Greetings and salutations, everyone; yes, once again it is I, Mani the purebred border collie, filling in for the guy I live with, and here to bring you the latest news from our garden, and, of course to wish everyone a very happy New Year. You may remember me from such posts as “An Almost Antlerless Day”, among so many, many others.
Here I am in a characteristic pose.
This is me doing a bit of convalescing, since early this morning I broke a toenail and bled all over the place. The guy I live with wasn’t sure what to do, because he wasn’t completely awake, and had forgotten that Chess, the purebred border collie who lived here before me, bled all over the living room carpet when the guy I live with tried to clip his toenails.
I seem to be okay now, but I don’t get to go on walks today, just in case. I did let him look at my toe, to be sure, but I wasn’t hugely happy about it. I spent the morning upstairs. Those are the railings on the stair, in front of me. I’m not imprisoned, if you were worried. 
As usual, practically nothing is happening here (besides my broken toenail). There is one pathetic snowdrop trying to flower.
The guy I live with says that all the early flowering snowdrops are going into the bulb frame this next spring, where they can get properly watered, and then covered, if necessary, when it snows. All of the other early ones are under snow on the north side of the house, which I hear is a dumb place to have them.
One kind of weird thing: this catalog came yesterday and the guy I live with got all excited about growing some vegetables.
He’s ordered from Hudson just about forever, but mostly things like California poppies, which you can get in bulk.
If you’re worried that he’s losing his mind, wanting to grow vegetables in a garden this dry, well, I wondered the same thing, until I found out that they won’t be grown here, but in his friend’s garden. Whew, huh. Heirloom corn and squash and stuff like that. There’s an irrigation system in place, (and little children to enjoy the vegetables and watch them grow) and so everything will be fine.
Oh, and speaking of seeds, some of the irises have leaves now.
It’s sunny here, as you can tell, but not incredibly warm. It was nice yesterday, and I stood outside to have my picture taken. The snow isn’t melting as fast as someone here would like, and it’s supposed to get cold again next week. I knew that because of all the moaning and groaning.
Now that my toe is better, this afternoon, I thought we should walk around the garden at the year’s end, and look at stuff.
This is looking southwest, toward the shed, and is about the first thing you see (besides me) when you come into the garden. 
The old-time steel garden fence you see at right, in the picture below, is to keep me from romping in the sand pile. The guy I live with says there are “fancy plants” growing there. Most of the cages you see here and there are to keep rabbits from eating crocus leaves. 
You can see the poles for owls, here. A couple of them are leaning more than they should, but it was really windy a few days ago.
A part of the fence around “the enclosure” was blown down. More repairs to make. I guess the wood rots here, because this part of the garden is watered regularly. There was a yellow-jacket nest in the mouth of the big metal chicken this summer. The grate you see is for a fire pit, but that’s not used any more. 
Back toward the house. You can see my toe is much better now. 
That’s about it for today. I do have one picture of me taken from the front yard, looking at the little garden under the living room window. More of that old-time steel garden fencing there. And with that, I’ll wish you Happy New Year again.
Until next time, then.
This is what it’s like here, today.
It’s five degrees out there. Minus fifteen Celsius. Supposed to get colder tonight, and so we’re staying in, mostly.
The guy I live with wanted to do a long post about how much he dislikes snow, but I overruled him. I like snow. So I’ll just say it’s super-cold out there, and go back to what I was doing.
the miserable gardener 