It's really not the nitrogen loss from the bark that may cause any problems as mulch. I found through some research that some pine needles are allelopathic and inhibit the uptake of nitrogen for other plants. Not all pines. I turns out the pines that grow in our forest just happen to have the allelopathic pine needles and I have collected the needles and used them to mulch between my propane tank and the garden shed. They have controled the weed infestation in that awful area. Smiles, Lyn

I suggest you do a google search for Farmer Says He Grows World's Longest Green Chile since we are not allowed to post url. Sweet and mild or hot and spicy, New Mexico chile farmers grow peppers for all taste buds. But one man in Hatch says the size of his peppers are breaking world records. "See this one here's 13, 14 inches," said Jim Lytle, as he picked fresh peppers from his 100-acre chile field. "I had one 17 inches." Lytle said he knew he grew the world's longest chile the moment he laid eyes on the enormously long peppers. "Yippee! I was really happy we had a new record to do it with. And then I got to looking in the field and found out that we had a lot more," Lytle said. The unusually large length does not affect the taste or quality of the product, he said. Instead, it simply adds eye appeal for customers, Lytle said. "That's one big chile," said a man purchasing the peppers at a nearby store. One measures about 15.5 inches from top of the stem to the bottom, breaking the current record of 13 inches set by Lytle's mother in 1988.

Here's the Snopes info on Corning/Pyrex. Hope there's something in here that helps. Here is a link that might be useful: Snopes on pyrex/Corning

1. Frontloaders by nature of their horizontal/tumbling action are much better suited to the low-water HE washing process. Both can have a bit of trouble saturating some kinds of loads. 2. Proper loading of HE toploaders is important, but literally rolling each piece of clothing into a ball is an exaggeration. 3. FLs are generally gentler, but both can be more aggressive than expected due to the low volume of water and clothing items rubbing/abrading together. 4. Both types can tangle. 5. No reason for that to be the case. Washing & rinsing is typically quiet. Any washer spinning a load at 1000+ RPM may generate some noise & vibration. 6. TLs can also develop residue and odor if subject to poor usage habits. 7. A FL boot can be damaged (punctured) by foreign objects such as a nail or screw or pen/pencil forgotten in a pocket, but there's no evidence that they spontaneously fail on a frequent basis. 8. No relation between motor failures and boot failures ... and anything falling through a torn boot is unlikely to literally make contact with the machine's drive motor. 9. Pretty much all appliances are expensive for repairs nowadays.