Morning, Happy to see this thread is still alive. Yesterday I made tacos...I like avocado on top, so as of last night, two 'cado pits are sitting in the sink. I'm debating whether or not I should 'try' sprouting the pits. I have a question. Why are some pits larger than others? The two in the sink are minis. What's with that? If they sprouted, grew, would they be dwarf avocado plants? Are larger pits and cado's filled with steroids and/or other chemicals? Is that the reason they're so much bigger? I mean a huge difference in size. Wanda, why are the passion vines dried? You said they're old....how old is old? I used to receive a catalog from a seed vendor. 'Don't know if the name can be mentioned.' On the front of the back cover were lists of plants/seeds with itemized care details. According to the company, passion vine 'fresh' seed takes 90+ days to germinate. I can't recall papaya, but someone here might have sowed papaya seeds, and a general time. Good luck, Toni

I shop at multiple stores. Pay day is every other Friday so I that is when I go to Wal-Mart or Smith's (Kroger owned). Every 2 weeks we also get coffee beans at the little mom and pop shop. We go to Sprouts every 2 weeks as their ads overlap on Wednesdays. This is actually getting less frequent as they have not put the bulk things on sale that I want the most as frequently (steel cut oats and short grain brown rice). The bread outlet is a once a month trip. Other stores such as Keller's (for meat), Trader Joe's, the international markets, Vitamin Cottage (for other bulk items), I alternate months. Some things I get through Amazon's subscribe and save and that can vary in frequency. Eggs are mostly from my hens and many of our vegetables come from our garden. Some of the variety in shopping is about the money savings but it is more along the lines of trying to match the quality to a certain price point and meeting my needs of acquiring a diversity of ingredients. Arborio rice at TJ's, quality meat at Keller's, red lentils in bulk at Vitamin Cottage, etc. Part of it is me trying to maintain a well stocked pantry because my moods are fickle and if the pantry has a variety of things, I can cook according to my mood. Pre-planned menus never, ever work for me.

Thought I should followup after a few months. "Every load with something smaller (underwear, socks, napkins) something was getting stuck in the gasket. This last happened years ago with baby socks in the Kenmore. So repair called and they think something is malformed so are installing a new one. Strike one." Well they replaced the original gasket and it is better. Still find smaller items in there once in a while (as opposed to basically never on previous front loader). Gasket design sub-par but I'd call it half a strike now. "The dryer thumps rather loudly every revolution, even when warmed up. So either bad drum seam or rollers (probably the former). Repair called and agree but are trying rollers first. Strike two." Got rollers replaced and really not better. Have not yet called again to try and get drum replaced. Either rollers need to be softer or seam smoother. Still a strike. "Capacity increase very disappointing. I knew the numbers were a bit deceptive but this is really bad. Since I still have the old one off to the side I compared and I only get a couple pair of pants and medium towel more in the new Whirlpool. Strike three." After a trying the old one a few more times I'm willing to back off a bit on this. I'll rescind my strike vote. "Fabric softener siphons out very easily before anything started but then often does not siphon out completely at end of cycle. Strike four." This is still problematic. I'll keep it as a strike, albeit a minor one. "At least a third of my loads so far have failed to spin completely dry probably due to machine not getting a balance or being too sensitive to imbalance. I then have to do a spin only cycle which seems to work. This happen only a couple times a year with the old Kenmore. Strike five." After a lot more loads I find the percentage a lot better than the one third. However it still fails more often than I'd like. I'd down grade this to half a strike. "Dryer sensing sucks. Half the time a normal dry still leaves a few damp clothes. Strike six." Again here it seems to have either improved a lot or I had a statistical anomaly. I'll rescind this strike. "And, WORST of all the washer twists clothes up terribly, particularly pant legs and shirt arms, compared to the Kenmore. There is also noticeably worse tangling. I am going to hook back up the old washer this weekend to confirm but I think it is a design defect due to a combination of the tilted drum and asymmetrical blades. I believe the blades are shaped that way to compensate for the drum tilt. I think the idea is they push the load a bit back towards the front of the drum as the laundry rolls off the blade which is higher towards the back. In any event it is my theory that this also imparts a rolling or twisting motion to the laundry which translates to a severe twist in longer articles of clothing. I'm not sure if all tilt drums have this issue. Strike seven." This issue is still the most annoying and fundamental. Pants and shirts are almost always twisted and loads with many of them are quite tangled up. I am almost certain the tilt drum and asymmetric blades are to blame and will never again buy (nor advise anyone to buy) a front loader with any sort of tilt. So final verdict is still pretty negative. I'd probably be neutral if it wasn't for the constant twisting and tangling of pant legs and shirt arms.

