Magazines, Guilt, and Overflowing Gardens

I get quite a few magazines in the mail. I love them. If I got more, it wouldn't bother me at all. I also regularly pick up dive magazines at the dive shop, so the collection is quite rounded. Hubby gets hunting magazines too.

While I love them, I can't stand them. I get one that sells stuff in the mail, like Harriet Carter or some such and I CANNOT THROW IT OUT WITHOUT LOOKING THROUGH IT! (I am the same with the circulars that come in the mail.) They sit there until I read them/browse them. It is absolutely impossible to throw one out without looking through it. What is this curse??

I have several baskets to store all these "treasures." I have 10 years worth of dive magazines that I just can't get rid of. I have 6 years worth of garden how to that I just can't bear to part with. I have really old Country Living and Better Homes and Gardens magazines that I just absolutely love. And those are just MY magazines!

One of my favorite things to do in the summer is lay out on the swing with a magazine in the warm sunshine.

The magazines that sell stuff end up in a special basket - in the bathroom. I can't tell you how many of these poor things are all ear marked up. I felt so guilty the week after Christmas as I was cleaning out the house. I had vowed that this year (2008) I would buy the things I had earmarked as perfect gifts. I never did. I pitched them all in the recycle bin.

And they do have really cool stuff that you just can't find in the stores. And they have good prices too. I just don't know why I never get a round to it. And I even have one of those little joke "roundtuits!" (I find them extremely funny.)

So the new round of magazines are starting to arrive. They are garden magazines filled with wonderful plants and gorgeous flowers and great prices. I HAVE ordered in the past (which is why I still keep getting them). The thing is, my gardens are so overflowing that last year when I literally gave away a station wagon full of plants to a girl at work, you couldn't even tell I had taken anything out.

Yet tonight I found myself earmarking pages with plants that I still want in the yard and have wanted in my garden. As I look out at the barren land in my yard, I can see spots or holes where I could put a plant. It's not till August that I feel like it is overwhelming and I live in a jungle.

I just can't seem get over the magazine curse.

Arg!

I am in the middle of watching the news, which I rarely do. Once again, they have a man teacher that won some kind of award for teaching that they are featuring. This really irks me.

21% of teachers (there are three million in all) are men. That is not even a quarter. Yet every time you turn on the TV lately, or open a magazine, they are raving about a man teacher. What about the 79% of women teachers? Not one of them is newsworthy??? I can't believe that.

Male teachers are a novelty and a necessity - and much needed in schools. This is not a male teacher bash by any means. I am more concerned with the inaccurate amount of representation they are receiving in the media. I know plenty of outstanding female teachers that go above and beyond every single day. Where is their movie? Where is their article about all their great deeds? Or are they all just too humble?

Many of our students need positive male role models. Some of our students respond better to male teachers. But the media needs to remember that there are 2.4 million female teachers and a lot of them are giving their hearts, their money, and their 100% effort to the success of their students every day.