Strep Throat

That's all I have to say about that.

Scent, Aroma, Stink

At some point in May, I remembered one of the most fleeting pleasures of last spring. For a while, we slept with the windows open. All night the room throbbed with a sweet, thick perfume. The source?

Linda's honeysuckle vine. It climbs across the fence dividing our properties. That's the same strip where her raspberries have colonized our land, providing us with a bounty of fruit in early July. Look out the eastern windows and you see roses, raspberries, lilacs, and these honeysuckle flowers. Right now, they welcome you when you come in the back gate.

It's hot here - suddenly - so we can't sleep with the windows open as we did last year. Still. I love honeysuckle. I love that in the path from spring to summer I can count on the honeysuckle to mark the transition.

Quiz

Which of these is worse:

1. Iain throwing up right after breakfast (strawberry jam on toast - not pretty). No camp today.

2. My sore throat, a sign that I caught whatever he had. [note, this item carries with it waking up every hour all night long to spray on Chloroseptic.]

3. Dreaming all night about zombies hunting us. If you smeared your entire body with mud they couldn't see you, but also some of them were vampires. Just so you understand.

I am bitter. Yes, I am.

20 Seconds of Zen

Today, a first hike of the season for Charles. At the top, as promised, a beautiful little oasis.

Not Dead Yet

Above, our new apple tree. It's a semi-dwarf Fuji, and as you can see it has already been espaliered. It's not much older than our "stick" (the bare-root that never was), but much farther along the path I hope it will follow for us. Fingers crossed, please.

Underplanting the apple and pear trees are a pair of tiny miniature gingkoes. They're doing well, producing those characteristic gingko leaves and adding an interesting leaf shape to the garden.

This is the new pear. It's a big improvement over the stick, don't you think? Yeah. It's a Hosui, the same type, but obviously older, healthier, and even:

Bearing fruit. I have no idea whether the fruit on it this year will mature (transplant shock and all), but I'm hoping. There are maybe 20 pears on the tree, and given its size we hope to be able to eat from it next year at the latest.

I chose to take pictures at absolutely the wrong time of day, but what you're seeing here is the backyard from the southern vantage, looking west. On the left out of the frame is the Blue Weeping Atlas Cedar. Eight feet to the north, the Fuji apple, then the Hosui pear, and in the corner our little bamboo.

It still struggles, and I really don't know if the bamboo will survive. But at this point I'm hoping that the warmth of the sun and the ample water we provide (drainage is goooood here) help everyone to settle in.

If, and this is a big if, they all make it we'll have established the basic framework of our Japanese garden. After that it's underplanting with conifers and grasses, creating the rock border, and deciding where to place a fountain and a seating area.

More Photos by Iain

Suddenly, it's HOT. As in 93 degrees. And SUNNY, as in all day long. Whew! We turned on the swamp cooler, broke out the tank tops, and I don't know if I'll wear socks again until September.

The garden moves forward, changing from spring crops to summer ones. I've pulled out most of the lettuce because it went bitter. And note to self: that oak leaf lettuce is just nasty. Nasty. Next year we will not be growing any of that.

The new fruit trees went in the ground early this week (photos soon), and the bamboo and bare-root roses are settling in. I suspect those roses may not make it, but time will tell. They came too late, they took a long time in shipping...meh. I dunno. Some things live and some die and I honestly can't tell which will do which.

But the tomatoes are in bloom, the raspberries are on their stalks (ripening, ripening) and I could go pick a few snow peas right now. The herb garden's simply amazing. So hurray for the raised beds!

Garbeldy Garbeldy Garbeldy

What happens when you give Iain the camera.

Anna, It is kind of the innocence and wanted need to call and ask you if you want with those he'dabout yard selling someone I didn't see anything that on Saturday We're gonna try and get everythingset up. 30 around 7 and then and you know go from 8 until 12:30. Anyway, let us know. I hope yourmom took me a call. It sounds like you're gonna be by divert some good sleep. 4. Volunteeringanyway. Hope you're doing well. Talk to you Later. Bye Bye.

This is a voice mail received earlier today. Yep.

I love Google Voice because I can skim the voice mail for things like: hospital, emergency, call me, help, etc.

But the premise that one can actually understand the message? Not so much.