This week was a bit of an off-week in lecture, as we had our first quiz. So while there's not much information to cover regarding plant growth topics, I'm going to instead talk a little bit about my personal food buying habits.

I primarily buy my food at Publix Super Markets...their weekly BOGO deals are impossible to pass up! As far as fresh versus processed foods, I would probably say that the bulk of my food is in some manner processed. In college, on a tight budget and with little free time, this is almost inevitable. I do try to supplement these foods with a mix of fresh fruits and vegetables from Publix and elsewhere.

One of these other places that I occasionally shop at is locally owned and operated supermarket called Ward's. While I primarily just buy produce from Ward's, I also can't pass up their delicious, freshly ground, natural honey roasted peanut butter and almond butter. If you ever find yourself at this establishment, don't pass these up.

Shifting gears, we had a somewhat soggy day in the gardens this week, with a steady light shower persisting for most of the time outside. An unfortunate outcome of the poor weather is that I again did not get to take pictures of my garden! As sad as this news is, I'll try my best to give a descriptive update of my garden and wait until next week to end the pictorial drought.

ATTENTION: From here on out, it can be assumed that I start every day in the garden weeding. I don't feel the need to constantly mention this exciting phenomena, and frankly I get quite bored at its mentioning.

We received more transplants this week, and thus I added two cauliflower plants to my garden. There seemed to be a big improvement in many of my plants this week. My beans, squash, and zucchini all appeared to explode in size. My peppers are looking healthier and not quite as yellow as before. My tomatoes are also looking greener and improved, but most are severely struggling to stand up straight. I added extra soil to the base of each tomato plant and packed it against the leaning side to add support. I'm hoping the wind and the rain don't undo all of this work.

As a whole, my garden seemed to be less affected by pests this week compared to weeks past. An interesting contradiction to this point is that a strange silvery coating appeared on the leaves of my squash. Apparently, I was not alone in this affliction, as many other students in the class noticed the same behavior in their own plants. Our instructor Libby tracked down an explanation, and passed along the information that this is caused by feeding of immature whiteflies. To control these whitefly populations, I'll need to make sure I spray the leaves of my squash (and other plants) with the neem spray pesticide, taking special care to spray both the top and the bottom of the leaves.

That's it for this weeks longer than usual rant. I'll be sure to add plenty of pictures next week to break the recent stream of tiresome text.