Zukes Aplenty!!!

Another news story got my attention over the summer. It seems that somewhere in North Dakota, thieves stole several thousand onions from a farmer’s truck patch. They stripped the field completely. Now the only reason this story caught my eye is because of all the produce that most gardeners have around here in late summer. By the middle of July, most folks can’t give a tomato away and if you’re known to grow zucchini squash, people will actually cross the street to avoid you for fear that you’ll force a grocery sack full of the stuff into their arms.
My friend “Roop” almost went to jail because of zucchini squash. He once tackled a young man running down the sidewalk because he thought he had mugged the little old lady who was chasing after him with what looked to be a club in her hand. Come to find out, she was trying to give him a big ol’ zucchini to take home to his momma. The kid was going to press charges but Boo finally agreed to take the zucchini in lieu of jail time.
Living in an area of such surplus, it’s hard to imagine anyone going to the trouble of garden thievery. Maybe there was a little snitching out of the watermelon patch in years past, but nothing major like stripping a farmer’s field. There just isn’t any need to steal produce in this part of the country. Most folks who wouldn’t put a quarter in the collection plate on Sunday are generous to a fault when it comes to their garden vegetables.
The South is the only part of the country where there are such prolific vegetable gardens. We have the weather, the space and the tradition that produces the finest crops in the world. Just a generation back, a big garden was a necessity and people are still in the habit of planting more than they need. Purple hull peas, butterbeans and green beans have been the staples of the southern diet for generations now. Before television, sitting on the front porch in the evening, shelling peas and butterbeans was family time. Parents and kids actually talked to each other. One of the best evenings I’ve ever spent was shelling peas with my wife and daughter. We were all actually in the same place together doing the same thing which is pretty rare anymore.
Gardens are a lot of work and a lot of people don’t want to work that hard. I‘m always full of enthusiasm every spring when I plow a garden, but by the heat of July, I’m pretty sick of the whole thing. I let the grass and the bugs take over by then and look forward to school starting. But some people are even worse than I am. My brother always plants a patch of corn every year; much more than the family can use so we often try to give it away. I’ve offered corn to people and have actually been told that they are considering several offers and that I would need to sweeten the deal a little. The neighbor down the road had offered to pick and bring corn to them but if I would shuck and silk mine for them they might be interested. I’m just not that generous. But I will make a deal with you. I won’t bring you a grocery sack full of bell peppers & okra if you won’t bring me any zucchini. How’s that?

OPEN SEASON ON POLITICIANS

Like most people, I’ll be happy when these elections are over. The politicians are in rut and running wild across the landscape in search of their one & only desire; your vote. It seems locally there are more people running for office than ever. The population of politicians may be getting larger than our environment can support. This is why I am advocating that in the future we remove the responsibilities of the election process from the Secretary Of State’s Office & put them in the hands of an office that knows how to deal with such matters; the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks.
Let’s look at the facts. If there is any department of state government that has been efficient and done an excellent job over the years, it has got to be the MDWFP. If they could run elections half as well as they manage the hunting and fishing seasons here in Mississippi, the whole process would be much more bearable to the general population. In fact they could structure many of the regulations just like the ones they already have in place:
Seasons: Season opens six weeks prior to the date of the primary and closes one half hour after sunset the day prior to the primary. Season opens again two weeks prior to final election as most voters will have already chosen their candidate & excessive political activity is simply annoying to the voting public and may cause depletion of their population. Politicking out of season is considered a felony and the offender is subject to a fine of $2000 or one year imprisonment.
Voting License: A voting license may be issued to any resident over the age of 18 who has not been convicted of a felony and who knows the name of at least one candidate for each office for which they intend to vote. Those who do not know such information must attend a Voter’s Education Course. No license will be issued to non-residents.
Voting Hours: Voting may begin one half hour prior to sunrise and must conclude one half hour after sunset.
Bag Limits: Voters are only allowed one vote per office per season. Votes may be cast for either sex. Voters who exceed these limits are subject to fines & imprisonment.
Decoys & Bait: The use of decoys in the form of religion, children’s welfare, and tax cuts are legal but are discouraged unless the politician has no other manner in which to obtain votes. Bait in the form of bribes, driveway gravel, changes in zoning restrictions or free rides to the polls are illegal.
Politicking from Roadways, Vehicles and Boats: Is allowed with certain restrictions. Political signs on roadways must not obscure intersections or the signs of other candidates. Signs for individual candidates must be removed from the roadside within one week of the election. Signs remaining after this period will be collected by county or city employees, shredded into confetti and strewn about the candidate’s yard after midnight on the 10th day after the election. Politicking is allowed from cars, vans, buses, boats, planes and horse drawn vehicles during daylight hours but the vehicle must be in motion.
Vote Scavenging: Scavenging votes from old voter rolls, old folk’s homes and cemeteries is illegal unless a list of such voters is also provided to opposing candidates so as not to place such voters at risk of violating previously stated bag limits.
I think by turning this all over to MDWFP, we could eliminate a lot of the headaches and costs of the election process here in Mississippi. There’s just one problem. We’d probably have to vote on it.