Becky Cockrum Photography

Iran produces about 4.2 million barrels of oil per day. It is the second-largest oil producer in the Oil Petroleum Exporting Countries, which pumps 40 percent of the world’s oil. Oil revenue accounts for about 80 percent of Iran’s government budget.

People want freedom, go figure. Governments want power and will use it to scare the people and acquire more power.

This is a great reason to stay home this summer… Enjoy your local community. Check out YOUR local concerts in the park, farmers markets. Meet your neighbors and play your music as loud as you want. Grow some vegetables. Adopt a new pet from your local shelter. Stay up late and see how many stars you can see from your back yard Get a bike and ride it up in the hills. Life is right here for those who will harvest it.

Being the proud recipient of the gift of lemons from the tree of Geneva Coats, I decided to celebrate by baking a lemon meringue pie. I had never attempted such a culinary challenge before but I set out with determination to create a tasty treat. I found a great video on youtube that is called Grandmom Price’s Lemon Meringue Pie. I adored Grandmom Price and her good spirited cooperation in passing on her lemon meringue techniques, so I decided to give it a try. The pie crust was easy and came out great. The meringue turned out great too! The only problem I had was the physical properties of the lemon filling. That turned out a bit thin, running into the pan when we removed the first piece of pie. I think I may have added a bit extra of the lemon juice or not have cooked the filling long enough. The thing was absolutely delicious however. I am ready to try again to make a firmer filling Here are some pictures.

I photographed the vegetable garden today as well. This is an update since the May 11 garden photos. The green beans are producing and we had a great side dish of stir fried green beans to eat today.

More photographs from the garden may be viewed in the gallery.

Washington, D.C. – Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) today named House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and House Energy and the Environment Subcommittee Chairman Ed Markey (D-Mass.) its May Porkers of the Month. They are the ringleaders behind H.R. 2454, the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (ACESA), the Waxman-Markey bill.

Read more from CAGW here

A protest was held at Henry Waxman’s office. Here is the author of the massive tax bill explaining the technical details.

Photographs from the event may be viewed in the gallery.

Congratulations to Daniel who graduated with high honors (mango come laundry or some such thing) from Cal State Fullerton on Saturday May 23 2009. I was honored to be invited to the ceremony. Here is the picture…

The 2009 Pomeranian Specialty Show produced by the City Of Angels Pomeranian Club at the LA County Fairgrounds on Thursday May 21, 2009 was a smashing success! Many beautiful Pomeranians attended and it is my opinion that all of them were winners. The prizes were special and the camaraderie and tireless efforts of the volunteers made the day a warm and memorable one indeed.

The photos may be viewed in the gallery.

Here is the slideshow in chronological order…

The tenth annual H.O.P.E. Pet Adoption Faire at Upland Memorial Park in Upland, California was a huge success! The tireless efforts of H.O.P.E. volunteers resulted in the adoption of many homeless dogs and cats. The success was a result of a collaborative effort with volunteers from Target, the City of Upland, PetSmart, the Disc Dogs of Southern California, Rock ‘N Rovers flyball team, the Ravelers, Ron Stark “the Voice”, Upland Firefighters, and many others who donated their time and resources.

The photos may be viewed in the gallery.

Here is the slideshow in no particular order…

Photographs from the Tax Protest at Toms Farms in Corona on May 16,2009 have been added to the gallery KFI’s John and Ken led the effort but were not the only ones angry about spiralling taxation.

Here are some early pictures of my 2009 garden.

I was looking forward to participating in the community garden project with Mary Petit. The idea was for community members to care for a cooperative garden to grow organic vegetables to share with others and the poor. Growing vegetables on private property may now be a crime! Go figure…

Here is the story from the Daily Bulletin.

The garden project, initiated by San Antonio Heights resident and avid gardener Mary Petit in February, has caused quite an uproar among residents near the proposed garden location at 24th Street and Mountain Avenue.

Petit’s community garden is intended to be used by local gardeners and families to grow vegetables, herbs and edible flowers to be donated to families in need.

“In my wildest dreams I never expected this type of reaction,” Petit said. “I certainly expected questions and concerns and would have addressed them all or at least attempted to address them all.”

The residents spoke at Monday evening’s City Council meeting, citing concerns about possible increases in wildlife, people, traffic and noise from construction on the property.

The smell of recently dumped manure on the land was mentioned by every resident who spoke.

In response, the council agreed to send city officials to the site at 7 a.m. Tuesday to prevent the project from moving forward.

“They put in a big water main and have been doing grading without a grading permit,” Mayor John Pomierski said. “You can’t do something like that when you have all kinds of people on your property with traffic in and out without a conditional use permit. None of that was applied for.”

Petit had been meeting with city officials concerning permit approval for the community garden.
However, the other work being done on the property was assumed by residents to be for her garden project.

“I met with them a couple of times last week and I think by the last meeting they understood it was going to take some time to go through a formal approval process to have a garden considered at that location,” said Jeff Bloom, the city’s community development director.

The Pfister family owns the property and decided to give Petit a portion of the land to support the project for a $1-a-year lease.

“It’s my understanding that the private land owner is well within his right to put his own personal garden on the property,” Petit said. “Part of it was for the garden to accommodate some of our needs and part of it was for his own private use.”

Mike Pfister said he was surprised to hear about the opposition from residents during Monday’s City Council meeting, but did not want to comment until he has time to review the meeting video.

Pfister did say the project will be on hold until the city gives him the OK to move forward.

“Mr. Pfister had already ordered a delivery of some soil or mulch to help with the garden and that got delivered thinking they were originally OK to go ahead,” Bloom said. “They still had equipment out there they still had to remove. He’s cooperating with us right now.”

Petit passed out fliers in the neighborhood to inform residents of the project’s details and to invite them to participate. She also held two meetings.

Bloom says her efforts to inform the neighbors could have triggered miscommunication in the neighborhood.

“It looked like they shut the whole thing down before we were given a chance to go through due process to describe what was being done,” Petit said. “A lot of the comments that I heard that were made at the City Council meeting and comments that were made to me when I was in that neighborhood was a lot of misinformation and unfortunately the neighbors that did confront me did not want to give me a chance to talk about it with them.”

To get approval from the city, Petit and those supporting her efforts will have to create a layout and plan for the garden and go through a public hearing.

“The concept of a garden, of course, is a good one,” Bloom said. “The problem they had is in the open space zone it required an approval process to do a public garden and they jumped the gun a little and didn’t anticipate that is what they would have to do. If they are going to pursue it on that 24th Street property they would have to go through the city’s approval process.”