results came out, it was determined that only 45-50% of the students passed fourth grade Reading. Similar scores were charted for Math, Science, and Social Studies. After a few years of testing, the state decided to introduce blueprints and frameworks, so that teachers had some kind of guide for instruction. Up until this time, all teaching material was developed by individual teachers. Textbooks simply didn’t exist that met Virginia’s standards. Teachers referred to this strange era as “The backwards time”- when the accountability came first and the diagnosis came second.

NCLB came along in 2001. NCLB is actually a federal bill called “The Education and Secondary Education Act.” It’s up for reauthorization by Congress this year. George II and Teddy K liked to refer to it as “No Child Left Behind.” NCLB, for the first time, instituted sticks to beat teachers and school divisions with if they failed to meet designated standards. These standards were graduated so that by 2013 100% of ALL children in public schools would meet or surpass predetermined pass scores. ALL children means just that. No excuses. Blind…pass the test. Retarded…pass the test. Learning Disabled…pass the test. Poor…pass the test. Black…pass the test. NCLB also instituted a sub-group game, sort of like a side bet at a football game with unusual and quirky rules. If your school has 50 or more special education students and less than ____% fail the state tests, then the whole school is deemed a failure. If your school has 50 or more economically disadvantaged students and more than ___% fail the tests, your school fails, etc. Fail once, you’re shunned. Fail twice, you’re on double secret probation, fail a third time, you’re shut down-teachers transferred and poor, unsuspecting teachers are sent in to replace you and your colleagues. (side note: I remember when my wife taught at an inner city school. There was no way in hell they would pass the tests or meet the standard cut scores. No way. The teachers were vilified in the press and in front of their peers and accused of being horrible teachers despite the fact that they were working harder for their children than any other faculty in the district…Across town, there was a school where all of the economically advantaged children went to school. They passed the tests, although their faculty really didn’t have to work hard to make that happen. They were praised in the media and in front of their peers. My wife and her friends looked forward to the day when they were transferred out and sent to other schools and were replaced by the golden teachers:) Once implemented, these ratcheting standards have forced teachers to “Teach to the Test” in order to meet expectations. You are even hearing of cases where teachers cheat the tests (Atlanta) to meet expectations.

Your question had to do with should Virginians keep the SOL’s or ditch them. It’s rather complicated, but I think that we may need to ditch them in the end. One other poster here alluded to the necessity for a common set of standards across the USA. I suspect that’s where we are heading. Virginia is one of six states that have yet to buy in to the “Common Core” curriculum standards. Part of the reason why is that Virginia was way out ahead of the “reform” movement when we developed the SOL’s in 1988. Now, however, most states have joined hands in the common core race and Virginia is slowly getting left behind. Why can’t Virginia go it alone? We can, but teachers need resources, especially resources that tie to the curriculum. We’ve just spent the past 23 years developing our own resources, but most teachers across the country utilized packaged materials from textbook and resource companies. Make no mistake, there’s big money (billions) to be made in this field. Texas, New York, and California drive the textbook and resource market. That’s the way it’s always been. New York and California are both on board with The Common Core. Texas and Virginia haven’t signed on yet.

Ask any public school teacher today…they will all tell you that the job has become impossible and shitty. Few are entering the profession. Since rigid evaluation standards have been implemented across the country without commensurate increases in salary, interest in teaching as a career has declined. In California over the past seven years, 45% fewer people are working toward a teaching credential. Yale has dropped their undergrad teaching prep program. In New York City, the poster child of reform, 50% of teachers leave by the end of five years in the classroom.

Why such disillusionment? Teachers have become the enemy of America. One reason for that is that most teachers are unionized (not in Virginia). Not just an ordinary union…but the largest union in the country. NEA has 3.2 million members. AFT has another 1.5 million. That means that teachers have the #1 and # 3 largest unions in the country. That makes them a very large target to people who want to politically devalue that base. One particular party views union voters with antipathy. If they can devalue the powerful teacher unions, they will have a clearer road to control of government. Another reason for the disillusionment is that teachers have become testers. The art of teaching, that which brought joy and want to the profession, has been replaced by sterile numbers and a business model for education, one where we don’t teach students; instead, we administer to clients. Teaching has become joyless, stress-filled, and empty for so very many. Again, that’s one reason why so many are leaving and so few qualified people are replacing them.

Teachers are now coming under the control of VAM’s (Value Added Models of evaluation) VAM’s sound like a great way to evaluate teachers and weed out the bad apples. Compare student achievement on standardized tests at the end of one year with the test score at the end of the next year. Simple. You can even tie teacher pay to test results. That’s where the Governor of Virginia wants to head before he becomes Vice President. The problem is that schools aren’t that tidy. Break points are arbitrary and subjective. The VAM’s really can’t determine which teacher is effective or ineffective, good or bad. Only which ones have their students answer questions on the standardized tests correctly. Plus, how do you compare growth using a Geometry score compared to an Algebra score? How do you factor in team teaching? How do you account for the effects of outside tutoring that only some students receive? How do you facor in kids who don’t come to school or suffer traumatic events? How do you factor in the wide variance of gains or losses students experience over a summer? How do you factor in transfers from out of the district, school? How do you evaluate Music, Art, PE, Kindergarten, First grade teachers? How do you disincentive teachers who teach to the test? VAM’s make no sense when you really get down to it. Yet, they are popular. Why? $$$$ There is gold in those hills. Testing companies stand to make millions/billions developing the tests that will determine a teacher’s future in the career.

What would be a better way to evaluate teachers? I think that the best way would be to develop PAR’s (Peer Assistance and Review) committees. Some of these programs have been used successfully to evaluate teachers since the early 80’s. (Toledo, Cincinnati, Rochester, etc) PAR panels observe and evaluate all teachers, and take the evaluation burden away from the school principal and building administrators, freeing them up to assist in content and instructional delivery methods within the school. The panels are made up of 6-12 people, half teachers and half administrators. These panelists take over the responsibility of observing and mentoring teachers throughout the year. At year’s end, they recommend to the panel whether a teacher should be retained, dismissed, or receive more assistance. The panel then reviews these reports and records, interviews the teachers, and makes a decision. No test arbitrary scores. No “gotcha” media. No $$$$ Bill Gates/Harcourt Brace money grab. Real, powerful professional standards enforcement by the professionals themselves.

You asked two other questions. How would you appropriate money and how would you keep teachers from cheating?

Regarding funding, the state of Virginia has been shirking its constitutional obligation to fully fund public school education for about the past five years. The state has an independent assessment of what investment it would take to fully fund education. This assessment is brought before the General Assembly each budget cycle and the GA then determines what its share will be. When I first started in the profession 30 years ago, the state was kicking in about 55% of the cost with the localities picking up around 40%. The feds usually carried the last 6%. These days, however, state support has shrunk to around 33% with the localities picking up around 51% and the feds kicking in around 6%. In addition, the state has redefined what it considers fully funding its share. For example, the battle every year is whether or not elementary school guidance counselors, art teachers, and music teachers will be included in the formula. These decisions really impact how the locality handles school funding, their instructional program, and local tax structures. Ultimately in Virginia, the General Assembly is constitutionally obligated to FULLY fund its share of educational costs in the commonwealth. This has NOT been happening.

As for keeping those nasty teachers from cheating. I’d fire them if they are caught. That’s a violation of the basic teaching contract in the state and punishable by immediate termination. Contrary to popular lore, no public school teacher in America has tenure. Tenure is a lifetime appointment that’s generally used at institutions of higher learning. Most teachers in union states have the specific right to hear and refute evidence if they are dismissed, binding arbitration through due process. In Virgina, a right to work state, teachers still have the right to know why they are being dismissed if they have attained continuing contract status, due process. Such status generally comes after a three year probationary period. Such a hearing is NOT binding, however. In other words, teachers can be dismissed even if the panel rules in the teacher’s favor. Non-continuing contract teachers can be dismissed at any time without cause.

Moreover, teachers will be less likely to cheat on tests if the tests are used for their original purpose, as a diagnostic tool to help guide instruction. When tests are used as hammers to determine career status or merit pay, there’s a ripe incentive to cheat.

I recently came across some interesting information regarding America’s schools. You know that we’ve all been conditioned by the media to believe that our schools are failing. I suppose they are in one way, but not another. According to the 2009 Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), which tests 15 year-old students in 60 developed countries, the USA generally scores about 14^th in reading scores. That’s not good. However, if you mine down a bit, and compare countries with low poverty to US schools with low poverty and suddenly we come out on top WAY on top. This holds true when you compare our kids at schools with 10% or less of poverty and schools with 20% or less poverty. Finland, for example has a poverty rate of 3.4%. If we compare that country to our schools with less than 10% poverty, we blow them away. Only when you compare our schools with their 20.7% poverty rate against those other schools with their low single digit poverty rates do we fall to 14^th.

Another piece of research I recently came across was “The Coleman Report” from 1966. That was the first research based study that identified “one-third in-school factors, two-thirds family characteristics” ratio to explain variations in student achievement. Results from that initial study have been validated, most recently in 2004 (Class and Schools). So student achievement isn’t just a school issue, it’s a larger societal issue. As a career teacher, those conclusions make sense to me and ring true.

What does this all mean? To me, it means that we have a poverty problem. Until we figure out as a society how to deal with that, we won’t see improvement.

Interesting pictures

2011-08-01T09:23:00.002-04:00

Tomato and Pepper Plants 2011

2011-04-18T20:33:00.003-04:00

This is the time of year when I set my tomatoes and pepper seedlings outside to get acclimated to the real world. Once again, I've created a "catalog". This year, I decided to fictionalize most of the historical descriptions. I certainly had a fun time creating some different stories.

Tomato and Pepper

Plants 2011

I have a limited stock of the following varieties of Tomatoes and Peppers. The suggested donation is $1.50 each (4/$5.00). Plants were tendered from seed and suckled on water in an organic mix. No additives other than treated county water, rainwater, dust particles, seaweed, and Roanoke’s own natural air pollution have ever been added to these plants or their immediate environment.

Here are my babies with a brief description of each variety. Determinate means that the plant sets all of its fruit at once. Indeterminate means that the plant keeps producing fruit and it ripens on the vine as long as the plant is alive. The fruit comes in throughout the season. I’m partial to indeterminate types. (#) = how many of this plant I have in stock. Of course, I’ll be taking my own cut from the total number, so for some varieties, there won’t be nearly that many available.

