Sprung.

As I noted, and you know if you're in this hemisphere along with most of the population, spring has arrived. And that means hope! Dreams! Young love! And WORK WORK WORK.

Yesterday I was in the giant houseware store, which I'll call Loam Depot because I was buying mulch and rocks. Rocks! When you're a kid you think rocks just happen. They're not something you buy. They're all over. Why spend money on rocks? Why torture the poor suspension (yours and the car's) with a load of rocks? And why buy mulch when you can mow over leaves and make it?

I know, I know. I don't care why. It just is. Spring comes and my un-mulched areas look like crap. As for the rocks, like most people in the 'burbs whose mailbox is on the devil's strip twixt sidewalk and road, I am not content to just let the mailbox post stand in dirt. But I am not so foolish as to think something planted in primo dog zone would survive. Once one dog hits the spot they all want to, and there's no plant alive that can withstand that kind of barrage. Some people cover the ground at the base of the post with bricks or mulch, and some use decorative pebbles, like moi. I use red ones. They match the mulch. 

My dad was a great one for landscaping, and he absolutely 100% did not pass that love down to me. I envy people like him, people who love gardening and tending the lawn and all the other things that make the property look dandy. They get exercise and fresh air and have more to show to the world for the effort than sweaty gym clothes. I like growing individual plants, but nothing more than I can grow in a pot, and that includes grape tomatoes and bell peppers. I cannot stand the idea of turning a large plot of earth, shoving in seeds, then fighting off deer and rabbits and bugs all summer. Unless I can develop a plant that produces Krugerrands, I think I'm just not going to maintain the motivation necessary. 

Today, though, is one of those days I have to buckle down and get some things done. Putting down some tick-murdering poison along the border of the property, for example -- one of the ways we keep the dog tickless. Killing weeds in walkways and other places plants don't belong. Washing the cars -- I feel confident that the big freeze is done, and there's no point in have a vehicle that looks like a pretzel. 

I guess that shows just how close to nature I am, that my spring endeavors are all about cars and poison. Oh, and I got the grill going yesterday, so that's propane for burning meat. I'm a one-man Anti-UN Environmental Programme. And for that, at least, I am proud. 

As I look back on today's blog entry, I realize I've covered this ground in years gone by. And that's what spring is -- covering the same old ground, year after year. With mulch.

What is a weed?

What is a weed? Is weed just a mean term for a plant we don't happen to like? 

Merriam-Webster defines a weed this way:

a plant that is not valued where it is growing and is usually of vigorous growth

especially : one that tends to overgrow or choke out more desirable plants

Similarly, the Encyclopedia Britannica says: 

general term for any plant growing where it is not wanted. Ever since humans first attempted the cultivation of plants, they have had to fight the invasion by weeds into areas chosen for crops. Some unwanted plants later were found to have virtues not originally suspected and so were removed from the category of weeds and taken under cultivation. Other cultivated plants, when transplanted to new climates, escaped cultivation and became weeds or invasive species. The category of weeds thus is ever changing, and the term is a relative one.

So yeah, they're plants we don't happen to find useful, as food, ornament, construction supply, etc. Worse, they tend to "choke out more desirable plants." 

Is it insulting to call a plant a weed, then, just because we don't like it? No. Plants have no minds and no feelings and so you can call them whatever you want. 

Some people will defend weeds. They may point to particular ones that are actually useful (dandelions, for one, are edible), or are important for wildlife (especially as pollinators). That argument, however, isn't saying that weeds are good; it's saying that things we think of as weeds are actually not, because they have an important purpose. 

Other people just like weeds because they are what nature would do if we weren't interfering. In the comic strip Miss Peach, scrawny weird kid Arthur was known for growing a weed garden. The character seemed to find identification with the unwanted plants. Perhaps Arthur thought that, like a weed, he was useless and ugly, but darn it, he was also persistent! Ironically, cartoonist Mell Lazarus said Arthur was his most popular character.

But are any people really like weeds? Should we not agree with Ars Nova, who sang "Fields of People / There's no such thing as a weed"?  

Yes and no; yes, because all humans have an intrinsic value and natural rights; no, we shouldn't, because it's an inexact analogy. A decent person can turn bad and become a vile slob; a sinner can reform. But whatever stinkweed does, it's never going to be a strawberry rhubarb pie.

