Journal 51 Pesticides, Taxes, Food, Welltris

Hello girls!

I have been enjoying the warmer weather, but this time of year brings its own challenges: landscaping and chemicals. When the weather is nice, we like to have the windows open, but we have to be constantly aware of the possibility that a neighbor will be spraying pesticides.

This week, on a rainy day, a single man came to the neighbors’ yard. We are usually on alert when the usual group of landscapers come to that property, but so far, they have not done any spraying. But the time was coming. This household has previously fogged their trees with insecticide and regularly gets fertilizer and pesticide treatments.

If we were not so vigilant because of previous experiences, we would not have noticed this man. He carried the chemicals in a backpack and used a spraying wand. If the neighbors choose to spray their yard, that is their choice. But this man started spraying through the chainlink fence right into our property!!!

He sprayed all the plants lining the fence (even into an area that was clearly designated as a garden), right under the fence, and all over our woodpile. Doused it, in commercial pesticide. This woodpile was an insect metropolis. Birds, chipmunks, and street cats all love to sit on top of and play inside the woodpile. A longstanding family of groundhogs lives underneath it. Bunnies find shelter and shade in this quiet forgotten area where humans don’t go. Every year, birds nest in the trees in the neighbors’ yard. While he was spraying, several birds came very close to him, sat on the fence at his eye level, and stared at him.

We are downhill of that property, and it continued to rain for the rest of the day, so everything just washed down into our property. What was the point? Pesticides work by attaching to the leaves of the plants.

What if we weren’t home? What if we were in a different room and didn’t notice? What if we wanted to grow produce in that garden? Or to burn that wood? Or to plant something in that area? I was considering planting trees near the fence, but I don’t want to dig in that dirt now.

The whole thing was so frustrating! Here we were, getting our property covered in toxic chemicals, and other people feel like they are going to get court-marshaled for putting up a treehouse, a chicken coop, or painting their front door a bright color. Our dreams of owning a small house on a property in the American Northeast were crippled by the zoning laws and HOA rules, even in super rural areas. Can’t to this or that, must do this or that– Oh, but toxic chemicals that "accidentally" may have gotten sprayed into your yard? No problem! No rule was broken!

This week we did taxes for everyone in our household. Tax day is not fun.

But I have been very happy on the food front, with fresh crops of spring produce. I was super excited to eat asparagus. More good food news: my curries have really been coming along. Remember how I said they were too thick? I learned that there are two types of coconut milk. With the "simple" kind, the curries have had a perfect amount of liquid. I have been enjoying making them with collard greens, because they hold up really well.

This week I played Tetris Forever. I just learned about this game. Unfortunately, all of the physical copies are already sold out, and there was no Xbox version. But we are enjoying the digital version. I enjoyed learning Welltris! It is a sequel to Tetris.

The hat game is fun too. These old games are so relaxing compared to new games. They slow you down, while the new games work you up.

Thank you for reading, I really appreciate it. Please have a good week ahead!

Asya