Spring Planting

            Within the next few weeks it will be time for spring planting. Which probably also means time for spring cleaning so that there is even room to plant anything. I currently have weeds and random vegetation occupying the spot where I would like to plant herbs. They moved in about September last year and began sprawling across my yard, taking up any open space. Well, the time has come to reclaim the dirt and prepare to plant something of value, like mint and parsley.

            I have tried for two years to grow vegetables rather unsuccessfully. My house is surrounded by trees and the most sunlight my “garden patch” receives is maybe a couple hours a day. Most vegetables and other plants need lots and lots of sunlight, and my yard’s just not cut out to provide that. In fact, there are virtually zero vegetables that will do well in only two hours of sunlight per day. Two years ago my tomato plant produced five tomatoes by the end of September, and I planted it in April. That same year I tried green beans, and after a promising start of growing two inches out of the ground, they pretty much stopped. There just wasn’t enough energy for them to soak up, no matter how much fertilizer and water I gave them.

So, needless to say, I’m learning about shade-loving plants. There are a number of flowers that grow easily in shade, but I don’t care to grow flowers. I want a plant that is useful, and herbs are certainly useful. I mentioned mint and parsley earlier, and both of them do quite well in the shade. They also do quite well in a dish known as “tabbouleh,” which is a very healthy and delicious salad made mainly with parsley with a dash of mint. When I first started making the salad, instead of fresh mint, I would simply spray the salad with a couple of shots from my breath freshener tube. I must admit, fresh mint is the much better choice, but in a bind the freshener will do.

Now, just because I don’t want to plant flowers doesn’t mean I don’t find them useful or want my yard to look nice. Flowers are useful because they add an element of beauty to their environment. To add some dashes of color in my yard, though, I’ll probably plant some anise hyssop or chives, because they flower. There are plenty of herbs that flower, giving them added value in my book. For the most part, I like decorative items to be functional as well as easy on the eye, whether it’s inside my house or outside. Herbs are fun to grow, beautiful to look at, and make food taste a bit better. You really can’t go wrong when you decide to start an herb garden.

If you have a yard that is conducive to growing sun-loving vegetables or fruit, I’ll strike a deal with you this year: you provide the potatoes, and I’ll bring the fresh rosemary and thyme to season them with. Should my herb experiment prove successful this year, I’m sure I’ll continue to try and find the perfect blend of vegetation in the coming years to create a beautiful, flavorful, and especially shady garden. Happy planting!

The Island

            After writing my last article about lake monsters, I got the itch to go out to Antelope Island and re-explore the buffalo-infested locale. So, I grabbed my little boy, a diaper bag, and some snacks and headed out there late Sunday morning.Even though the weather wasn't perfect for an island getaway, we needed a day tripand there were promising patches of blue sky visible in the midst of the cloudysky.

As my son and I crossed the Great Salt Lake via the causeway, he began to cry. He had just woken up from a nap and I knew he was hungry. In order to entertain him and help stop the flow of tears, I began making North Shore Monster noises. I doubt any of my attempts truly captured the monster’s terrifying nature, mostly because my son smiled at each different bellow or grunt I tried. By the time we reached the island, neither one of us was scared of the monster because of how silly I was making him sound.

A wintry Sunday afternoon is the best time of year to visit Antelope Island, given the fact that there seemed to be only five other vehicles on the island besides ours. If you want to do more than simply drive around the state park, though, you may want to wait for spring or summer to visit. The sun, when it appeared, couldn’t do much against the chilly lake winds, so we stayed in the car and searched the landscape for buffalo.

There are somewhere between 550 and 700 buffalo on Antelope Island. I’m not sure how that number fluctuates, but for such a small island, that’s a lot of buffalo. I don’t know where they were all hiding, because we merely caught a glimpse of maybe eight or nine of them. And they were all a good distance from the roadway. The one animal that decided to make an appropriate appearance was a pronghorn antelope. While all six vehicles on the island convened to check out the antelope, it posed and slowly walked about, clearly enjoying the attention. I think most of us visitors were relieved to have at least one story to share about the wildlife on our trip to Antelope Island, since the buffalo weren’t cooperating.

Luckily buffalo aren’t the only attraction on the island. There are short and long hikes, a visitor center, picnic areas (with restaurants that serve buffalo burgers), and an old ranch. It’s interesting to walk around the ranch and try to imagine what it would have been like before the causeway existed. On clear days, you’d be able to look out over the lake and see Salt Lake City, knowing full well that there were probably a few dances or horse carriage races going on there, but you were stuck out there on that island, tending the livestock and watching out for the North Shore Monster. Ranch life is difficult in general, but ranch life on an isolated island is hard to beat.

Snow began to fall as my boy and I left the ranch and traveled back toward the entrance to the island. It was like the sky was trying to put Antelope Island to sleep with a cold blanket. The snow helped create a quiet ending to a long day. My little guy and I were both tired and ready to go home. Antelope Island was the perfect day trip destination and I look forward to coming back soon to take my son on one of the numerous hikes that affords beautiful panoramic views of the Wasatch Front and the Great Salt Lake. Oh, and search for a monster, too.

