Life’s garden: To plant a garden for daily living, plant three rows of peas. Peas of mind, peas of heart, peas of soul. Add four rows of squash. Squash gossip, squash indifference, squash grumbling and squash selfishness. Add four rows of lettuce. Let us be faithful, let us be kind, let us be patient and let us really love on another. And no garden is complete with turnips. Turn up for meetings, turn up for service and turn up to help those in need. Finally, a garden requires thyme. Time for each other, time for family and time for friends. Water freely with patience and cultivate with love. You’ll have much fruit in your garden, because you reap what you sow.

Clean-up crew needed: I recently heard from my friend Brooke Vallister on Sapelo Island that a clean up would be great, since wind and heavy surfs have inundated the beach with litter. I need five people to volunteer to do a clean up on Oct. 11. Call me at 884-7555 or e-mail me at riverrat@coastalcourier.net to volunteer.

Now we’ll know: According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, supermarkets will now have to label ground beef, chicken, pork, veal, steak, lamb, goat, fresh and frozen foods macadamia nuts, pecans and peanuts showing what country they come from. Hallelujah! I for one, do not like eating a piece of fruit that has been handled by the pickers, handled by the packers, handled by the shippers, handled by the people unloading it from the ship, then handled by the driver unloading it at the grocery store, then handled by the produce manager. That’s why I don’t eat fruit during the winter. When our local farmers can drive their fruits and vegetables to the supermarket, then that’s when I buy it. The USDA will fine any grocery store up to $1,000 for not complying with this new law.

Consumers still getting gouged: According to the Associated Press, we were not supposed to have seen a surge in gas prices because “gas for this region comes from tanker ships on the Atlantic.” Yet, you and I know that gas prices did rise considerably. Why? Because Colonial Oil, Sommers Oil and others are just so rich they can do this and get away with it. The people running our Georgia government live so high on the hog, that they don’t care either. Even our local officials aren’t doing anything about the gouging. With all this “pork” why don’t we have one big barbecue?

Helpful hints: Instead of throwing out those used dryer sheets, place them in the bottoms of flowerpots and planters to keep the soil from falling out. If you run out of fabric softener or softener sheets, substitute hair conditioner. For a full load try a fourth to a half cup. A Missouri resident says she begins in mid-February saving banana peels in the freezer. When she plants tomatoes, she digs down two inches deeper than required for her plants, places the banana peels in, then covers them with dirt, then plants her tomato plants on top. She claims her plants grow 8 to 10 feet high and the fruits are very sweet. I guess I’ll try this. I did put baking soda around the base of my tomatoes this summer and they were so sweet. Placing “black ink only” sheets of newspapers between the rows of my plants helped to retain moisture and keep back weeds.

Benefits of paving: If I lived on a dirt road, I would be bowing down to the people who want to pave it. Who in their right mind would not want their road paved? Do they not remember what happens to a dirt road when it rains?