Not necessarily a new variety…just a new one in my garden this year

"A world without tomatoes is like a string quartet without violins." - Laurie Colwin

Main Crop Tomato

You can put it on a sandwich with a bit of salt and mayo. I like to open the bread and lay a tomato slice on it then toss the whole package into the toaster oven. You can have a lot of classic food fun with slicing tomatoes.

It's difficult to think anything but pleasant thoughts while eating a homegrown tomato.
~Lewis Grizzard

Abraham Lincoln This heirloom variety produces 9 ounce fruit that supposedly is quite prolific. Abraham Lincoln was a variety developed by the Buckbee Seed Company in 1923. Introduced with little fanfare, it gradually grew in popularity until it became more popular than lawn grass. Other seed companies rushed to get on the bandwagon. Soon, George Washington, James Madison, Thomas Jefferson, and Teddy Roosevelt were wildly popular as well. The Alexander Hamilton fared horribly, however, and was dispatched to the seed graveyard.

Indeterminate (3)

Better Boy A 12 ounce tomato, Better Boy is the current standard for excellent, well-rounded tomatoes in the modern home garden.

Better Boy is the latest in a long lineage of Boy tomatoes. Coupled with the Girl family of tomatoes, a home gardener has all he needs to propagate success. Boy was the first of this great family. Soon after, Girl appeared-genetically spliced from organic Boy material. Boy and Girl ruled gardens for many years. Eventually, more Boys and Girls appeared. Big Boy, Early Girl, Early Wonder, Good Boy, Bad Boy, Best Boy, Husky Boy, Big Girl. These days, Better Boy is the best Boy.

Indeterminate (12)

BHN 444 Hybrid A modern hybrid, BHN 444 is notable for its disease resistance. This medium sized slicer with the outside shell texture of a bell pepper is resistant to many common plant diseases as well as many human diseases as well. BHN 444 is resistant to German Measles, psoriasis, shingles, and Justin Bieber.

Determinate (9)

Black Krim This rare heirloom variety originally from the Isle of Krim in the former Soviet Union is a mid-sized dark slicing tomato.

Krim used to be a cherry sized yellow tomato before the Chernobyl nuclear reactor disaster of 1986.

Indeterminate (12)

Brandywine Sudduth Strain Large pink fruit up to 2lb.Brandywine tomatoes are cult favorites among old-time gardeners. This “Pink Brandywine” strain, obtained by Ben Quisenberry from Dorris Sudduth Hill, whose family had “grown it for more than 80 years” is considered the absolute best by many of those old-timers. Ben’s acquisition of the Suddith Strain is shrouded in some mystery. Dorris Suddith Hill had taken some of the family’s heirloom seeds and trialed them in her garden with great success. Mr. Quisenberry, her next-door neighbor, had worked his family’s established garden for many years with little success. Some suggest that Quisenberry, jealous over his neighbor’s gardening success, disappeared Ms. Hill and absconded with her precious seeds.

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Carbon Perhaps my dog’s favorite tomato last summer, Carbon produces a fair number of large, dark-coloured fruit.

My dog enjoys tomatoes, especially Carbon. Last year was my first summer with Carbon, and I really wanted to see if it would produce better and taste better than Cherokee Purple. So I planted one in a special location in my small garden and planted another in one of those new-fangled up-side-down-get-people-to-throw-away-their-hard-earned-money-on-frilly-nothingness tomato containers. I set the container up on my deck initially, and as the plant grew, it developed several excellent specimens, and I moved it out into the yard. As they gradually grew larger, they dipped closer to the ground. The very day I intended to pick them, I observed my 12 year-old arthritic black lab pooch get up on her hind legs and snatch each one individually from the vine. She had dripping black tomato juice bleeding from her sharp canine jaws and a wide grin on her face.

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Cherokee Purple This heirloom variety produces 5 ½-inch fruit that some regard as quite tasty. According to many sources, the plants are not terribly prolific, and are susceptible to disease. Some, however, would disagree with that assessment.

Cherokee Purple’s history is steeped in the ancient Native American lore of the Cherokee Nation. It is told that these seeds, scattered across wide acreage, ward off predatory cats. Since its introduction, wild predatory cats have virtually disappeared from the east coast of the United States.

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Delicious Perhaps you knew this. Delicious has the record for largest tomato ever measured. In 1974, Jonathan Wilbur from Arab, Alabama grew a lone Delicious vine along the back side of his three bedroom ranch house. Wilbur trained the plant along a central stalk and carefully tended one tomato. All other fruit was removed and the plant was actively suckered. He fed his plant weekly initially with a concoction of seaweed and fish emulsion. As his prize tomato accelerated its growth, Wilbur increased the feeding and developed reinforcing structures that attached to the side of his house. Finally, fearing that the tomato would damage the side of his home, he called the local horticultural extension agent and explained that he needed his massive Delicious tomato, affectionately named “Bubba”, weighed and measured. The agent arrived on the scene promptly with an industrial scale. Carefully raising the scale to the tomato and gradually allowing the scale to accept its full weight, this record breaker went down in the books: 114 lbs. 7oz.-that’s not a misprint. Bubba’s circumference was an eye-popping 73 inches.

Sadly, hours after the measurement, Wilbur returned home from a celebratory dinner to find Bubba’s remains lying on the ground below the vine and his cute blue tick hound, Sadie, lounging beside it grinning from ear to ear.

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Djena Lee’s Golden Girl Djena (ZShena) Lee, famous tomato developer of the 1920’s, developed this golden gem. After her passing, the tomato seeds were taken by her minister. For years he hoarded them before finally entering the fruit in a Chicago tomato taste-testing fair. One judge reportedly exclaimed, "When eating the center of the tomato it continues to explode in my mouth." Impossible story, I know. But it’s the truth. How can a person talk after a tomato explodes in their mouth? Djena Lee’s Golden Girl went on exploding its way to blue ribbons at that Fair for the next ten years.

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Druzba Perhaps the friendliest tomato you’ll ever grow. Druzhba in Bulgarian means “Friendship.” This large tomato is supposed to provide excellent yields with good disease resistance. I can’t say that my experience bears this out. In fact, I didn’t find the tomato to be very friendly at all. Every time I’d go to talk with it, the plant would just curl up its leaves.

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Early Girl For many years now, Burpee’s Early Girl was been a staple member of America’s gardens. It’s an early season tomato with decent slicing size.

Early Girl became the golden seed in Burpee’s 1960’s catalogs. Seed beta testers reported that this variety germinates in ground covered by up to two feet of snow. First fruit can be picked in deep snows as well; however, it is susceptible to snow drifts.

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Early Wonder What a cool early tomato. Early Wonder develops wonderful little clusters of fruit. A pale shade of red, these clusters pale in the sunlight and fool you into thinking that they aren’t ripening. But they are! How cool is that?

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Giant Belgium 1½ to five pound fruit. That’s representing. Giant Belgium is a beefsteak tomato, but has a more regular shape and less wasted tomato according to reports.

Giant Belgium was named by Bertrand Verhaegen, famous Belgian aerialist. He was noted for riding his unicycle seventy-five feet above the hard earth while munching on this giant tomato that he obtained from his Aunt Elise’s garden. Sadly, Verhaegen died tragically one late summer day in 1923 when his unicycle hit a kink in the wire just as he was about to chomp into a Giant Belgium. Bertrand plunged to his death, forever sealing his place in Belgian lore.

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Goliath A giant tomato in the 1-2lb range with some getting as large as 3lb on a huge plant as one catalog says or growing 10 -15 oz fruit on a bushy plant that are good for containers. Goliath, for such a large plant, is masked in invisibility. You will never actually notice that you are growing this plant until just before the fruit is ready for picking.

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Jet Star 7 to 8 oz red fruit. Low acid. Compact plant.
“ ‘Uncle’" Dick raised hogs, greens, and Jet Star tomatoes. Sold them at the public Market. We weeded and later picked these tomatoes; they were and still are the one tomato I can count on come harvest time. I can them and we eat them off the vine. I try several varieties every year for fun, but depend on Jet Star for canning. I put in 100 plants and feed give away a lot of tomatoes.” ~Marc from Monroe County, NY

Marc is strange.

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Momotarō: 6 to 7 oz perfectly round pink fruit. This import from Japan is regarded as the most popular tomato there. It’s supposed to be sweet and tasty.

In America, this tomato is sometimes called “Tough Guy,” but in Japan, Momotarō is a popular hero in folklore. According to Wikipedia, in the oldest known version of the legend, an “old, childless woman discover[s] the giant, floating peach and take[s] it home with her, as she finds it to be of good color and tasty-looking. After eating a piece of the peach, the old woman is suddenly rejuvenated and regains the beauty of her youth. When her old husband comes home from the hills, he is astounded to find a dazzling young lady in his house. At first he does not even recognize his own wife in her rejuvenated form, but she explains to him how she has picked up an unusual peach floating in the river and brought it home to eat it and was magically transformed. She then gives her husband a piece of the peach to eat, and he also regains his youthful vigor. That night, the newly invigorated couple make love, and the woman becomes pregnant as a result. She eventually gives birth to their first child, a son, whom they name Tarō, as that is a common Japanese name for a first son.

Years later, Momotarō left his parents for an island called Onigashima to destroy the marauding oni (demons or ogres) that dwelt there. En route, Momotarō met and befriended a talking dog, monkey, and pheasant, who agreed to help him in his quest. At the island, Momotarō and his animal friends penetrated the demons' fort and beat the demons' leader, Ura, as well as his army, into surrendering. Momotarō returned home with his new friends, and his family lived comfortably from then on.”

By eating this perfectly round tomato, may you be rejuvenated. Too bad I only have ten plants; the other fifty didn’t germinate.

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Park’s Whopper This is the mega monster. It’s the big kahuna. The Whopper is the greatest tomato ever engineered in The Park Seed Company’s 141-year history. Resistant to everything except size, yield, and taste, this variety will engulf your garden and swallow the neighborhood. It’s that big.

