I didn't get my bulbs planted before the snow!

I have a sheltered porch that can keep them at around freezing or I can keep them against a cold wall in the house - about 50-60 degrees.

Do I plant them during a thaw, wait until Spring, or give up completely?

I should mention - our ground rarely freezes here because we get heavy snow cover before it freezes or else we're in a thaw.

Grey's anatomy and end of life care :

I don't usually watch this show, so I'm fuzzy on the details, but I watched part of it last night. Apparently, one character has severe Alzheimer's - she's in residential care and doesn't recognize her husband. She develops an aneurysm and is near death. She is then given a major surgical intervention, makes a miraculous recovery and recognizes her husband, and dies of a heart attack.

My reaction is this - if someone I loved was that far gone with Alzheimer's, I would never allow surgery in this situation. The aneurysm is a blessing compared to the long slow destruction of Alzheimer's. Recovery form such surgery is likely to be more difficult and more painful than shown on TV.

Isn't it time for servers to be covered by labor laws?

I think it's absolutely ridiculous that servers are paid less than a kid mowing a lawn and are expected to survive on tips. It's way past time for them to be covered by the minimum wage.

Christmas review:

I made two quiches for Christmas Eve - one with and one without ham to suit the omnivores and vegetarians. I served a green salad alongside.

Delicious!

I made an eggnog pie that was great - custard pie with extra nutmeg and a dash of rum. It's only last night that I realized that I could have taken any eggnog recipe and cook it as a custard filling!

I made a cherry pie with almond crust and added rum to the filling. That pie got eaten, but I'm not really sure how it tasted - i have Sjogren's Syndrome and my taste buds are out of whack. I thought the rum was too much; my husband said he couldn't taste it!

For Christmas dinner I made a roast chicken and what I am now calling "Bean Glory" ( I called it bean glop when making my list, but spell check changed it and I'm sticking to it!). Bean Glory was a large pan of stuffing (bread, eggs, onions, garlic, butter, celery, mushrooms, sage savory, celery seed, salt and pepper) with a collar of Duchess Potatoes and Green bean casserole as a topping. That was just right for a leisurely day.

Plum pudding with Irish Mist for my daughter's celebration tasted better than plum pudding with rum for our New Year's - but that may have been my taste buds again!

Creamed onions - with frozen pearl onions! Why didn't I think of this before! I just didn't have the energy to peel a pound of tiny onions in previous years, so I ended up throwing out the spouted onions in February. It's the favorite of one of my daughters, so I'm glad I was able to make it.

Any weather geeks here? What will the record high temperatures in Australia

do to the monsoon season, or are they unconnected?

Is pot really a gate way drug? Or do people move on to other drugs when they can't get pot?

Has Purchased Payroll software hit your workplace?

SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- A new $365 million computer system that was intended to simplify National Grid’s operations has created chaos instead, screwing up paychecks for thousands of utility employees and delaying payments to vendors.

Two unions have filed lawsuits on behalf of unpaid workers, and on Monday the Massachusetts attorney general fined the company $270,000 for failing to comply with wage laws. New York’s attorney general has subpoenaed company records to investigate.
....
For more than a year, National Grid worked to develop a new computer system to consolidate a patchwork of human resource, supply chain and finance programs it inherited from the handful of U.S. utilities it has acquired. The new system, based on software from SAP AG, of Germany, cost an estimated $365 million, according to National Grid rate filings.

http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2013/01/national_grid_syracuse_payroll.html


My health insurance has been screwed up ever since my employer went live with SAP!

Editted - sounds like it's the fault of the companies buying SAP, not SAP itself!

If you are approaching retirement in a career/job you've held a long time,

do you think your employers have been hiring enough new people to be trained in time to replace you? I keep hearing from engineers in their 50's that there is no one in the pipe behind them.

Slut shaming - I think it comes from the same culture as date rape

Both assume that it is every man's right to have sex with any woman, whether she is willing or not. In all too many cases, the man walks away with nothing except maybe the congratulations of his friends, while the woman bears all the consequences and shame.

Your government in action: the FDA is working to ensure pet foods are safe: