It's just a bunch of stuff that happened - Part 2: Chairs and Gardens

Friend's greenhouse on July 7th
teeny cucumbers (or zucchini?)

How it started:

In early May, we volunteered to water a friend’s greenhouse plants for seven weeks in June and July.   And then in late May I got severe sciatica.

How it’s going:

I started physical therapy in late June.  The first thing the physical therapist advised me is:  get a new office chair.  Then, do these 20 exercises/stretches at home.  Don’t do yoga.  Don't do weeding. Whenever you think of it, pull in your belly button to engage your abs.

My Black-eyed Susans on July 3rd. 
The one in the back (storebought) is prissy
 and also a favored snack of the
local wildlife. I doubt it's gonna make it.
The ones in the front are a gift
from the neighbor.

I bought a used high-end office chair.  This required crossing the Ohio River, four times, I tell you.  (There are three major rivers in this county.  Crossing any river is something people here don’t like to do.)  The local office stores had nothing suitable.  I bought from a humongous office furniture warehouse, in a warehousey section of the little river town, all the while astonished they would even entertain selling one small chair to me.   The actual chair and its price are quite comfortable for me.

This is only half of the used chairs they had.

P.T. is SOOOO time consuming.  But also beneficial.  P.T. meant less time for driving (15 minutes each way) to water plants–for a total of at least 45 minutes each time.  I had hoped to make it three times a week, but that dwindled to one or two times.  Some of the plants are thriving, but some are barely making it.  

A lovely 5-inch cucumber.
Large enough to please the Secretary of 
Defense, so I harvested it.

It’s been hellishly hot, and it doesn’t rain inside the greenhouse, so it needs a lot of water.  But not too much, because fungus can grow in the hot and moist greenhouse mini-climate (and so it has). 

I decimated the mushrooms with
the force of hose water.  I do
not think for one moment that
they are actually gone.

Then a huge sinkhole opened up in front of the hospital near where we live, adding 5 minutes to the greenhouse trip.  

Let’s do a short tally of some of the terrifying things so far this month:  

- hellishly hot, due to climate change

- sinkhole (thank God the federal government is not in charge of this one)

- cyclospora parasite infection, nationwide, due to CDC cuts

- screwworm parasite in livestock and pets, surging back, due to DOGE cuts

- dangerous smoke in the air, with AQIs above 400, due to climate change

- sciatica, due to my own stupidity + aging

And this is small potatoes compared to what some human beings are suffering because of current policies. Oh, 2026, why are you doing this?!

Those zucchini/cuke tendrils are
biologically amazing and are spreading
everywhere.  A successful species.

The tomato plants have not produced many flowers, while the cucumbers (or maybe zucchini) are threatening to take over the whole place, as squash do.  Our friend suggested I spread fertilizer and pluck some lower stems off but I simply don’t have time to do actual gardening like that, which makes me sad.

On the bright side, we have harvested some delicious lettuce, 3 beautiful little cucumbers, and 7 green beans.  This is produce that is safe from the evil parasite that the cuts to the CDC have brought us.  Yay!  It's a balm in the face of it all.

The second harvest.

Dear Reader, have you harvested anything from anywhere lately?

Part 1: Peaches Deliver Joy

Part 3 (final in this series): Empty Nest Again