The Park Seed Company was struggling to make ends meet during the Panic of ’98 (1898) when their research team developed this winner. While Park had an established seed business in Pennsylvania, they were fortunate to strike up a deal with Sear’s to market this new seed in their Winter catalog. It became the best selling seed in the catalog thanks to a clever ad-copy and art.

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Peron Peron is a medium-sized early season slicer. This is an heirloom variety that seems to have few disease problems. This variety is also known as “Peron Sprayless” because supposedly it is so disease resistant that it never needs insecticidal interventions.

Last year, I created an emulsion from the leaves, fruit and stems of the plant and smeared it all over my deck, outdoor chairs, and body. I noticed a measurable drop in insect annoyances.

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Polish If you are looking for a large red brick (or pink) coloured tomato, then Polish may just well be the one. It bears large 1 to 1 ½-pound fruit that is great for canning or slicing. Some reports I’ve read claim massive yields from this heirloom. Keep in mind that it’s a traditional beefsteak which means that the fruit will be irregularly shaped, ribbed, and lack production. Word has it that this variety was smuggled out of Poland on the back of a postage stamp.

My father’s family hails from Poland, so it’s sort of cool that I found this variety in my hunt for interesting new tomatoes a few years ago. I remember my grandmother muttering in Polish about the deer that ravaged her garden every year. She ran a chicken farm near Sag Harbor, New York. I have many fond memories of traipsing through the fields and woods to get to the Great Peconic Bay beach so I could collect shells, clams, and driftwood. Polish churns up a lot of memories.

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Soldacki Another Polish tomato that was brought to Ohio around 1900. Soldacki (I wish I had spelled it correctly on the cups) is a tomato loaded with potential. I’ll be honest. If you grow this tomato, be prepared to baby it. It has a thin skin that is susceptible to rotting if left too long on the vine. It’s also prone to cracking which allows the annoying little black ants to invade and devour the fruit.

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Supersonic Supersonic was one of the varieties that my father used to grow. It was developed in the 1960’s by the Harris Seed Company. The fruit is between 5 and 8 ounces, but it grows in clusters. My Pop used to pick these gems and my Mom would put up quart after quart of delicious tomatoes.

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Thessaloniki Greek by birth, this ancient baseball-sized heirloom is prolific enough to waste the excess pelting actors in Greek dramas.

The earliest record of this ancient variety was on an ancient parchment scribed to warn wise Thessalonians of a troubling agricultural problem. According to the best translations available, it seems that the surrounding area was suffering the ravaging effects of roving bands of tomato hunting dogs. These canines wandered from farm to farm attacking tomato plants loaded with ripe fruit. One description of an attack suggested that the satisfied dogs would lounge beside their kills “…with sweet juice dribbling from their smiling jaws.”

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Virginia Sweets A giant tomato in the 1-2lb range. What sets this tomato apart is it’s strange coloration-orange and red. The variety was first grown in Virginia in the 1860’s after the Civil War. Local lore has it that the first plants were found growing in the Wilderness Battlefield ruins near Locust Grove, Virginia. Some say that the vibrant orange and red were seared into the first plants by the destructive intensity of the battle. Some say that growing Virginia Sweets is akin to growing peace.

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Zapotec Perhaps the weirdest tomato in the collection, Zapotec hails from Mexico. It’s red. However, that’s where the comparison to natural looking tomatoes ends. Zapotec is violently ribbed and oddly pear-shaped. It is hollow inside and contains few if any seeds. It’s a mystery to me where the seeds come from to cultivate this strange thing. Beware that it’s hard to judge when this thing is ripe. It doesn’t last too long on the vine before rot sets into the mountainous ribs.

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Cherry Tomato

Good things come in little packages. These little buggers seem to multiply and are the most indestructible of all tomatoes. I like to cruise the garden and pop ‘em in as I go.

Large Red Cherry Very similar to Sweet Million, my perennial favorite cherry tomato. L.R.C. has tons of tomatoes and produces late into the season, although the fruit is larger than Sweet Million.

Earl McCord from up in Rupert, West Virginia is said to have discovered and named Large Red Cherry. Ordinarily, Earl spent his spring days in the unnamed fields cutting creasy greens and in secret mossy woods searching for illusive merckels.

That spring of 1952, McCord was laid up with a bad case of the gout. Nursed back to health by religiously drinking the family ramp tonic, Earl was finally feeling enough up to par to go out on one of his hunts in late July. Not knowing if he would find a mess of creasy greens or any stray miracles, he wasn’t surprised that there was nothing to be had. On his way back to his trailer, something growing out of a cow pie caught his eye in the creasy greens field-a lone tomato. Balanced and growing tall in the still July air, the plant stood proudly as Earl bent down and marveled at the large, red cherry-sized fruit. Carefully, he uprooted the plant and transplanted it back home at his trailer. After nursing it along for a few days, the plant began to share an abundant harvest of the little big tomatoes.

Earl entered a strawberry basket of these tomatoes in the Fayette County Fair that year and won first prize for the tomato he had named, “Large Red Cherry.”

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Riesentraube This heirloom variety produces hoards of large grape-sized tomatoes in massive clusters. The variety has been grown in America since 1856 when a Pennsylvania Dutch farmer first introduced it from Germany. Cleverly, the Germans had named the plant, Riesentrauble or “Giant Grape.”

These tomatoes would have remained shielded from the modern tomato connoisseur if not for a strange accident. In August of 1936 near Lancaster, Pennsylvania, a traveling encyclopedia salesman was speeding down a narrow country lane when his car came upon an Amish farmer taking his vegetables to the local market. The sudden appearance of the car spooked the horse that was pulling the farmer’s cart, thus causing spillage of all the fruit and vegetables. The salesman, a kindly gentleman who felt very sorry for what he had done, immediately stopped and helped the farmer pick up all the messed about food. As they parted ways with kindly tips of the hats and no hard feelings, the farmer reached out and gave the salesman a bunch of Riesentraubes.

Later, the salesman decided to try his hand at starting a seed company. Today the Atlee Burpee company is a leader in vegetable and fruit gardening in the world and Atlee’s first great vegetable hit was Riesentraube.

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Snow White What’s beautiful, white, little, and round? Snow White. It’s fascinating, the science of tomato variety development. Take Snow White , for instance. Tomato breeders were experimenting with all sort of genetic alterations a few years back and stumbled upon an interesting idea one day after picking asparagus. One researcher observed that if you dig underground before an asparagus spear breaks the surface of the ground, it will be almost pure white. His breeding group decided to apply that principle to developing a new tomato variety. They took a common Sweet 100 cherry tomato plant and placed a small black plastic baggie over each developing tomato. They did this repeatedly over generations of growth, hand-pollinating the plants. What they noticed was that in each successive generation, the tomatoes became lighter and lighter in pigmentation until , finally in the 113^th generation, all discernable pigmentation was erased. These tomato developers succeeded in creating the first truly white cherry tomato.

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Sun Gold I missed growing this variety last year. These little devils are a sweet yellow color and almost melt in your mouth. You can spend hours just snacking on them in the garden. Go ahead and do it; no one will ever know.

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Sun Sugar More gold, more sweet flavor. Perhaps the best of the best of all the best cherry tomatoes. Sun Sugar is a direct 50/50 blend of sun and sugar. Half the tomato is made from sun. The other half is refined from sugar creating a sunny, sugary treat. You could bottle sunshine and drink it down and you could chase that with a sugar elixir, but you still wouldn’t come close to approximating the sugary, sunny flavor of Sun Sugar tomatoes.

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Sweet Chelsea A few years back, a school chum bought the seed for this variety for me to propagate. She had wanted to try container gardening at her new home, and this was the seed that came in the package she bought. I had never heard of this variety, but I planted it and nurtured the seeds. When it was ready for transplanting, I gave her the plants but kept a couple for myself. By the end of the season, I was in awe. This variety out-produced everything in my garden.

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Sweet Million I’ve grown Sweet Million for many years and it has always been my most prolific cherry tomato. Millions of marble sized tomatoes come from each plant. They keep coming and coming all season. Their taste is delightful. The only problem I’ve ever experienced is a tendency for the fruit to crack, especially if they are exposed to rain just prior to final ripening. When they crack, the soft interior of the plants becomes exposed and it attracts hoards of fruit flies and very small black ants.

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Tumbling Tom You’ll be swimming in tomatoes from this beautiful, edible ornamental. Perfect for balcony containers in a sunny location, this cute little feller is just perfect for the on-the-go patio gardener. Okay, I know. That sounded like some spiel from a brainless catalog, but it wasn’t. That was just me honing skills I will need after I retire from teaching when I go into the catalog copy business.

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We have to convince the little housewife out there that the tomato that ate the family pet is not dangerous!

~Swan from Attack of the Killer Tomatoes

Salad Tomato

A smaller version of a slicing tomato. Not everyone recognizes this category. In fact, I don’t know of anyone who uses the term “Salad Tomato.” All I knows is dis. Them buggers are just the right size for plopping into a salad whole. Sometimes just for fun I try to slice salad tomatoes. It’s fun and challenging, too. Be sure you have a sharp knife!

Bella Rosa Y’all looking for a tomato that embraces the southern climate. Bella Rosa is the choice. Wildly popular in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama this determinate produces solid clusters of nice, tasty tomatoes. Bella Rosa handles the usual tomato diseases and few human ones as well.

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Japanese Black Trifele This Bartlett pear-shaped black tomato hails from the Central Russia. I know what you’re thinking. Isn’t it odd that tomatoes can be pear-shaped and black? The name, what about the name? “Trifele” is an unusual name for a tomato. Some claim that “trifele” is Russian for truffle which makes some sense considering the tomato is Russian in origin. However, others say that “trifele” is actually the Latvian word for “truffle.”

The Japanese connection to this unusual plant comes from a dark period in relations between Japan and Russia. Eizaburo Nomura was a famous Japanese explorer of Central Asia who traveled under the guise of secretary to Count Ōtani Kōzui as they visited ancient Buddhist sites of interest. He made two exhaustive trips there between 1902 and 1910. On his last journey, Russian intelligence became suspicious of their actual status and detained them both after an elaborate tea was set up between them and a local businessman. After tea and truffles, the men were scooped up by intelligence officers and made to confess to being members of the Imperial Japanese Army after hours of having black juice from an oddly pear-shaped tomato drizzled continually down their throats.

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Pink Ping Pong Huge plant that produces pink ping-pong ball sized fruit all season and then some. You’ll most likely have to stake or find some way to contain the plant. Ordinarily, they are very prolific. The tomatoes keep extremely well and can be picked and left to ripen on a counter.

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Stupice Looks like your ordinary garden-variety 1-2 oz salad tomato, yet it’s something more. When I asked The Catawba Gardener, my organic gardening friend, what tomato he swears by, he said, “@^&%#@ right, it’s &%@#!%$* Stupice!” A native of Czechoslovakia, Stupice is a cool-weather, early season tomato. The fruit does produce all season, but gets smaller as the summer heat turns on.

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Tigrella Tigrella is a smallish early or late season tomato that has a unique orange and red-striped skin. Sometimes called “Mr. Stripey,” but it should not be confused with the beefsteak also called “Mr. Stripey.” In my garden, my best recent tomato success has come from this class of smaller tomatoes. My friend, The Catawba Gardener, swears by this variety as long as you use real, natural soil as a propagation medium.

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Paste Tomato

When I was growing up, they still had paste in school. Elmer’s glue was around, but economy paste reigned supreme. Old lady Johnson, my first grade teacher looked like paste. She wore an ankle dress with her gray hair in a bun. Her voice would crack almost as much as her ruler on kids’ palms. Every day we’d get the jar of white sticky paste out and use craft sticks to spread glops of it onto paper before gluing our creations down, cementing them for all time. Then she’d offer her critique of our work. She was never very impressed with my gluing. I was too messy. Paste tomatoes are great for making sauce.

Opalka Opalka, my friend, you are back again. I’ve grown Opalka many times in the past with mixed results. In my disease-ridden garden, Opalka is quick to die. The tomatoes, however, are quite tasty. Bred for making paste, these tomatoes are meaty and sausage shaped. Be alert that many may get blossom end rot, an annoying affliction. I hear that if you mix in 1 gallon of hydrated lime juice around the plant, the condition can be mitigated.

Opalka shipped to America in about 1900, about the same time my grandparents came to America from Poland.

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Super Marzano King of the sausage pastes. Super Marzano is the Superman of tomato sauce. Son of Marzano, this super variety really is keen.

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Last year, more people were killed by automobile accidents, heart attacks, lung cancer, and natural causes combined than by any one tomato.

~Commercial in Attack of the Killer Tomatoes

Give a lift to a tomato, you expect her to be nice, don't ya? After all, what kind of dames thumb rides, Sunday school teachers?

~Martin Goldsmith

Sweet Pepper

“Sweet” is a bit of a misnomer. Sweet peppers aren’t really sweet. Rather, they are decidedly not spicy. Chocolate is sweet. Well, that’s not right either. Chocolate is actually bitter unless you add a little sugar to it to masque the bitterness. Sugar is sweet though. It’s sticky, too, which makes sugar so darned hard to clean up off the floor when you spill a sweet Coca-Cola. Sweet peppers, on the other hand, don’t make floors sticky when you clean them up. Plus, they’ll still be good and crunchy. Coca-Cola isn’t.

Bell Boy Bell Boy is your average, garden-variety bell pepper. Five inches in diameter. Thick walled and green. It is what it is. If you want a pepper that people want, then this is the pepper for you. It seems like every year, I grow some of these, but then EVERYONE asks me for them so I inevitably run out. Not going to happen this year.

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Cubanelle The most perfect roasting pepper you will find is the Cubanelle. The fruit is about 2x6”. With proper soil and growing conditions will really produce large quantities of fruit. It looks like it should pack heat, but it truly is just the opposite. Of all the peppers I grow, Cubanelle is my absolute favorite. I like the way it roasts when I slice it in half, strip away the seeds, and coat it with a mixture of olive oil and a hint of garlic before tossing it on my grill.

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Giant Marconi Quite possibly this is the largest pepper you will ever see. If size matters to you, then this pepper will amaze you. These massive peppers are best served roasted. They are sweeter when red, but edible anytime.

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Marconi Golden Seven inches long and yellow, this Italian roasting pepper is supposed to be quite the gem in the roasting pepper world. They are staggeringly beautiful, perhaps the most beautiful sweet pepper in the garden.

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Red Knight Everyone want a bell pepper it seems. Last year I tried these for the first time and was very pleasantly surprised. I had more red bells than I dreamed. The fruit is perfectly shaped and the plant is quite prolific.

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Revolution Without a doubt, Revolution was the most prolific bell pepper in my garden. My plants started producing early and kept going past the first frost. Fantastic…I still have them stuffed in my freezer. That reminds me. I really need to eat them.

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Sweet Banana Looks hot, but it’s not. Yellow banana shaped fruit. I love to slice these babies up then freeze them for later use on pizzas from Domino’s. Right now, I have so many of these in the freezer that they are crowding out the frozen Rosemary. Frozen Rosemary? That’s right, another failed frozen experiment. Everything in our freezer now smells like Rosemary. Did you know that Rosemary smells a lot like freshly cut pine, and its stems have a sap that’s just as sticky. Vanilla Rosemary ice cream isn’t very good. Oh yes, Sweet Bananas are my favourite sweet pepper.

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Sweet peppers don’t have sugar in them. How come? Why are they sweet then? Is it good for "sugary" snacking then? Confused…

~The Internet

Hot Pepper

Many people like hot peppers. I don’t. They look pretty cool though. That’s why I grow them. I also grow them so that I can play tricks on my friends with them. Some hot peppers are very hot. Some are just hot. Others are mild, which is just a little bit hot. Peppers that aren’t hot are sweet, but not sticky. I don’t know of any sticky or sweet peppers, but I do know hot peppers.

Cayenne Long Slender and long, red cayenne peppers are known for their heat. These will deliver as promised or I’ll be a monkey’s uncle.

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Black Hungarian I really need to get more of this seed. The plant is quite gorgeous. In fact, you’ll have a very difficult time prying these plants from my hands.

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Habanero So innocent looking. Cute little yellow to orange-ish fruit when mature. Vibrantly, nose-meltingly hot. A great pepper for playing eating tricks on your friends. Several years ago, my son’s friend, Greg, came over to the house after his soccer practice. He was bragging about how he loves hot peppers. So, I invited/challenged him to eat one whole habanero. He did. Then he proceeded to drink a gallon of milk in a vain attempt to quell the fire in his belly.

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Serrano Tampiqueno Serranos, in general, are very hot. This one weighs in at 30,000 Scoville units. A classic shape with fruit that goes from green to fire engine red.

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Chilies help you lose weight by increasing your metabolism.

The scientific journal Toxicon reported that drinking a quart and a half of Louisiana-style hot sauce will cause death by respiratory failure if your body weight is 140 pounds or less.

The hottest pepper in the world is the Naga Jalokia, or Tezpur (aka Ghost Pepper), pepper of the Assam state of India at over ONE MILLION Scoville Units.

He who has the pepper may season as he lists.

~George Herbert

Ornamental Pepper

The Beauty and the Beast of the pepper world, these plants are so beautiful to behold yet possess such fiery demons within. People eat these peppers, too. I haven’t quite figured out what makes a pepper join the ornamental class. If I were in charge of peppers, I’d classify them all as “ornamental.”

Chilly Chili Fruit is red and points upward in clusters. I consider this ornamental to be the absolute most explosive low growing ornamental. I use as the front layer in a terraced flower garden. Its colors blast off from the plants and stay strong for weeks upon weeks. Seeds were very rare and limited.

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Explosive Ember I’m a sucker for purple peppers. Classic purple to orange to red fruit ripening is what these 14” plants will offer this summer. I found that the purple cluster if fruit lasted a long, long time.

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Filius Blue Another one of my family of purple peppers. In fact, this variety is often confused with one called Pretty Purple Pepper. The little peppers grow on 18-inch plants. The leaves are dark green with no variegation.

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Largo Purple Amazing 2 ½ to 3’ purple variegated (white, green, purple) shrub with conical yellow fruit that turn red as they mature. Very Hot! This hot ornamental pepper is great for main flower garden planting and the fruit is great for eating if you like hot peppers. No one is getting this baby from me.

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Medusa Wild and crazy…like a head full of snakes that are on fire. That’s what Medusa is like. It’s, without a doubt, the most intense conversation piece in my flower beds.

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Numex Twilight I have two distinct batches of seeds. I’m not sure if they are in fact the same Twilight, but I’m treating them that way. Twilights are quite colourful and grow to about 2-feet tall. I like the rainbow of colours. Very similar in colouration to Sweet Pickle, but with heat.

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Purple Flash The best of my new purple ornamentals. It reminds me of Tri-fetti, but more civilized. The deep purple marbled fruit go from a hot purple to an electric ruby. The leaves are delightfully variegated.

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Riot Very similar to Poinsettia (only stocked in volunteer form) and Medusa. Some people are toasting these babies up and grinding them up to make excellent pepper flakes.

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Sweet Pickle Clever geneticists have done it again. They’ve bred the heat out of another ornamental pepper. These little colourful peppers look like psychedelic toadstools popping out of a green forest.

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Tri-fetti This little purple wonder is a unique variety for me. I had obtained seed for this variegated pepper plant many years ago. The plants grow to about 2-3 feet with the tricolor leaves as much of the show as the deep purple to red fruit. Oh yeah, they’re very hot to eat, too. I’m getting good at saving these seeds. I have a whole gallon sized baggie of them. The cool thing is that each time I plant them; I get a slightly different plant, but obviously closely related. I guess growing them is my own little fruit fly experiment.

I wrote all that last year. Those little suckers just keep coming and coming. I didn’t plant a single one last year and they just volunteered. These plants really frame my mailbox well.

Hot, Edible (Dig your own from my flower garden in early June)

People who eat chiles are generally healthier.

Miscellaneous Varieties

Nadia Hybrid Nadia is a classic Italian shaped eggplant. It’s reported to have strong yields of glossy purple fruit. It’s supposed to set well in cool weather, but I’m interested in seeing how it does in the muggy summers of Southwest Virginia. I grow eggplants in my main flower gardens. Their rich purple color juxtaposed with their feathery green leaves really sparkle a garden.

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Cauliflower Cheddar Just thought I’d mess around a bit this year with a bizarre looking cauliflower. Hopefully, it tastes as good as it looks in the picture.

