Greetings and salutations, everyone; yes, once again it is I, Chess the purebred border collie, filling in for the guy I live with, and here to bring you the latest news from our very white garden. You may remember me from such white-oriented posts as “The White Stuff” and “A Snow Day”, among so many, many others.
Here I am in a characteristic, slightly snow-bedizened pose.
I bet you can tell, just from the title of today’s post, not to mention from my picture above, that it’s snowing here. It’s been snowing all day long. This is really the only time that we have day-long precipitation, when it snows. Once in a very long while it rains all day here, but that’s pretty rare indeed.
The guy I live with says that now that the big pinyon is gone (which he still feels kind of weird about cutting down), it looks like the shed has a smokestack, but that’s a feeder full of thistle seed. The shed is pretty cozy, with a dirt floor, but I’m glad I can stay inside when it’s cold. The evergreen you see to the right of the shed is a pinyon, by the way. 
I’m doing much better. I thought I should say that. Apparently I just had an episode that freaked out the guy I live with a whole lot. We went for walks in the snow today, but I could tell that he was glad it wasn’t an hour-long walk like some have been.
I did want to show what has happened to the pie pumpkin that was left out on the patio table. We both knew this would happen. 
The The guy I live with stuck his head out of the sliding glass door (after opening it, of course), and told the squirrel not to make a mess. Like that did any good.
I don’t know if I’ve talked about this wrought-iron furniture before. It was the guy I live with’s grandmother’s, and was originally white, then got painted green, and then black, and gradually the paint peeled away, showing all three colors, and my mommy said to leave it that way, that it gave it some class. That’s her stuff on the table. The guy I live with sows seed on the table, with the pots in a dishpan full of water, even in weather like this. Sometimes he starts a fire in the charcoal grill, to warm his hands, or (more likely) just to be different, but usually the seeds are sown outside, so as not to make a mess in the house, and then the pots are put on the shelves on the patio, unless there’s no snow, and then they can be put into the seed frames.
And incidentally, my mommy would save the seeds from the pie pumpkins, and roast them in the oven, and then salt them. They were really good. I know.
I’m not sure what the guy I live with is going to do if this turns out to be a long winter, with snow on the ground for months. He says he’s going to “think a lot”, which makes me a little uneasy. Most of the gardening takes the form of seed sowing and things like that. Sometimes he reads about gardening. But I’m feeling much better, and I guess that’s the most important thing. The cold weather makes my coat extremely soft.
I guess that’s it for today. 
Until next time, then.
the miserable gardener 
Bedizened and be-dazzled, dear DoG. So, snow. If it makes your fur coat feel especially soft, then that’s ONE good thing about snow.
So, the pumpkin smorgasbord made me laugh. Starting in September, here on the Isle of Long, I start to examine the fungi that shows up in woodland crevices in our moist and warm Fall season. I’m look ing for teeth marks. Twice in my life I have watched a squirrel gnaw at a mushroom and it is the cutest thing. So, squirrels. The ultimate proof that such a thing as a “hive mind” among mammals does indeed exist.
So, Winter. The active gardening is done. So, what now? i think this is what my cats call “the Existential Big One”. According to them, Winter is for glomming onto every source of heat available, making yourself supremely comfortable, and dreaming your life away until May.
So, snow. If you were listening to NPR on Saturday morning you heard the Standards and Practices editor (Mark Memmott) say that the number One complaint from NPR listeners is when NPR hosts use “So” to begin a sentence. Count me in, NPR Grammar Police. It seems that *everyone* interviewed on NPR ALSO uses “So” to begin their sentences (mostly in response to a question posed by an equally So-addicted NPR interviewer). Also, everyone under the age of 39 “cracks” their voice and it pains me. Hmmmm….is it the inevitability of Winter that makes one so radio-in-the -comfort-of-home focused? So, I think so, Yes.
Thanks. So, here we are sort of at the beginning of winter, though the guy I live with, who incidentally claims he’s been on NPR twice, says we really have a month more of autumn, but also says whatever, and we’re not sure what we’re going to do. I have this idea of long naps and things like that. And both Nietzsche and Edna Ferber wrote books beginning So, and Kipling with one sort of ending in So. There are seed lists to wait for, and then to order from, and so travel vicariously to far-off places like the Kunlun Shan or Boz Dag or Issyk-Kul (called the “hot lake” because it’s so deep it never freezes), or Khan Tengri, King of the Ghosts, in the Tien Shan, or Mt. Ararat. So, the guy I live with will probably wind up watching TV. Really, DVDs that are played on the TV.
Glad you’re feeling better you softie you
Thanks, I am. Not having anyone to offer a second opinion doesn’t help the guy I live with so much, but he might talk to my doctor tomorrow who will explain things to him. It could have been the tiny slice of raw milk Manchego that did it to me, on hindsight.
Oh, Chess, your place looks so pretty in the snow. Snow even makes messy pumpkin innards look graceful and decorative, just as three contrasting layers of paint gives soul to wrought iron furniture. Feel a bit shocked to read you were suffering inflammation – OF COURSE it was the tiny slice of raw milk Manchego that did it to you – while I was off eating and drinking my way through New Orleans. Heirloom roses of Louis Armstrong Park were involved too, and I was successful bidder on “Roses Their History Development and Cultivation” by J. H. Pemberton, first addition. All this while you, dear Chess, were engulfed in inner flames. Happy and pleased to read that you are now recovered. Do remind the guy you live with that he has plenty of second opinion available in your readers. My opinion now is Stay Away from Raw Milk Cheese. Second opinion: stay warm and cozy, Chess.
Thanks; it probably was the Manchego. I understand it’s all gone now. Probably thrown away, huh. It was really good, though. I do suffer from some sort of inflammatory bowel thing and it’s quite common in dogs, and can actually carry us away. “Pemberton as in the musks?”, the guy I live with asks, who really should get back to his cleaning and laundry-doing. (I guess the right word here is “laundering”.) He also says that there are Certain Plants which do not appreciate a 70 degree (Fahrenheit) drop in temperature over a 48 hour period. He says those plants are stupid and not worth growing. It turns out that not only can we have protein in our old age, even should, but eggs are good too, so I get half a hardboiled egg as well, custom-mashed, of course. The guy I live with says he hopes I’ll go back to regular food pretty soon. Uh huh.
Yes, Pemberton, hybridizer of “Cornelia” among many, many others. Today my dogs received raw (!) egg in canned tuna water with a sprinkle of supplement powder and liquid fish emulsion. A treat when I make tuna salad for myself.
I think there was a ‘Cornelia’ here, ages ago. And several others. Things change. I also think raw egg is good for me but cooked is good too. The guy I live with heated cooked rice with Pacific chicken broth and then ran it through the min-processor, so “there wouldn’t be so much rice flung all over the kitchen floor”. I don’t know who he thinks is flinging rice. Tuna water sounds pretty good; when my mommy made the guy I live with’s lunch, to take to work, which she did every single day they were together except for one day when she was sick, and it was tuna salad sandwiches, my buddy Slipper and I would get to lick the spatula when the tuna was done being made. Or if it was egg salad. I still remember that.
Your feeling better is definitely most important.
Yes, thank you; I’m feeling pretty good right now.