We got about 18 inches of snow which is piled around in drifts thanks to the wind.  With temps in the teens and wind chill in the mid single digits we won't be slowly start clearing a path and uncovering the car.  And we expect more snow in spurts today.  Actually, watching the news/weather we are reassessing.  We will wait a day or two.  Neither of us are that young or that fit and we have no where we must go.

I have started to go through the seeds I have (new and old) to decide when to plant what where.  All garden plans are tentative because the garden in the fall is never the one I planed while the snow was still on the ground.  It should be an interesting season.  I have two tall sunflowers.  I ordered the Candy Mountain variety (a hybrid) from Burpee and Baker Creek sent Lemon Queen, another tall variety that is an heirloom, as a freebee.  I plan to companion plant three of the beans (Blauhild, red-seeded Asparagus, and Gold Marie Vining) and one of the cucumbers (Dragon's Egg) with the sunflowers so they provide the "trellis" for the vines.  I read on one blog last week that planting cucumbers with sunflowers not only provides support but increases the sweetness and reduces any bitterness in the cucumbers.  I retrieved an upright enamel-painted shoe rack a neighbor threw away last fall which I will mount on one of my large containers so it will support the Sunset runner beans.  I have one more cucumber, the Barese, which Totally Tomatoes sent as a freebee that I don't know yet where it will wind up.  It is an heirloom that is actually a melon with a cucumber flavor.  The small ones can be used as cucumbers in salads and whatever while the large ones can be used as melons.  Should be interesting.  More seeds to consider and more planning to do.

Now a sample what I am reading today:

The Atlantic:  Kent Greenfield argues that the real solution to corporate bad actors is more corporate personhood not less.  He brings up the case Hobby Lobby brought under the Restoration of Religious Liberty Act which, the courts agreed, exempted the company from the requirements of the Affordable Care Act.  They argued that the company, as a closed corporation the shares of which are owned by the Green family, shared the religious orientation of the owners.  Greenfield suggests that, if the corporation is indeed a person, it's "religious orientation" should be separate from the ownership.  Let's go a step further and mandate a means of executing particularly egregious corporate criminals.

Tomdispatch: Seven reasons why America's wars will not end any time soon by William Astore.  And I read yesterday that Obama wants the military exempted from "sequestration" and proposed a hefty increase in the Pentagon budget.