mariness

As some of you know, my body just really, but really, does not like gravity and has a tendency not to believe in its existence. So I am delighted to hear that at least one physicist doesn't believe in gravity either. It is, if I understand him correctly, more of an attempt by the universe to make things even more complicated, as if things weren't complicated enough. (I am beginning to think that we, as a species, need to have a lengthy talk with the universe about this sort of thing.)

So, for my birthday, tgregoryt got me something absolutely awesome: a good sized patio garden stand, where, at least in theory, you can grow hanging tomato vines bursting with tomato flavor, and then in the top section grow flowers, if you are the nice picture, herbs, if you're me, and exotic vegetables if you're him. ("Uh. Do we even like those?" I asked, looking at the seeds. "We'll find out.")

Naturally, for awhile, the patio garden stood in solitary splendor in the living room, an object of interest to two furry creatures who swiftly realized that the columns and plastic poles of the patio garden provided marvelous places to spring upon other furry creatures in an unexpected fashion. It worked great, despite an extreme lack of plants.

A few weeks ago tgregoryt moved the patio garden out to the balcony, where the furry creatures happily found that the black plastic base warmed up beautifully in the sun and was a splendid place to sleep on. It still worked great, despite an extreme lack of plants, but we decided to push our luck, and put four little pots with tomato seeds on the top. (By "we" I mean "him.") I put water on the little seeds and sang tomato songs at them* and little sprouts leapt up into the happy sunshine, which we took as a sign to put the patio garden to full use. Which equally naturally is where things went wrong.

This Sunday, he transferred the tomato plants to their new hanging position and put soil on top and planted little seeds on the top. The tomato plants looked exactly like the picture, except, well, smaller. The tomato plants smiled. The furry creatures looked up and meowed. The sun shone. Night came. Morning came. Coffee came. The cats arranged themselves into careful nap positions.

Metallica's "Whiskey in the Jar"** came.

CRASH CRASH CRASH.

As blackgryphon pointed out, clearly, this meant the patio garden, and the tomato plants, were not Metallica fans. Or particularly fond of the pineapple plant, which they crushed on their way down.

As the afternoon progressed, I decided that letting it stay there could not be good for the plants, so I stepped out into the balcony, leaned down, and started to pull it up and nearly blacked out, learning the valuable lesson that leaning down to pick up heavy objects is no longer an activity I can engage in. A few seconds later I felt the firm claws of the Grey One keeping me down. So I decided to let tgregoryt handle this. Which he did (and despite my resulting major headache, I was somewhat cheered to realize that it was, indeed, heavy for him as well, if not dizzying), so we have hopes of tomatoes again. As long as I'm careful not to play Metallica around them.

* I don't actually know any tomato songs. I did sing English madrigals at them.
** I'm not a Metallica person, but that is one awesome cover of that song.