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Tonight I bid Herald adieu.  After seven months of tending to a container of composting worms, they have left my care and are waiting for the ground to warm so they can take up residence in a greenhouse garden.

Sometime last spring, my friend BT had ordered a bunch of Eisenia Fetida, or redworms, and spent the summer composting.  In an effort to be a helpful friend, I had collected container after container of produce waste product and donated it all to BT’s worms, more or less, on a weekly basis.  I was amazed at how many produce scraps I could collect in a week’s time.  Very faithfully, I would leave them on BT’s chair in her office at work so she would be sure to find them.

BT had ordered her worms through the mail and then purchased a worm composting system from a local nursery.  When they arrived, she buried them in some dirt mixed with shredded newspaper, and let Mother Nature run her course.  A few vegetable scraps were added from time to time and those worms were in pig heaven!  Over the course of the summer, we had christened the whole lot of them “Herald.”  It was a collective name as it seemed like a dauntless task to try to name each worm individually.

In October, the time came for BT and her husband to travel to Seattle as he was scheduled for a kidney transplant.  BT had made the decision to donate one of her kidneys as well so they were going to be gone for quite awhile.  When the time neared for their departure, they needed someone to care for the worms while they were gone.  BT thought of moi.  How great an opportunity for my husband and me to see how we liked this composting process.  I have to tell you, as is often the case, it was lots easier in theory than in practice.

BT brought the worms to me at work and we transferred them to my car.  I took them home and felt all my nurturing instincts kick in.  I continued to faithfully collect veggie scraps and we added them to Herald’s box each week but, after a couple of months…a problem developed.  In the process of caring for all of my new charges, I ended up overfeeding Herald which resulted in some tiny flies of some sort, possibly a fruit fly.  We waited and waited to see if the flies would die off as we thought they may have developed from some larvae on the rind of something we had entered into the worm environment.  We tried everything we could think of to improve the living conditions.  Some of the worms perished which caused a horrid odor we thought would never go away.  Finally, it was after discussing my situation with a cooperative extension agent at our local university that I was able to solve the problem.

What she told me was that we had probably given the worms too much wet food all at once.  The worms don’t actually eat the veggie scraps.  They eat the bacteria that is causing the breakdown of the food.  This abundance of moisture from the breakdown of the table scraps created the flies we were dealing with and there was a solution to that.  I was advised to add dry, shredded newspaper, mixed with finely crushed, cooked egg shells to the habitat.  Add some dry leaves as well and bingo!  The egg shells would raise the pH level of the soil and kill all the flies.  Low and behold, it worked!

Everything perked along through the rest of the winter months.  Every so often I would collect the worm “tea” which would drain into the bottom portion of the composting system.  That will eventually be used on my flower boxes next month when I prepare the soil for planting.

About a month or so ago, my husband and I decided it was time to start thinking about returning the worms to BT.  All had gone well with her kidney donation and her husband’s transplant and with the longer days and winter definitely coming to an end, it was time to discuss plans to move Herald back to their original home.  A gal in my office was working on getting her garden in order and was very interested in taking Herald.  She wanted to release the worms in her greenhouse plots so we got together with BT to see if she thought this would be a good idea.  BT was all for it and we made arrangements to move Herald to their new digs.  After work, the gal from my office, who lives down the street, came by on her four-wheeler to collect Herald.  She will keep them in her garage until the mornings warm up to at least 40 degrees farenheit.  By then she will have her greenhouse ready for Herald to take up residence.

So, with a touch more sadness than I had ever expected, I set the composting system filled with Herald, in the back of her four-wheeler, and waved goodbye.  Through a lot of hard work, the composting system was in the best shape it had been since last Autumn when it arrived on my doorstep.  Caring for the worms was certainly a learning experience that will be remembered for a long, long while.

I have heard the expression, “Life happens while you are making plans.”  Well, that is the way I have felt over the past couple of days.  After meticulous planning for a trip to Philadelphia to see an eye specialist, knowing full well that I would be having the mole (nevus) on the inside of my left eye treated, I learned that the time was not right for such treatment.  Wow!  What a surprise.

On Wednesday afternoon, my husband and I found ourselves with lots of time on our hands which we had not expected.  With that unexpected gift of time, we decided to reinvent the remainder of our trip and so we did.

