Hi, My name is Ben

I have a problem.

I am completely obsessed with mason jars.

Oh it started innocently enough. I bought a flat of jars from the store to can last years tomato harvest. Not having a canner of my own, my mother in law let me use one of hers that wasn't in use. while digging it out of her garage( and I mean DIGGING) I noticed some old boxes of jars in a corner. "what are those?" I asked. "Oh, just some jars we got out of the cellar before we filled it in. you can have them if you like." hmmm. Free jars?I am sold.

It was all downhill from there. Next thing I knew I was cleaning out every basement, well house,barn and even crawlspace on the farm looking for more mason jars. I had accumulated quite a collection in anticipation of all of the canning I was going to do this Summer. After all I was doubling the size of my garden and planting such a variety I would be lucky to have enough jars anyway. This is akin to counting chickens before they hatch. The backyard project went over budget enough to nix my 50/50 mix of compost and soil I wanted to use to fill my raised beds. "That's alright", I thought. "I planted right in the ground last year and they did alright". Well the dirt that we used for fill was fine for grass, but not for vegetables. That and the super wet,slightly cool summer has really decreased the bounty this year.

So I had more than enough jars. Did this stop me from acquiring more? No. While driving one day, I passed a house with 4 trash cans in front of it with the sign " free jars, take them all"

I briefly contemplated putting them in the back of my work truck, but I figured the package delivery company I work for might have frowned on that. So I worked the rest of the day just knowing that someone was taking MY jars. After work I jumped in the car and flew back to the house. Score! they were still there I began to load them, taking time to separate them by size and usability( some were non mason ). After the second trash can I realized that I would be to just lucky fit them in so I began to just pile. When I got home Jenifer and I sorted the good from the bad and came up with 4 large laundry baskets full. I now , not counting the jars with food in them, have enough jars to can 75 gallons of food. That's right, gallons.

Does this stop me from cruising craigslist for more free jars? No. eBay ,looking for the elusive gallon size? No.

I need help.