I have social media, but basically my life is cooking and orchids. I post in Instagram a lot pictures of flowers I've grown and food that I've cooked, and my Instagram cross-posts to my facebook, but that's about the extent of my social media activity. I don't even read the news thread anymore. It's all political bickering. I consider myself pretty moderate. I'm registered Democrat, but I'm not married to that distinction, and I don't always vote Democrat. But the political arguing on facebook just makes me sick. I have no interest in that. Fighting with strangers on the internet is the epitome of stupid.

And this is the only thread I've ever invited anybody to call me by Jeff, my actual first name that my friends call me.

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And by the way, I work with severely disabled young people also. I am a high school teacher, and I teach a class for students with severe social/emotional/behavioral disorders. Some of them are profoundly intellectually disabled as well, and some have physical disabilities too.

And I already wanted to buy you a beer!!

I have family in Naples, and I go to visit them from time to time, so if Naples isn't too far from you, maybe we could make that actually happen someday.

My social media consists of Facebook. I have 23 "friends" and my page is private. It's how I see what a couple of my daughter's friends are doing in their businesses, keep up with a cousin I rarely see, a couple of cyberfriends I've made from another forum, and some folks I care about who live in faraway places. Mostly to see businesses of folks I care about... a holdover from having a business and knowing how important FB can be to the business traffic in some instances.

I rarely post anything myself, other than particularly funny cartoons or jokes. Politics...meh... I have better things to do than discuss talking heads.

I have great respect for others' privacy. But I ask a lot of questions, because it's my nature, figuring if someone wants to answer they will or saying no thanks. My life's pretty much an open book IF the right vibes are there. Otherwise it's Cliff Notes. And yep, very few know my name. But dammit JScott, I wanna call ya Jeff too! :rofl:

You feel free to call me Jeff if you want, but you certainly don't have to tell us your name. I respect your privacy. I also occasionally post funny things I see on facebook, but because I'm a teacher, I have to be careful, as some of my former students after they graduate send me friend requests. By that time, they're adults, and i don't feel like I have to shield them from anything. They're probably doing a lot worse than anything I do, but the thing is, they have friends who haven't graduated yet, whom they might show my profile. My best friend is Brazilian, and I usually go down there and spend my summer break with him. We go to the beach, we go to the clubs, we go out drinking, but I make sure there's never a picture of me with a drink in my hand. Not that drinking is immoral, and not that it would reflect poorly on my character if a student saw me drinking a beer, but it would just cause attention that I don't want. They might be saying things like, "Wow Jeff sure partied it up in Brazil this summer!" so I try to make my life looks pretty boring on facebook so I don't have the kids talking about it, asking me personal questions, and generally trying to insert themselves into my life. The ones I like, after they graduate, I'll accept their friend requests, and if they want to talk to me about anything, I'll talk, but I'm not gonna post it for all of them to see.

Exactamente! I'm sure I'll have to clean up my act even more when my grandkids get older. It's already done wonders for improving my potty mouth again since my kids grew up.

And a bit of good news, I finished the tilling of the enormous back flower bed without further injury, and it is now ready to plant! Now I've got to figure out what i want to put there. I have some ideas already, but it is a huge bed, and I haven't thought of enough things yet to fill it up.

Good landscaping advice would be to start with the bones and work out from there. You need the structure, and then a variety of textures. I'm sure you'll figure out something beautiful. I love Seven Son shrub and I love hydrangeas, so I know I'd be working those in there. Do you have any ornipet lilies? Those are great for structure and mid border.

I do not, but I'm looking at them on Google now, and I NEED THEM. There's a couple things in that flower bed I left. There's two miniature looking crepe myrtles that I decided to leave, and there's a big buddleia that had gone wild, but I pruned it up and gave it a nice shape, so that will stay. There's a couple other shrubs in there. Not sure what they are. Maybe boxwood. Just some generic looking green shrubs with small green leaves. I haven't fully decided what to do with those, if I'm going to keep them or not. For now I'm going to keep them. This is a huge bed. I'm not going to get it exactly how I like it one year. It's going to take several years. I know I want some digitalis, and I have a spot that I think is perfect for them. It's too hot here for them to be perennial, but I planted some every year in Oklahoma and they got huge and did fantastic, and they make a great focal point toward the back that catches your eye. I've planted some dahlias and calla lilies already, and some Japanese iris. I sowed some poppy seeds, but I don't think they'll do anything. They are starting to come up, but I think it will get too hot before they can bloom. I should have planted those in October, but I just didn't have the bed ready yet. But that's fine. I'll plant some this October and have a nice show next spring, I planted three things I got at Home Depot. I don't remember what they are called. They have grassy foliage, and later in the summer will have white kind of bird-like flowers. Even not in bloom the look nice. I don't know if I mentioned that with the virus going around, a lot of the employees at the garden center I managed in Oklahoma are scared to work, and the owner has almost nobody, and he knows I'm out of school because of the virus, and he asked me if I would come back up to Oklahoma and work there. He's going to rent me a little camper to stay in, and I think I'll work 5 days straight in Oklahoma, and then come back to Texas for two consecutive days to handle what I need to handle here. It's only a 3 hour drive. But I'll get a lot of what I end up planting at at the garden center. He's really good to me, I worked for him for about 15 years, eventually working my way up to manager. Employees are supposed to just write down whatever they take on their time sheets, and he will deduct it when he does payroll. I always write down what I take, but he never deducts it from my pay. I did a lot for his business, and he's been really good to me in turn. We open on the 8th, so when I come back to Texas on the 13th, I'm sure I'll have a whole lot of stuff to plant hahahahahaha.

Have a plan. Even a loose plan is better than no plan. Otherwise your bed will look like you're a collector, not a gardener. Grassy foliage, bird like flowers? Must be a Texas thing?