All the Things You Never Wanted to Know and the Ugliest Creature in the World

Like I said yesterday, GrafixMuse tagged me for a Meme award. Today I found out I was also tagged by Momma_S from Gardening with Care. Both are very cool ladies and I'm thrilled they enjoy my blog According to the award, here are the rules:

1. Link back to the person who gave you the award
(Easily done)

2. Reveal 7 things about yourself
(Not so easily done)

3. Tag 7 other bloggers at the end of your post and link to them
(Even harder)

...and a few more rules to be discussed later.

The most difficult part of these types of things is that when you read blogs, you tend to have circles of 'friends' who all read each other's blogs which makes rule number 3 difficult. I went back to GrafixMuse's and Momma_S's pages, looked at the people they tagged and who tagged them and who tagged that person etc, and through it all, everyone whose garden blog I religiously read has already been tagged.

*sigh* I can, however, play along with the first and second rules, although the second one is harder to come up with than you would think. Let's see....

1) I'm an English teacher, but I hate writing creatively, however I'm learning how not to automatically hyperventilate when I have to come up with an example for my class. Momma_S says she doesn't like school and I quite understand. We don't teach as things need to be taught, especially English. We teach like everyone is headed to a four year research institution when actually, only a small percentage are. We have students whose goals are to be welders, chefs, auto mechanics or engineers. They don't need to read Beowulf; they don't have use for research essays. What they need are the skills to read and write manuals, instruction booklets, informational pamphlets, inter office memos and the like. Once we realize that no one is going to stop our grown students in a dark alleyway, hold a gun to their backs and demand to know what a gerund is or if a certain prepositional phrase is adjective or adverb, or why Pearl from The Scarlet Letter was able to cross the stream and dart in and out of the sunshine whereas Hester could not, we may be able to improve the quality of the education they receive by making it applicable to their lives.

2) I have an unnatural fear of sand. It gets everywhere and never comes off. It gets between your toes, in the creases of your joints and makes a terrible sound when crushed between your teeth. It holds like super glue whether it's dry or wet and when it is wet you have the distinct possibility of looking like a well cooked tater-tot. Wouldn't you know it that the boy and girl could play hours in the sand. I make someone else clean them up afterwards. I can't do it.

3) My fear of sand is not to be outdone by my fear of loose teeth. Honestly, I can't even write about them. This one's done.

4) I will root for FLA on certain occasions like if they're playing inter-conference games or in a BCS bowl game. Any SEC team is worth rooting for if the situation is right. I will not, however, admit in polite company that I occasionally cheer for FLA.

5) On all other occasions, I bleed Red and Black. GOOOO Dawgs! However, this year I think I'll be crying red and black. Blasted rebuilding year....

6) Banana pudding. That statement stands alone.

7) I used to work for a local Harley-Davidson store after my teaching job on weekdays and on weekends for four years just because I liked the sound. It was something I did for myself, before we had children. The man rides; he has an 84 Electra Glide and an 03 Anniversary Duce, but I've recently stopped. You hear stories that all Harley employees/riders have nick names. Yes, I had a nick name given to me rather quickly, but no it wasn't Skull or Road Kill. Mostly, I was called Teach by the customers (go figure that one), but the other employees that knew I was simultaneously coaching cheerleading (another story entirely) called me Rah-Rah like a pom-pom cheer.

So there you have it, my friends. That's your guide to my life in seven small points.

I watered the garden this afternoon. That obviously means it just rained. It's done that the past four times I've watered. I found the craziest thing on my sweet potatoes in the other corner yard. Get a load of this egg sac:

It was just huge. When I peered under that leaf, I found this:

The sucker was a beast!!! I whisked the monster into the woods, but couldn't bring myself to squish the egg sac, so I broke off the stem, put the sac in a zippy bag and then in the garbage. Who knows if the zippy will contain the little cretins, but at least they'll be in the garbage outside.

That's it for me. The morning comes early. Sweet gardening dreams.