You’re just small potatoes

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Mother Nature and I had a conversation the other day. Well, not so much a conversation, as me making a mental statement, and Mother Nature giving me a slap down to make sure I knew my place in the world. Thanks, Mother N.

It went somewhat like this…

Me: This year I’ve been really on the ball. I got my potatoes in at the right time, and I made sure they were well watered when they most needed it. I can’t wait to dig up these lovely big potatoes I’m growing!

Mother Nature: Dig away, loser, we’ll see who’s got the big potatoes. It ain’t you. You – you’re small potatoes.”

Mother Nature didn’t so much say this, as make it obvious by letting me dig up my potatoes, at which point she  figuratively and literally pointed out that my potatoes were – indeed – small.

I don’t get it. I must have done something cataclismically wrong in the whole Mother Nature and vegetable world in one of my previous lives.

Or maybe I didn’t use enough poo. Or any poo, for that matter.

There is a guy with a plot right near the entry gate who is constantly growing huge stuff. He doesn’t do it underground in secret – he makes sure he grows things that are going to shout out “I’m huge, look at me!”. Pumpkins, for example. My pumpkins on the other hand, forgot that they were supposed to bear fruit.

His plot is about 10 away from mine, so there surely can’t be much difference in the soil, appart from one thing. I know he’s got a dead fox buried on the edge of his plot.

I think Mother Nature likes a good old blood sacrifice.

I can’t quite bring myself to catch and kill a fox, and I’ve not had the (mis?)fortune of one dropping dead on my plot in the years that I’ve been doing this, but I wonder if a small child would suffice?

This holiday has been rife with arguing between my two girls, and it seems to me that by eliminating one child I’d kill two birds (figuratively) with one stone (perhaps literally). I’d appease Mother Nature and grow some big potatoes, and I’d return a sense of peace and tranquility to the house.

But then again, explaining why one child was no longer in school might be tricky.

On the other hand, who’s going to miss my husband if I chop him up and plant him in a shallow grave? He’s certainly going to produce bigger potatoes than a 9 year old…

Of course, I guess I could just try using some horse manure for next year. Maybe Mother Nature would accept that I am just full of it?

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Categories: growing from seed

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