the miserable gardener

Greetings and salutations, everyone; yes, once again it is I, your popular host, Mani the purebred border collie, here today to bring you up to date on all the happenings around here. You may remember me from such posts as “Biscuit Time”, among so many, many others.

Here I am in a characteristic pose.You can see that the snow is almost gone. It’s been here like forever. We are not used to having snow on the ground for so very long.

Because of all the snow, and especially ice, the guy I live with did something to his leg, and so he’s been laid up for quite a while now. He went to the doctor one day, and then to have ultrasound and an x-ray another day, and what it is is a ruptured Baker’s cyst. Behind the knee. He felt it snap on one of our walks.
If it sounds painful, well, it is. He’s been using a cane to walk, and lying in bed a lot, with an ice bag on his swollen leg. He’s very good at lying in bed, and so, as it turns out, am I.

Meanwhile, the weather has been very nice, that is to say “normal”, for once. In the mid-sixties, Fahrenheit. (Say about 17C.)
And there are now snowdrops.

A bunch are escaping into the front yard, too. The guy I live with says they might find more freedom to spread, there.This is one of the Greatorex doubles, called ‘Cordelia’.Well that’s pretty much it. There are some crocuses in flower, too, so the only complaining I hear is about the leg. I haven’t been able to go on my walks, though, but the leg should get better eventually. 

Until next time, then.

Greetings and salutations, everyone; yes, once again it is I, your popular host, Mani the purebred border collie, here to bring you up to date on the news from our garden and its environs. You may remember me from such posts as “Another Cold Front”, among so many, many others.

Here I am in a characteristic pose. Rather pensive, don’t you think?

There hasn’t been much to do around here lately, because it’s just been snowing, and snowing, and snowing. It’s snowing right now. The guy I live with wonders out loud if it’s ever going to stop. Next month is the snowiest month of the year here, and April has been a pretty cold and snowy month, this century, so he says, with these constant below-normal temperatures, we’ll have a short window in maybe July when it isn’t snowing.
The guy I live with said it did no good to reminisce about “the old days”, when we had snow and then very warm temperatures to melt the snow, because we’ve only had about four or five days of warmth since, well, whenever. Since a long time. This is the way it is, now.

Anyway, this happened last week.And now we have less garden:It was pretty fun to bark at everyone while they were working. The guy I live with is pretending to be nonchalant about this, but I know he’s much more chalant than he lets on. Some of the plants that had to be dug up might live. You never know.

So, that’s pretty much it, except for what went on a few days ago. The guy I live with went over to watch his neighbor work on cars, and he was actually able to help, with some of the stuff.
A socket got dropped down into the engine, the way it always happens, according to the guy I live with, and when they looked down into the engine, there was a rabbit sleeping there. They tried all sorts of ways to get the rabbit to leave, but it wouldn’t leave.
The guy I live with even asked the guy who came to inspect the new asphalt patch in front of his house if he knew how to remove “an engine rabbit”.  He didn’t.
Eventually when the car was put up on blocks, the rabbit decided to leave its warm and cozy spot, and raced away, so there was a happy end to this story.

And despite the seeming hopelessness of the weather situation, the guy I live with placed an order with Odyssey Bulbs. If nothing else, he said, the bulbs could go into the frames, where, even now, there are snowdrops and crocuses in flower.

And I do get to hunt for voles, in the snow. 

Until next time, then.