The main thing about weeds is that they grow like, well, weeds. It's a symbol of this fallen world that the plants that help us to survive and thrive have to be brought along with effort, while the useless ones proliferate like crazy. No one ever found a field that just automatically produced delicious potatoes or amazing rows of corn.

Sure, sometimes you can find wild blueberries or bunches of coconut trees or other wonderful things, but those are the natural exception rather than the rule. One estimate says that only around 10 million humans could survive if we were all hunter-gatherers. That's roughly the population of Michigan, for the entire planet. And fewer would survive if they were vegetarians. 

Modern agriculture (and aquaculture and animal husbandry etc.) gets the credit for the survival of the other 6,990,000 of us. 

Seeing how vital plants are for us, heck yes, there are weeds. We ought to make sure there's nothing particularly useful about them before we murder them, but then it's fair game. Bring on the corn flakes! Say no to stinkweed flakes!

It's all too mulch.

On Monday, which was very hot, I took the dogs out to go lay down mulch around the plants and the trees in the front yard. Finally. I've had the stuff in the garage for weeks but at last had a chance. The dogs, being exceptionally hairy beasts, were sent inside after a while, but no such luck for me. Ah, but now the place is well mulched. 

He mulcheth here...

He mulcheth there...

That Freddy mulcheth everywhere.

I prefer the red mulch to the black mulch for two reasons:

1) My wife likes the red one better and
2) See #1.

Now that the job is done, let's consult Good Housekeeping and Better Homes and Gardens to see what I did wrong. 

Well, I think I did all right. You shouldn't use too much mulch and cause root rot, and you shouldn't use too little or the weeds will not be discouraged from coming up. Don't make a volcano of mulch around the base of the trees -- not I! I make a mulch dinner plate. You note the top picture, where I put down damp garden soil topped with mulch to protect the feets of the baby tree I just planted. The old, grumpy trees get the same dinner-plate mulch serving. 

To my surprise, Good Housekeeping actually recommends plastic mulch in certain circumstances, such as promoting vegetable growth by keeping soil moist and warm. Well, I'm not growing any vegetables this year, so I went au naturale, mulchwise. 

Probably the one dumb thing I did is the same thing pretty much everything does -- BH&G says not to let mulch touch your house. "When damp mulch touches your siding, it creates a path for termites and other pests to use to get to your home." Oops. But hold on -- my mulch doesn't touch the siding, although it does get up against the lattice of the porch. Maybe that's too much, too. Oh, who the hell knows. I've been doing it for ages and the termites haven't taken us out yet.

My feeling is -- I'm gonna mulch once a year, I'm gonna do it in the spring, and the hell with it after that. The shrubs don't lie awake at night worrying about me, so I'm going to do the same regarding them. 

Butterfly.

Butterflies are free! Bumblebees, three for $1.

I saw this majestic butterfly the other morning. It was so large I was sure it would fly into my face if I disturbed it, but I'd hoped it would stay still long enough for the photo. 

I'm enjoying spring, or at least I keep telling myself how much more I like it than winter. But the gnats are getting quite rude, and I've already donated a pint to the Mosquito Annual Blood Drive. Now it turns out we have poison ivy among the bordering weeds, for the first time in all the years I've been here. 

In my mind I'm renaming the seasons; instead of Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter I will say Itch, Burn, Mold, and Shatter.

So yesterday morning I stopped at Home Depot and got a big ol' jug of weed killer, one that specifically lists poison ivy and poison oak on the front. The cashier asks, "Does this kill poison ivy?" I said if not I'd be back for something stronger. Agent Orange, perhaps, or napalm. 

I couldn't use it yet, though. Saturday turned into a day-long rainout, but not without advantages. It appeared that my wicked neighbor, the one that will be arrested by the feds, was going to have his annual cookout and pool-opening party. How do I know? Because his wife's sister was over the day before to help clean the house. I don't think they let her stay for the party. Well, every family is weird in its own way, and some are weirder than others. 

Anyway, it looks like the party was a bust (one car showed up). 

On the whole, though, the weather has been pleasant enough this May, and helpful to my new tree. A friend asked if I've been watering it once a week, as the nurseries suggest, and I pointed out that I haven't had to bother since we've had lakes of rain this month. 

One last thing: About that huge butterfly?

So I lied a little. Cute, though, ain't he?

