Smokin'

I am happy that CVS pharmacy has decided to refuse to sell tobacco products any longer even though it is a huge financial hit for the huge company. Personally, I use a local, minority owned pharmacy for my prescriptions even though sometimes I pay a little more than I would at CVS or Wal-Mart. My long-time pharmacist is an immigrant from the middle-east and attends a Muslim mosque. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Rush Limbaugh. I am a sixth generation Scots-Irish-German-Swedish American but it makes no difference because I am just plain happy I was born here and allowed to live my life in these East Tennessee hills of America. Brotherhood, y’all.

Weather is a bit crazy which is getting to be the norm since we screwed up the stratosphere. Yesterday we had high winds which—at this time of year—normally means that spring is trying to horn in on winter’s time. No telling what it means these days but it is cold and gray today. Give it up, old man winter and allow baby spring to have its way.

Winter Olympics begin today but I won’t be watching much of it except maybe speed skating; I hate cold and darn sure don’t want to look at it on TV.

New “reality” series on TV about harvesting ginseng. I knew the plant was becoming rare but I didn’t know it was bringing up to one-thousand dollars or more for each pound. I used to sell a bit of it back in the day but the price then was seventy-five to one-hundred twenty dollars per pound and it had to be dried. It takes a lot of the dry roots to make a pound. The big prices these days are for fresh out of the ground product and nearly all that is harvested here is exported to China. I also harvested may apple root and bloodroot. I occasionally see ginseng plants when I am in the woods making photos.