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It started out innocently enough.  A parent of one of my Critter’s basketball teammates e-vited the team and their parents over for an end-of-season potluck and cookout.  A list of choices of things to bring was included.

Me, being me, didn’t get to the RSVP thing until everyone had already pretty much chosen everything good on the list.  So I said I’d bring bread.  (woo woo.)

But when the day approached, I found I wanted to bring something else.  Something with a little pizzazz.  I decided to bring some home-made punch in addition to my home-made bread.

I got out my favorite Pier One Imports beverage container

and proceeded to make up the punch as I went along.

I made lemonade.

I added fruit….apples, lemons, limes, oranges, blackberries.

Tasted it.  Needed something else.

I added seltzer water.

Tasted it.  Needed something else.

I added apple cider.

Tasted it.  Still needed something else.

I rummaged through the fridge.  Nothing looked appealing.  I shut the fridge door and tapped my lips with my finger.  Hmmm.  What to add?  What to add?

My eyes fell on my Little Red Hutch.  I love that thing.  Everyone should have one.  My Captain bought it for me when I first moved into my little cottage.  It holds lunch items for my kids’ school lunches; it also holds water bottles and telephone books and goldfish crackers and vitamins and pasta bowls and caffeine shots and napkins and my moose cookie jar.  And Booze.

Ah Ha!  That’s it!  Booze!  My punch needed booze!  I grabbed the first thing I saw:  Citrus Vodka!  And proceeded to empty the bottle into the punch.

Tasted it.

OH YEAH.  It was like Mike’s Hard Lemonade mixed with Sangria mixed with a whole lot of happiness and love.

And I now had a couple of gallons of it to share.

Uh oh.  Wait.  I don’t know these people all that well.  I mean, we are acquaintences…but maybe they don’t imbibe?  Maybe they would feel this was not an appropriate venue for mommies and daddies to get snookered?

I called the host.  “Um, is there going to be alcohol at this party?”

“I just finished putting beer in the cooler.”

“We’ll be right over!!”

It was a huge success.  A beautiful evening at a lovely house.  Fantastic food, funny people, happy kids, basketball medals, contented coaches….

….and adult punch.

I just love it when a last-minute idea becomes a moment of genius.

I spent the majority of the day smelling like fertilizer.  I fertilized the grass, the garden, and, apparently, my clothes.  And since I didn’t have time to shower or change until 11:00pm tonight, I enjoyed that odor all day long.

I use an organic product called Milorganite.

Milorganite is cheap, and full of crap, much like myself.  ( huh?)

It is literally “composted bio-solids.”  Sounds yummy, don’t it?

Second line under Growing Beautiful Lawns, Trees, Shrubs and Flowers since 1926:

“…produced by sewage wastewater treatment processes..”

I have to wonder who first came up with the idea to: 1) use human poo to fertilize and 2) collect and process it for such a purpose.  Oh, and 3) how much did they pay people to make it?  Not enough, I’d venture.

Why do I use it?  When I was a young whippersnapper (whippersnapper? Really? Did she really just use that term?) I worked at a company called American Plant Food in Bethesda, Maryland.  There I learned all about this fantastic product.  It very effectively keeps deer away from flowers. It slowly releases Nitrogen into grass without burning it.  It does not consist of any chemicals.  And it costs less than just about any mass-produced fertilizer/deer repellant out there.

I use it every season.

Here is what my tulips look like when I don’t treat them with Milorganite.

Damn you, Bambi!

It’s a good thing I’m a bleeding heart, or you’d be a steak on my plate you no-good tulip munching …..

And here are some tulips that have been treated with Milorganite:

Show promise, don’t they?

Ok, so my camera wouldn’t focus properly on the foreground.  Nice detail on the soil, eh?

Gracie was helping.

Let me tell you about a couple of drawbacks.  First off, there is a question about some tiny little detail like heavy metals in the product.  I dunno.  Look it up.  I’m not smart enough to understand it.

And secondly, there is a smell.  Not just any smell.  A SMELL.  Well heck, it’s composted human poo…of course it smells.  And no, you just don’t get used to it.  So I try to put it down before a good rain.

It was forecasted to rain all day today, tonight, and tomorrow.  So I spread it liberally, in addition to over-seeding our lawn.

It hasn’t rained.  Not one drop.  My yard stinks.  My clothes stink.  My cats stink.

But by Golly I’m gonna have me some purty tulips this spring!!!

Even if they do smell like poo.

If it can be propagated by rooting it in water, I’ll do it.

Doesn’t matter the species.

Ivy?  Done.

Philodendron?  Done.

Peace Lily? Done.

Avocado? Done.

WHY?

I’m a mother.  I have to nurture.  I can’t help myself.