Strange (6)

Of the tomato or love apple, I know very little. It is chiefly employed as a sauce or condiment. No one, it is believed, regards it as very nutritious; and it belongs, like the mushroom and the potatoe, to a family of plants, some of the individuals of which are extremely poisonous. Some persons are even injured, more or less, by the acid of the tomato.”
‘The Young House-keeper’ by William Andrus Alcott (1846)

The federal government has sponsored research that has produced a tomato that is perfect in every respect, except that you can't eat it. We should make every effort to make sure this disease, often referred to as 'progress', doesn't spread.

~Andy Rooney

Thank you. Have a great tomato!

Contact: Newt999@gmail.com

Find me on Facebook (Thomas Ryder) and follow me on twitter (Newt999) or don’t.

Leprechaun on the Loose

2011-03-16T22:17:00.000-04:00

Update

2011-02-08T21:05:00.002-05:00

I haven't posted here in a while. Facebook has taken a hold of me.

News:

My son is getting married this Saturday. I can't believe that he is actually old enough to consider that, but he is.

He's marrying Trish Urick. They met while at Virginia Tech. Trish and Sam were both in the Corps of cadets. Trish was commissioned into the Army after graduation and Sam went into the Marines. She will be deployed to Kuwait for a year starting in late February. Sam recently finished TBS (Technical Basic School) and awaits the beginning of Infantry School. After that three month school he will await deployment, most likely to Afghanistan.

Callan is at VT and is working hard. She took a job at a local Southwest burrito place (Moe's) in addition to attending classes.

Jackie and I are still teaching, but it has become a chore. Many UNREALISTIC demands from people who don't seem to understand that they are being unrealistic.

Happy 2011.

Maybe, one day, I'll get back to blogging here.

Thinking about Christmas

2010-12-04T10:33:00.002-05:00

I'm in a creative frame of mind today. I confess, I haven't been in one for some time now. Last night, I didn't sleep well. As I was tossing and turning, I kept thinking about the annual Christmas note I'll soon pen.

Here's what I've come up with. First, I plan to write the traditional one page family update. Second, I plan to do a spoof on the first note and write a family update, but instead of talking about everyone in the family, I plan to write about only my son...with a couple of sentences about his sister and his mother and father.

I'm also turning a piece around in my my mind that will incorporate "Walking Man." This is a guy who I've observed walking here and there over the past five or so years. He dresses in a white button up the fron shirt, and slacks. He wears worn brown Rockports. He walks miles upon miles in summer or winter. In winter, he wears a thin windbreaker over his classic attire. His hair is long and disheveled with an unruly mustache framing his upper lip. Despite his constant walking, Walking Man is a bit pudgy. I spent my summer trying to become my own version of Walking Man, but my body broke daon a bit and then I had to actually go to work. Who is this guy? Is he a superman?

I'm still here...

2010-10-16T08:58:00.002-04:00

...just not very motivated to write anything. School is pressing this year. Lots of new initiatives and much much much much more paperwork. My raise again this year (0%) didn't really cover the inflation of our expenses (college up 10+%).

I'm supposed to be happy to have a job. I'm beginning to think I'd be happier without one.

[SIGH]

2010-08-31T19:54:00.000-04:00

I think I may be getting old.

Hate Lives Here

2010-07-31T19:27:00.003-04:00

"In Lockstep With
The OBAMA REGIME
CONGRESSMAN
PERIELLO
Putting America
into Bankruptcy."

You can find this delightful sign just north of the Westlake traffic light near Smith Mountain Lake.

Congressman Periello defeated long-time Republican incumbent Virgil Goode two years ago by a very narrow margin. Periello didn't even have to open his mouth before people started hating him.

I'm saddened that people in our society view President Obama as operating a "Regime," as if he's some sort of Castro-like dictator. These are, indeed, depressing times for that reason.

Modern Turtle

2010-07-30T21:10:00.001-04:00

Tinker Cliffs

2010-07-30T17:30:00.018-04:00

I visited Tinker Cliffs today and saw incredible scenery, as well as a turtle, deer, turkeys, and a young bear.

Barrels and Tires

2010-07-25T00:28:00.002-04:00

Barrels and Tires

“ZORB^® globe riding is the latest and greatest adventure activity to come out of New Zealand. Yes, that's right – New Zealand - the innovative little country at the bottom of the world (next to the penguins) that brought you Bungy Jumping, Hobbits, and a range of other crazy things to do while on vacation!!”

So begins the Zorb interactive internet web page. A Zorb looks to be a giant clear globe in which humans strap into and roll down a track. My wonderful niece recently experienced Zorbing first-hand. I can honestly say that taking a trip in a Zorb looks to be quite exciting. You enter the one-story tall plastic ball through a small tunnel-like opening on one side and strap yourself into the seating chamber. Then it’s off you go down the bowling alley gutter in a hilly field. But Zorbing is nothing new, really.

Many moons ago, the neighborhood provided me with unique ways to pass the days. One such time consuming activity was tire rolling. Some mysterious neighborhood force would summon all the neighborhood kids to the empty field between the Grosso’s house and the Garst farmhouse on a seemingly random day. The field sloped quite nicely, a perfect place to launch old tires. The idea was to start a tire rolling down the hill and see how far you could make it roll before it toppled over. Tire drag races were common. Two tires guided by expert child “slappers.” Slapping was a special technique developed by the best of the tire guiders. As the tire rolls to the bottom, the slapper would run beside it and slap the top of it if it deviated from true course. Slapping off center gently steered the tire right or left.

Brave children would sometimes climb inside a tractor tire and race down the hill hoping to avoid old man willow and mailbox row at the bottom. Fitting inside a tire was a bit unnerving. Someone held the tire upright and you climbed in straddling the tire. Then you lifted your feet inside the inner loop of the tire and compacted yourself into a ball shape. When ready (or not) the pushers began the launch. With Bobsled-like effort the pushers gave the tire a boost on its journey. I’ll never forget the feeling of seeing the world turn upside-down repeatedly. The trip took no more than a few seconds and it ended with a stop by safety volunteers, a slam into the tree or mailboxes, or a crash on the track.

During very special sessions on the hill, the barrels would appear as if by magic. You see, back then, everyone burned their trash in a metal barrel in their backyard every few days. When a can rusted out, it would need to be replaced. So it was vital to have a few extras lying around. Old metal chemical barrels made excellent fire pits and human transportation machines.

Riding down the hill in a barrel took some nerve. The ride was always extremely loud, especially when the barrel runners banged on the barrel with sticks as it rolled down to meet old man willow. All the barrel passenger had to do was climb in, brace against the side, and get someone to give the barrel a rolling start. With luck the trip was straight and true. More often, the barrel would careen and veer violently from side to side until the contents were spilled onto the hillside.

I’ll most likely never visit New Zealand or Pigeon Forge to ride a Zorb, but the neighborhood always seemed to provide thrills.

Pickled Green Tomatoes

2010-07-24T00:34:00.003-04:00

Pickled Green Tomatoes

Visiting with my mother has changed over the past ten years. During that stretch, I watched her mental powers steadily decline. These days, I visit her at her house two or three times a week in the afternoons. We usually chat for a couple of hours then I head back home. My younger sister stays with her full time, which I’m sure is quite a drag sometimes.

My mother especially has trouble with knowing the present. Days of the week, years, ages, relations and friends outside her immediate children are all difficult for her to remember. When my father died this past January, she lived in a state of denial for several months. Back then, she would stare at the picture shrine dedicated to my pop set up across the room from her recliner and wonder aloud where he was. She figured he was outside tinkering in the yard and would be in soon. When I’d tell her that he’d passed away in January, she would begin crying-grieving a profound loss. This scene played out on almost a daily basis for months. Her grief was drawn-forth as if it was the first day after his passing every day.

She’s gradually come to accept that her husband of 62 years has passed away from her. She told me the other day that it seems like he’s been gone for such a long, long time. I agreed with her and we both became teary-eyed.

Through her mental haze, there are moments of supreme clarity-memories of times long ago. She can’t attach dates to most events, but her recall of the way things used to be remains clear.
Earlier this week, we were sitting chatting like we always do-talking about gardens and canning. “Are you and Jackie canning any tomatoes this year?”

“Not yet, but I suspect we will.” I’ve answered this question many times this summer.

“My ma used to can all kinds of food for us.” She went on to tell me about how her mom and dad used to put up vegetables from the massive garden so that they’d be able to be fed through the harsh Upstate New York winter. Beans, tomatoes, squash, and pickles were all quite popular. She went on to tell me that her family especially enjoyed pickled green tomatoes.

I had never heard of such pickles before, so I asked her for details. Basically, you take green tomatoes, slice them wedges, and pickle them according to the secret family recipe. I asked her if she still had the recipe, and she said she had it around somewhere.

I learned that my grandfather would go to the store and buy gallons or even barrels of vinegar to use in pickling. Once the pickles were made, everyone always wanted some at dinner. She said that their food was generally boring and repetitive, but the green tomato pickles really livened up meals and were hands down the family favorite.

Sometimes we talk about her early schooling and teaching career. Most recently, she told me her father’s connection with the local public school and how it affected her. Her father was on the board of the local public school system. One of his jobs was to drive out every morning and pick up the teacher and bring her to school. This daily run allowed my mother to hitch a ride to the public school and her sister to get dropped off at the local Catholic school (I believe). Teachers weren’t paid much back then, but they never had to provide their own transportation to my grandfather’s school.

My mother has been thinking a lot about her own mother lately. One of her stories was quite remarkable. I was telling my mother about all the catnip I just picked and how it could be used to make a tea that would help get rid of headaches and help you sleep. My mother nodded her head and began telling me about how her mother used to make all kinds of teas for all kinds of conditions and ailments. She said that her mom was always giving them nasty tasting teas to cure their colds and wounds. They all dreaded the teas.

It seems that my grandmother was known as the local medicine lady as well. Before she had children, she had been a school teacher in the area, so everyone had grown to know her and trust her. Plus, she could read and write. If someone was complaining of one ailment or another, they would invariably be told to “…just go see Dorrie Devins. She’ll fix ya up.” My mom said that the locals all called her “Dorrie.” It was their way of saying her proper name, “Dora.” They’d come by the house and ask her for advice about whatever condition they had, and Dorrie would consult her medicine book. This was a book that was handwritten and passed down from generation to generation. My mother says that she has no idea what happened to the book, but she imagines the family just left it behind when they sold the farmhouse since all of them had such horrible memories of those teas.

