(Or vegetables, actually.)

I grew these!That’s right! ME! I grew these!

It’s official: I no longer have a black thumb! (Although whether or not I can keep an indoor plant alive remains to be seen.)

Perhaps I really am a true farmer’s daughter after all.

Knock on wood—and potential raccoon invasions notwithstanding—but my tomato plants, pepper and zucchini plants, celosia, begonias, vincas, petunias, zinnias, impatiens and lemon thyme are still flourishing. (The once-thriving verbena, however, which I purchased at, um, Aldi, has apparently bit the dust.)

I feel like I could now belong amongst those women (like my late Grandma McGaughey) who know how to can things. And sew curtains. And knit afghans.

But instead I still have cereal or frozen dinners for supper. And the other day I actually cut my finger open and caused it to bleed just by lifting back the foil on top of a Jell-o Pudding Cup.

Sigh.

One thing at a time, friends; one thing at a time.

The Olympic-themed ones?

Well, I didn’t. Know about them, that is.

This weekend when I was in Springfield for my nephew’s baptism, I was trying to help my sister clean up from the post-service reception. We were putting un-opened pop cans back into their cardboard boxes, and my sister said, “Wait, before you put those away, are there any regular ones (vs. diet) left?”

I peered inside the cardboard box. “No,” I said. “Well, wait. There are some. The Hy-Vee brand ones.”

My sister looked at me. The way she often looks at me. With the look that says, “What planet did you come from, and how can you possibly be my biological sister?“

I pulled one of the red cans from the 12-pack box. “These,” I said. And then I realized the can I was holding was decorated with big white letters spelling NOT “Hy-Vee” but:

Come on, you can see it, can’t you? I’m not crazy.*

* yes I am.

True story from the Register-Mail

(thanks to reader Bill S. for sending in!)

Oneida man arrested for stealing meat

The Register-Mail

GALESBURG —

An Oneida man was arrested Tuesday morning after he put meat in his pants in an attempt to steal it.

An employee of Econo Foods, 962 E. Main St., told police she saw Joshua A. Colwell, 28, 215 E. Prospect St., Oneida, put packages of meat in a bag and in his clothing around 8 a.m. Tuesday. He was stopped by employees when he attempted to leave the store without paying for the meat.

Police found a black camera bag filled with various meats and four more packages of meat in Colwell’s pants. Colwell told police he did not know how the $64 worth of meat got into his clothes.

Colwell was charged with theft.
–

Barry’s Taxi is closing!

Yes, it’s true. It’s on the front page of today’s (tangible, print-version) Macomb Journal, although I can’t find a link to post.

The owner says, after 31 years, she’s being forced to pull the plug because of gas prices.

This is kind of troubling for multiple reasons.

(Granted, when you called them to pick you up after a night on the town, it only took them about two hours to come get you, and before dropping you off they made rounds to all the dorms to pick up the already-drunk kids on to take them to the bars…. but hey. It was still a ride.)

Hopefully someone will buy it and keep the service going in Macomb.

Actually, come to think of it, I’ve been looking for a side job to make some extra money…. can you see it?
–

1) The fact that a ground squirrel was on the loose in my house (and by “house” I do not mean “basement” or “deck” or even “storage area outside the basement door” but actual house, as in bedroom, living room, and under the sofa [last place I saw it and tried, unsuccessfully, to catch it] for at least three days?

or

2) the fact that, now, I can’t find it?

Mark your answer in the space provided below.

_________
_________

As I mentioned previously (in the Tale of Detouring through Iowa When Already an Hour Behind Schedule), poor little Gulfport is still almost entirely underwater—the rooftops poking out not too far above the water level.

This article (from today’s Journal-Star) does a nice job of summarizing the situation– but seriously, I wanna know:

what about the strippers?

No word on what has happened to the hard-working pole dancers and/ or whether the, …er, “stripping community” will re-build.

Gulfport slowly re-emerging

Crews working around the clock to return floodwaters to Mississippi

---

JODI POSPESCHIL

Hoses connected to industrial pumps snake to the Mississippi River levee just outside Gulfport in Henderson County. The county recently hired a contractor to ‘de-water’ the town by using 36 industrial pumps.

---

By JODI POSPESCHIL

OF THE JOURNAL STAR

Posted Jul 22, 2008 @ 08:48 PM

Last update Jul 23, 2008 @ 01:01 AM

---

GULFPORT —

Twenty-six workers running 36 industrial pumps 24 hours each day are ridding Henderson County of billions of gallons of muddy Mississippi River water.

The workers have been in Gulfport for more than a week. On Tuesday, they continued the daily process of pumping about 75 million gallons of floodwater back into the river through enormous hoses hooked to industrial pumps. The result, according to project manager Paul Williams, is a water level drop of about one inch per day- if it doesn’t rain.

“But in this big of a pool, one inch is a lot of water,” he said.

Williams works for Readiness Management Support, a Florida-based company hired by Henderson County to remove water that breached the levee south of Gulfport last month. Another way the county is trying to return water to its rightful place is by creating a man-made breach in the levee at Gulfport by digging a trench, allowing water to flow back out.