Thanks for all your thoughts! However, I've been researching and talking to a real estate agent, and I found out I was WRONG -- DEAD WRONG -- on something massive: When I went out and looked, I was looking at the wrong lot! Yes, I was being completely and totally STUPID. I have two college degrees, and I was shut down, befuddled, and confused by street signs and a map. My husband also has two college degrees, and ... well, in our defense, none of the lots have "for sale" signs. No, that's not enough: We have no defense. We're only part-time idiots, I promise. So ... the correct information: The above-shown map is correct, but the roads look totally different in person. The lot is actually located on a cul-de-sac; yeah, I know, it doesn't look like a cul-de-sac on the map. Only two lots are placed on the cul-de-sac, and the house that's already built doesn't face the cul-de-sac. The thing is, the cul-de-sac isn't going to STAY a cul-de-sac. The road is going to be extended out towards the aforementioned Town Center (right now it's connected to the neighborhood with a trail, but it'll be a real, driveable road eventually). They're planning more houses between the neighborhood and the Town Center, which I knew; I just didn't know that road would be extended in that spot. That's why the rectangle looks odd: Eventually this rectangle will face the road straight-on. So the lot has plenty of road frontage, but that road frontage is going to change at some point in the future. So ... I don't think I'm interested in buying a lot with a road that will DEFINITELY be changing significantly. I think it's too much risk. And it seems pretty certain that at some point I'd have to do some re-work on the driveway /mailbox. However, there's another lot for sale by owner -- why don't people put up signs? -- slightly larger at 1.5 acres, 30K more money, and backwards (meaning that the back of the house would face North). BUT it has really nice hardwood trees, and it's on the road leading towards the will-be-altered-cul-de-sac. In response to your above comments: - The city owns the triangle in front of the lot -- knowing that this will eventually be a road, it makes sense. This may be why a lovely cul-de-sac lot is available ... but, then, a couple other very nice lots are owned but not built upon yet. - No, having seen the lot personally, that's one of several piles of wood in the corner of the map. Not another house. I had to study it carefully and think back to what I saw to figure it out! - Now that I am looking at the right lot, only one house is next to this empty lot, and it's a comfortable distance away. The other side is empty for now ... but eventually when the road opens up, other houses will be built on the other side. How close? Can't say. Again, this is awfully uncertain. - Yes, we're retiring in about five years, and we're building this house with the intention of living in it the rest of our lives. I do not welcome the idea of building, and -- at some undetermined point in the future -- having to re-do a bunch of stuff. Sounds expensive and problematic. And if the road doesn't follow the anticipated path, which could easily happen, they could end up taking a portion of my lot against my will. I don't think that's likely, but it is possible. - No, no rush exists at all. I'm not hurrying into anything, and I will definitely talk to zoning people -- if I decide to pursue this lot. I'm well aware that the real estate agent has "an agenda", and it isn't to make me happy long-term, so I'm not taking everything he says as gospel truth. - This is a really great neighborhood, but it's not the only game in town. If I heard that someone else bought it (and the other lot I just found out about) this afternoon, I would not be upset -- I'd just figure God didn't want me to have it. I will not be the person who buys an unbuildable lot. - No, I don't really have big concerns about my 45 acres of farmland being near the school. I agree that it means extra traffic, but really only twice a day. And it's not like I'm right next to the school -- they're set back over perhaps 30 acres plus a two-lane road. That's one reason I suspect that IF my husband's fears ever come true and the school annexes someone's farm, it'll be one of those other two, which are closer /more convenient to the school. I'm near but not right on top of the school. Incidentally, the exisiting school is a middle school, so no teenaged drivers; however, our fear is that they might build a SECOND school adjacent, and an elementary school would mean more pick-up parents, and a high school would mean teen-aged drivers -- that's what I really don't want. If my husband suddenly said, "I give up the idea of a city lot, let's stick to the farm", I would be happy. Some things about a city lot are appealing (good places to walk being one of them), but so are some things about the farm (like more privacy). - As for living in the country, I'm well aquainted with it! I grew up in the country -- real country, on a farm. And for the first decade of our marriage, we lived in the country. We really only came to "the city" for the schools we wanted our kids to attend. We want to go back.