Bluebird Meadows of Stevensville, Michigan

Owner's Web Log
Copyright 2001 Michael S. Brown
October 2004


Daily activities of the owner of a 20 acre Organic Farm plus
observations, notes, and comments on a wide variety of topics.

1 Prepared for the Farmers Market.

Finished taking down bird netting on the sunflower seed head fields.

Closed the lower screen on the greenhouse south wall.
2 Worked a Vendor booth at the St. Joseph, MI Farmers Market.

Set up 2 more saw horses with planks at the Roadside Stand to hold more pumpkins.
3 Started harvesting remaining ripe pumpkins.

Took potatoes and tomatoes off the Roadside Stand to make room for more pumpkins.
4 First HEAVY FROST of the season.
5 Bush Knew There Were No Weapons Of Mass Destruction?
I am astounded by the growing number of reports that President Bush knew that Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction and posed no real threat to the USA.  In spite of this information, he directed military actions anyway.  President Clinton was impeached for false statements about his affair with Monica - but what is to be done about a president who launched an entire war under false pretenses?   (apparently nothing)
6 Disappointed in Powell
As a follow-up to yesterday's note, I'm disappointed that Secretary Of State Powell was an active participant in going to war under false pretenses.  His presentation at the UN was pivotal in getting the UN resolution approved which was the green light for our military actions.  I have had a great deal of respect for Mr. Powell - I thought he might become our first black president.  My admiration has dropped magnitudes as I'm sure he knew there were no weapons of mass destruction either.  I would have preferred to see him resign his position rather than present lies and twisted facts in a effort to rally the UN to war.
7 Sent out an e-mail to our Internet Guestbook list announcing this year's sunflower seed heads were dry and ready for sale.

Picked more pumpkins.
8 Prepared for the Farmers Market.
9 Worked a Vendor booth at the St. Joseph, MI Farmers Market.

Set up one more set of saw horses and plants at the Roadside Stand for more pumpkins.
10 Picked the mini-pumpkins and mini-gourds from the Grapes SW Field, then mowed and plowed the field.   Also mowed then plowed the Fairway East Field.
11 Finished picking pumpkins.

Started mowing grass in the Mulch Fields to place in the furrows plowed in the other fields.
12 Mowed more grass in the Mulch Fields.

Found a kids play area in one of our wooded areas near the mobile home park which is west of us.  Several articles of furniture and evidence of several fires having been set.  There is no fence on the mobile home park property line - so people just come to our property when they feel like it.   This is the last straw for me.  It's time to explore taking legal actions with the mobile home park.
13 Put out a "Leaf Drop-off Sign" near the road by our Farm Stand:

Wanted
Bags Of Leaves
For Our Organic Farm

Being Organic, we can't use commercial chemical fertilizers.   The nutritional chemical value of leaves isn't that great.  On the other hand, there isn't anything better for building good soil and feeding the worms and all the other soil creatures.  To compensate for the low nutritional value of the leaves, we try to use a lot of them.  The leaves are dumped in the plowed furrows (about 12" deep) then disked in when a field is covered.  The field sits this way all winter.  In the spring, the fields are disked a couple more times and they're ready for planting.

Washed and priced pumpkins.
14 Washed mini-gourds

Put up new "Keep Out" signs along property line with mobile home park.  Wrote letter to the owners/managers of the mobile home facility threatening legal actions if a chain link fence is not erected along property line by July 1, 2005.
15 Prepared for the Farmers Market.
16 Too cold and windy to go to the St. Joseph, MI Farmers Market.

Caught up on paperwork.
17 Mowed the Grapes SE field and the Pumpkin Field.  Picked up cardboard squares which had been placed under the pumpkins.
18 Hauled bags of leaves from drop site to the open furrows in the fields.

Kerry - Flip-Flop vs. Dynamic Decision Making
It seems that one of the largest hits on the Kerry campaign is the fact that he has flip-flopped on a number of issues - changed his mind.  I'm surprised that the Kerry group has not leveraged (or done a "spin") this to his advantage.  I think they should promote "Dynamic Decision Making" when somebody always makes the best decision based on the information they have.  As that information changes, their position on topics may change as well (would need to take care in pointing out what information changed which resulted in the changed position).  It should be easy to contrast this with the President's "snapping turtle" methods of rigorously hanging on to a point of view, even though the information has changed (still went to war in Iraq although he knew there were no WMD).
19 Hauled bags of leaves from drop site to the open furrows in the fields.
20 Plowed pumpkin field.

Took down the new supports for the East Meadow SW Field.
21 Mowed sunflower remains in East Meadow SE and took down the bird net supports in East Meadow SW.
22 Prepared for the Farmers Market.

Mowed the sunflower remains in East Meadow SW then plowed the field.
23 Worked a Vendor booth at the St. Joseph, MI Farmers Market for 1hr in steady rain, then gave up and went home.
24 Raked leaves in our front yard and took to fields.
25 Hauled bags of leaves from drop site to the open furrows in the fields.
26 Hauled bags of leaves from drop site to the open furrows in the fields.

Started raking (by hand) cut grass mulch from the Mulch Fields.
27 Hauled bags of leaves from drop site to the open furrows in the fields.

Started hauling cut grass mulch to the open furrows in the fields.
28 Hauled bags of leaves from drop site to the open furrows in the fields.  Raked leaves in our front yard and hauled out to the fields.

Minus One Voting
I think we should have the ability to vote against candidates.  Along with the current ability to vote for only one candidate in an election, rather than placing your checkmark "for" a certain person, you should be able to to vote "against" a candidate instead.  You would still get only one vote - but rather than being counted as a +1 for a candidate, it would be counted as a -1 for the one you selected.  When the results are tallied, you would subtract the -1 votes against a candidate from the +1 approval votes they got.  In the coming election, I don't feel as strong "for" Kerry as I have strong feelings "against" Bush.   If such a system were in place, some sub-rules might require a re-election (with different candidates) if none of the candidates achieved a positive net result.  If the goal of the election process is to represent "the will of the people", then I think Minus One voting should be given careful consideration.
29 Hauled bags of leaves from drop site to the open furrows in the fields.  Raked leaves in our front yard and hauled out to the fields.
30 Hauled bags of leaves from drop site to the open furrows in the fields.

Mowed the Tomato Field and hooked irrigation pipes to bottom wires.
31 Hauled bags of leaves from drop site to the open furrows in the fields.

Clipped all the ties to the dead tomato plants and pulled out all the dead tomato plants.
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