Per &@%#$! aspera ad &@%#$! astra.

Think of this as my graduation speech to the class of 2022. 

I took the photo above from a storm sewer in the neighborhood. The photo is real. The words are my words of advice to the youth of America who can't seem to stop seething with envy long enough to build their lives. They can do it -- but it takes effort, including the effort to stop looking over the shoulders of those who started out with more advantages.

I know what that's like. When I started in publishing, many entry-level jobs were unpaid or barely-paid internships, which meant that the only people who could take them were rich kids living on their parents' dime. I had to sneak into the business through the backdoor, being a jack-of-all-trades for a small circulation nonprofit magazine that was run by four people plus me. While other my age were padding their résumés, I was filling my skill box, and the best jobs I've had ever came from employers who appreciated the difference. 

Still, not having the connections one would get from the chummy Ivy League set has always been a disadvantage for me, but so what? When the magazines started to fold and the dot com bubble burst, all of those guys were as unemployed as I was, and many for a longer period. 

What I'm trying to say is not that you should stay in a lousy position or a lousy town, but that you have to play the hand life deals you. You can't always trade them in. Know what you can and can't change. And toughen up, buttercup. You'll get a lot further and stay a lot happier if you don't let your life run on envy.

Wildflower myths.

If you grew up anywhere where there was grass -- and yes, in the outer boroughs of New York we had lawns -- you undoubtedly heard some floral myths in your childhood gatherings with the other knuckleheaded kiddos. The best known one is probably that you can make a wish while blowing the seeds off the white top of the dandelion. 

Well, you can make a wish, but don't expect a response. Wishes don't come true, kids! Wishes are stupid! All you did was spread those stupid weeds around some more. Thanks a lot.

I have enough dandelions on the lawn this year to make a billion wishes, and as they say, if wishes were fishes, we'd be up to our necks in herring. Or something like that.

Somewhat less common myths about the flowers on my vast estate include the following:

BUTTERCUP

The dumb myth about the buttercup is that if you hold it up to your chin and it reflects a yellow glow, that means you like butter. Well, duh. Everyone likes butter. Even vegans like butter, although they think it's bad for the cows and maybe us. I'm surprised when I recall being afraid the buttercup would turn my chin yellow and expose my illicit butter love to the world. The way my old man ate butter (half a stick or more per corn on the cob, please) (and he was rail-thin), a buttercup would have made him look completely yellow if there was any truth to the myth.

There may have also been some myth about the buttercup revealing your true love, but that was definitely girl stuff and, in those days, girls were known by the CDC to be infected by cooties. Although the nice ones maybe not so much. And the cute ones.

HONEYSUCKLE

The myth here was that if you picked the flower, bit off just a tip at the end, and sucked on the flower, it would taste like honey. It does not taste like honey. It tastes like a flower. It's not bad, but it's not honey. Fortunately the flowers are not poisonous, and are in fact edible. 

Clearly the confusion exists because of the name, but the name really means what it says. Merriam-Webster says it originated from "Middle English honysoukel clover, alteration of honysouke, from Old English hunisūce, from hunig honey + sūcan to suck," so it's been in the mix all the time. It still doesn't taste like honey.

Kids would pretend to like the taste of the flower, but the flowers don't taste like much. It was a sort of gang obedience, wee tots' peer pressure. "Yeah, it's delicious!" Eh, not so much. But sometimes it's easier to pretend and go do something more fun than to disagree and start an argument.

I sometimes think that in the story of the emperor's new clothes, the kid who sees that the emperor is naked wouldn't necessarily shout the fact, but would instead strip down to his birthday suit and yell "Lookit me! I'm an emperor, too!" and go marching after him. I knew a few kids like that. I think some of the adults I know now would do that, actually.

⚘🎕⚘🎕⚘🎕⚘🎕⚘🎕⚘🎕

Those are a couple of myths about backyard plants of which I know. Got any of your own? Share them in comments!

Spring! Time to kill.

Spring is here! We're almost done with temperatures in the thirties and the risk of snow! We've had snow in May around these parts, so I don't discount the possibility. However.

Time to get the rubber mats off the porch steps -- walk at your own risk, suckas! Time to figure out which of last summer's gorgeous plants have up and died. And time to KILL KILL KILL!

What am I planning to kill? Better to ask what am I NOT planning to kill. Mwa ah ah!

