Good morning to you all on this foggy Friday.  The weather people say there is a monster storm with blizzard and heavy snow warnings for the plains from Colorado through eastern Kansas.  They don't expect us to get more than variable amounts of rain.  High 30s here and low 30s in Chicago.  I will see what the forecast is late next week before deciding when to put the cover on the greenhouse.  I am still collecting the milk jugs because I can put them in the green house to start the hardy plants.  I did some errands yesterday.  Stopped at my favorite quilt shop and, of course, I couldn't leave getting a small bundle of fat quarters.  The colors and patterns always raise my spirits.  I also stopped at my favorite source for seeds.  Found two of the specific varieties I was planning to order on line from Burpee along with a couple of good substitutes for two other varieties.  And, of course, I found a couple of impulse seeds.  The only thing I didn't find was the Christmas basil but I will put that on the list for next year unless my favorite nursery has transplants.

Your weather has made our news over here, Nicola.  The snow in eastern Europe is stunning as are the temperatures.  I hope they don't make the news because of spring flooding.  With that much snow that is entirely possible.  And, yes, the labeling on foods is frightening both for what is included and for what is not.  Our food industry has been fighting any requirement that they label GMO foods or GMO ingredients included in processed foods.

Hey, Kay.  What is Jobs and Family Services doing to restrict your food choices?  I know that many of our 'social service' organization seem to bend with faddish wind that blows and to do so with intrusive insensitivity.  The news said that Punxitawny Phil saw his shadow while another groundhog didn't.  I guess you can take your pick.

The news last night had a short piece on a salmonella scare that no one knew about--because the FDA and CDC did not release the information and when they did they referred to the fast food restaurant chain only as 'Restaurant A.'  Restaurant A has been identified as Taco Bell which makes this the second time in three years and so far, in neither case, has the source of the contamination been identified.  But what is really troubling is the lack of information given to consumers.  It is rather hard to make an informed decision on what risks you want to take if you are kept in the dark.  It seems that our health and food safety agencies are more concerned with the financial 'health' of businesses rather than the physical health and well being of consumers.

Well, I guess the kitchen got a bit too hot for the Komen Foundation.  This came by way of Crooks&Liars.

New flooding in Australia.  If I remember rightly, parts of these areas were hit last year.

The mainstream media is celebrating the wonderful (tongue in cheek alert) economic news that 243,000 new private sector jobs were created last month--far more than expected.  But I don't take any economic data at face value.  We have inflation data that eliminates most of the goods and services that affect me because it is 'too volatile.'  This piece in the Agonist shows why I don't trust the employment data either.