Goings on in the Dirt in Everyday Ramblings

Late lilac garden with interesting sky. The city has issued a proclamation about how we are a city of gardens and apparently next year this time there is going to be a conference of horticulturists and garden scientists at the American Public Gardens Association annual get together. And we will have modified Rose Festival activities this year.

Our case counts are dropping, but we are still identifying over 300 cases per day. The death rate is dropping back to early days numbers and that is good. I worry about long term effects for those unvaccinated folks getting the virus now.

Diego and I had a challenging day with his IBS a few days ago. He is fine now, sitting in my lap. We are going to the vet next Monday for a monitoring visit. The poor guy, it is hard to find balance.

Back before I met Mr. Finch, I was seeing a fellow from Victoria B.C., an industrial chemist. A good guy. He had a fabulous garden and was generous. One day when I came home there was a ceramic statuette of a wise man with a staff in colored robes in the big flowerpot on my porch. They call them mud men.

(That is the flowerpot that Mr. Finch turned over and sat on while he smoked out there for years and it now holds my birdbath.)

I have always felt regret that I wasn’t kinder to the Canadian Chemist. It is one of the few regrets I carry these days. We weren’t compatible on a number of levels…he loved fireworks, omg, how he loved them…and we were both attached emotionally to other folks. But still, he was kind and generous…

Anyway, when I woke up Tuesday the mud man had been rotated on the patio. I thought maybe the young pigeons had done it, I have a pair that have been hanging around that area. When I woke up yesterday The mud man was broken into a number of pieces.

There was a creature out there. At first, I thought it was a rat, it was a little smaller than rat size but bigger than a mouse. Then I thought maybe it was a baby possum. I have had an adult possum out there before. Eek. They are so scary. But this guy had fur. It turns out it was a mole. He must have scrabbled over the patio well wall.

This is the problem with living alone. Critter displacement is all on you. I did consider bringing Charity into the mix because she seriously loves all creatures, except maybe ants.

In the end I was able to get him into a shoe box and let him go up in the rhododendrons above where he happily dug a hole in the mud where the morning sprinkler had done its thing. With this drought I am pretty sure we will have water usage restrictions soon.

It feels odd, this coming out of lockdown, the remarkable heat early in June, the specter of wildfires and now the era ending breaking of the mud man by a wild animal that was waylaid and looking for food.

This morning I got up and cleaned my refrigerator out. Including getting rid of the white grape juice and flat Sprite I bought for colonoscopy prep two years ago that I did not finish.

Yesterday morning I managed to touch the wall twice with a foot in my attempts to kick up into handstand. We only have three more sessions together. I am working with the fear.

The whole Handstand Club has been a positive experience all around. I am stronger and more flexible, and my back hurts a lot less and all that was the point. I am pretty critical of most yoga teachers but there are a few that stand out and she is one. And she doesn’t teach classic yoga, she teaches “Mindful Strength”.

And she has an adorable dog named Crow who looks a lot like Frieda.

The leaf miners are still enjoying my beet and chard leaves, but I am keeping an eye on them and removing the affected areas. I got some netting to keep the bugs out but now I need to figure out frames to support it.

Mrs. Sherlock is taking me to the big fancy local nursery tomorrow after we do a long walk on the East Side. I can ask them about Spinosad with a penetrant. It was buggy a couple of days ago, so I sprayed the Safer Soap on all the veggies. They like that. Next stop on this train…blueberries. All the strawberries in the garden are coming on.

Last updated June 04, 2021