Residents of the community of about 200 people, just over the river from Burlington, Iowa, still can’t return to their homes or businesses [...ahem, cough cough..] because most town roadways are still underwater. As the level recedes, the tops of submerged property, such as sheds and cars, continue to pop up.

Williams said residents frequently stop by the company’s office trailers to talk with workers about their homes and possessions.

“We can’t let them in because this is a construction zone,” he said. “But you have to have a lot of empathy for those who have lost an awful lot.”

Henderson County Board Chairman Marty Lafary said Tuesday the hope is that federal funding will help pay for bringing in the private contractor and subcontractors. He said the price tag for the “de-watering” is not yet known.

“It’s one of those things we’ll have to wait to see,” Lafary said. “But we needed to get something done, and we took it upon ourselves to do it.”

Officials are not sure how long the workers will remain in Gulfport.

On Friday night, a section of U.S. Route 34 approaching the river bridge was reopened to traffic [literally 10 minutes after I was forced by a state cop to turn around, double-back, and head for Niota, but that's beside the point...] after about one month of being underwater. One lane of the road is opened, built up above the water line by rock and run by a traffic signal that lets 10 to 15 vehicles through at a time [and like I said, you really don't want to drive across it in a 1985 Crown Victoria.]

Water still lapped at both sides of the roadway Tuesday, and nearby Carman Road, south of Route 34, remained closed and underwater.

One positive rebuilding sign was visible Tuesday as workers framed up walls for the Ayerco gas station at the junction of the two roads. But the station remains surrounded by water, and workers had to drive their trucks through about 18 inches of water to get there.

On Tuesday, Lafary said he credits the de-watering project with getting Route 34 open much earlier than previously estimated.

“It would probably still be under six feet of water,” he said.

I’m not sure, but I do know (from taking a wrong turn, when I was trying to be adventurous and take county roads home from Iowa City) that eencie-weencie little Smithshire, IL, (home of the above building) is one out-of-the-way place!

Let’s just say, hypothetically speaking, that if you were on your way out of town on a Friday evening to meet up for dinner with someone nearly three hours away? (near Iowa City)

And to attend a workshop for which you have been registered for more than four months?

And you’re already speeding and spazzing out because you’re a disorganized packer and spent too long on Mapquest and Google maps getting contradictory directions?

Well, if that happens, hypothetically speaking…

Um, you might want to call the state police and check the road conditions.

(Otherwise you will be met by a barricade of three state cops who tell you to turn around, go back 15 miles, head south, add an hour to your already-way-behind-schedule trip, and travel to Iowa City, Iowa from Macomb, Illinois via Dallas City, Lomax, and Niota.

Yeah that’s right.

Sigh.

Oh well. I still managed to have a fantastic Iowa City trip.

(And hey, I got to drive by The Pink!)

P.S. On the way back home on Sunday night, I was able to cross back into Illinois without re-routing this time. But let’s just say the one-lane, temporary levy-ish thing they have you drive on top of after you cross the Burlington bridge? Yikes. Made made me glad I am no longer owner of the Boat but a much narrower vessel (Honda Civic.)

I snapped these pics from my car while waiting in the line of backed-up traffic at the temporary stoplight.

P.S. again, this is said in all seriousness: now that Gulf Port is completely, well, engulfed, how are the strippers making their money?!?

For a certain number of you, this headline will ring a bell!

I wonder, when your cell mate asks what you’re in for… what’s the best way to phrase this? :

Underwear theft lands Streator man in jail

(from today’s Journal-Star)

A suspended corrections officer is behind bars for breaking into a 63-year-old woman’s home in Streator and stealing her underwear.

Jeffrey A. Yusko, 50, of Streator was sentenced Friday in LaSalle County court to six months in jail and 10 months of probation. He pleaded guilty May 30 to two counts of the Class 1 felony or residential burglary.

The woman testified Friday she thought she was going crazy when she realized about $20 worth of underwear was missing. [That's all? Damn! She has no idea....] She set up a surveillance camera in her home and caught Yusko, an acquaintance of her daughter’s, stealing her undergarments Jan. 25 and Feb. 7.

Yusko apologized to the woman in court. He failed to give a motive for his actions but said he wants to seek help for psychological and substance abuse problems.

Judge H. Christ Ryan Jr. [any relation to Jesus H.?] could have sentenced Yusko to four to 15 years in prison.

Assistant State’s Attorney Greg Sticka requested a seven-year prison sentence. He said the crime demonstrated a repeat pattern of behavior and robbed the woman of the right to feel safe in her home.

Too bad the guy from Carthage never got caught and got his name in the paper! (but oh well… We know who you are. That’s right, fella…)

Word around town is that Salsarita’s has bit the dust. It’s only been here about two years, if memory serves.

I suspected this was coming. I never, ever hear anyone say they “just came back from” or “met up at” or “totally need to go back to” Salsarita’s.

And then a week or two ago a friend and I cruised by and noticed the big sign out front was lying in the parking lot. We couldn’t tell if it was from storm damage or if it was a purposeful takedown.

I wonder how The Spaz is doing?

P.S. Check out this cutline from the Western Courier story on the place when it opened:

Salsarita’s puts a twist on fat food with beer and margaritas on the menu and food being prepared in front of customers. Waiting time is based on the length of the line, which has been long since its opening.