Editor's Note: Very little advance preparation went into Hawkinson's report. He may have been drunk at the time of the writing. Sometimes we have to send out a search party for him when he goes for walks. Sometimes he's sitting in trees talking to the squirrels. Sometimes he's throwing bread crumbs at the kids waiting for the school bus, apparently thinking they're birds or something. Yes, he's starting to fail. With that inside knowledge, please read with patience and empathy.
Thank you.
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Well, the weather here in the northland--not in but near Minnesota--has been favorable for getting the facilities cleaned up and ready for another year of tremendous salsa production. Blame it on global warming or the moderating influence of El Nino. Either way, we're about two weeks ahead of schedule.
Some random notes:
1.
Early April: The first plants to fend off the coolish (sometimes downright cold) nights were the cabbages, broccoli, snow peas, and Chinese cabbage--a new plant that I'm going to experiment with to decide whether it might work out well in one of my new roll-outs:
Duane's pretty good Smokehouse Coleslaw. To grow in this market (no pun intended), one must increase one's product line.
Grow or perish, that's what I always say. Not that I say it often, or anything like that.
2.
February and March: Part of being a successful facility means investing in capital equipment. This winter I invested in grow lights. They work very nicely, producing healthy, vigorous seedlings, for a while. Unfortunately, my tomatoes grew about 18 inches long, became somewhat etiolated, and got sick. I'm still debating about whether I should yank them out by their roots and toss them into the compost bin or give them a chance in the greater outdoors. I imagine it will ultimately come down to what kind of mood I'm in.
3.
March: One of the side effects of using strong grow lights for approximately 20 hours a day is that the peppers sort of went nuts. At no taller than 6-8 inches, they were already producing peppers large enough to use in a small salad. But spending too much time in the house also caused my pepper to start failing, with yellowing leaves and a generally depressed look about them. Lesson learned: Don't keep plants in the house too long. They need to get away.
4.
May: I can grow cilantro! It's true,
despite an earlier post by one of my employees attributing my failure to grow cilantro with a somewhat dissipated moral character. Now my latest version of
Duane's pretty good Smokehouse Salsa will be truly authentic with cilantro instead of parsley, which to my way of thinking, never added much of anything to any recipe, except a little color and the ability to get stuck between one's teeth.
5.
May: As a CEO and an entrepreneur, I feel a sense of pride in my surrounding community and believe that to be a good citizen it's important to give back, to, as those moronic millennials say, "pay it forward." I'm going beyond that, however. Now that our political candidates for president will undoubtedly blow up the world or, at the very least, increase tensions with Canada, I've decided to create an outreach salsa garden (in a pot) to extend a hand--with a green thumb-- of friendship and goodwill to the good folks in Canada. Here's my plan: I will show the progress of the pretty good smokehouse salsa garden (in a pot) in tweets to one of my favorite Canadian celebrities, who almost no one else knows here in Minnesota, I mean in a state near Minnesota. As I send her updates and pictures, I will include short messages intended to improve our neighborly relations. Maybe some of those photos and sentiments will also end up on this blog. In fact, I'm almost sure they will.
Now, you may ask, how does growing a pretty good smokehouse salsa garden (in a pot) improve relations between Canada and the U.S.? I already said most of it, but sometimes my readers skim a little too much. So to repeat, I'll say things like, "You Canadians are such nice people." I might say, "Canada doesn't dominate the world, but you do all right for yourselves." Or, "Maple syrup isn't one of the main causes of obesity." Or, "Nice flag. Maple leaves are calming." Comments in that general vein--nothing too serious or too political, although (if you want to know the truth) Americans are still spitting mad that you sent Ted Cruz to our shores (what a doofus). On the flip side, I absolutely refuse to engage in such comments as, "Canada sucks money from the American economy by sending its actors and TV shows across the border and into our living rooms." And I won't go so low as to say, "Your bluejays are illegally crossing our border and stealing food from bird feeders intended for American birds." You can hold me to that. Beyond the polite words, I was also thinking of packaging up the harvest of the pretty good salsa garden (in a pot) and sending it to your Canadian food shelves and the like. And if there's anything left over, I have every intention of sending a jar of
Duane's pretty good Smokehouse Salsa made from the pretty good smokehouse salsa garden (in a pot) to the Canadian celebrity--but I doubt that she'd accept. I don't think she likes me. Some of my blog postings have made fun of Canada. So it's understandable, even if I'm trying to right the wrong. Seriously. Can't I ever be forgiven?
In the meantime, the garden will continue to grow, and I'll let you know whether the squirrels or other critters dig up everything in the pot and leave the remains to dry up and die on the ground. That would be a shame. But squirrels in this neck of the woods have their own branch of ISIS. (I've seen it; they carry around a little black flag and everything.) So you can never predict what horrors will occur. Just saying.
Bye for now.
