May 5, 2021
Liz Writes Life
With it being Mother’s Day this coming weekend, lots of
spring activities are cropping-up. For those in need of garden plants, the
Yreka Garden Club and Yreka Community Garden will jointly hold a plant sale on
Saturday, May 8, 2021 from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the garden on Knapp Street. You
might just find something for mom there!
Masks and distancing will be required, according to Peggy
Heide, the garden coordinator, but she said to stop by as there is a nice
selection of veggies, flowers and older perennial potted plants in the Yreka
Garden Club Nursery. I asked if there were any Black-eyed Susans and they have
a good batch. I better get over there. I only want one or two for my new row of
perennial and annual flowers I am planning for the outside border of my garden.
Peggy said there are a variety of tomato plants and one is
called “Tumbler” that is blooming and small tomatoes have already set-on. These
are in one-gallon pots. This is a small cherry and can be grown year-round
inside. Hum, sounds great for a nice sunny window in the winter. I wonder how
big they get and if you need to keep them pruned to a smaller size, when grown
indoors?
After the sale, people can still purchase or visit the
nursery by calling Peggy at 530-842-6456 for an appointment.
After checking three different weather stations, I will wait
one more week before turning-on what I call my outside water. It is a
below-ground plastic line that gives me three faucets to use. But, just in case
it may freeze after a predicted rain and cooler temps on Friday or Saturday, I
have decided to continue to hand-water with the hose this week. I do not want
the pipes or a faucet to break. Yeah, it probably won’t get that cold, but I am
not ready to plant the garden anyway.
The soil is dry and pretty warm. I think many folks are
already planting. I am just being a bit lazy and I need to put my energy into
weed-eating. The bright yellow Marlahan mustard is blooming (yuck) as is the
lavender-colored lupine and California poppies. Because of the drought, my
weeds are not nearly as invasive as they could be. But, a good rain would
change that and I do hope for a good rain. Yep, wishful thinking, I know!
Because fire season is already upon us, Cal-Fire encourages
us to get a defensible space around our homes and outbuildings. Yep, we are
probably all quite leery about wildfires this year. I am so thankful for our
firefighters, police and other safety folks. They certainly have tough jobs.
History Tours
The next tours sponsored by the Siskiyou Historical Society
will be held in mid-May. The schedule includes a City-Ranch-Greenhorn Walking
Tour on Friday, May 14, 2021. An Evergreen Cemetery Walking Tour will be
Saturday, May 15, 2021. On Sunday, May 16, 2021, there will be a Third Street
Walking Tour. And a Miner Street Tour will be held on Monday, May 17, 2021. These
tours begin at 5 p.m. and cost a mere $5 each. They are in the Yreka.
On Tuesday, May 18, 2021, a special “Memories of Hilt” will
be at 1:30 p.m. with a cost of $5. Call 530-572-1099 to reserve your spot and
get more info.
Bipartisan Legislation
Yep, a bipartisan congressional bill sounds odd in today’s
political polarized realm, but our CA. Dist. 1 Congressman, Doug LaMalfa, has
joined with California Democrat Representatives, Jared Huffman and Doris
Matsui, and several Texas Representatives to introduce legislation expected to weatherize
electrical grids across the nation. What a great idea!
The proposed legislation is titled “The Preventing Outages
with Enhanced Resilience and Operations Nationwide Power On Act” and would
assist electricity providers and suppliers with federal funding to protect
their facilities and infrastructure against future extreme weather events, like
wildfires in California or the February 2021 deep freeze in Texas.
What makes this legislation a real possibility is that
California Democrat Senator Alex Padilla and Texas Republican Senator John
Cornyn have introduced companion language in the U.S. Senate.
LaMalfa said, “California and much of the West have been
dealing with electric service blackouts for several years due to severe
wildfire seasons, and this year’s forecast suggests this devastating trend will
continue.” LaMalfa has advocated upgrading the power grid for years.
Senator Padilla stated: “Once-in-a-generation weather
events are now becoming a regular occurrence. Whether it be public safety
power shutoffs or electric system failures due to extreme weather
events, we must invest in grid resilience and modernization in
order to keep the power on in impacted communities. We can’t leave another
family in the dark during wildfire season or without heat in a blizzard.
That’s why Senator Cornyn and I are proposing these necessary,
smart investments to strengthen our electric grid
and create jobs to boost our economy in the process.”
The bill, if passed, will authorize $100,000,000 (yep, that’s
a lot of zeros) annually for fiscal years 2022 through 2026. One thing I like
about the bill is that the monies cannot be used for new construction, but to
improve equipment and the electric grids to withstand extreme weather,
wildfires and other natural disasters. Yep, this would be a really good
thing!
May peace and calm be with you this week. Smile – just cuz it
makes you feel better!
Liz Bowen began writing ranch and farm news, published in
newspapers, in 1976. She is a native of Siskiyou County and lives near
Callahan. Columns from the past can be found at: lizwriteslife.blogspot.com.
Call her at 530-467-3515.
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