Another Hot, Dry Saturday in August

The kids use a grid like this to play. When I was a kid, we had to draw our own grids on graph paper and the DM never commented about the accuracy of what we drew.

I’m taking a break to cool off and write this short update. Suna is on sabbatical with some of her friends this weekend, but I’m holding down the home front.

Mr. Stripey is gone. I ripped him out of the ground and ran over him with the mulching mower. Mostly, he is now part of my compost pile. The good news is that I now have room to plant a couple of fall tomatoes, and the unnamed variety that Suna bought now has a fruit. That little ’mater signed Mr. Stripey’s death warrant.

One of the New Guinea Impatiens I transplanted to the front yard has also returned to the earth. About a week ago, it just started dying back. I cut the affected stalk off, but the others soon followed and left a gaping hole. I haven’t got a clue why. The others in the bed are all very happy.

Not much else is going on. TubaBoy brought over a bunch of male friends, and they played D&D late into the night. They were not overly boisterous, but they did make enough noise to let me know they were having fun. Mostly, I tried to stay out of their way and let them have fun. Maybe sometime they will let me play, too. I really enjoyed that game when I was their age, but I stopped playing when I couldn’t find anyone who was interested.

Oh, and I’m putting up some shelves in the guestroom closet. I can get some of my books out of boxes that way. Let’s hope we get some rain tonight. I’ve been doing my part: leaving car windows open and watering the lawn when it clouds up, but still no measurable rain.

---

18 August Update: The kids played again last night. I was able to update the picture to reflect their actual game area. Sigh! I guess I’m getting too old to really want to stay up all hours of the night to play. They didn’t get started until after Suna and I had gone to bed, old fuddies that we are.

Gardening and More Mosquitoes

This yellow mass of #2 Perennial has taken up residence next to Mr. Stripey, the front yard tomato.

I realized today that the effect I wrote about last Sunday and that continued throughout most of the week was just the lull before the storm. Or the intermission between acts might be a better metaphor. The Spring mosquitoes may have died of heat prostration, but the teeny once I mentioned were the new summer crop. Now they are full grown and ravenous. Sigh!

On to better news, which is to say gardening news. To de-stress after returning from selling part of the farm, Suna suggested a trip to the home center to buy some new summer plants. We didn’t go hog-wild, and putting plants in the dirt certainly re-establishes a connection with Mother Nature. We bought:

• Two lovely red caladiums
• A Nanho Purple butterfly bush
• Two pots of three yellow ornamental peppers
• A big bucket of lovely yellow flowers called #2 Perennial

The caladiums are going in a hanging basket in the back yard that once held a sturdy New Guinea impatiens (Cherry Red). That plant has moved to the front bed extension and now lives in the ground. Three of the ornamental peppers also went in the front bed extension.

This ornamental pepper seems quite happy next to the New Guinea Impatiens.

The butterfly bush went at the right side of the house in an area where it may not get enough sun. Suna said that the last one burnt up in the sun, so I decided to try a shadier place. I hope I didn’t kill it by that choice. We’ll see.

Perennial #2 and the remaining ornamental peppers (You gotta love those names!) went in the original new bed in the front yard to replace some heat prostrated petunias. I imagine the other petunias will soon follow their compatriots into the compost pile.

In other news from that bed, the tomato has grown immense. It is even starting to put on those ugly little yellow flowers that are harbingers of tomatoes. One of the peppers I moved to the front has loads of blooms and a couple of fruits. All of the other peppers are still full of lovely dark green foliage, but nothing else.

It’s good to he home and have dirt on my hands. Funny how the earth can absorb all of the tension out of your body and make you whole again.

---

26 June Update: Added photos and captions.

Wall Progress

I am making progress. Only the back remains, but I may have to add another course. I hope not.

I finished the front part of the expanded bed in the front yard. The back still needs doing. But since I had been acquiring some plants for the expansion, I decided to plant them.

The soil is very clay-y there, and I hope I don’t kill my lovelies, which consist of:

• Some of the extra red flowering landscape tray we have been keeping in hanging baskets even though they are not suited to such an application
• A lovely four-pack of New Guinea impatiens that I hope do well
• Two of the pepper plants that have been surviving in the shady back yard but need more sun.

Some time this week or next weekend, I hope to finish the wall. There is enough money on a gift card of Suna’s to pay for the needed stones—unless I have to add another course.

Bush Administration at It Again

This New Guinea Impatiens isn’t a bush, but it has performed like the Bush Administration. First, it exceeded expectations (because they were set so low) by surviving the winter. Then it has failed to produce a single flower so far, not one tangible result.

I found this article to be particularly disturbing. It shows the current administration’s obsession with border security at the expense all else—including common sense, not to mention economic growth. Hasn’t free trade been one of the tenets of our economic policy for the last few decades?

While the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) hasn’t lived up to the expectations of any of its signers, the Bush Administration should not unilaterally decide to abrogate any of its conditions. But then, when did they ever do anything in any way other than unilaterally? They certainly don’t seem to take the will of the people into consideration in anything they do.

But am I paranoid to think that there is a deeper purpose at work here? Walls and fences that keep other people out, also keep us in. Is this a move to prevent the steady trickle of educated workers who have been moving north for the last few years in an effort to escape the totalitarian tendencies and corruption of Bush/Cheney? Are they trying to force Canada to retaliate by closing its border with the US?

Unless McCain “wins” the election this fall, I will be surprised if the current administration relinquishes power without at least attempting a coup. But I don’t really expect them to do that. It is so much easier to rig an election, as they have shown in the last two.

Gardening Happiness

After work last night, I got a chance to plant the new babies we got at the home center Sunday. In a large green planter that was blocking a hole in the fence, I put:

• Chives (ajo morisco)
• Double impatiens (impatiens doble)
• New Guinea impatiens (impatiens de nueva guinea)
• Verbena (3 small from a landscape mix)

Suna had also picked out a pretty yellow pot, into which went:

• Creeping fig (ficus pumilo repens)
• Coral bells amethyst mist (no genus)
• Verbena

Finally, I scattered more of the verbena in some other pots and placed them around the patio. I still have some left for the front flower bed. I hope to add some pictures later.