Many people would come by the farmhouse to get Dorrie to help them with their taxes. With the passage of the 16th Amendment in 1913, suddenly poor, illiterate farmers were faced with filling out tax forms. Since Dorrie was so smart and could read, they would ask her to straighten out their taxes. My mom said she always left the room, because these farmers would be in the dining room with all of the personal business papers spread out. The people were always grateful that Dorrie had made it all right.

Several times during her retelling of the story, my mother would get quite emotional and begin to cry. She repeated over and over how her mother would help anyone who came by and “…never charged anyone a cent.” Her mother was the kindest person she ever knew.

So between my grandfather single-handedly making public school education work and my grandmother healing the sick and tending to others’ businesses, I had two incredible grandparents.

1952 Vincent by Del McCoury

2010-07-02T22:13:00.002-04:00

Del covered this Richard Thompson classic back in 2002. I'm just now hearing it.

A Walk Along Peters Creek Road 6_29_10

2010-07-02T21:07:00.006-04:00

I had to drop my son's car off at our Pete's place, Plaza Auto, so that he could get some new tires before he heads off to The Marines this weekend. I decided that I'd walk home.

Burlington Elementary School. This school is still in service. I believe it was built in the late 1930's.

I stopped on the bridge overlooking I-581 and snapped this photo.

A look at the Northside High School entrance. Southview Elementary was closed long ago. It was given to the police department and they remodeled it to use as their emergency response command center. They left the building about three years ago and it's been vacant ever since. The regional morgue purchased the property from the county this spring. I haven't heard if they will demolish the building or renovate it to house dead people. I suspect they'll demolish. [pssst...asbestos....]

Another look at the grand profile of Southview. This mid 1930's building, red brick complete with a slate roof , is a beautiful. Look at the shield on the front left side of the building. That was my fourth grade classroom. There used to be a huge white pine that towered over the building. on the left side outside our window. I used to days dreaming of escaping the classroom by climbing down with my girlfriend, Karen Sarver, in tow. We used to hold hands sometimes. Her hands were always moist. She kissed me on the cheek once. It was on carnival night of our fifth grade year. We broke up right after that. Way too much pressure.

Hazy Monday 6_28_10

2010-07-02T21:02:00.010-04:00

Monday was a hazy hot day with temperatures destined to head for the upper 90's. I went out as usual at 7am to my favorite spot on the AT south of Rt 311 near Catawba, VA.

Clear Friday 7_2_10

2010-07-02T20:44:00.030-04:00

Friday July 2, 2010 was an exceptionally clear day with almost record low temperatures. I started my little hike at 7 am and made directly for my favorite outcropping on the AT south of Rt 311 in Roanoke County, VA. I'm especially pleased withe the hole in the rock shots.

Back

2010-06-15T09:56:00.000-04:00

It's summertime. That means that I may actually have some time to sit and think. So I may just start writing on this blog again.

I have my second hernia surgery coming up on Thursday, so I'm a bit scared, to be honest. We'll see how this one goes.

Reflections on a Ground Hog

2010-06-15T09:54:00.004-04:00

Summertime for me is a time of reflection.

Yesterday afternoon, I captured a mole in his hole for the first time in my life. The mole was disposed of in the tunnel that an annoying ground hog has dug into the back of the shed at my parents' house. That ground hog definitely lives in a hog mansion. But now, he may think twice about entering his house. This is sort of akin to tossing a flaming bag of poo on a neighbor's front steps.

Thoughts of moles in ground hog holes reminds me of one of the most evil things I've done.

A few years ago, my neighbor and I were working together to trap some annoying ground hogs who had taken up residence under his deck. These varmints would come out at night and ravage my vegetable garden. Beans destroyed. Ripe tomatoes plucked off the vine. I was ticked off at the monsters.

Each day, Charlie, the neighbor, would set his live animal trap and leave it on his deck. Over the course of a few weeks, he caught several ground hogs and transported them to woods adjacent to fancy homes in a remote location far away.

Charlie told me one day, that he had to go out of town for a few days, and he asked if I could keep an eye on the trap for him. So I eagerly agreed. We were embroiled in a heat wave. Temperatures raced to the upper 90's each day for a couple of weeks in a row. The second morning Charlie was gone, I saw a mammoth ground hog caught in the cage. He was desperately trying to get out. I told myself that I needed to take him somewhere to release later.

Well, I sort of forgot about the ground hog. By the time I remembered, it was late afternoon. The temperature was well into the upper 90's, and the cage had been bathed in the heat, unfiltered, on the dark deck all day. Needless to say, I was now responsible for an ex-ground hog.

Charlie's house is immediately next to mine. His wife's flower garden and my vegetable garden adjoin, and when I am working in my garden, I am just a few steps away from his deck. On the other side of his yard, the land falls away dramatically through mature woods to a tiny polluted stream. I had discovered in my many walks to the creek that ground hogs pretty much had set up a paradise retreat on the side of that bluff.

With all that in mind as I was contemplating the final resting place for the deck visitor, I had an inspired thought.

I took the trap with the ex-ground hog and walked to the bluff, descended until I found the first active looking ground hog hole. I opened the trap door and slid the stiff rodent out tail first into the hole. He slid down a bit, but his rigid front paws got caught on the lip of the hole, and he became stuck. Only his paws and head were sticking out. It was a Caddy Shack moment. He looked so natural there. So I left him. I figured that he could serve a warning to all the others of what awaits them out in the open yard above.

I really didn't mean to kill the bugger, but I certainly felt no mercy either. I suppose I could have humanely disposed of his remains, but I wasn't feeling especially generous. I know what some of you may be thinking..."What a cruel man." But I look at it this way, what would Farmer MacGreggor do? After all, the bugger stole my ripest tomatoes. He deserved it.

Tomato and Peppers 2010

2010-04-19T19:49:00.004-04:00

They're back. I've been taking a hiatus from blogging over the last few months. Only sporadic entries from me. I suspect I'll get back in to it this summer.

Until then, here's a look at my current tomato and pepper plant catalog. (trying out some new technology)

Discover Simple, Private Sharing at Drop.io

Acorns

2010-04-03T23:19:00.000-04:00

I sure do admire her spunk.

Felix and 95

2010-03-30T22:34:00.006-04:00

My son and my niece (she, her mother, and brother lived with us back then) found 95 and his brother, Felix, under the porch of the clubhouse at the neighborhood golf course in Greene County, Virginia. They were beautiful American short-hair Tabby kittens. I never quite understood his reasoning, but my son thought that 95 was a cool name for a cat since, after all, it was 1995.

He and his cousin reared those two kittens and spoiled them. Such joyful times. A seven year old boy, his ten year old cousin, and their two cats.

At 3:25 on a Wednesday afternoon, my sister-in-law was coming back to our house after work with her two kids in the car. As she pulled into the drive, there were two large coon dogs in the front yard murdering Felix. I won't go into the details, but my niece leaped from the car and began screaming at the two dogs. They growled at her but eventually ran off. It turns out that they ran across the golf course and killed another cat and attacked its owner. Police then became involved and the two coon dogs were hunted down. Later we found out that the dogs were quarantined for 30 days and then returned to their owners in neighboring Madison County. Apparently, two blue tick coon dogs, despite their taste for blood, were too valuable to just put down.

It became apparent that the two kittens had been in our garage when the dogs came. We used to leave the garage door open for them so they could come in and go out. The old couch that we kept in there was shredded, as if the dogs had ripped it apart to try to get at the two cats. Obviously, the two bolted from there, and we know that Felix had made it as far as the front yard.

95 was nowhere to be found. We assumed that the dogs had carried him off to the woods. So we searched high and low. Nothing. My niece was devastated at losing Felix. My son was inconsolable over losing his 95.

In the predawn quiet before sunrise the next morning, the birds began their calls as they came out from their evening slumber to find their partners. My son's exhausted tears had finally given him away to sleep sometime late in the early fall night. Mixed in with the bird symphony, I thought I heard a faint meowing from my open bedroom window.

Grabbing a flashlight, I ran outside and tracked the call into the neighboring woods. By this time I was joined by the whole family, We were all calling out 95's name. We could all hear the cat's cries, but they were so faint, yet strangely close.

I'm not sure who looked up first. But that's where we found 95. He had scrambled to the top of a very, very tall eastern pine-perhaps 70 feet up. No amount of coaxing, however, could get the kitten to shinny down. So we looked in the phone book and called a tree specialist at 7 am. I must say, he wasn't very pleased to be awakened at such an hour, and he told us that the cat would come down when he felt like it...just before he hung up.

Sure enough, about 45 minutes later, with all of us standing around and cheering him on, 95 began to inch down the trunk from his dizzying height.

I can't begin to describe the joy on my son's face that moment when he held his cat once again. It was all tempered, however, by the tragic loss of Felix the day before.

The next few months came and went. 95 grew up into a delightful young cat. One cold winter day, lightning struck twice. As my son and niece were returning home from school, they saw two big dogs running from our yard. One of them had something in his mouth.

Although we searched and searched, day after day, we never found 95.

Angels are Real

2010-03-13T19:44:00.001-05:00

My daughter hopped in her '99 Honda Civic early this afternoon to drive to Charlottesville from Roanoke for a visit with her aunt.

When she got to the I-64/Lexington interchange, she heard a loud clunk from under the car. She immediately called her mother for mechanical reassurance. It was a one-time clunk, but everything appeared to be running normally. So my wife told her to drive on.

Within a few miles, all hell began breaking loose under the car. The whole car shook with a grinding, deafening vibration. Luckily, she was right at the White's Truck Stop exit. So she pulled in and parked the car at the Burger King in front of White's and called home.

I was out on a Coke run in the "Blue Party Van" (2003 Dodge Grand Caravan Sport) when I got the call from my wife to go on a rescue mission. So I headed up I-81.

Over past few months, I'd been noticing a clunk whenever I shifted to reverse in that car. So I wondered if the transmission might have detonated.