I think I mentioned in a past blog that our older son is living in NYC as an actor.  Part of our visit to the eastern part of the country involved a visit with him.  Our younger son is presently living in Portland , OR so my hubby came up with the idea of looking at the possibility of heading to Portland for a visit for a few days.

After multiple phone calls to our son CW, as well as the airlines, we finally had all our transportation booked.  First up was an Amtrak train ride to the Newark, NJ airport which is where we would begin our plane journey across the country.

It has been years since I was on a passenger train in the United States.  We had traveled to Britain and New Zealand and rode trains there but neither of those trains were nearly as comfortable as this Amtrak train.  Perhaps the Chunnel train going from London to Brussels, Belgium or Paris, France would compare.  The Amtrak seats were generous, with lots of leg room, and very thick and comfy.  Even though they did not recline all the way to a  proper sleeping position, they were comfy enough that one could nod off and not wake up with a stiff neck.  The journey itself was only about an hour or so long with two stops between Philadelphia and the Newark airport.  Upon our arrival, we caught a shuttle to our hotel for the night and settled in for a good rest before the next day’s journey that would begin at a ridiculous hour.

After a very early rise, we were at the airport by 6:10am, boarded the plane around 7:30am and got nowhere fast.  The computer system at the airport failed so the pilot was waiting for final weight numbers in order to set the wing flaps for the safest flight, most efficient use of fuel, etc.  Well, we waited, and waited and waited about an hour before we heard the computers were up and running.  Yeah!!

Unfortunately, by then there was a backlog of 180 planes on the runway that needed to take off plus a bunch sitting at the gates.  Okay, the next delay was to be at least 90 minutes.  We were told we could get off the plane, stay in the boarding area, and couldn’t reboard until they said so.  So, about 3 hours later, we finally took off.  I am happy to report it was a very smooth flight and 5 or so hours later, we arrived in Seattle, about 15 minutes after our connecting flight left for Portland.  Drat!

We hustled over to the Customer Service Center and our flight had been rebooked to leave at 3:30pm.  The customer service rep gave us our new boarding passes and sent us on our way.  About this time it was 2pm so we headed over to the food court, had a little lunch and then mosied on down to our gate.

By about 5:30 or so, we were once again ensconced in our  motel room which we would call home for the next few days while visiting our #1 second son in Portland, OR.  After a good night’s sleep, I will be ready to see the town!

What a grand idea this was, I have to say!!

Get yourself a cup of coffee, tea or a tall glass of the beverage of your choice because this may be a bit of a read!  One the way to visit my eye specialist in Philadelphia, we passed through New York City to visit our older son and his girlfriend.

As usual, it was a whirlwind of activity while we were in New York. On Sunday, we were out the door around 10am. That is considered pretty early by the young folks’ standards.  We walked about 6-8 blocks to a restaurant for brunch called Cheryl’s where I had poached eggs on salmon hash which was a delicacy for the palette (sp?).  With each brunch ordered, came a complimentary Mimosa or Bloody Mary. Not being in the mood for alcohol at that time of they day, I ordered just the Bloody Mary mix. Quite spicy it was!

After that, we took a car ride (like a taxi only not as we were in Brooklyn and not Manhattan) to an apartment complex where we looked at a couple of apartments.  No, we are not contemplating a move but the kids are.  Their rent has gone up and they are looking to find something for several hundred dollars less per month.  Can’t say I blame them.

Afterward, we took the subway to the NY Transit Museum which is actually underground at an old subway station.  It was very interesting.  They had outdated cars there from around the turn of the 20th century and had lots of information concerning the subway system.  It originated as 3 different subway systems and all came together as one many years later.  Over $9 million is spent each and every day by people riding the public transportation system in New York City.  Amazing! Prices for a subway ride are about to go up as I guess they are struggling along.

Walking back to the subway, we caught view of a Trader Joe’s so we had to stop in and visit.  This Trader Joe’s (grocery, if you are not familiar with them) just opened last year and is in an old bank building.  It was gorgeous!  Prior to its opening, the only TJ’s was located at the Grand Central train station in Manhattan.  I bought a bouquet of flowers to bring home to my son’s girlfriend K since it was her birthday the following day and I also brought along  some herbal tea, a cheesy baguette and some black licorice that I enjoy so much.  My son did quite a shop for him and his girlfriend and we took the subway home arriving around 3:30pm.  I could have laid (lain) down for a nap!

