I Hate Doing Jobs that Un-do Themselves

   I hate doing jobs that un-do themselves. Weeding, laundry, loading & unloading the dishwasher are a few good expamples of what I am talking about.   Surely the satisfaction of a job well done should last longer than a nano second. I have heard tell that there are people who actually enjoy these tedious, thankless, jobs. Who are these people?  Would one of them like to move in with me?

   In a 24 hours I will be in Mexico. We have a lovely little house there in a village outside the city of Oaxaca. I was last there in January…. no one has weeded the garden since I was there.  I know what awaits me…. weeds…. Mexican weeds.  The enemies of my Pennsylvania garden, in order of magnitude of destructive potential, are:  white tailed deer, crown vetch, multiflora roses, and wreckless weed whackers.  In Mexico there is only one true enemy…. dramatic pause…. imagine that you are hearing some scary music…. the castor bean, AKA Ricinus communis .  Public emeny #1 without a doubt. I am not exagerating when I say these babies can a grow a foot a day reaching heights of at least 10 ft tall based on ones that I have seen.  I am guessing that by now there is a towering forrest waiting for me.  The first order of business is buying a machete at the Sunday market in Tlacholula.  I wonder how badly one can injur themselves with a machete?  Being both clumbsy & accident prone, it doesn’y hurt to think about these scenerarios in advance.

  I actually saw seeds for this devil for sale at a  local greenhouse,  Gardner’s on route 113, to be specific. Are you kidding me?  What kind of terrorism is this?  Who would unleash such a demon on unsuspecting gardeners?  Curiously enough, castor plants have in fact been used as an agent of bioterrorism.  The castor bean plant is the most deadly of all plants. Eat a single castor bean, or perhaps two if you’re an adult, and you’ll die.  Doneskie, end of story.   In addition to being the source of castor oil, the seeds of this plant are used to produce ricin, a powerful poison for which there is no antidote.   A 500-microgram dose (about the size of a pin head) is enough to do the job if injected or inhaled.   This is James Bond stuff here people.  In 1978, Georgi Markov, a Bulgarian writer and journalist who was living in London, died after a man stabbed him with an umbrella, which injected a ricin pellet.  I am not making this shit up, an umbrella, call Maxwell Smart on your shoe phone & alert Chief at CONTROL, CHAOS walks among us!

   Should I be concerned that there are thousands of these seeds being dumped in my garden as we speak?  What poses a greater danger to my life, castor beans or machete?  I’m banking on the machete.

   Eso es todo por ahora amigos. No sé si voy a ser capaz de blog de ​​mi pueblo de San Andreas Huyapan, pero lo intentaré ….

   Cheers