My daughter was happy to see me, which warmed my heart. I immediately inspected the car visually side to side, peeking under, and opened the hood.

While I am a long time listener of Car Talk, I have no mechanical skill. Car Talk has taught me about sounds and probabilities. I know where things are, but generally once you put a ratchet in my hand, I become a bumbling, nervous fool.

Under the hood, I noted that the the car was past due for an oil change and was very low on oil, but no light had come on. I also noted that the transmission fluid didn't register on the stick, an ominous sign in my Car Talk book. Furthermore, there were bits of grit in the transmission stick register.

I hopped in the car, started it...no unusual sound. Then I put it in gear and moved slowly forward. The car instantly began grinding and groaning and screeching. I immediately feared the worst. The transmission. I had convinced myself.

So my daughter and I walked over to White's and bought a quart of oil and transmission fluid. I told her that sometimes when you add tranny fluid, you can keep the issue at bay long enough to have it diagnosed properly. But more than likely, the transmission was shot. She asked me if that was bad. Chip off the ole block.

I had discussed our dilemma with the clerk at White's and she assured me that she had names of flatbed tow operators who could return the car to Roanoke for me.

After adding the fluids, I took a slow test drive around the pumps, and the horrible sounds were still there.

We were about to walk back to White's to make the call when we noticed that a guy in a nice '91 Mustang had pulled up beside us in the Burger King parking lot. He got out of his car and began tinkering with it. So in a friendly tone, I asked him if he'd ever heard the sound of a dying transmission. He told me that he had many times because he was a bit of a mechanic. So I explained my situation.

Intrigued, he came over and immediately suggested that what we were hearing most likely wasn't a transmission problem. So I asked if he'd hop in and listen. So we backed up and pulled forward. Immediately, he knew what the problem was- stuck brake caliper.

So, he suggested that I jack up the front and he would try to get it freed up. I couldn't believe our fortune. I got the cheap Civic jack and popped that tire off the ground, He got his deluxe lug wrench out and

took the bolts off the tire.

While we worked, I learned a lot about our angel. He is about 30 years old and his name is Jason Meredith. He was visiting a girl back in another part of Virginia. I won't go into all the personal details here, but Jason was feeling a little down on his luck and glum. He told me that he had been doing "man jobs" ever since high school and had never had the opportunity to go to college. I told him I went to college and never bothered to learn "man jobs."

Once the tire was off, he began looking around the caliper area...While he was doing that, I made a stunning discovery. A loose bolt was wedged into a crotch in the frame behind the front right tire, a large bolt. Jason immediately knew that the bolt had come from the brake casing. It seems it had shed one of the two bolts and was barely hanging onto the rotor. I lined the casing back up and he screwed it on, making extra sure to tighten it down thoroughly.

Problem solved. Crisis averted. No pain. No injury. I was amazed that the bolt hadn't fallen to the pavement and been lost for all time. Jason was amazed that the whole unit hadn't dislodged and ripped apart the rim, rotor, wheel well, and fender. My daughter was glad the whole thing didn't fall apart when she was traveling at 65mph down I-81. Certainly she was fortunate that her angel was watching out for her.

After we chatted for a few minutes about the VT/WV rivalry in football, the fortunes of the WV basketball game, and what a scumbag RichRod was for lying to WV, he went on his way with my thanks.

So to Jason Meredith of Charleston, WV, you are a kind gentleman and a great representative from your state. Go 'Eers!

A Tangled Net

2010-03-09T22:19:00.002-05:00

I lead an aimless life these days. Unfocused. I spend unhealthy evenings sitting in front of my computer screen clicking from link to link. Website to website. Facebook is rising up within me. It's all an escape, I think. A way to avoid painful chapters.

My days are spent teaching school. These are not happy times in schools. Many of my colleagues from across the county are worried that they will lose their jobs. It seems our "Jobs Governor" meant something other than what you might think when he was elected Presid...Governor in the Fall. At school this is the stress time; the month before the high stakes state examinations. How I'm professionally treated next year largely depends upon how well my children do on the examinations this year. Some nights I spend my evening at school board meetings listening to how bad the financial times are for schools. Those poor teachers have every reason to be worried.

After school these days I sometimes head over to my mother's house. My father passed away on January 17 after a long and courageous battle with emphysema. Spring was our time together. I used to visit after school and perform many odd yard jobs for him. In the past few years, I'd prepare his garden and eventually plant most of it. After all work was done, we'd relax on the deck with my mother and sister sipping beers.

My mother has difficultly remembering things these days. When I visit her, I usually have to remind her of where my children go to school and who is currently living at my home. Sadly, I have to frequently inform her that her husband has died and won't be coming back. We've recounted the story over and over since January 17. Today was no different.

"My mind just keeps going in and out and I just can't keep things straight."

I wait for her to go on. I know where she is heading with this conversation. I've heard it before.

" I need to know... is Dad here?" Her tone seems resigned to the inevitable answer. It's as if she knows already, but is hoping to just wake up from the horrible nightmare of reality.

"No Mom, Dad passed away on January 17." I see her eyes well up in pain. "He died peacefully on his own terms. You know he had struggled so with his breathing this past year, and he just couldn't go on anymore."

Her tears flow freely now.

"I know, I know. It's just so frustrating. I can't keep it all straight. I know now that I was there that Sunday sitting beside him on his bed. He didn't say anything, but he could hear everything I said to him."

My thoughts were taken back to that particular moment in that long vigil. I'll never forget my mother sitting beside my father that last time as she gently stroked the peaceful face of the man she'd loved for 65 years. His breathing became slower as the blessed morphine allowed his body to finally give in to the nature of his disease. Then, without a word, he stopped.

By now I was crying as well. As I watched her relive her husband's death again, I couldn't help but view it as some sort of cruel, heartless joke. Day after long day, her mind erases the events in her life and scrambles her thoughts. Several times each day, she confronts and tests her "horrible dream", checking reality. Each day she discovers that her husband is dead and never coming home. Each day, she grieves all over again, as fresh as the moment death walked into her life.

Sometimes when I feel so melancholy, I reach for a random book, one in which I've only lightly read in the past or that I have long forgotten. I'll page through that book until I find something that strikes me.

The book I picked out this evening, is one I used for an Appalachian Folklore class a few years ago. It's called The Earth-Man Story by Darwin Lambert. In this book, Lambert journaled about time spent in Shenandoah National Park. One passage I flipped to lifted my spirits and helped me remember times I've spent outside in the woods at night as the clouds whirl through a moonlit sky.

Clouds come from behind the ridge imperceptibly, as if accompanying the moon, at first seeming to overtake and play at blindfolding it, then lagging while it finds a thin spot to shine through. I blink, and seem to feel earth floating in space. The moon and the widespread dimpling clouds constitute the firmament as the ridge sinks to reveal more of that stationary sky...Whatever else the moon has been-a reflector of romance or light from the sun-its primary function now must be to serve as a mirror of earth, helping us see ourselves and our home in the heavens in truer perspective.

I wish so many things were different about my life right now. Despite the troubles of the day or the pain that surrounds me, I'm buffered by the calmness gained through immersion in the complexity of simplicity; a bird calling from a tree, an individual snowflake melting on a leaf, a crow flying by with straw in his beak, and orange sunlight returning the day.

The Sting

2010-03-01T22:35:00.004-05:00

The Sting

A lot of experienced teachers awoke this morning before the sun came to visit. They showered, poured a cup of coffee, opened their morning newspaper…

Teachers will likely feel sting of shortfall

Teachers over age 50 and those with fewer than three years of experience are likely to be most affected by budget cuts.

…and spilled their coffee all over themselves. Exactly a month too early for April Fools’ Day, teachers all over the area perked up and stared at the headline from Courtney Cutright’s front page article in The Roanoke Times in disbelief.

Although the headline was screaming at the top of its lungs this morning, the information within the article really didn’t surprise teachers and educators in Roanoke County; however, the article did break new ground. Teachers in the county have been aware for some time now that non-renewals and reductions are a distinct possibility. We also have known that salaries will most likely be frozen, and that the school board is working diligently to lessen the impact of the state’s insane budget cuts.

The revelation that teachers over age 50 are likely to be most affected by the cuts is a bit of hyperbole. We’ve known since the last school board meeting that the board is offering a new retirement deal for teachers over the age of 50 with at least ten years of experience. These teachers may choose to retire and accept $2500 for five years toward the county health insurance premium or they may choose a lump sum of $12,500 if they do not wish to receive health insurance from the county. Deadline to apply for this offer in writing is March 19. So, it’s not really true that those over 50 are likely to be most affected. Those educators will only be affected by their own choice.

Teachers with less than three years of experience, however, are certainly in line to be most affected by any reduction. Generally, the county will process all possible nonrenewals before dipping into the well to reduce continuing contract teachers. What that means is that teachers, who do not have tenure, will be let go first if positions need to be eliminated. The idea seems straight-forward as well as unavoidably tragic.

That being said, there is some murkiness in county policy regarding Reductions in Force (RCPS Policy 5.38) and elimination of teaching positions. The policy alludes to “Senority Lists” for continuing contract teachers, but there is no mention of what these lists are and when they are to be published or released to the teachers. For transparency-sake, this list should be available to all teachers in a timely manner so that they can be prepared in case a reduction creeps into their category.

Non-tenured, non-continuing contract teachers have “no official standing.” This means that the county can dismiss them without cause given as long as the county follows The Code of Virginia § 22.1-305. Their contracts are simply not renewed. There is nothing in RCPS Policy 5.38 that addresses any particular order in non-renewing, no mention of any seniority considerations for non-tenured teachers. How such de-staffing is approached should be clearly defined and explained to any teachers potentially affected as soon as possible. Will the personnel department, utilizing defined categories, base nonrenewals on contractual hiring dates? Will de-staffing happen within each school base with the site administrator making the final determination on who is released? A clearly worded definition of procedural intent would be appropriate and welcome.

Courtney Cutright’s article is her best education piece to date. She took time to research carefully the financial side of the budget equation and delivered information and content that no media source has reported. Ms. Cutright relied on information gained through her Freedom of Information Act request. She mixes in timely reactions from the school board leaders in both Roanoke City and Roanoke County and infuses excellent VEA Research information to create a factual, balanced piece.

