My "Fifteen Minutes"

I think I've recently come as close to a brush with greatness as I ever will, which, admittedly, is pretty sad; however, when one's personal aspirations aren't very high, little achievements mean a lot. I've mentioned before that I really enjoy listening to, watching, and teaching with many of the podcasts available these days on my trusty ipod, especially while gardening and working around the house; through this medium Ken Druse and Vicki Johnson have become two of my favorite "gardening buddies". Through their podcast (which is actually broadcast on one or two radio stations in their region), "Real Dirt with Ken Druse", they entertain and inform me every week as I water, pull weeds, and hack back the trumpet and cross vines which would eat our entire landscape if we allowed it. Ken has long been one of my favorite garden writers and photographers, and Vicki is a great gardener, environmentalist, writer, and photographer in her own right, so I was honored when they asked me to help them test out their new setup for integrating remote interviews into the weekly broadcast. Vicki was delightful, kind, and easy to talk to, which made the process at least enjoyable. The technical aspects must have worked reasonably well, since they used my stammering, rambling thoughts on yesterday's podcast; I hope I don't come across as too big an idiot.
Vicki and I talked about lots of things, including family connections to gardening, my haphazard approach to garden design (due mostly to space, time, and laziness), and the challenges of integrating botany (among many other subjects) into elementary music instruction. We also discussed my main reason for starting this blog, which was initially for weight maintenance - I can't type and eat at the same time! It was really a fun conversation, but knowing that it was being recorded somehow increased my tendency to hem, haw, and stammer; I guess that's true for most people in similar situations. There's no "backspace" or "delete" button when you're talking, and pausing to think translates into dead air, which is every bit as bad as it sounds.

I highly recommend giving Ken and Vicki a listen; you can do this at the computer without even going through the process of downloading itunes (though how life is possible without it is beyond me) - just visit this link

http://www.kendruse.typepad.com/

and follow the instructions available there. My somewhat flaky, but well-intentioned conversation with Vicki is included in the broadcast titled "Good Gardening and Blogging".