“Remoted” – Day 443 (Wednesday)

Irises starting to pop.

The weather was nice and the flowers are popping. Time was spent in the yard before and after work. Before work, the clumps of grass left by the mower last night were raked into four or five heaps not unlike mini hay piles. As I raked, the adorable pups from next door ran over to the fence to say hello and have their chins rubbed. I will miss them when they move at the end of the month.

The yard waste barrel was very nearly dragged out back to collect the clippings, but there was a fear that the yard waste pickup truck would come in the meantime. Yard waste is collected on trash day. Theoretically, anyway. Sometimes it’s a day late, sometimes two. This week, trash and recycling pickups were on Tuesday due to the holiday, but yard waste wasn’t collected. It turned out it wasn’t collected today either, but it would take until after work before I knew that.

Explosion of roses.

The little haystacks sat in the yard all day, drying in the sun. After work the barrel was dragged to the back yard to collect the clippings and then replaced at the curb. This is the sort of stuff I now have myself convinced is “exercise.” It’s generally so brief that it barely counts as activity. Fifty steps dragging a barrel is not exactly aerobic or weight bearing. 

A tour of the garden occurred, under the flimsy guise of “walking.” The entire grounds can be covered in mere minutes, so from a step count perspective, it’s probably barely a couple hundred. I could check it with the pedometer, but that seems embarrassing. Anyway, the big two-tone purple irises bloomed last week, and now the smaller, darker ones are opening. 

What is this mess?

The rosebush out front has exploded with blooms. I don’t understand that plant at all. Each year, I hack it back and each summer it grows back even bigger. It’s now sprawling all over the place, invading the yard, and my arms have been shredded by thorns just walking by it. It looks nice against the picket fence, but it needs some control. Last year, or maybe the year before, I tied it up with gift wrap ribbon, due to a lack of proper string. Unfortunately, now there is also no more gift ribbon, either. There is a box of wires and cables that could be pressed into service. 

A few petunias left over from the Friday cemetery planting were finally set into a planter. Mom said they were my payment for digging the holes and pulling out the grass. The big metal tub used for the frustrating non-crops of tomatoes, basil, and other veggies the past few years is now full of mystery green seedlings. And I mean full. It’s being treated as an experiment. They could be weeds or they could be future flowers from the seeds of the flowers that were scattered in there last year. There are three identifiable marigolds in the mess and one tall thing that looks familiar, and a lot of who knows what else. Eventually, the sprouts will be revealed.