Scratch That

Spring has been making an effort, and seems finally to have overcome winter for dominance of the weather.  The days are longer, things have bloomed or are blooming, the popcorn tree has exploded pink petals all over our yard, and the iris are early with their enthusiastic coloring of the front bed - usually they don't burst open until May or June.

The blueberry bushes are heavy with green berries that will tease me for months with their slow ripening.

The Bradford Pear trees are long past their horrid flowering stench.

It's still cool enough at night for a blanket, but warm enough in the daytime hours to allow for shorts if one is so inclined.

Everywhere, life is...lifing.  And everywhere, everywhere, everywhere, things are pollinating.

Ah, pollen.  Wonderful stuff.  If you're a plant.

For a human with allergies, pollen is a special kind of hell.

Lort, but my eyes itch.  I mean, ITCH!  You know, the kind of itch that feels like it'd only be satisfied with a cheese grater?  My eyes itch that way.  Also, my scalp.  I look like one of those old Head and Shoulders advertisements, always scratching.  Gah!!!  My face itches.  My arms.  My legs.  Inside my ears, even!

The world is an odd sort of yellowish-green.  My driveway looks like aliens sneezed all over it.  Puddles are rimmed with bright yellow ribbons, and you can track how quickly they evaporate by the concentric pollen outlines left behind.  The outdoor cats are all the same color, and when they sneeze or move, they poof out pollen-y clouds.

It's a real effort not to scratch.  It won't do any good - short of remaining under water until summer takes his turn on the seasonal wheel, there's no avoiding pollen.  Allergy medications aren't reliable, and they're expensive, so I just have to endure. And shower frequently (I guess that's an upside for anyone hanging out with me, but my water bill gets outrageous this time of year).

Anyway, it builds character having to unglue my eyes every morning, right?  Right???

So, What Does It Mean...

...when you dream you're driving through Europe in a cute little convertible with Clint Eastwood, and you stop at your French grandmother's Italian chalet (because doesn't everyone think "chalet" when they think of Italy??) for the night and he won't sleep with you and and you tell him you know he won't sleep with you because he's scared of you because you're so much younger, but he's hiding behind some excuse and you think letting the age gap keep you from having fun is specious, and you also know that he won't take some movie roll because it's the male lead and he thinks he can't carry it off any more, but he's making some other lame excuse about the script, and he's pissed off because you're right so he goes and sulks in the bathroom all night and you sleep alone, leave together the next day, part ways a little while later, and then your French grandmother calls and bitches you out because you left the bathroom of her Italian Chalet a shambles and she has to replace the heated tile you tore up and you have to explain that you never even saw the bathroom because Clint Eastwood wouldn't let you in because he was having a hissy and you didn't know it was torn up, and who has a chalet in Italy anyway?? and she's all "Well, if it was Clint Eastwood, then..." and you think that sucks because if it was you who'd torn up the bathroom, her head would be spinning around on her neck and she'd be breathing fire?

Someone and I agree is may mean it's inadvisable to eat jalapeno cheese fries before bed. What's your take?

Sorry for the absence - it's Spring, the days are behaving themselves nicely and demanding I go outside and air out my lungs (and fill them with pollen which will have me sneezing, hacking, coughing, and rheumy eyed, and isn't THAT a pretty mental picture?), I've been stressed about some things at Casa de Crazy, and I'm getting ready to set up and run a little booth for a friend at a show next weekend, which partly means I have a ton of sewing to do (among other things) and can't even be bothered to separate my thoughts into real paragraphs but instead am forced to write in run-on sentences.

I'll try not to be so lame next time I write...at this rate that'll be sometime in 2012.

Well, Hello There

The denizens of Casa de Crazy spent much of the day outside...and can you blame us, when it was in the mid-sixties all day? The Evil Genius even manged to get a wee sunburn. Nothing horrible, just a little pink here and there.

While Someone worked his cute tushie off, I spent a chunk of time whittling wands our of Forsythia branches. I even made a little one for Bird, who promptly asked me why it wasn't working...he was trying to magic some plants from outside where Someone was re-potting them into his room. I told him he was doing it wrong and to practice. He was busy all afternoon.