Lake Monsters

                Supposedly every lake has its monster. Loch Ness in Scotland contains a prehistoric plesiosaur. Lake Tahoe boasts a giant serpent. There is a white shark in Lac Simon in Quebec. Thunder Bay in Ontario is home to the Ugly Merman. Several lakes in the Congo are plagued by the fearsome Mokele-mbembe. Minnesota’s Red Lake has a fish-like monster that consumes the dead. And there are crocodilian horrors haunting Utah’s Bear and Great Salt Lakes. If you ever needed a reason not to enter the water, besides the movie Jaws, you have plenty now. And remember, I’m only referencing lakes. I’ve not accounted for the oceans and rivers of the world.

                There are two things that freak me out: deep, dark water and deep, dark caves. I like being able to see clearly for miles and miles, or at least more than fifteen feet, and neither murky water nor mysterious caves allow me to do that. Combine the two and you’ve got my worst nightmare. Actually, add a monster and you’ve got the worst possible scenario I can imagine. I can’t even handle the submarine ride at Disneyland.

                Anyway, the reason I bring up caves along with lake monsters is because there are allegations that most lakes of the world are connected by a network of caves that reach far beneath the ocean floor. The monster that people are seeing in Scotland could be the same monster popping up in a lake in China or California or Brazil.

                For many people, water monster sightings are just as ridiculous as alien sightings. One point I would like to pose, though, is that water monsters are a lot more plausible than aliens. They typically resemble something that actually exists in nature and they can easily hide out in their underwater caves. Also, it makes sense that monster sightings are not very common, considering the fact that the monster may be constantly in transit between multiple lakes in order to make appearances. And, since humans really are a rarity on and in the water, we are not a main food source, and therefore sightings may be few anyway.

                I, for one, do not care to disbelieve the rumors, mainly because so many movie characters’ famous last words echo the following sentiment: “There’s no (insert pretty much any animal, real or mythical, here) round these parts!” Plus, my fear of water monsters is an extremely deep-seated fear, and I don’t particularly care to test the validity of the stories. There’s no way I’m going down into water over ten feet deep to try and find a serpent or its lair.

                The next time you visit the Great Salt Lake or Bear Lake, be on the lookout for humongous crocodilian beasts. In the case of the Great Salt Lake, you may only see the creature’s giant horse head or hear its blood-curdling bellow before the monster consumes you. Trust me, the last thing you want to be known for saying in this life is: “There’s no North Shore Monster round these parts!”

Choosing a Bike

            My last bicycle was stolen last summer right from my fenced-in front yard. Luckily for me, I had only spent $20 on it. The thief certainly didn’t get anything worth more than that – the chain would skip a link from time to time; the brakes were rusted and close to snapping; the headlight constantly moved; the seat was cracked and hard to sit on for more than ten minutes. I could go on and on about the bike’s problems, but it was sometimes convenient to take for short distances, like to the library and back, and I miss that. I don’t mind walking, but a bike makes more sense in certain situations.

            Tonight I am on a mission to find myself a new bike. I am visiting the Salt Lake City Bicycle Collective, where I hope to choose a bike that suits me well. I am a man of simple needs when it comes to my bike: it has to be bright blue in the front which fades to black as it nears the back, and it needs a horn. The kind of horn that reminds me of what a clown’s nose would sound like if I were to squeeze it. Other than that I’m pretty easy. As long as it has two wheels, brakes, and a comfy seat, I’m set.

            I wasn’t always so laid back about the specifications of my bicycle. When I was younger, I had saved up enough money to buy my first “real” bike. I say real because I was looking at bikes with more than one gear and pedals that weren’t constantly moving with the wheels. Back then, grip shifters were relatively new and I had to have them. The normal push button method was too old-fashioned. Soon after purchasing my bike, I found out why grip shifters weren’t necessarily the best. Every time I hit a bump, my hands would accidentally rotate the shifters and the gears would freak out.

            Another new innovation back then was goop inside the tire tube, intended to prevent flats. Any time something punctured the tire, the goop would fill in the hole. It didn’t always work and after a couple years, it simply became hard and threw off the balance of the tires. I think I originally paid something like an extra $50 for my tires to contain goop. It’s hard to tell whether it was worth it or not.

            I used to put a lot of stock in bike brands and names. Since then, I’ve learned that for all intents and purposes, a bike is a bike. If you are a hardcore cyclist, you probably don’t agree with me, but then again, our purposes for riding a bicycle are more than likely very different. As a casual rider, I will be on the lookout tonight for a bike with a big comfy seat, blue-to-black coloring, and a horn. And maybe a basket on the back. In the event that I don’t find that exact bike, I’m sure I’ll be fine with anything that gets me from point A to point B, unless it has pink streamers, of course.