We are blessed to have a garden apartment. And by “garden” I mean a 30×20 or so concrete slab. When we moved in there were edging blocks inartistically stacked in a square, minus a few made into a BBQ pit - that’s about all we had to work with. I hate renting because I’m not inclined to spend money on anything I can’t take with me, but I’ve decided to do what I can.

Last year I arranged the blocks in a more appealing pattern and was surprised how far I could get them to stretch. If this was my place I’d tear out some of the concrete to have a dirt bed - no such luck as renters.

Task #1: how to build up dirt without spending much money. These are row houses, so no digging it up from elsewhere. We have some sort of bamboo that grows like a weed so I’ve been cutting it back and piling it behind the blocks.

Urban Composting. You can buy some really nifty compost bins, but that defeats the point. I picked up a 30 gallon trash can, drilled holes every 6-8 inches, and started throwing weeds and scraps in (at the Rose house, there is a high percentage of coffee grounds in the mix). Most urban composting articles call for using red worms, but that again costs money. I’ve found the simple method works just as well, we’ve had no odors, no problems with rodents, only a lot of fruit flies escape when lifting the lid.

So with my weeds and compost we will slowly build up dirt behind the pavers.

Task #2: How to get pots, plants, and dirt home with no car. No problem, Lowe’s - “It’s just down the street”. Ok, carrying a fully loaded 30 gallon trash can a mile wasn’t as easy as I thought. Nor the repeat trip with fully loaded push cart in one hand and son in stroller in the other hand. But no matter, Rick doesn’t do spending money on Taxis.

Task #3: Vegetables. I’m a country boy by birth and whatever you call those red things you buy at the grocery store, they are not tomatoes. So I picked up tomato plants, red pepper, zucchini, and cucumber. I don’t want tons of pots and plants come with 6 - I don’t want to throw out too many. So one pot got 2 tomatos planted next to each other and a zucchini or cucumber in the back of the pot to grow out and up the fence. In the 6″ of dirt I do have against the back fence I planted the leftover vines. I’ve heard rumors that people have trouble with rodents eating the veggies in Brooklyn, but we’ll see how it turns out.

Task #4: flowers. Out were the plastic flowers my landlord put in front of the apartment, in were real flowers. …Out was my neighbors cigarette… in my flowers and up were my flowers in flames. Ok, not so successful in the front yard, but we have nice flowers all over in the back yard now.

Task #5: perennials. After our visit to relatives in New Jersey, our little concrete garden felt rather pathetic. I realized I need some more interesting plants and I can pot those as well to take with me when we leave. So I picked up some ornamental grasses, hostas, echinacea, etc. It’s a start. Perhaps my landscape guru father-in-law has suggested plant choices?

So far so good. We’re not winning any awards here, but I’m enjoying it.

My wife thinks Ann Coulter goes a bit far on her rhetoric when talking about abortion so I’ll add that warning… but I think this is an absolutely classic illustration of liberal absurdity.   Read her article 49 Million to Five or here’s the recap of the important parts. My paraphrasing in italics and square brackets.

[Liberals are quick to defend Muslims as "most are peaceful" after a Muslim commits an act of murder or terrorism. 911] would be the equivalent of 19 pro-lifers shouting “Abortion kills a beating heart!” as they gunned down thousands of innocent citizens in Wichita, Kan. [In the wake of the killing of abortionist Tiller,] Why aren’t liberals rushing to assure us this time that “most pro-lifers are peaceful”?

According to recent polling, a majority of Americans oppose abortion — which is consistent with liberals’ hysterical refusal to allow us to vote on the subject. In a country with approximately 150 million pro-lifers, five abortionists have been killed since Roe v. Wade.

In that same 36 years, more than 49 million babies have been killed by abortionists. Let’s recap that halftime score, sports fans: 49 million to five.

But the killing of about one abortionist per decade leads liberals to condemn the entire pro-life movement as “domestic terrorists.” At least liberals have finally found some terrorists they’d like to send to Guantanamo.

the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America — coincidentally, the same church belonged to by Tiller’s fellow Wichita executioner, the BTK killer, the official Web page of the ELCA instructs: “A developing life in the womb does not have an absolute right to be born.” As long as we’re deciding who does and doesn’t have an “absolute right to be born,” who’s to say late-term abortionists have an “absolute right” to live?

[interjection: the finale is the most brilliant part, because you'll recognize this as the identical logic used to defend abortion, turned on its head]
I wouldn’t kill an abortionist myself, but I wouldn’t want to impose my moral values on others. No one is for shooting abortionists. But how will criminalizing men making difficult, often tragic, decisions be an effective means of achieving the goal of reducing the shootings of abortionists?

Following the moral precepts of liberals, I believe the correct position is: If you don’t believe in shooting abortionists, then don’t shoot one.

Today we moved into our new office in Brooklyn, bringing the opportunity to reminisce…

So what is it like to commute by subway?

