I have two tiny Roma tomatoes starting on one of my plants. I debated removing them (to give the plant more time to make leaves and stem) but then decided that the plant is probably big enough to support tomatoes already.

I gave the tomatoes a dose of the Miracle-Gro tomato fertilizer this weekend. I tend to try to garden organically, but I do deviate from that when it comes to fertilizing. I don't know if it's entirely the fertilizer or the fact that we've had warmer (i.e., more tomato-favorable) temperatures (especially at night) this past week, but they are looking much better - they had got sort of chlorotic and looked almost like they were suffering from an iron deficiency.

***

On the peeing-pets issue: I'd probably be more sympathetic if it were an old animal who was having medical issues. But it sounded to me like these were barely-past-puppyhood dogs, and that the urination was more of a dominance/territory thing. And that the husband was unwilling to do training. And I'm sorry, but I wouldn't deal with the washing of slipcovers and the ruining of things just because my SO felt his dogs "didn't need training." (I may be biased because I had friends in a sort of similar situation - they got a dog and never let it "learn" its pack hierarchy when it was small, so when it got big, it did things like yank on the leash and jump on visitors).

****

Finished another book.

This one is "Larklight," by Philip Reeve.

The book maybe takes a bit of explanation. It's sort of junior steampunk (in the sense that it's aimed at tweens/young teens, it's not as "dark" as a lot of steampunk). It's also an outer-space pirate book. (I think the cover blurb is actually something like, "Not your typical outer-space pirate story!" Heh.)

It's set in the Victorian age (in fact, at the very end, the Queen herself makes an appearance - and Prince Albert, too, so it must have happened before 1861, unless that's another place where history was bent a bit in the book). However, it's not the Victorian age we actually experienced.

What is (in our world) the United States has apparently remained a colony of Britain. In fact, the Empire's reach has extended out into space - to include Mars, Venus (now deserted thanks to some poisonous trees), and some of the moons of other planets.

Also, there is a source of energy - not coal - that powers everything - the "chemical wedding," an alchemical process that takes place in a structure that is called an "alembic." (All of this very conveniently takes place offstage, and the practitioners of the art are very secretive about how it's done - sparing the need for any kind of explanation of how, or what chemicals are involved, or whatnot. It sounds a bit like fusion or "dilithium crystals.")

Incidentally, Sir Isaac Newton - in the world of Larklight - is the discoverer of the chemical wedding and the one who is credited with finding the energy source that makes all the advancements possible.

Sir Richard Burton and Lord Wellington are also in the book - Wellington in a cameo role, Burton in more than that (and Burton is married to a Martian woman. And he's the head of Her Majesty's Secret Service).

These little bits are kind of interesting - for one thing, they give the book verisimilitude, and at the same time, leave you wondering (if you don't know much about the person) what they were really like, what they really did.

(I will admit to doing a Google search on "Sir Waverley Rain," one of the characters in the book, to see if he was actually a real person. No, he wasn't, but it seemed plausible he could have been.)

(You may notice that I'm so enamored of the "world" that Reeve has created, that I've not even discussed the plot yet. I'm getting to it.)

One of the interesting things about the novel is that it can be read as both a good and amusing story, and also as a parody of British colonial attitudes. (And granted: some of the people who are strongly anti-colonialist and who are quick to blame all of Africa's current problems on its European colonial history may find the book unenjoyable or angry-making.[I don't think ALL of Africa's current problems are related to colonial history, but surely SOME are.])

But, as I've said before in other places: I'm good at reminding myself that it's just a book, I should really just relax.

So anyway. Here's the story, without too many spoilers: Myrtle and Art Mumby live in a giant, space-bound house (located somewhere between the Earth and the Moon) called Larklight.

(Aside: if you're an extreme stickler for things being scientifically correct, you may have a hard time with this book. It plays on a number of outmoded hypotheses, like the idea that there is an "aether" between the planets. And space is not a vacuum; rather, like the top of a mountain, there is air there, it is just very thin and not very breathable.)

Art and Myrtle live with their father, their mother having disappeared years ago on a spacebound "packet ship" and presumed dead. The day starts out ordinarily enough, but they are attacked by a horde of white spiders, which encase the house in their web, wrap up their father (who seems a rather ineffectual sort - he is mostly devoted to studying Ichthyomorphs, sort of the deep-space version of deep-sea fish). Art and Myrtle escape in a pod, travel to the moon, where they are captured by Potter Moths and might become food for the moths' larvae.

But. They are rescued! By a band of space pirates! Who have a ship! That is kind of like a real, earth-bound, sea-faring ship, except sturdier, and with an "alembic" to power it.

The band of space-pirates consists of mostly former specimens from the British Xenological Institute - beings collected as eggs and raised "for science." (presumably, to be vivisected upon reaching maturity. Another thing I suppose you could let yourself get very angry at if you were that sort; I kind of blipped over the idea and got on with the story).

There is Jack Havock, who is human - his parents lived in the colony on Venus but are no longer really "living." Then there is Mr. Munkulus, a heroic, four-armed Ionian; Grindle, a foul-mouthed* sort of goblin; Ssillissa, a blue lizard-creature who is the ship's alchemist (and the only female, until Myrtle is rescued); Nipper, a kind-hearted sort of giant land crab; and the Tentacle Twins, which are similar to sea anemones but are terrestrial.

(Of all of those, the only ones who don't speak are the Tentacle Twins - Yarg and Squidley - they communicate by electrical pulses and also by colors flashing on the tips of their tentacles. I rather liked Yarg and Squidley.)

(*this being a book for young teens, they very cleverly use the Victorian device of writing cursing as "d_____" and such, and then have some other character comment about how "that should not have been said with a lady present.")

Incidentally, Jack is half black West Indian. Which leads to some interesting bits, given some of the typical attitudes of the day. (In the end, Myrtle winds up falling in love with him...yes, that was a bit of a spoiler but I rather expected it from their first meeting.)

Anyway. They go off and have a lot of hair-raising adventures, mainly aimed at trying to figure out where the spiders came from and how they can be stopped. Myrtle gets separated from the group and winds up on Mars where she's rescued by Ulla (a Martian woman) and Sir Richard Burton (who, in the book, is married to Ulla).

There are a lot of plot twists, several points where you're asking yourself "Whose side is he on, anyway?"

Eventually everything works out very well.

There was one moment of Deus-ex-Machina about 2/3 of the way through the book that I SUPPOSE was necessary but that felt, well, kind of forced to me.

But in general - it's what the late, lamented Common Reader catalog used to call "A thumping good read" - very entertaining, very escapist, very interesting. There are lots of funny little bits - in one point, when the captain is pushing one of Her Majesty's ships to go faster than it normally might, the man in charge of the engines (a Scotsman) remarks that "I canna make her go any faster, Captain!" Lots of little allusions like that.

There's a sequel, called Starcross, which I ordered upon completion of Larklight. I hope it's as good.