I've concluded that, yes...yes I am.

Every year I volunteer to ring bells for the Salvation Army. PART of it is the meal allowance they give volunteers (the longer you work, the more you work...the more money they can give you to make sure you're fed. I usually save this money, instead of spending it on food. It's how my family actually had a christmas last year, and in this way...I consider volunteering as a "job")...but the rest of it is having been there, needing the SA's help around christmas and wanting to make sure they can continue to help others.

This year, with the economy like it is...I...and probably the whole Salvation Army knows how vital it is to ring this year. Which is why we're starting early. Even though plenty people will accuse me of taking part in the christmas creep, I think starting early to make sure people -- especially children, get things for christmas is important.

Thankfully, BECAUSE of the christmas creep...many stores are enthusiastic about the idea of people ringing early (they're trying to get people in the mood to buy christmas stuff early. Many of you might recall seeing wrapping paper or hearing christmas music if you were out shopping on Halloween), which opens up alot more locations in my city for ringing.

Why do I consider this all madness? Because, as time wears on, I will be turned into a Rache-cickle.
 I have a low tolerance to prolonged cold, especially when it comes to my hands...which I inherited from my Mom (they ache and get stiff when it's fifty degrees. Imagine being outside in 20, 30 degrees...sometimes with wind or snow!). The SA understands how hard the weather can be on all of us, and won't send us out when it's really bad or if we're ill, but ultimately, we all decide to sit outside for hours in the cold for the poor.

This is our kind of madness.

My Farmer's Almanac is predicting snow for Thanksgiving, and the weathermen have been excited ever since it snowed heavily on Halloween in some locations.

Hoo boy.

In other news, I've already got a sproutling in one of my pots! I dunno if it's lemongrass, wolfberries, or dandelions yet. Mom thinks it might be a weed, considering we mixed some compost with worm dirt and regular dirt for all our pots. Mom has some sproutlings of lettuce in the basement already as well.

The challenge is: protecting them from the cats and keeping the house warm.

Ozzy slept in my banana pot, so I'm worried about that. One of my new pots was knocked over and moved around, so I don't know what it was...so I'm worried about that as well.

We'll have to see how it goes. *will take pictures of the sproutlings later*

So, the lemon grass seeds arrived, unknown kind of soybeans arrived, golden bounty sweet corn, wolfberries, and the provider bush beans arrived.

We're more or less done with gathering all the seeds we'll need for next year.

I've been gone for awhile, 'cause I came down with a cold...and then there was Halloween and getting new kittens and...and..lol.

So, to mollify ya'll here's some pictures:

I went as myself, for Halloween!





 
And...I'd like to introduce you to Jack:

He came from a farm just down the road!


Random night ago I cooked chicken stir fry:



And here're our new kittens!
  First a video (mind you, my voice was still weird from the cold and I tend to sound more cutesy than I do in real life *cross face* lol):

Now pictures:

Here is Mister Bear. He's hard to take a picture of, because he's VERY very dark.


And here's Grims. He's sort of a scaredy kitty because he was hardly ever handled by humans, but he's slowly adjusting to the life of a housecat.



 



I'll get to more updates really soon, I'm kinda behind on everything right now. So...yeah.

Hope you enjoyed the pictures and video!