Today’s Spanish Word of the Day is “soborno”, meaning “bribery, subornation; bribe; kickback, hush money (informal)”.  In Italian, “bustarella”, meaning “bribe” & “corruzione”, meaning “corruption; bribery; payola (implying music industry corruption); graft (type of political corruption – the obtaining of money or advantage by dishonest or unfair means, esp. through the abuse of one’s position or influence, as in politics; money or advantage acquired in this manner); decay, decomposition”.  In Portuguese,  “suborno” (meaning “bribery, suborning”) & “sobrecarga” (referring to a supercargo – “an officer on a merchant ship who supervises commercial matters and is in charge of the cargo”).

We’re at the end of the year & now is a time when some summer plants may be dying.  I know I pulled one of my zucchini plants yesterday because many of its leaves were dead.  Some flowers though, are just beginning to bloom.  Additionally, since I was forced to put my tomatoes out late this year, the plants are just beginning to produce fruit.  Hopefully with the warm year they will still have some time to produce before it gets too cold.

My potted peppermint is doing great, but it’s also flowering.  If your peppermint flowers, you need to snip the buds off if you want to prolong its life cycle.  It may produce for a good while longer & consider bringing it inside for the winter if you live in an area with colder winters.  It still needs to die for the winter, but it will come back if it is brought inside & protected from the deep cold.

Consider what flowers & vegetables you might like to harvest seeds from.  Choose the plants that die the latest in the season.  You can cover the flower heads with a Ziploc bag, but wait until they die.  You shouldn’t wait too terribly long to cover them with a bag once that happens so it’s there when they drop seeds.  I know I have a sunflower that is super large this year; I’d like to get seeds from it, but it’s super tall & I have to figure out how to cut it down…

#spanish #italian #portuguese #soborno #bribe