1) Weeds. Weeds on the lawn. Weeds on the walkway. Weeds in the cracks on the driveway. Weeds on the sidewalk. Weeds in the woodpile. Weeds on my chinny chin chin. All the weeds. Dead! 

2) Bugs. Wasps' nests. Ants' nests. Termites' nests. Individual spiders. Worms. Flies. Ticks. Gnats. Fleas. Dead!

3) Groundhogs. Kill or chase away. I'm tired of their sinkholes in the lawn. I have purchased some smokers that will send them running or kill them. Kill them DEAD! 

Ah, but even in the depth of this murderous depravity is the spark of life. My dead tree is gone, the stump finally removed, and yesterday I put a young red maple in its place. It looked so large in the SUV, so small on the lawn near its larger mates. I planted it with tenderness and care. I will mind it and bring it to root in its new home. 

And if it dies, I'm spraying the lawn with Agent Orange and calling it a day. Paint it green! Pave the Earth!

Pots o' dirt.

I have four pots o' dirt on the porch now, each with seeds, trying again to shame Spring into getting things going. I think it's starting to work; yesterday the high was 71!

Two of the pots stand astride the stairs leading to the porch. These contain bell pepper seeds, which turn into big leafy plants all summer. They look great, green and lively and dramatic. And then you get delicious red bell peppers. If they grow at all, that is. If not, those guys who bag the dirt for Scotts Miracle-Gro will hear from me. I haven't forgotten your persecution of an employee for engaging in a legal activity in his own home, Scotts. Fail me and you'll be hearing from my lawyers.

On notice

The third large pot o' dirt contains seeds for grape tomatoes. We got a lot of good tomatoes out of that pot last year, but I made two mistakes -- I started late and I didn't get a tomato cage to tie up the plants. Tying them to the porch railings was a disaster. It lolled all over the place like a drunken green octopus. I got a cage yesterday that can stand in the pot and hold the plants up. Of course, the wind may blow it all over, pot and all, and I won't be able to sue Scotts for that.

The last pot o' dirt is the saddest. When our junior dog Nipper contracted lymphoma this winter, we made an appointment to take him to a vet in the next county that specializes in dog cancer treatment. Two days later we cancelled the appointment -- Nipper was too far gone. They were kind enough to send a condolence card with a little packet of forget-me-not seeds. I planted the flower seeds yesterday in honor of our little one, gone too soon. A good dog is never forgotten. 

Nipper, 2016–2021; forever young.

Come on Spring, you idiot!

Short post today; busy weekend, busy Easter. But I'm sure you'll find something of fascination below. (Note: Fascination not guaranteed.)

One of the weekend tasks was to try to shame the season of spring into action. Not that there was a lot of reason to complain; the mornings were gorgeous. The week ahead looks good, although I did wear the winter coat out with the dog this morning. 

My weekend plan was to get a jump on the spring projects and move things along. After all, Mets fans missed out on opening weekend thanks to the Chinese Death Virus, so I had to do something.

What I did was, put down some of that mulch I bought. I put it around the trees. I also wanted to hammer in some fertilizer spikes for trees and shrubs, but found that the ground was still frozen about three inches down. Those spikes are just compressed fertilizer; they do not penetrate hard surfaces well. So I abandoned that task, although the mulch is nice.

Closer to the front, the lovely and talented Mrs. K wanted to replace some mums, which take all summer to pop up and last a brief time, with shrubs. I got some little firs, but I did not put them in yet. There's an issue with symmetry that needs to be resolved. See, it's not obvious, but one end of the porch is a little longer than the other, and she would like that to not be obvious. While we puzzle this out, the firs remain in pots on the porch.

Also in pot news: I planted my bell pepper seeds in pots. Too early for this zone, but I don't care. I was late with my cherry tomatoes last year and we missed out on some late harvest. Get moving, spring!

I oughtn't to tempt fate, though. Here's a scene from last May 9:

Another 2020 joy

Latest snowfall I've ever seen here. Killed all the daffodil and rhododendron blooms. Went away fast, but the damage was done. 

What will 2021 bring? I don't know, but I'm giving it the gimlet eye. Prove me wrong, spring!

On the passing scene.