We visited for a couple of hours and then the kids went to a birthday dinner (for K and another friend of theirs) and my hubby and I walked down the street to a Mexican restaurant we had enjoyed when visiting there in November.  Altogether, I logged 11,606 steps on Sunday, meeting and exceeding my 10,000 step goal.  How about that?

The rest of the evening was quiet.  Once the kids got home we visited for awhile and then hit the sack.

Monday was a gorgeous, sunny, although cool, day.  Once again we had a leisurely start leaving the apartment around 10:30am.  My son, an actor, had an audition in SoHo (area south of Houston St. ((pronounced How-stun, not like Houston, TX))) so my husband and I rode into Manhattan with him.  While he attended his audition, we walked across the street and had a coffee at a coffee house where we could keep an eye on the door to see him exit.  This audition was for a national commercial for a new search engine of some kind.

After C finished his audition, we headed to Times Square and then took a shuttle to Grand Central Station.  I wanted to see the train depot and is it ever gorgeous!!  Busy place, too, hence the expression!  We then took another subway to Macy’s where we looked around awhile but I didn’t see anything I wanted to buy.  From there we went to Lower East Side to a famous deli called Katz’s where they are known for their pastrami sandwiches. This is the deli from the movie “When Harry Met Sally” and Sally (played by Meg Ryan) had her big orgasm scene. There is a sign hanging from the ceiling in the middle of the seating area which states, “We hope you had what Sally had at Katz’s!”  As it was about 3pm, my husband and I split a pastrami sandwich while C, our vegetarian son, had a tuna platter with potato salad and cole slaw.

We headed back to the apartment after our lunch and I walked down to the dollar store several blocks away to look for some wrapping paper for K’s presents.  After finding wrapping paper and ribbon, I returned and got everything wrapped for the birthday girl.

We left again to head over toward the Brooklyn Bridge to meet K (who had been teaching all day) and another couple of friends of C and K for dinner at one of the top three pizza places in NYC called Grimaldi’s Pizza!!  We ordered three large pizzas which everybody shared. All the food was great and we all had an enjoyable time.  After dinner, we walked down to the East River Promenade where we could admire the lights on the Brooklyn Bridge and the Manhattan Bridge.  The wind was really whipping around so we didn’t hang around there very long.  The other couple who joined us drove so they took us home and we avoided yet another subway ride.

Once we got home, my husband put on a pot of coffee and we enjoyed a cupcake K had bought for each of us while she opened her gifts.  All in all, it was another fun day but very tiring.  I organized my suitcases so I was ready to go the next morning as we were scheduled to leave for Philadelphia by bus.  Monday I walked a total of 15,139 steps.  Not too shabby! You can really rack them up in New York!

We were out the door around 9am Tuesday morning, caught our bus about 9:45 and were in Philadelphia by about 11:30am. After a short taxi ride to our hotel, we went out for some lunch and then walked down to the hospital to see where I had to go on Wednesday.

Wednesday was the day with all the answers regarding my eye. Wow, a big surprise was in store for me. I’ll have to chat about that later.

The idea of blogging is not one that came to me naturally.  A dear friend of mine suggested I blog and I thought to myself, “What on earth would people be interesting in reading?”  I still am not certain of that answer but I thought I would pull together a few words and give it a try.

This week I am preparing for a trip out of town.  My husband and I leave next Saturday for New York City where we will spend a few days visiting our older son who lives there as a professional actor.  He and his girlfriend moved to NYC after completing their post graduate degrees in southern California.  Now, San Diego is the place to visit!  We managed to get down there a couple of times per year for the two years our son was attending school.  The weather in that part of the country is like heaven on earth.  We still miss those visits but because we live so far from all our family, we feel when we head out on a trip, we should visit a blood relative.  Our younger son is in Portland so we presently have bi-coastal children.

After a few days in NYC, we will head to Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love, where I will see an eye surgeon regarding a nevus, or mole, which I have on the retina of my left eye.  It was discovered during a routine eye exam about 19 years ago and my eye doctors have been keeping watch ever since.  I was in Philly 3-1/2 years ago and at the time it was decided to continue the watch.  Well, it appears the darn thing is growing so off to Philly I go again to have it re-examined by the eye doctor who has developed a treatment for removing it.  This time I hope to leave Philly sans the nevus.

Guess that about sums things up at the moment.

Talk to you later!

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