I walked a few blocks to the nearest station - you are always a few blocks from the nearest station in New York. I swiped my card and waited no more than 5 minutes for a train. Don’t count on a seat, but I sit at a desk all day and choose to stand even if there is a seat. On the ride you can read, listen to music, or zone out and sleep. I popped out near Penn Station, walked a few more blocks, and arrived at work.

How is a subway commute different from driving by car?

Commute time for many may be the same 20-40 minutes depending where you live, but the opportunity to zone out or read makes the time go quickly and reduces much stress. Stop and go traffic by car boils the nerves; you feel every minute, not so by subway.

Human nature is to complain and you will hear about unreliability of the rail lines. The truth is, a subway commute is the only way you can have an incredibly consistent commute. Sometimes the train stops briefly due to congestion or the train may run late - but this may add 5 minutes tops. Maybe a handful of times a year will a true delay occur causing 20 minute delays.

What is the worst part of taking the subway?

In the summer, the stations are not air conditioned and they get HOT. Luckily if you are travelling at peak times you are not waiting more than 5 minutes and then the subway cars are air conditioned, but you will sweat. During rush hour, especially in the morning, the trains can be packed. You may have to push your way in and feel like a sardine for a couple stations - but usually only a stop or two before a lot of people clear out again.

What will you miss most about your subway commute?

Actual time on the train was only about 20 minutes for me, but added together that was 3 1/2 hours of reading each week I could accomplish. It offered me a chance to relax and transition in and out of work.

What is something interesting one might not expect about the subways?

Performers. There are some truly talented people who gather to play music in the stations. I’ve often walked past thinking how given another context the quality of some of the performances is the type of thing I might travel and pay to go sit in a coffee shop and hear. Jazz music is most common, but also interesting things like percussion with buckets and pans, folk music, bluegrass, and I once saw an opera singer. 14th Street Union Square and Atlantic Avenue are where I saw the most.

What does it cost to travel by subway?

80 bucks gets you unlimited monthly rides. For the budget conscious imagine having zero variation for gas prices and car repairs. No insurance, no taxes, no car payments. This is a major area New Yorkers can make up ground for the otherwise higher cost of living.

So, what now?

I’ll be walking just under a mile to and from work. I’ve begun plotting the most scenic route and I’m looking forward to the exercise. I’ll miss my reading time, but I’m planning to keep up some podcasts. If I can find a place to secure my bike I could come home for lunch if I wanted. And as for rain, if I really need to I can take the subway with about half the walking on either end as my previous commute.

I’ve lightly abridged this article from (http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=10153)

[In his first 100 days Obama's] made a running start toward transforming the federal government’s role in the economy and — if such a thing is even possible — further expanding the president’s role in American life.

On the bright side, though, at least this president has a sense of humor. How else can we interpret his offer to cut $100 million from a $3.9 trillion federal budget? Economist Greg Mankiw puts those numbers in perspective:

“Imagine that the head of a household with annual spending of $100,000 called everyone in the family together to deal with a $34,000 budget shortfall.” The new austerity plan? One fewer latte at Starbucks this year — the rest goes on the credit card.

Thus far, Obama has signed into law a major expansion of children’s health insurance and a $787 billion “stimulus” package that ramps up federal involvement in health care and education.

The projected $1.8 trillion deficit for the current fiscal year equals the entire federal budget in 2000. But have no fear, taxpayers: Obama’s going to ease your burden by forcing the Department of Homeland Security to buy its supplies in bulk and cancel some magazine subscriptions.

This is a president with grand plans and vast powers. He promises a “cure for cancer in our time” and views his budget as a “blueprint” for the entire American economy. This is a president who can fire the CEO of GM without so much as a courtesy call to major shareholders — a president who wants new powers allowing him to preemptively seize financial institutions deemed “too big to fail.”

But this president sweats the small stuff as well. Not a sparrow falls without our National Father noticing — and offering a seven-point plan for sparrow recovery. Last week, Obama assured Americans that the days of hidden credit card fees are over.

That followed upon his April 9 infomercial-style TV appearance urging you to take advantage of low interest rates and refinance your mortgage! This is a president who stands behind the warranty on your Chevy Suburban. You’re not gonna pay a lot for this muffler! POTUS commands it.

A raccoon-eyed Dick Cheney, newly emerged from his underground bunker, growls that Obama is shrinking presidential power in national security. It’s hard to see how that’s so. Hype and Hope aside, Obama’s anti-terror policies don’t differ that much from the Bush-Cheney approach.

Obama’s Justice Department has fought to retain most of the Bush-era powers governing enemy combatants and surveillance. They’ve embraced the Bush-Cheney position that the State Secrets Privilege bars the courthouse door to litigants who claim they’ve been harmed by warrantless wiretapping.

Worse, according to constitutional lawyer Glenn Greenwald, the Obama DOJ has gone even further than the Bush team, arguing that “all claims of illegal government surveillance are immunized in the absence of ‘willful disclosure’ to the public of the intercepted communications.”