I said to myself, "Self!" I said, "That's an old Emeril Lagasse gag." "It predates him," Self replied. "In any event," I said, "I hate to do a Random Thoughts type column, but I have all these little bits that don't cohere into a solid blog post." "Hey, Thomas Sowell did them frequently for years before his retirement," Self said. "If it's good enough for him, it's good enough for you." I agreed.

Item 1: Via Instapundit -- have we reached peak 2020?

One can hope, but we still have a presidential election to decide, and the mobs are still running the streets in some cities (except by the mayor of Chicago's house, because shut up, peons).

Obviously we need Batman now more than ever.

Item 2: I wish we could box up some water and send it to California, because this has been an unusually wet summer here. Foggy mornings and rain. Usually by mid-August the grass stops growing for a while because it gets scorched, but that never happened this year.

This morning's dampness featured the visit of a stink bug on the kitchen window. The brown marmorated stink bug is yet another damn invader from Asia, like the Chinese Death Virus, first spotted in the United States in Allentown, Pennsylvania in 1996. Hmm... Isn't that around where our friend Stiiv lives? I'm sure it's a coincidence.

I wrote our little stink bug friend a haiku.

Stink bug under glass
Kindly leave my country now
Take the 'rona too

Item 3: While we have no wildfires here, we did get one wild, fiery sunrise this week.

That looks like Wrath-of-God stuff.

Item 4: The Indianapolis 500 runs today, weather permitting, before a 25% capacity crowd. Certain persons in the house here are very excited. I'm not a big racing fan, but I'll watch; I watched it a couple of years ago and enjoyed it. I hope they don't do any politically correct bows to the current crisis in the run-up to the race. A sport where people burn fossil fuels while speeding around in circles is never going to get the approval of the PC crowd, no matter whose rings they kiss.

Item 5: Autumn is knocking at the doors, and I'm not just saying that because of the Halloween candy in the supermarket. Saw a big Canadian goose V in the sky this morning. It was not heading south, though; actually, it was heading east. Maybe these were Canadian geese with poor sense of direction.

Also, the chestnuts are on the way:

But the dahlias haven't given up yet.

Item 6: My favorite online gags of recent note:

And with that, I hope you have a lovely Sunday, and keep your sense of humor whatever happens next. Good luck, Karen Doe; I hope Higgins comes home soon.

These plants are made for walkin'.

If every day was not strange enough already, with Chinese Death Virus and unprosecuted violent mobs and Florida Man running amok, we have weird holidays to keep us on our toes. Worse, we sometimes have a confluence of weird holidays that seem to go together, but seem to not as well.

What I mean is, today, July 27, according to the fine folks at Holiday Insights, is the day we celebrate Take Your Pants for a Walk Day, Take Your Houseplants for a Walk Day, AND Walk on Stilts Day. Three walking-based celebrations, but no obvious connection. Or IS there?

Here are the descriptions of the days:

Take Your Pants for a Walk Day: "It's an easy day to celebrate. Simply go for a walk. Unless you are wearing a dress or a skirt, you probably are wearing pants. So, by definition, as you walk, they come along."

Take Your Houseplants for a Walk Day: "Take Your Houseplants for a Walk Day is a great day for you and your houseplants to get some exercise. It will be good for them. It will allow you to bond with your plants, helping them to reach their maximum potential. Along the way, you can get your houseplant accustomed to your neighborhood!"

Walk on Stilts Day: "Stand out in a crowd by hopping onto a pair of stilts. If you are about to mount stilts for the first time, begin with a pair that is short... low to the ground. Once you've mastered your first pair of stilts, you can easily graduate to taller and taller ones."

If you celebrate holiday #2 with pants, you're also celebrating holiday #1. Way to go! If you wear a sun dress or kilt, or even shorts, you're letting down the side. Now get some stilts. I especially do not recommend walking on stilts in a kilt.

It might be tough to try to enact all three holidays together. Here's a little girl I saw online who seems to have the houseplants thing down, though:

And look! She's got pants!

I currently have only one potted plant going, or rather plants; back on June 13 they looked like this:

But now the cherry tomato plants look like this:

I ain't walking them anywhere.

But if I do walk, it will be in pants. So let's celebrate, and Sing the Praises of Pants!

Little triumphs.

