Tony Brewer View

We had a thunderstorm come through here last night, but I was not too concerned. Our place is pretty solid and well maintained – thanks to a lot of work that I put in the place. So this morning when I walked outside, I was a little surprised to see that a big tree limb had come crashing down in our front yard. It came off a big old oak tree, which makes me concerned that maybe that oak tree is not as healthy inside as I first thought.

Today I will have to get the chainsaw out and cut that big limb into smaller pieces so I can get it out of the front yard. I haven’t had to use that chainsaw much lately, which is a good thing. But it sure comes in handy when something like this big limb falling happens.

It is starting to act like spring more and more around here although technically we should still be freezing and dealing with snow storms in the month of February. It has been the mildest winter in recorded history and I fear that we just might be in store with some type of wacky summer weather, exactly how I have no clue, but time certainly will tell.

Along with so many of the plants and flowers that have all ready started blooming, there has been an increase of bugs inside of the house recently. The spiders are the worst, may I can’t stand the thought of spiders roaming around the house day and night so I have gone ahead and went to http://www.pestcontrol.us and have scheduled a professional to come out to the house to help nip this in the bud, before I start losing sleep with the thought of a possible spider crawling in the bed with me at night. I just can’t handle that.

Guest post by Katie Blackwood

One of the biggest challenges I’ve had in trying to reduce my carbon footprint is in finding a company that will pick up our recycling materials. There simply is not a convenient place to drop off our recyclables, so I’m sorry to say that a lot of times our recyclables end up in the trash can. I’ve tried for a very long time to sort the recyclables and deliver them once a month to the recycling centers, but with the price of gasoline continuing to increase as much and as quickly as it has been I have to take a good hard look at whether I can even afford to go there once a month anymore.

I’ve seen some rubbish removal Brisbane trucks driving in town and wondered if any of them get involved in residential recycling. Next time I see one I’m going to try to write down the company name and phone number so I can call and find out. Recycling really is an important thing to me.

For years I have bought a variety of plants from the local hardware store to put in my garden. It is easier to get plants that already have a head start on their growth than to start them from seed.

My gardens have always done well with the plants, but this year I think I will try to start a few of them from seed. I have been saving the cardboard egg cartons and next weekend I will buy a big bag of potting soil mix from Lowes or Home Depot. The seeds should be sprouted and tall enough to transplant into the garden by mid-March.

Depending upon the weather, I’d like to get an early start with many of the vegetables and try to get a second crop of some things this year.

I was reading an article on the Time.com website about how a lot of companies are participating in what is termed “Greenwashing.”  I had never heard of the term “Greenwashing” before, so I was curious and read the article.  It seems that “Greenwashing” is the term used to describe the action of promoting a product or service claiming that it is better for the environment than it really is.  The article included links to other articles that showed instances and examples of greenwashing by real companies.  I found the article to be informative, and have bookmarked the links for future reference.  It is disappointing to see how many companies are so shameless in their false promotions!