Just leaving out mentioning the goldfish… Huh…

Pretty sure there is one Goi in there as well.

“boy do I have thrips” triggered a funny memory.

When I worked in Ag. Research we had a big international field day. People from 50+ countries visiting in. I got the wonderful job of doing presentations in the field all day long. This was in late summer on a bad thrip year.

Well, one of the office goons decided that they would order all the staff polo shirts for the three day event. We were all supposed to wear the same color on the specified day.

They ordered in a light blue, yellow, and green polos. The first day was to be light blue. I “accidentally” wore the green one instead and had a few very irate office goons on my back first off that morning. Strangely enough all of the experienced outdoor staff “accidently” wore the green shirt as well.

For those that don’t know, thrips are highly attracted to light blue and they bite. I laughed my ass off most of the day.

The following two days everyone wore green. Except for the one determined office goon who wore the yellow shirt. In a field full of honeybee hives…

Swirski mites are my favorite in the greenhouse or nethouse. They work better than any pesticide I have ever seen.

Yes but can they dislodge the glue from their mouth parts? Very unlikely if it’s strong enough to hold the smaller insects.

This is a really, really, bad idea.

The issue is that sticky traps are non-specific. Any insect the size of a trip can be trapped. Then when predators are attracted to all the free food, they are potentially stuck or damaged as well.

Thrips are also one of the easiest species to control using predatory species.

It’s all about profits. Seedless watermelons usually sell better with American consumers.

In order to produce fruit on triploid watermelons there has to be regular seeded (diploid) varieties in the field. Traditionally they would use a large oblong traditional seeded (allsweet types). Mainly because there was a market for them and they looked different than the seedless varieties.

The growers had to dedicate 1/5th of their acres to growing a seeded melons which they could sell at 50% or less than seedless varieties.

That’s when seed companies introduced dedicated pollinators (non-harvested). These untilized several different dwarf genes and could be interplanted with seedless varities with no loss of space.

With the exception of the big party markets like the 4th of July, most fields utilize the dedicated pollinators in the U.S. now. For production in Latin America, they export the seedless ones to the U.S. and sell the seeded ones l ones domestically.

Bottom line, today you only occasionally seeded watermelons in grocery stores in the U.S. and Canada.

I was an advanced learner and started college at 16. The only reason I didn’t start at 14 was because I had to get a highschool diploma or GED to qualify for financial assistance. It took me 18 months after acceptance into university to get the adult education diploma.

Up until then I had moved along with my class, always placed in the advanced courses.

Basically school sucked for me.

In my experience being in the 99+% sucks socially growing up and even into adulthood. There is no easy path for these kids. They do not fit in anywhere. There is no “right” path for all of them. Each has to figure it out on their own and suffer through it.

They are not all bad. In the early 2000’s a breeder created a logistical method create tetraploids in 6 years (5 generations every 2 years). He used 3 countries to do it in if I recall correctly.

He integrated some of the small seeded deep red fleshed Chinese germplasm combined with the old flavorful allsweet types to make dramatically improved tetraploids.

Other companies have followed suit and the average quality of the fruit has improved. Some of the newer ones have really excellent flavor.

Also a bit of trivia I had to double check.

The seedless watermelon against Catholics image.

The original picture is one I took.

A. They have no significant difference in nutrition than non-GMO. In fact many GMO’s have been created to improve nutrition but sadly not used because of dumbfucks like Greenpeace who would rather have people go blind or die than accept GMO food. For example, rice that produces vitamin A and folic acid have been created but never used.

B. The “Terminator” GMO gene was created by the USDA-ARS and was NEVER released. No seed on the market has ever had a GMO sterility gene. Contrary to public opinion, it was designed to be integrated with other GMO genes to prevent the outcrossing and spread into the environment, not as an IP control mechanism.

Now why seedless watermelons suck is an interesting story.

The first intentional creation of a seedless watermelon was done in 1939 in Japan. University breeding programs in the southern U.S. after WWII began using the technology to create the first hybrids. In the early '50’s and '60’s multiple tetraploids were created by the university programs and released to private companies to produce seed with.

These tetraploid lines were “greys”. “Greys” were selected to have a thick hard rind for long distance shipping. They were barely red on the inside and tasted slightly bitter. They all sucked for flavor.

A seedless watermelon hybrid is made by crossing a tetraploid female by a diploid male. The resulting hybrid (triploid) has 3 copies of every chromosome and is sterile.