It was an absolutely spectacular weekend here in the lower Hudson Valley, wonderful for the graduation ceremonies at West Point. And on my little patch of paradise as well. Some may have complained that it was too cold -- 47 degrees Sunday morning -- but that was because the humidity was so low. I loved it, my wife was a fan, and our hairy dogs thought it was an early Christmas gift. Remember, we had snow suitable for making snowballs five weeks ago, so this was plenty warm enough.

Did I get a lot done? Kill the weeds, clean the fridge, repair the front walk, and all the rest on my to-do list? No, I did not. But I had my little triumphs, and in the current conditions of the year I am happily blessed for those. Here are some:

1) Watermelon! As you may recall, the last time I brought a watermelon into this house, carrying it up the cellar stairs from the garage, it turned into the worst fumble since Jeremiah Castille ruined Earnest Byner's day in 1987.  So this time I put the big ol' fruit in a paper shopping bag with handles and carefully carried it up, bracing the bottom to prevent sudden tears. It is sitting on my counter, waiting for the knife. Triumph!

2) Tomatoes! Last week I planted tomatoes in a large pot on the porch. I've done this several times since we lived here. The deer and other pests won't come on the porch, and there's a good mix of sun and shade. I've had lots of luck with red peppers, too. But since we got dogs, who famously like to dig, I have avoided putting temptation in their way. Well, my wife misses those home-grown cherry tomatoes, so I said I would try -- but I got a late start. I set up the pot on Saturday. And less than a week later....

They're growing a lot faster than my hair is from my home haircut. Triumph! (I did have to put a barrier around the pot because junior varsity dog Nipper could not tear himself away from it -- sniff sniff sniff. And we all know the sniff is the father of the dig.)

3) Mass! Saw a great Mass online. That was not what we'd hoped to do; the churches have reopened, but the restrictions for Mass are exceptionally tough to prevent a resurgence of the Chinese Death Virus. So the Archdiocese says there's still no obligation to attend Mass in person. Indeed, most of us can't; with the crowd restrictions, the church is only allowed to have about a quarter of the usual attendees. I count it as a little victory that we exercised caution and were rewarded with a wonderful homily for the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ by Fr. Mike Schmitz of Ascension Presents.

4) Speech! I mentioned above the commencement at West Point. A friend a mine, lifelong Democrat, called yesterday and said he was very impressed by what he saw of the president's commencement speech on the news. I was obliged to check out the speech, and I have to agree. Very moving, very powerful. A few classic Trump flourishes, but that's our president for ya. I loved his mention of the Great Chain at West Point that saved the nation from British invasion from Canada in the Revolution -- a chain whose links we touched on our visit in 2018 -- and used it as a metaphor for the army itself, "a great chain reaching out from this place — one made not of iron, but of flesh and blood, of memory and spirit, of sheer faith and unyielding courage." That's a great chain, indeed.

Not all these li'l triumphs had anything to do with me, beyond my willingness to participate, but it's not all about me. How was your weekend?

Spring pictures.

Okay, enough with the depressing things for a bit. Here are some pictures I got while walking around. The National Geographic people may not come hammering at my door to buy them, but hey, I write novels, not picture books.

Here we have an example of the concrete worker's art, a planter apparently awaiting whatever plant will adorn it for the summer.

I guess they put the pebbles around to keep it upright, but I think it looks a little silly. Tell you the truth, the first thing I thought of that it looked like a spittoon for the Thing from the Fantastic Four.

"Reed, will you please speak to Ben?  He keeps missing the spittoon and now there are pebbles all over the floor!"

"Ben, why are you spitting so much?"

"Because, Reed... It's SLOBBERIN' TIME!"

Speaking of elegant concrete sculpture, we also have this content and well-dressed chap, although a bit worse for weather wear. Yes, allow me to present Monsieur Grenouille Faux;

Fake frogs are okay, but with all the rain we had, we had enough of the real thing around here. In fact, the same day Nipper and I passed M. G. Faux in the morning, we encountered Monsieur Grenouille la Vraie in the evening:

I wonder if M. Faux and M. la Vraie have met?

We've also had plenty of wildflowers, some of which don't suck. I mean, most wildflowers are more weed than flower. This one was okay.

