5 June 1956 “Elvis, Vegetables, Dogs-n-Chicks”

Elvis is really beginning to get up steam. Tonight he will appear on the Milton Berle show. Though other ‘teen heart-throbs’ such as Sinatra caused a stir among the young, Elvis was really that beginning. I know many people like Elvis and I do to, but I wonder if this is really that beginning of the modern media machine that takes over a person and sells them to people. At this point in time, the wars are over and the youth don’t have to worry about their friends dyeing or any general fear as just 15 years earlier was a very real threat. And the sad thing about it is, the industry machine; this taking a person and marketing them as a product obviously does affect the person (Elvis died from Drugs and was very badly misused and ill-treated) Is this what music has become today? Did it start innocently enough here only to become a vehicle to create a craze to sell sell sell and simply to separate the youth from the old? Now, does each generation need to always shock to make their point or to prove ‘they have arrived’? It seems so. It is too bad that again we could not see the earmarks of where we are today in our oversold, over-produced marketed world. Why can’t music just be good and fun to listen to or make you sad and cry or make you feel impassioned or even just tap your feet? Why must it be a battle line in the sand between generations? Does that make it easier to market to groups? Twice as much revenue if more ‘styles’ are needed overall? Tweens like this, teens like this, 20-30’s like this, etc and on and on.
I do feel with our modern technology some of this is starting to crack, in that anyone out there now can be heard and are not at the mercy of the ‘big industry’. It perhaps really is a time of change, maybe we really are at the cusp of a new ‘Retro-Renaissance’ (now I better copyright that term so I can make millions every time someone says or types it, right?) I hope that we can begin to move away from the conglomeration of our species and into a new way of thinking of pure and simple joy without the care of ‘shock and awe’ or ‘Me me me’.
Well, enough of that, how about some garden talk: As many of you know, I have been busy both out in  my garden and building my structure for my chickens. They both are very time consumming and add to that my usual chores of cooking/cleaning/marketing as well as trying to keep up with our blog…well, I have been a very busy gal for sure.
My garden is coming along nicely. Yesterday morning we had waffles with strawberries from the garden. These are so much sweeter than store bought ( I did a taste comparison) Of course our local farm also has strawberries to pick, which I will have to take advantage of, as my little patch will not produce enough to put up jam. But, next year I will plant twice as many and hope to one day provide all I need from my home with those. Then I can spend my money at the farm for blueberries as they take up more room than I have here.
I also picked a few radishes to serve with dinner last night. These are an old heirloom variety called French Breakfast. They are meant to be long and thin (these actually could have been picked sooner) and their greens are lovely, much like the peppery taste of arugula and great on salad. Last night, though, they were so pretty in their natural state, I just served these and fresh farm tomatoes (hot house started at local farm) raw with our roast beef. Now, for those of you who don’t eat meat, this may not look very appetizing, but Hubby and I are very much the ‘rare beef’ eaters. It has more true flavor this way. And the mashed potatoes have fresh basil from my garden (It has done So well from seed, I pick from it everyday to cook with!) and garlic chives as well as some of the chopped leaves of the radish. This was just a sampling of how we shall be eating like kings come late summer!
Oh, and just for fun, some more shots of my radish. I just really enjoy photographing my vegetables and plants. There is some intrinsic artistic value to me in something that I created by planting from seed, nurturing and then documenting it.
My chicks are also getting big and impatient for their new home. One set of eggs did not hatch when I originally hatched my chicks and the main I purchased them from felt bad and mailed me another dozen free. So, I put them in the incubator and out of a dozen, two hatched. I have two new chicks to add to the fold (when they get older, now they are living in a box on my desk). My little dog loves all small living things. I honestly don’t think he would hurt a fly. He loves the chicks and begs to be put in the box with them for as long as he can stand the heat of their heat lamp. Here he is curled up resting in the box with them. The two chicks think he is mum and when he goes in the box, run up to him to huddle under his ‘feathers’. This little grey one seems to be his favorite. It needed help getting out of the shell and is a little bit ‘the runt’ he watches it very carefully and will not move quickly for fear he will step on her. Here you can see the two little chicks ‘under his wings’. The light is red, because their heat lamp is red and we did not use a flash for this shot. So, we have many things happening on our little ‘mini farm’.
I have so many other things ear-marked and notated down to blog about, but again, I need to get back out and get to work. I hope you enjoy this smaller post and I shall next time talk more about food and I think discuss fashion. We have been having a talk of a good ‘vintage primer’ on the forum that I really think deserves more in-depth look here on the blog.
Well, happy homemaking, all.