Cause and effect

Once upon a time I had hostas in all of my flower beds.  They're the perfect plant for me to cultivate because the work involved goes like this:

ME:  Hmmm -- looks like the hostas are thriving all on their own for yet another summer.  Well.  Time for more coffee!

But for whatever reason, just in the past couple of years the deer have really taken a liking to the delicious, salad-like goodness of the hostas that are planted all over my yard -- along with any other delicious garden treats they can lay their delicate muzzles on.  This little lady has just bitten the tops off of all the remaining daylilies in my side bed (a palate cleanser), and now she is preparing to jump the neighbors' fence.  Their squash and zucchini blossoms look so tasty!  So --

-- this is what my hostas look like now.  Not quite the desired effect, is it?

 Looks like someone just discovered the (up until now) pristine plant at the base of the mailbox.  The blossoms are now history; any bets as to how much longer those leaves will last?

Cicada song

When you listen to the sound in this short little video that I recorded in my front yard, I want you to realize that the steady thrum in the background is the sound of millions of cicadas.  We live smack in the middle of the seventeen-year cicada Brood II emergence.  It's quite an event!  The eerie, echoing song is enough to drive some people nuts (one of my friends noted that he feels like his morning coffee is enjoyed to the soundtrack to a 1960's sci-fi movie).

Others are creeped out by how many, many cicadas have emerged.  It is impossible to overstate their everywhere-ness.  We sweep them off the porch every morning; we brush them out of our hair before we get into the car; the dogs either chase them or bark at them or stop with a jolt every time one buzzes by an inquisitive nose.  In this part of the country one can find on-line guides to planning a wedding around the cicada emergence.  Tip for the cicada-savvy:  skip the gazebo wedding if you plan to marry this summer.

I am fascinated more than grossed out.  I find their life cycle oddly compelling and even (am I weird?) endearing.  The males will serenade their lady friends throughout May and June, and then we will say good-bye to them for another seventeen years.  So -- don't be hating on the homely cicadas!  Their visits are so infrequent and so brief, and all they're looking for is a little romance!

All character, no plot: garden

 

These are leftover herbs from last year's garden pots.  Theme = resilient.

 

The sage is out of control.

The lemony-smelling something that I can't name but love to smell has taken over its pot, but the rosemary has found a way to lean way over to the side so it can get some sunshine.

We have wild strawberries everywhere.

It looks like I planted a pot of little pansies that are now thriving, but really I bought a pot and plunked it in this larger ceramic pot, thinking I would transplant it later.  That never happened, so the pansies just soldiered on without me.

This pot also came from the grocery store (just like the pansies).  I plunked it down beside my mailbox three years ago, because I thought it was festive:  it had daisies, and something red that died almost immediately, and a cabbage-looking something that was green and purple and that lasted through the first season.  The daisies do this every spring, and then burst into bloom at the end of the summer.

And I don't do a thing. 

Heavyhanded metaphor

So I've been neglecting my garden, which isn't surprising to anyone who knows me.  My poor hydrangeas were left to fend for themselves over the winter, and here the hydrangea metaphor or symbol or meaningful image or whatever you want to call it can be understood to stand in for any old thing you can think of:  my blog; my marriage; my laundry; my health; my friendships; my stack of books to be read; my kids -- and that's just what I can think of off the top of my head.

Some heavy-duty shit has gone down around these parts in the past months, but I won't babble on about it again because there's a long list, and I've talked about some of it before and I don't want to bore you, and some of it is not just my own shit and would be an invasion of another person's privacy, and some of it is just that I am a pain in my own ass sometimes and need to shake off my winter blahs so I can blossom again -- just like my hydrangeas.

And see how I did that?  Brought it right back around again like a boss!  Who said my English major was useless?

The Tomato Follies: Here we go again!

So you remember my pathetic tomatoes from last year, right? This sad, sad picture was taken in August 2009, when my plant should have been groaning under the weight of all those warm, ripe, glowing red tomatoes.

People, I despaired.

But this weekend we planted a new crop of tomatoes and basil -- and I am ready to begin anew.

I may be delusional but I think I can already taste the perfect B.L.T. -- made with tomatoes from my own garden. Don't be a hater; it could happen!

Silly Haiku Wednesday

It's time for another poetry slam -- and this week Jenn's theme is very timely: SEASONS.

Leaves change and my heart
sinks a tiny little bit.
I don't like the fall.

Nothing makes my day
Like these happy, happy words:
"Schools closed due to snow!"

As the weather warms,
I hope (knowing better) that
I can make things grow.

Summer! Now there's a
season I can get behind!
Give me sun and heat!

Footwear Fashion Makeover

Last February I found these gorgeous boots, and I bought them immediately because I am a member of Bossy's Poverty Party, and thus I am very frugal. That very day, because God apparently loves the frugal, I fell down the stairs and got another style of boot:

I got to wear this bad boy for, oh, about twelve weeks and three and one fourth days, if I had to give you a rough estimate. The time just flew by! My doctor also gave me the excellent news that I have a genetic blah-blah, which causes the bones in my blah to blah-blah: to sum up I am a foot mutant, and will probably break my foot again which will require surgery, and by the way, about wearing all those glamour shoes in my closet? Not so much. I paraphrase.

Not that I have much opportunity for glamour shoes, but it's nice to dream, and there has never been a day so bad that a kicky little pair of red pumps didn't make it seem just a small bit brighter. I wear these while I'm gardening.

Well, last week I defied the medical skeptics and (dramatic pause) wore the new boots! So far I have lived through the ordeal. The praise for my footwear was epic at the middle school back-to-school night, let me tell you. [Like my oldest girl's toes?]

