Good morning, Everyone.  Still dark here but it looks like the day will be sunny.  We are still in a warm pattern until later in the week when colder weather is supposed to come in.  That colder weather is, for the most part, predicted to be normal for this time of the year.  I hadn't heard about using bubble wrap for plants, Nicola.  It sounds interesting.  This is the first year I have tried to overwinter hardy plants in the containers.  So far they are all looking good.  I dug out a couple of bricks of cedar shavings Mom had picked up for a project long done and put the shavings around most of the plants.  I also plant to have some late, cold season plants this year and will use my plastic tents to extend the season on them next fall. The nice thing about my very small space is that, if something fails, I can quickly replace it and try something new.  I have several new items (new for me) on my list.  I pulled out my shopping list and will be ordering the seeds I need later this week.

I saw this posted on Natural News as well as here.  I agree the defense Pepsi has put up is a bit insane.  They don't deny the possibility of a customer finding something disgusting in a can of Mountain Dew because their manufacturing process is so tight foreign substances couldn't find their way in.  They deny the possibility because if it had the acid in the product would have completely dissolved it before the customer could possibly have consumed it.  For my part, I never liked Mountain Dew anyway--I found the taste disgusting and I assume there wasn't anything in it that shouldn't have been there.

Undernews had this entry today which echoes a thought I had this morning listening to the news.  Extending the school day by 90 minutes has been a major priority of the Emanuel administration in Chicago ever since he became Mayor.  They bribed a number of schools and teachers last fall to get on the bandwagon while the Union raised a number of very serious objections to the plan including the fact that the teachers would not get additional pay for the extra time and there was no real plan on how that tim should be used.  I have another objection:  the emphasis the current Chicago Public Schools CEO placed on preparing students for college.  So they extend the school day and emphasize the skills the students need for college so those students can spend four years getting a degree only to work as waiters, waitresses, and sales clerks.  That is a royal waste.