Some neighbors put in an appearance, announcing that it may yet freeze, it may yet rain, but Spring is truly nigh.

See that speck a bit left of center? Bat.

Honest, look.

Lookit 'im go!

He (or she) was having a feast, and there were several others enjoying an evening's flight, too.

Go, bats, go - they eat mosquitoes by the ton and are most welcome here.

Hello, friends!

Then there was this fellow in the woods.
The first of his clan to make himself known, but there will be many more in the next few days - they don't take snow (hah!) for an answer.

Sprung

Or at least, Springing...

Rainy Morning Thoughts

Ah, the soft patter of fat raindrops plopping on the roof. It is raining, has been since yesterday. It comes in waves, soft but intense, then more insistent. It seems overnight, the world has gone green. Out front, the pink popcorn tree is beginning to...well...pop. Fat pink blossom clusters are bursting from their tight green buds; first on the branch tips, then parading inward until the whole tree is covered. It has a proper name, but it has been "the pink popcorn tree" since our first Spring in this house, when I watched it turn from winter gray to frothy pink confection in a matter of days.


Out behind the house, the woodland lasses are veiling themselves, preparing for the heavy-handed Summer sun. Palest green, most delicate, flutters as a backdrop for the redbuds, which do not bloom red, after all, but rather a sort of lavender-pink. The color is almost an illusion, acting for all the world like a shy lavender cloud, ducking behind the larger trees when you look straight at it, unsure of its finery.


Bolder are the dogwoods. Striking white pronounces their place in the wood, the occasional pink sport equally fearless in presenting itself for admiration. The shout for attention, vying as they do with the ornamental trees around the house.


The bright yellow forsythia has been waving his kraken-y arms at us for weeks, and doesn't look to be giving in soon. Now he has a bit of green on him, a foil for those happy blossoms.


One of my Dwarf Iris is blooming, the one called Alpine Lake. Here is a picture from last year (it's too wet to go take one right now):

I bought most of them for their names - someone has had fun walking along the iris beds and thinking of striking labels, haven't they? The dwarf iris are around my now defunct (banned because of the drought) fountain - Bedford Lilac and Alpine Lake. The Bearded iris are out by the mailbox, all jumble into one bed (which, I am told, is a no-no. Oops. I have to separate them soon, anyway, so perhaps I'll give them their own places this fall). Anvil of Darkness. Badlands. Alaskan Seas. Before the Storm. Blue Crusader. Metolious Blues. Hello Darkness. Stellar Lights. San Juan Silver (which really is so white it looks like silver). Tempting Fate. Fatal Attraction. Midnight Revelry. Don't they sound yummy? They've come back for three years, now, and I am always delighted to see the greenery poking its spiky way skyward - I have such a poor record with gardens and flowers that I am never certain anything I plant will survive.


It's best if I plant trees, vines, and bulbs, things that like me to put their feet in the earth and then walk away.


I believe that at least some of the morning glories will be back, too. Oh, the drought has been hard on the lovelies - the pale blue ones are gone for good, I fear, except for the few photographs I have of them (my photo avatar thingy on Blogger is a detail of one of them). I can't seem to find seeds anywhere, and I got them as part of a mix called "Glacier Moon" that isn't on the market any more. It had the pale blue and the medium blue in it, but the pale ones didn't come back as readily. Somehow, some purple velvet glories have found their way to our trellis, and they do just fine. I never know what's what until they bloom!


This year, I would like to put in some grape hyacinth around the mailbox - I must see if they go in during the Spring or the Fall. Mum has some at her house, and they are striking.

I need to mulch before long. All of this lovely rain, I want to keep some of it in the soil. I also want to put in some soaker hose, on the off chance the watering ban is lifted a bit. In the meantime, I am permitted to hand water plants, or water food gardens, but I usually hope for rain and leave it at that. If we don't regain our balance this year, though, I may have to take drastic measures to keep the iris and the glories going - they won't survive another year of scant water. I think it's time to invest in a rain-barrel watering system.


For now, though, my bit of Earth and I will revel in the blessed drops falling upon us and hope for a wet Spring, a kindly Summer, and a refilling of the water coffers.