I just love these boots!

A mystery . . . .

I really don't understand this . . . .

These mums were purchased together.

They live ten feet away from each other, in the same garden home -- same shade, same sun, same rainfall, same cat peeing near them.


They have been cared for identically, where cared for equals ignored and forgotten.

Explanation?? Anyone??

tangent: As I've said, I find mums to be snooty -- the perky cheerleaders of the flower world, just because they are the preferred Homecoming corsage choice. Bitches.

Name this plant . . . please!

I bought this beautiful plant at the Home Depot, mainly because it cost (costed? did cost? was in the act of costing?) I paid $6.00 for it. I feel like a plant that is lush and lovely and purple and costs six bucks is a plant that is meant for me.

But I don't really know what it is. It was out with the mums (a plant that annoys me because I find it all smug and "I get worn by the Homecoming Queen -- nyah, nyah, nyah!") so I assume this purple beauty is a fall-ish plant. Or maybe it's a spring plant that originally cost (costed?) thirty-five dollars. I haven't the foggiest notion.

It was gorgeous in the rain on Saturday, but a) I don't have the camera savvy to take a picture that captures its glamour, and b) it was raining, dudes! There's only so much I am willing to go through for my art.

Ominous information I feel compelled to report -- I tend to kill the beautiful plants. At the beginning of the summer this planter held this whitish silvery thing (What is it? Don't know.) and some English lavender. The ivy is, I feel, a weed and should be ignored. The silvery thing has not changed a bit. It hasn't grown; it hasn't wilted. And I have not done One. Thing. For. It. Clearly silvery plants can take this kind of treatment, but English lavender? Not so much.

It lives!

Hey, look! My tomatoes are perking up! No, really! This is pretty darned perky compared to earlier this summer. My whining strategy seems to have worked. Maybe I'll market whining as a "green" alternative to chemical fertilizers. Watch out, Miracle-Gro!

And honestly -- my strategy truly is green -- as in, I was green with envy over my friend's lush tropical tomato paradise. Heh! -- hang on a minute while I slap my knee . . . .

OK, so we're only talking kind of perky. Ironically, up until now this was the only plant that had produced any fruit. Very, very small fruit.

But check it out! This is almost respectable! You can even see more teeny, tiny tomatoes yearning to be big, grown-up tomatoes -- and then be eaten.

And this right here is a bona fide cluster of tomatoes. Eat your heart out, Coleen!

But -- in other garden news . . . .

Things are not looking so good for the spud plant. We may be emigrating to Ireland after all. Do you think they have signs posted in shop windows: "No dogs or Americans"?

It's just not right!

So, on the same day back in May that my dear pal Coleen bought my three tomato plants for me at the local farmers' market, she bought the same number for herself. We both have our plants in big pots for reasons that are boring, having mostly to do with squirrel avoidance . . . .

. . . . but whatever. Look at her stinkin' tomato plants! Her deck is a jungle of tomato-y tomato-ness -- you can't push your way through to the patio furniture without a machete. She seriously has more tomatoes than she knows what to do with. She called me yesterday to gloat worry: "Oh, dear, boo hoo! I have too many tomatoes -- I guess I'll have to make bruschetta." Bitch.

She had us over for dinner the other night, to celebrate our return from England. On the menu: Margaritas and tomatoes. That's it. Oh -- and guacamole, used as a dip for the tomatoes. Like this picture? iPhone, baby! I call it "Still Life with Tequila and Whatever."

Here's a Pioneer Woman shot of my pal making dessert. Mmmmm! Tomato ice cream! Where's that Coronation Spoon when you need it?

So -- let's recap, shall we?

My tomatoes . . . .

Her tomatoes, purchased on the same day, from the same vendor, at the same farmers' market. Hmmm. Did I say something once about an evil tomato plot?

More tragic garden news . . . .

My youngest girl is convinced that she has single-handedly caused the Great Potato Famine of '09.

The "Garden Guru" on our local radio station has been sounding the alarm about Late Blight -- the plant disease that caused the infamous Irish Potato Famine. This year, Late Blight is terrorizing gardeners and farmers all along the East Coast. So of course my girl picked this year to plant a spud in a pot and see if it would grow.

Now, with no signs of disease on this plant -- but no spuds, either -- she is packing her bags, preparing to emigrate back to County Cork (who knew we were Irish?). She keeps saying stuff like, "You know -- those people in Ireland had to eat grass, because the potatoes ALL DIED! And I don't even like SALAD!"

I exaggerate. But she is a little worried.

Meanwhile her plant is thriving -- and yes, that is a school ruler used to stake the plant, because that's how we roll at my house.

** In case you're worried, the sad tomatoes don't have Late Blight, either -- I checked. No -- they're just sad.

You say "tomato," I say "feh!"

Meet my friends, Sad and Sadder:

People, this is my entire tomato crop. Three -- count 'em, three -- tomatoes. What the hell happened here?!?

Please don't tell me that I haven't watered enough. Usually I would be agreeing with you (I'm not so good with the remembering to water . . .). But I've been gone so much this summer that the fabulous neighbors have used my hose more than I have (that sounds dirty, but whatever).

I would suspect an evil tomato competition-type plot, but a) the fabulous neighbors have too much real stuff to do, and b) my hydrangeas are lovely -- so watering is not the issue.

What gives?!

Pathetic, isn't it, that because I've been gone all summer, my yard is more lush and green than ever before (tomatoes aside, obviously). Fabulous neighbors, I'm telling you.