farmville addiction: conquered

It’s been more than 30 days since I’ve plowed, seeded, or harvested my farm on Farmville. They say that’s how long it takes to break a habit. I broke it and haven’t looked back. Farmville, albeit a silly social-online networking game, hooked me after a little competitive spirit between Nicole and I (full story here).

Think I’m alone? Farmville boasts more than 70 million fans, more than watched the finales of LOST and 24, combined. Even Steve Jobs announced the Farmville app in his iPhone 4 keynote.

Why? Long story short: It was a way to “check out” while still being connected to social networking. I’ve been farming neighbors with wedding clients, peer wedding photographers, high-school friends, and the list goes on. Go figure.

First my goal was buying the million dollar Villa. Then, silly as it sounds, seeing what was under the ‘Farmville’ Christmas tree, then building the Maison, getting my barn TP’d on April Fools, and the story continued. My final goal was to get to level 70, which was more anticlimactic than the series finale of LOST.
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To totally geek out, click here to download the high resolution image of my ’finished’ farm (composited from screen grabs in Photoshop).wpid-4_upb-2010-06-10-20-044.jpg

Ellen and David got us into the real gardening effort and served up a crop of inspiration. We attended several gardening classes together, brainstormed what was possible, and then gave our green thumbs a go. With Nicole’s fine effort, is the present state of my window in my home office with about 3 week-old growth of lemon cucumber, mini pumpkins, and zucchini seedlings of which 10/12 sprouted:
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Outside, I’m proud to report the fruits of our labor: roma tomatoes, green peppers, yellow peppers, plums, rosemary, mohito mint, sweet basil, thyme… just to start.
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Our ‘outside’ landscaping has taken off:
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The secret? Daily watering, a good assistant gardener…
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… and an effective garbage disposal:
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Gardening enthusiasts, for good summer reading, check out William Alexander’s hilarious book, The $64 Tomato.

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