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Fan of Rain, not BP
Jun. 8th, 2010 10:09 amI adore rainy days like this one, especially since yesterday was so beautiful that I was distracted. I sat on my front porch, writing, but when I think I look up... and I saw the outside, calling to me to plant a boulevard garden. Which I did.
We went to Shady Acres Herb Farm on Sunday, which is all the way out in Chaska or just beyond, and bought a ton of herbs. Mason is a big fan of parsley, so we got two whole flats of curly parsley for his garden and mine. We got sweet basil, dill, thyme, garden sage, greek oregano, and (because my grandmother used to grow them) ground cherries. Shawn got some hot peppers -- Thai and jalepeno. Mason got a pumpkin (which I still need to find room for somewhere in the back).
But in the new boulevard garden -- which is one of the few parts of our yard that's not completely shady and not already occupied -- I planted two butterfly bushes, Russian sage, and a group of lavendar. None of which, I should say, I've ever had much success with before, but I'm hoping that their new super-sunny location will suit them better.
I wish we had the kind of room that Shady Acres has out at their farm, because they had the coolest "faerie garden" out there. They'd put a tiny castle (probably meant for an aquarium) in the middle of this circle of all sorts of thyme. The thyme happened to blooming and was this gorgeous riot of pinks and white. It was really something. I was really hoping they'd have a picture of it on their website, but I didn't see one. Anyway, it was totally worth the drive. Mason and I also spotted three painted turtles having a conference in the little pond they have out there, as well as a few bull frogs and one humming bird.
Just thinking about humming birds makes me freaked out about the oil spew in the Gulf. So many birds go through that area during their migration, including the Minnesota loon. What's it going to be like when our loons and hummingbirds come back all oil slicked... if they come back at all?
I just donated a small amount to the Gulf. I'm sure all you savvy Interwebs people have already seen this, but Cherie Priest has a lovely list of things you can do to help. Check out her post: Things You Can Do About the Oil Spill.
Today is apparently World Oceans Day and the Huffington Post is encouraging people to Meetup Everywhere to Work Together to Help the Oil Spill.
I know people have oil spill fatigue/disaster, but our ocean is probably the single most important thing to protect and preserve. Everything depends on it, and in so many ways we don't even really understand. More people have been in space than have been to the bottom of the ocean. We've only explored 1% of the ocean -- so much of its life exists at depths below one mile. It's almost incomprehensible....
However, in a more microcosom view, I wanted to tell everyone about my fish disaster averted. Just before we left for LaCrosse, I bought a new whisper-ma-phone (air compressor) for my tank, and the sudden influx of oxygen caused a mold bloom on one of my oldest fish, Joe. I quickly dosed the tank with fungicide and did a lot of feverent praying. The next day I thought he looked a little better, so I cleaned the tank and left for LaCrosse. We came home to happy fish and a mold-free tank. It was really rather miraculous.
Also, in the good news department, I have a radio gig lined up for July 20 at 7:00 pm on KFAI's "Write on Radio" show in their new time slot. Cool Yule, no?
Well, I need to go home and get writing on the novel due July 15.
We went to Shady Acres Herb Farm on Sunday, which is all the way out in Chaska or just beyond, and bought a ton of herbs. Mason is a big fan of parsley, so we got two whole flats of curly parsley for his garden and mine. We got sweet basil, dill, thyme, garden sage, greek oregano, and (because my grandmother used to grow them) ground cherries. Shawn got some hot peppers -- Thai and jalepeno. Mason got a pumpkin (which I still need to find room for somewhere in the back).
But in the new boulevard garden -- which is one of the few parts of our yard that's not completely shady and not already occupied -- I planted two butterfly bushes, Russian sage, and a group of lavendar. None of which, I should say, I've ever had much success with before, but I'm hoping that their new super-sunny location will suit them better.
I wish we had the kind of room that Shady Acres has out at their farm, because they had the coolest "faerie garden" out there. They'd put a tiny castle (probably meant for an aquarium) in the middle of this circle of all sorts of thyme. The thyme happened to blooming and was this gorgeous riot of pinks and white. It was really something. I was really hoping they'd have a picture of it on their website, but I didn't see one. Anyway, it was totally worth the drive. Mason and I also spotted three painted turtles having a conference in the little pond they have out there, as well as a few bull frogs and one humming bird.
Just thinking about humming birds makes me freaked out about the oil spew in the Gulf. So many birds go through that area during their migration, including the Minnesota loon. What's it going to be like when our loons and hummingbirds come back all oil slicked... if they come back at all?
I just donated a small amount to the Gulf. I'm sure all you savvy Interwebs people have already seen this, but Cherie Priest has a lovely list of things you can do to help. Check out her post: Things You Can Do About the Oil Spill.
Today is apparently World Oceans Day and the Huffington Post is encouraging people to Meetup Everywhere to Work Together to Help the Oil Spill.
I know people have oil spill fatigue/disaster, but our ocean is probably the single most important thing to protect and preserve. Everything depends on it, and in so many ways we don't even really understand. More people have been in space than have been to the bottom of the ocean. We've only explored 1% of the ocean -- so much of its life exists at depths below one mile. It's almost incomprehensible....
However, in a more microcosom view, I wanted to tell everyone about my fish disaster averted. Just before we left for LaCrosse, I bought a new whisper-ma-phone (air compressor) for my tank, and the sudden influx of oxygen caused a mold bloom on one of my oldest fish, Joe. I quickly dosed the tank with fungicide and did a lot of feverent praying. The next day I thought he looked a little better, so I cleaned the tank and left for LaCrosse. We came home to happy fish and a mold-free tank. It was really rather miraculous.
Also, in the good news department, I have a radio gig lined up for July 20 at 7:00 pm on KFAI's "Write on Radio" show in their new time slot. Cool Yule, no?
Well, I need to go home and get writing on the novel due July 15.