What that always puts me in mind of is "Fields of People" by an underrated English group, the Move. A friend of mine got me into their stuff long after their heyday had passed -- also after the heyday of Electric Light Orchestra, actually, which is what the Move morphed into. "Fields of People" is a cover of a song by Ars Nova. I like "Fields of People" a lot ("Fields of people... there's no such thing as a weed...") but I used to have more tolerance for hippie stuff. Now my home is a tambourine-free zone. Anyway, it's a fun song, from the album Shazam, but unless you really dig sitar music, bail after the main song portion. (Side note: The lead vocal by Carl Wayne was recorded on the street, the rest in the studio.)

Finally, we have a horse-drawn hay rake that has been turned into a planter.

I love this thing. I admit that I had to look up olde tyme farm equipment to find out what it was; I've explained this city slicker's knowledge of farming to you in the past. I think they family is a little optimistic; I don't know what's growing in the planter but it's overwhelmed by the machine itself. Still, I wouldn't care. I love old stuff and I'd probably just sit on the seat, wearing an Amish hat, chewing straw, whittlin', and making wise country remarks to people like an idiot all day. Good thing I don't own it.

That's what I've been seeing around this spring; how's it with you?

Summer scenes.

The days are getting so short! The SAD is kicking in! WAH!

Actually I wouldn't mind the days getting a little shorter; the dogs, especially junior dog Nipper, tend to be waking up too early. They're pretty good about it, but when I come rolling out of the bedroom after loafing around until 5:30 a.m., I feel like I've kept them waiting. I certainly don't like waiting when I have to use the can.

On a brighter note, I thought I might share a few visions of summer seen here and there.

I'm really proud of this little guy:

Last year I put in a couple of dahlias. One was to fill a hole, the other to replace a chrysanthemum that didn't survive the winter. I was told that in this climate, dahlia bulbs can only survive if you dig them up and let them slumber in a dirt-filled pot indoors, basically coddling them like children, or starlets. Well, I let nature take its course. One dahlia did go to the big nursery in the sky, but the other one survived and is doing great. Should be considerably bigger and more full of flowers this year.

This is... your guess is as good as mine.

It's the back of a tree house that was built long ago, and this window faces the street. Clearly the kids in the house had some kind of message here for passersby, but I have no idea what they were trying to say. I think I'm being taunted. Well, kids -- and they're probably old enough to have kids of their own now, judging by the look of the place -- you'll have to up your game. I've been taunted much worse than that, and I doubtless will be again.

Here is the most convincing sign that summer is indeed in full swing:

Yes, the first Herrschners Christmas catalog has arrived! My wife's a crafter, and she'll be glad to tell you that you had better be knitting already if you want your homespun presents to be under that tree on December 25. So get to work! Knit at the lake house! Knit at the barbecue! Knit at the ball game! Knit on the beach! There's only 179 days until Christmas!

Finally, here's the sky at 8:37 last night:

I'll take that.

Nature!

Is there any time we appreciate the wonder of nature more than late spring? Flowers have come and gone and more have come in their path. The trees are in full bloom. Look at this big beauty! 

Isn't Nature aweso-- WHAT THE HELL IS THIS?

While walking the big dog I came across an evergreen that had any number of these icky pods with revolting tendrils coming out of them. One of these is disgusting; dozens of them are horrifying. One eighteen feet long would be a reason to call in the Marines. 

Nature makes so many things that are only saved from being Hellbeasts by lack of size or number. Seriously, if we only had a handful of dust mites around but they were as big as Buicks, we would all go around with rifles. 

Even on something simple, Nature can be gross. I had to cut a tree limb because it was covering a path; here's how the tree responded.

It sprouted a dozen little limbs like some kind of monster plant. I expect to find it reaching in the window to saw off my leg as I sleep. Maybe I should set it on fire now.

The irony is, my wife probably wouldn't find any of these things really disgusting. But this friendly, handsome chap that I found on the lawn last week? She'd scoop it in a snow shovel and catapult it over the roof, screaming all the while.

I admire people who like and study things that gross out most of us, like bugs and snakes and bacteria and those weird deep-sea fish that look like alien invaders. It's important to know about these things.

I mean, in general. I don't want to know about them. They're skeevy.

Killing frost.

Between Thursday evening and Friday morning we got the first frost of the season. The killing frost.

Welp, there went the dahlias.

I planted them in May and we have enjoyed beautiful blooms all summer, into the fall, right up until Thursday evening. Then, wham. All at once. I've never seen such a vivid example of the killing frost in action.