Conservatives who recently screamed bloody murder over a DHS report targeting “right-wing extremists” ought to ask themselves if it was such a good idea to have fought relentlessly to expand federal wiretapping powers over the last eight years.

So far, Americans seem broadly tolerant of Obama’s power grab. In a recent Gallup poll, 86 percent think he’s met or exceeded early expectations. But danger lurks for Obama in some of Gallup’s numbers. More Americans reject an expanded role for government in fighting the financial crisis than support it, and only 13 percent want the expansion to be permanent.

From Christmas until mid March we had the use of a car and as we’ve been locked in about a 3 mile radius for 2 1/2 years we took advantage of the opportunity to take weekend trips to explore the northeast. Or as I like to call it, we implemented the Rose stimulus package.

Sleepy Hollow

Mystic, Connecticut

Bear Mountain

Mystic (Part 2)

Princeton

Woodstock

Cape Cod / Plymouth

At the beginning of January the Dow was at 9000 points. By early March it dropped to 6500 points. Now that the Rose stimulus money has taken affect we’re trending up by 1500 points since mid March. I think the results speak for themself.

Stimulus Package: 1 Trillion Dollars
New Taxes: 1 Trillion Dollars
Net Gain: zero

What do you call taking a trillion dollars from some and giving a trillion to others? Redistribution of wealth.

Federal Deficit as of today: 10.8 Trillion
Stimulus Package: another Trillion in a single year
Payment through new taxes: a trillion over TEN years

Barack Obama claims he’s cutting the debt in half within 4 years. My math works out a little differently…

#1 spending item on the budget: health and human services
Barack’s plan to cut spending: Nationalize health care

If you are anything like me, you may have been gravely mistaken in your understanding of oppression and child abuse. Let me clarify for you:

Oppression is teaching your child about God, teaching morals and absolute standards. Child abuse is not respecting your childs autonomous authority to do as he pleases. It is not giving your child privacy to brood in self-destructive activities. But mostly it is teaching religion which is the worst form of abuse.

Now allow me to set you straight about what children’s rights and liberation is:

Killing 40-50 million unborn babies in the world per year (compare to 5-6 million holocaust victims, which was I suppose liberation on a smaller scale?).

Fox News reports on the the international childs rights treaty that will set us all straight on the above points. Somalia and the Unites States are the only countries that have not already signed on. Barbara Boxer would like to change that.

Folks, this is extremely important. We CANNOT have children growing up with a sense of moral right and wrong. Children who may grow up to take away our right to kill our unborn!

And in related news, the dictator of the Rose household has anounced veto power over all state, federal, and international law. Arrest me if you wish, Christianity will be taught without competition when you enter the threshhold of this home.

My wife and I began reading A Tree Grows In Brooklyn since we ourselves are living in Brooklyn. The book is an account of a life in poverty at the turn of the century. I began thinking - how would this account differ if written today? Well, here is how it might go:

Francie was a poor child. Her father had no cultural sense of responsibility and her mother bravely rejected the shackles of marriage for single motherhood. Francie was forced to live in a 4 bedroom government housing unit, twice the size of her middle class friends at half the rent. Everyday Francie played video games and became fatter and fatter as she lived on a steady diet of government food-stamp-sponsored microwave dinners, Crown Fried Chicken, and McDonalds. On holidays, Francie would not be like the man; she would not be a suit arrogantly earning wages and possessions. No Francie would have to sacrifice those middle class cost cuts and bargain hunting in favor of a Government check to buy Prada purses and sneakers which uniquely match the hue and color of each outfit she owns.

Francie wasn’t very smart. She couldn’t read or perform well at school. But being cool among her peers was far more desirous than grades. Every day Francie thanked Uncle Sam for not allowing her to shop her education and attend a school with a track record of success, but instead allowing her to remain where she could be ignorant and cool. She didn’t need smarts, because she wouldn’t need a job. Uncle Sam would take care of her as he always had.

Francie’s mother worked in a medicaid office. It was a good job which allowed her to make disgusted faces at clients plus all the time she needed to paint her nails, catch up on cell phone conversations… It was a recession and the job was easily expendable to the operation, but Francie’s mother need not worry about performance or streamlining the operation. She could never be fired - she worked for the Government. Not like those evil, middle class who consider job performance a fireable offense…

I would like everyone to take the following challenge.

Go to the US Post Office to ship an overnight package. Don’t bring a box, just show up and ask the person at the counter for a box and ask some questions about the shipment. Now go to FedEx and do the same thing.

Now ask yourself if you want more Government in your life or less? Which was the friendly, pleasant experience? Where was the wait shortest and the workers most competent?

And you think you want Government involved in your healthcare, your retirement, your child’s education, controlling your banks and money supply, making decisions and policy about your life?

“You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation.”

-Adrian Rogers