Here we are at the last day of September. Only three more months left in this strange, strange year. The temperature was at 50F a bit ago so it will probably dip down into the 40s before the sun comes up. I didn't get any work done outside. We decided, on the spur of the moment, to do our grocery shopping yesterday instead of today. During the summer we generally do that on the days the farm market is open but as the season winds down we don't have as much to buy there because we have already put up as much as we can in the space we have. By the time we came home and put things away the wind was kicking up so I decided not to fight it and left the gardens and outside clean up for today--I hope. Baker Creek sent out their e-mail announcing their 2018 catalogs so I ordered it. I already have a list of seeds started for next year.

So Price has resigned as HHS secretary. I wonder which parasite the Parasite-In-Chief will nominate to replacement. I doubt very much that the money angle bothered #45 much. I suspect it was the embarrassment and the fact that Price was supposed to smooth the way for the ACA repeal but failed to get that job done. The real lessons: don't embarrass the boss and give him enough progress toward what he wants to allow him to claim a biggly victory.

Garden Myths has a good review of a product I once used when I first began trying to start plants from seed--the Jiffy pellets. Actually I should say "peat pellets" because I used other brands as well. I stopped using them for reasons mentioned: they aren't big enough for the larger plants and the mesh that holds the peat together to form the "pot" isn't biodegradable. I dug the mesh out of my beds for several years and threw them away--after emptying the peat into the soil. Last year I started using toilet paper core tubes as my starter pots and will expand my use of them next spring. They soften when wet, help the soil retain moisture, and they are biodegradable. I was parsimonious and cut the tubes in half to make two pots. I won't do that this year because the half size is too small. And I found the roots do make their was out of the pot.