Fertile stable tetraploids take a long time to create - around 15 generations of you are lucky. Seedless watermelons also took a long time to gain popularity in the market. So nobody put significant money or time into creating more tetraploid inbreds for over 40 years.

From the 1980’s when seedless watermelons were introduced until around 2010, everyone used those shitty old tetraploids as 2/3rds of the hybrid. Since 2010 companies have created new tetraploid to use, but a significant portion still use 70 year old shitty ones.

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He should have had his “soft” targets better protected. Russia has a long tradition punishing the families of those that oppose them.

This is what happens when unrestricted funds corrupt politics.

Who benefits the most from lower domestic production due to a decrease in the workforce in Florida?

Extremely rich landowners in Mexico, and Central America whose production windows overlap.

Buying a corrupt politician is cheaper than advertising.

Had two ponies growing up and 15-18 horses on the ranch.

The two ponies were absolute assholes. Vicious aggressive beast who hated people. The farrier charged double for them.

The 17 hand paint was a big puppy. He’d follow us around looking for loves and your sandwich. He would beg for a PB&J.

As a highly paid professional this is bullshit. Most insurance plans in the u.s. are costing more and covering less every year. They have introduced all sorts of fun things make it more brutal. Evaluating a companies insurance plan has become a critical exercise in evaluating any job offer. Some major companies offer shit benefits packages.

Things they have done:

Raised deductables: The insurance basically pays nothing until the deductible is met. In many plans, this is $4,000+. I have seen them as high as $10,000.

Increased out-of-pocket maximums. This is the maximum amount a person can pay in a year. These are important for chronic illnesses or serious accidents etc. it used to be $4000 in a year for a family. Now I see plans that have $8,000. as the maximum.

Decreases the percentage they pay. When I started working a most “good” insurance plans would pay 90% of the bill. Now 80% is the standard with many “bad” plans only offering to pay 50 or 60%.

Limit medical networks that they do business with. You want to see a Dr or specialist who is not in your network. You are fucked.

What has the government done? Introduced the HSA plan. Basically you can save money out of you paycheck tax free to pay for all these ballooning costs. The plan just happens to be an investment plan in the stock market with high fees and lots of money for Wall Street.

Insurance and medical care for my wife with another autoimmune disease has been as high as 30% of our income.

She started a union job with better negotiated insurance. It’s down to 10% of our income now.

We’ve had a constant selection pressure for people who are economically and socially adaptable to move away from small towns since the start of the industrial revolution.

The issue is who is left in the towns. It’s people who are socially and economically highly resistant to change.

What’s interesting is why they are so resistant, studies show it’s an overdeveloped sense of fear. They are terrified of moving to a new location. I know many people who refuse to visit any city because “it’s too dangerous”. People in small towns today live in a constant state of fear. Political and religious organizations have stoked that fear to a fever pitch.

Unsurprisingly, depression and anxiety rates are high in rural communities. Areas that also have poor mental health services. So they use drugs and alcohol at a higher as a form of self-medication.

My preference has changed over time.

Originally I went through stacks of books. Even when ereaders came out I didn’t like them. I built two massive floor to ceiling bookcases to hold them all. It’s full with most shelves doubled up.

Then I started traveling all over the globe and I couldn’t pack enough books for two weeks and 20+ flights. So I got an ereader and eventually transitioned to a tablet. Last I counted I have around 10,000 e-books.

Recently audiobooks have been my go-to. I drive a lot for work now so I listen to them on my trucks speaker system. When I am home I am always doing something else like cooking dishes, yardwork, etc. I have gotten use to listening to a book through my earbuds as I do other things. In the evening I often relax and listen to a book while playing a video game. I will go through 20-30 audiobooks per month.

I have worked outside at those temps and humidity. The only way I could survive was by putting ice under my large floppy hat. There is no other way to keep yourself cool under those conditions. I would go through a gallon of water every hour and still be dehydrated. It was brutal.

I would go home and fill up a tub of cool water and sit in it for 30 minutes to cool down. I was fully acclimatized to temps 40-45C then too.

It’s just a bottle of ink that you pour into the tank. You can find generic ones for $7-8.

My wife prints 1-2 boxes of paper per year in color. About 10% of those are photograph quality. A laser printer wouldn’t cut it for the photographs so I got her an ecotank.

The tanks hold 130ml of ink so they last a long time. The largest HP cartridge held like 49ml of ink of I recall correctly. Most of them had under 10ml.

If you print infrequently or an absolute ton (like an office) a laser printer is better. If you print a case or two of paper per year and photographs, the inkjet is better.