Of course I can't think of killing frost without thinking of 1975's "Wildfire." It was one of those horribly tragic story songs of the sixties and seventies, wherein a story is told and it looks like someone meets a bad end. It could be suicide ("Ode to Billy Joe"), a fugitive caught by the law ("Indiana Wants Me"), needless death in war ("Billy Don't Be a Hero"), hanging of an innocent man ("The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia"), a trapped miner getting eaten by his coworkers ("Timothy"), a crippled veteran abandoned by his wife ("Ruby, Don't Take Your Love to Town"), miscellaneous death ("Seasons in the Sun"), or procreation of vermin ("Muskrat Love"). All tragic. In the case of "Wildfire," it was the story of the eponymous pony who busted out of his stall and got lost in a blizzard. His female owner ran out into the blizzard after him and I guess they both froze to death.

Oh, they say she died one winter
When there came a killing frost
And the pony she named Wildfire
Busted down its stall
In a blizzard he was lost

Now, this is awfully sad. But I first really became aware of this song when Dave Barry solicited entries for a column, and later a book, of the worst pop songs ever recorded. One of his respondents, Steele Hinton, nominated "Wildfire," noting that a killing frost is only deadly to "flowers and garden vegetables" and "no normal person or pony would freeze as a result of getting lost in the killing frost." And, "Nobody ever got lost in one that wouldn't get lost in July as well."

Barry responded: "This makes sense to me, although I guess the song wouldn't be quite as dramatic if it were about a girl running around desperately calling for her lost tomato, named Wildfire."

I suppose, as Hinton thought, that the meaning of the phrase "killing frost" may have been unclear to those in warmer climates, like Southern California. All they would know was that "frost" rhymes with "lost," and that was the important bit.

I guess I could have saved my flowers from the terrible tragic fate that met Wildfire by protecting them with some fabric, or maybe the grill cover, but it's mid-October and their doom was only a matter of time. I read that you can keep your dahlias over winter by digging up the tubers and keeping them warm inside, but that sounds like work.

Sorry, dahlias. As we say on the ranch, you've gone the way of Wildfire.

Autumn miscellany.

Just emptying my phone of recent pictures -- another sentence that would have made no sense 25 years ago -- and I wanted to share a couple with you. Always something interesting around, if I bother to look. 

A month or so ago our lilac plant, one of several we planted last year, came under attack by those disgusting purveyors of disgustingness, tent caterpillars. For a short time in late August and early September these punks were busy in the neighborhood, and apparently some of them like lilacs. The plant became bare of leaves where the little creeps were munching away, and it seemed to be spreading rapidly. My wife, who hates tent caterpillars even more than I do, or would if such a thing were possible, was convinced we would have to uproot the thing and hope to plant a new one in its place. But not I. I was too determined, too thoughtful, too cheap to entertain such a notion. So I went to Home Depot to get vicious, dangerous poison, and came back with some weenie insecticidal soap in Miracle-Gro's Nature's Care organic schmorganic line. I didn't want nature to care, I wanted it DEAD. The store was out of all the really effective stuff because everyone else was also killing tent caterpillars. So I wound up with soap. I wasn't planning to give these bugs a freakin' bath. 

Well. Not only did the soap kill the bugs, but the lilac survived, and was the only one to give us a late bloom. 

"Ta-da! Thanks for killin' the bugs, mate!"

So I owe Miracle-Gro an apology. Sorry, Miracle-Gro; thanks for saving the plant.

Other bugs I have left alone this fall. This big fellow gave me a start, but he was just minding his own business.

Caught this shot below while driving (totally illegal, I know -- breakin' the law! breakin' the law!). Obviously an abandoned little house, right by a busy road. Almost looks like it had just been dropped there.

Made me wonder if little tiny houses can be haunted. It's always castles or big mansions in the stories and most of the movies, but the little ones might have even more ghosts. Depends on what happened there....

And maybe... maybe even station wagons can be haunted!

There was so much stuff packed into this one that I thought it had to be driven by a ghost, because there was no room for a live human being. In a way this car was itself a ghost; there was a time not that long ago when cars like this were all over the place. Then they started to fade away, get replaced, drive off into the sunset, and now they're all gone. All but a small, brave, possibly haunted few.

To end on a pretty note: All the mums are fading, but weren't they nice in September? A neighbor had a bunch of these around.

So that's some stuff that swam into my ken of late. What's new with you?