Which is the same reason I can’t bring myself to kill the mold growing in the refrigerator.

Guys just can’t understand.

Driving up Sellman Road in Dickerson, you pass Poole’s Farm.  And on Poole’s Farm is a small wetland (as in, puddle) that is filled every spring with the welcome song of Spring Peepers.  The sweet beckoning of one wee boy-frog to one wee girl-frog…times a bijillion.

Critter and Varmint and I were driving home one evening, via Sellman Road, and I lowered the windows and slowed down so we could enjoy the reptilian concert.

Critter:  “Why do they do that?”

Me: “It’s their mating call.”

Critter: “What’s a mating call?”

Me: “It’s the boy-frogs saying ‘Hubba! Hubba!’ to the girl-frogs.”

Varmint: “What is ‘Hubba! Hubba!’?”

Me, not liking the direction of this conversation: “It’s like the boy-frog is saying, ‘Hey!  I want to kiss you!’ to the girl-frog.”

Critter, laughing because he does like the direction of this conversation: “Peepers don’t kiss!”

Me: “Sure they do.”

Varmint, matter-of-factly : “Uh, no, Mom, they don’t.”

Me: “Yep.  They sure do.”

Varmint: “Mom, I’m pretty darn sure Peepers don’t kiss.”

Me: “Prove it.”

Silence.

It’s good to be the Queen.

Critter and I were out in the back yard, swinging in the hammock.  I was laying there, marveling at the sweetness of this mother / son time with the sun on our faces and the breeze in our hair.  I enjoyed every moment as we swayed slowly to and fro. I was thoroughly absorbed in my Critter.

Not him, however.  He was fixated on a ‘thing’ that he could see over the wire fence, mostly buried in the leaves.  What was it?  He kept craning his neck to see.

I’m feeling sentimental and maternal;  he’s being….well….a boy.

“MOM! Quit stroking my head!  I’m not a cat!”

Eventually I gave up, let him jump off the hammock (ok, I admit, I had him locked in a half Nelson to keep him with me) and he ran over to the fence to try and figure out what was in the neighbor’s woods.  He couldn’t reach that far through the fence, and there were prickers galore on that side.  We’re talking thistle, raspberry, nettles, etc.   NOT the most hospitable woods.    So I say what any other reasonable parent would say,

“Don’t even think it.”

“Aw Mom!  I’ve totally got it!  I’ll run down to the wooden section of the fence, where I can climb it, then I’ll use this (gestures to cat litter bucket he’d been previously playing in the gravel with) as a shield from the prickers.  Then I can get to it and see what the heck it is!”

I knew there was no stopping him when he has a ‘McGuyver’ tone in his voice, so I let him go.  I figure Pain is an excellent teacher, and that he’ll get scratched a few times and turn around.

But see, I keep forgetting that my boy has passion and drive like I never did.

A few minutes later I hear,

“Mom? A little help here?”

And there he is, well surrounded by briars and barbs in the thicket, cut up as all get out, and looking rather scared.

***sigh***

“Alright.  Don’t move.  I’ll be right there.”

(If this were a movie, this would be where the heroic music starts)

I went to the house, grabbed one of My Captain’s Carhardt canvas work jackets and a step-ladder and went to the section of fence he was nearest.

(It’s important to note at this juncture in the story that I have shorts on, and he has shorts on. Thank you.)

I tossed him the jacket to protect him from further pricker impalement.

(Oh, it’s also important to note that I have a t-shirt on.  Thank you again.)

I put the ladder near the wire fence.  Climbed the fence. Made my way to him (ow, ow, ow, Jeeeeeeeshus Golly OW) in the briars, picked him up, took him back to the fence (ow, ow, ow, Jeeeeshus Golly OW), plopped him back over to our yard, and then ….

….stood there wondering how I would get back over.  He couldn’t lift the ladder to me.  I couldn’t climb the wire, and couldn’t make my way through the briars to the wooden part of the fence.

At this point, I was waiting for My Captain, the Rescue Tech, to look out the window, see me, and come to my rescue.  Then I thought about it and fervently hoped he wouldn’t look out the window and see my predicament.

“Mom?  Should I go get Troy?”

“NO!….er..I mean, uh, no, honey.  That isn’t necessary.  Mommy’s got this.”

I told Critter to lean the ladder against the fence where I was able to use it from the other side to boost at least one of my legs over…where I dangled for a painful minute.

Did I mention there were briars?

Eventually the wire bent under the massive weight it was bearing (ahem) and I was able to get my other leg over, scratching it thoroughly in the process, and landed with a thump in our yard.

“You know what that thing was, Mom?  Just a stupid old birdie from the badminton set we threw out last year.  It’s just trash.”

NnnNNnnnnrrrrrr.