“Teachers will likely feel the sting of shortfall” is no surprise for educators in Roanoke County, but it may come as an eye-opening bucket of cold water on the heads of the public. What the State of Virginia is about to do to our public school system is reprehensible and destructive. There’s simply no way around that. Teachers, parents, and, most importantly, children- will feel the sting of this shortfall.

Raise the Banner; Strike the Chord

2010-02-23T06:45:00.001-05:00

Imagine that you are the average citizen of Virginia and you read the most recent article in The Roanoke Times. Would you understand what the heck is going on? $330 million this, $1.9 billion that. $731 million this, $240 million that. Freezing, unfreezing, making harmless, GIANT TSUNAMI's.

So what does it all mean? So what's real?

Here's what's real. State support for public school education is about to take a nose-dive. Historically, Virginia already under-funds schools. With this new effort, we may even take the gold medal over Mississippi in the under-funding championship.

Through it all, I'm amazed and floored by some of the revelations from this budget cycle. Here's an unscientific listing...in no particular order.

1. Senator Lacey Putney, a most powerful state senator, wants to grant school divisions the pleasure of adding one child to the maximum teacher /pupil ratio. Hey, in Kindergarten, that means going from 25-1 to 26-1. Bad becomes...badder? Thanks Lacey. That's ONE way to ensure we have "No Child Left Behind."

2. I'm sardonically bemused that local TV media portrayed the latest Senate budget as being a happy, rah-rah kind of thing that will SPARE Education bone jarring cuts. I heard one TV media source say that the Senate version only cuts $330 million. Right, perhaps on top of the $1.2 BILLION that Governor Kaine initially proposed.

3. VRS raiding is becoming an art form. Sort of like those modern painters who take paint and splatter it on a canvass and call it "art." "We take a little VRS and toss it at the budget canvass and BEHOLD!...Problem solved!!!" Folks, keep an eye on your retirement. Besides your job, it, along with your professional dignity, is all you have. It represents a trust established between you and the public. It's no small amount of money, and it's sitting there in Richmond-ready, ripe, and juicy. Legislation now being considered will change retirement ages, change to defined contribution, change "multipliers," and change how much you may have to contribute out of your pocket.

4. Lost in the discussion is the fact that most flesh was cut from local budgets LAST YEAR. This year, we're going after bone. Who needs bone? I guess bone is over-rated.

5. The Governor's Economic Opportunity Fund: People need jobs. McDonnell campaigned as a "Jobs Governor." So, it's no surprise that one of his first actions was establishing this opportunity fund. Funding. It needed funding. Hmmm, where could he find the $30 million needed to establish this fund to provide NEW JOBS to Virginians? ...He could take $26 million from VRS. (JLARC - General Assembly's non-partisan review committee had already determined that VRS is underfunded.) Kerosene on the fire. Splatter that paint.

6. Rest Areas are opening!

7. Virginian's will legally be able to go 70 mph.

8. Pot holes. Lots of pot holes out there thanks to the tough winter.

9. With 30,000 educators about to join 12,000 of their brethren who joined the unemployed ranks last year, a mega state effort to help these bread-winners find jobs is warranted. A program needs to be designed............

...Rest Areas.... Pot Holes...

The Governor needs a new "Jobs Initiative." Perhaps he can find some money in VRS to train and pay unemployed educators to maintain the new rest areas and serve in roving bands of pot-hole patchers. Call it the Educator Economic Opportunity Program (EEOP)... complete with it's own monikers: "No Seat Left Soiled"(NSLS) and "No Hole Left Behind" (NHLB).

If you've managed to follow this stream of consciousness opinion piece this far, congratulations.

This weekend, our friends in Orange County, Virginia are spear-heading a "Rally In Richmond." Educators and our friends will meet at the bell tower in front of the capital building between 11am and Noon. It's time to stand up...even louder than we stood up in 2004. We can't sit quietly by the wayside and let our school children be robbed. We need to MAKE OUR VOICES HEARD.

It's time to make time.

thom

Big Storm

2010-02-03T21:54:00.005-05:00

Some misguided people have been asking me what I think will happen to us during the big Friday storm to come. Do you remember that bad movie a few years back where the world was ravaged by a series of super storms? That Hollywood polar outbreak caused the Statue of Liberty to get buried by super snow. Looking at the early satellite pictures of Friday's storm as it moves through Texas causes shivers to tingle my weak spine. I want to call people and tell them to lock themselves into libraries and burn furniture and books for warmth.(That was part of the movie script.)

Tuesday, a little freezing rain event morphed into a surprise wet snow event here in Roanoke. We didn't get much snow because it was too warm, but just north of here, some people got up to six inches of snow. That little storm is what may just make or break our next storm on Friday.

Initial computer forecast models had Roanoke in the murky zone of snow, sleet, and freezing rain. Melted down, the models predicted we would get about an inch and a half of liquid. Further north from about Greene County north through Washington, Baltimore, and Philadelphia, the precipitation would stay all snow and they could end up with 20-30 inches by the time the storm exits on Saturday afternoon. Furthermore, the models predicted that the new storm will transfer its energy to a new low pressure off the coast of Virginia and "bomb." That means that it will quickly wrap up and pump copious amounts of snow and wind upon the east coast. Thus, blizzard warnings will no doubt go up soon.

However, things have subtly changed in the past few hours. That little storm that passed through Tuesday is now out in the Atlantic and IT has BOMBED. Amazingly, it will have the intensity and winds of ...get this...a Category 4 hurricane. Rarely has such a super non-tropical storm formed. (Watch out for the UK in a few days).

Sometimes, the best way to understand a storm is to pretend its sentient. Our new monster storm, the one slated to hit this area Friday, will be following the same path as the previously weaker storm. Now that the weak sister is POWERFUL, our new storm will have the tendency to STAY AWAY.

That's what the new computer model runs are beginning to detect. The new big storm's projected path is now slated to be further south than earlier predicted, essentially staying further away from the super cyclone in the Northern Atlantic. That more southerly track will allow more cold air to be dragged down the spine of the Appalachians ahead of the precipitation. This change will only be a degree or two, but it may prove to be enough to keep Roanoke in mostly all snow Friday-Saturday morning. It most likely will also slow down our storm as it decides on its final path and waits for the big Atlantic storm to clear the area. If all that happens, look for Roanoke to get about 15 inches of frozen stuff. If the sleet mixes in, as is forecast right now, look for us to get closer to 7 inches of stuff.

I'm beginning to lean toward big snow for us...but I have very little confidence in that prediction. And that's the truth.

Choices and Paths

2010-01-14T23:32:00.002-05:00

If you know me personally, then you most likely know how I feel about certain political issues. If you know me casually or professionally, then you most likely have no idea about my political leanings.

Let me state this as clearly as I know how...Fox News, owned and operated in America by an Australian, scares me. I love my country. I always have. As a teacher, I have started each day in my classroom with a prayer followed by The Pledge of Allegiance. Many people in today's society think that teachers are godless, a myth perpetuated by "religious leaders" and talk show hosts in "The Main Stream Media." I assure you that's not true.

I've included a collection of videos that highlight exactly how Americans are being manipulated. Glen Beck, especially, scares me. With his "emotional, God-fearing, love-my-country act," he has taken a wedge and polarized our country like never before.

This first video is Beck orchestrating the Tea Party movement. Watch him in his full glory.

Glen Beck's Love

This second video is a spoof on Beck's stick. Jon Stewart captured the essence of Beck, strangely, by talking about Beck. It's like Beck on Beck, and it's brilliant.

The Daily Show channels Glenn Beck

For good measure, I've tossed in the latest from everyone's favorite Club-mate, Pat Robertson. You remember Pat. He ran for President once and ,inexplicably, lost. A few years later, he proclaimed that Hurricane Katrina was God's vengeance on that den of sin and iniquity. Now Pat claims that the Haiti earthquake was God's vengeance on the people of Haiti for signing a deal with the devil to gain their freedom from France 200 years ago. I'd like to hear Pat tell that to the surviving orphans at The Foyer Des Filles De Dieu (Home of the Daughters of God). A friend of mine was due to land in Port Au Prince today on a mission trip to work with and teach the orphaned girls. The earthquake postponed that trip. Today she learned that five of the girls died along with the cook and his family.

Pat Robertson on The Haiti Curse

Happy New Year!

2010-01-14T21:52:00.002-05:00

I haven't had much to say so far this year. I can report that my body seems to sort have healed from my little encounter with one of our local general surgeons. Both sides of me seem to be working for now.

School is on an extended weekend holiday/midterm break. This break comes just nine days after our extended two week winter break. I'm anxiously looking forward to our long winter weekend break coming up in about two weeks.

Well, it's ten o'clock here in Roanoke, and I plan to watch a television show, Archer. We shall see if it's as good as its hype suggests. In case you're wondering, Archer is a new animated series on FX network. I hear that it's rather intense, funny, and edgy in a mature adult way.

1965 St. Louis Cardinals

2009-12-29T16:45:00.014-05:00

Back in the 60's, my brothers and sister used to write major league baseball teams to ask for free stuff. Usually, the teams sent nice packages in return. In 1965, they scored sets of Yankee and Cardinal glossy photos. I'm not sure what happened to the Yankee photos, but the Cardinal photos were stapled to the paneling on my parents' basement office. Long ago, I took them down and put them somewhere long forgotten until I stumbled upon them today. So here are those 1965 Cardinals, 45 years later.

Difficult Times

2009-12-28T19:43:00.002-05:00

I haven't been posting much lately. As most know, I had hernia surgery back in early December. That seemed to go well. I'm still not back 100% from that yet, but I'm good enough to get back to work. I've developed another medical issue that I won't detail here, but it is something with which I'll have to deal. On top of all that, I've been battling a persistent cold for the last couple of weeks that is now threatening to go deeper into my chest.

More important than all that, we've been monitoring my father. He suffers from COPD (emphysema) which has become quite advanced. He had a breathing episode on the 26th that forced him into the hospital. It took quite a lot of powerful medicine before he could recover his breath. However, they stabilized him and he was set to come home today. When I went to pick him up this morning, someone else was in his room and I was told he'd had another respiratory distress and was sent to ICU.

Again, he received a lot of intervention, but he was again stabilized. So that's where we are right now. He's resting comfortably, but is living on the edge.