My Drains are Mooing Plus I Go On and ON About My Garden Plans

[botias]

I went hunting the other night. I hunt at night with a flashlight. I know it's illegal, but frankly, not too many game wardens where I am. There's no sport to it really; I just pick them off one after the other. Sometimes my 5yo comes with me, sometimes he's too scared. If I didn't do it, they would mow my garden plants. The snails I feel a little bad about, but the slugs I have no mercy for. I filled my margarine tub about a third full of the voracious little land mollusks. I have no ducks to enjoy this bounty, so down the toilet they go.

It is raining. Somewhere just outside, there is a noise that sounds like a 'cow in a can' having a moment of private ecstasy, or the cooing of a cow-sized pigeon. Over and over and over again. I'm guessing it's related to the rain somehow. Happily, it's too absurd to be annoying. Day before yesterday, I did my first outdoor planting of the season. Yay! Daffodils. Seventy of the little suckers. Yes, this should have been done in November, but *shrug*. My vegetable boxes got their first new additions: carrot, radish, and lamb's lettuce seed. The carrots I planted last fall made it through the winter more or less, the losses mostly due to slug depredation. I also planted my indoor seeds, also a bit late, but 4 weeks rather than four months. I planted marigolds (six six-packs!), sunflowers, (slugs will take a bus across town to mow sunflower sprouts if direct sown. Even when I was living in the desert these poor, dessicated slugs would crawl pathetically from under a rock and eat them flush to the soil before returning to their wait for the Rockies to wear away and the continent to drift back to warmer, wetter latitudes.) tomatoes, salvia, chinese lanterns, brussels sprouts, sea holly, purple millet, and bright red lettuce. I can't wait to see what my garden does this year! I've spent much time staring and thinking and planning. I want to add a planting box on the concrete pad next to my back porch. I should be able to grow veggies all winter long in this most sunny and sheltered of spots. I was going to do this in brick, but have decided that the brick is all curved and this will have right angles, and the 'right angles' stuff is all wood so this must be wood as well. I explained this to my husband just because I knew he would enjoy thinking that I was eccentric, but I am also totally right.

This year I am keeping track of what I plant and when, and when it sprouts/flowers/fruits. With a bit of luck, I should still have flowers at Thanksgiving. Still to plant: Cilantro, Summer Savory, Bush Beans, Cardinal Vine. Very likely a few varieties of Basil. But not just yet. It was sad to watch the Basil limp through our cool early summer. Perhaps I will plant it in June or something; the scents/colors/flowers are just too wonderful to resist.

On the fic front, I have reached the stage of the fic where I am convinced that it is deadly boring and unlikely ever to improve, and I have also been very busy with other things. But! I plan to soldier onward, because I know it's just a phase. Deadly bore or no, I like it and some other folks like it too.

I still think about Persephone from time to time. I would like to continue with it, but wonder if I can or should or will.

P.S. Am I the only one whose house plants turn into ant condos every winter? I flood them out, only to have them return within a week or two.

Comments

[cleoius.livejournal.com]

No, don't doubt your fic!! It's L and A goodness!!

[botias.livejournal.com]

Thanks! *gloms onto this encouragement*

[shinyshinybaum.livejournal.com]

I own one plant. It's an indoor one and won't stop growing. Plz send slugs.

[botias.livejournal.com]

*snickers* So pinch it back severely then. :) Of course, that will only make it bushier, but it will be smaller in the meantime.

[petzipellepingo.livejournal.com]

"sigh" I only wish we could start planting around here, it was 7 degrees yesterday.

[botias.livejournal.com]

*feels for you* If I recall, 10 degrees was painful and -10 was WTF!!

I like your icon! Victory gardens for the win!!

[petzipellepingo.livejournal.com]

That's the work of callirhoe.

[brunettepet.livejournal.com]

Ambitious plans, indeed! We just took the cover off the bed, and I'm waiting a few weeks before putting in basil and fennel and peppers. We got nothing last year because it was too hot and dry. I hope it's milder this summer. Slugs and snails are not endangered, and, thankfully I've never seen any on a cross town bus!

Oh, I think about "Persephone" periodically and give it a re-read. What you've already written is fantastic, but I'd love to know the ending you'd planned.

[botias.livejournal.com]

Why do you cover your flower bed? To discourage weeds? Mmmm!! Basil and peppers. I didn't discover spicy food 'til my mid twenties, but I'm a happy convert.

It's when you don't see them on the bus seat that is the worst. :/

Thanks! :D I know how it ends, if that helps.

[brunettepet.livejournal.com]

I stupidly put in things that keep growing (chard, parsley, peppers) and I feel terrible that they're still trying when it starts freezing! I just throw all the pots that would otherwise have to come inside under the cover, so it's win-win!

No, it doesn't help, but I'm glad you have closure :D

[botias.livejournal.com]

Ah! Yes. I had hundreds of baby marigolds... well, I'd best not talk about it. *wonders if I could have saved them somehow*

XD Well, I just mean that it actually has an ending, which puts it one step closer than if I had no clue how to end the thing. But! But! I did post that non-con you expressed an interest in, and there is snark.

[beanbeans.livejournal.com]

Still to plant: Cilantro, Summer Savory, Bush Beans, Cardinal Vine. Very likely a few varieties of Basil. But not just yet. It was sad to watch the Basil limp through our cool early summer. Perhaps I will plant it in June or something; the scents/colors/flowers are just too wonderful to resist.

You write sentences like that and then you doubt your writing? Uh HUH.

Permission to thwap you, ma'am?

:P

Your plantings sounds wonderful. I want to come over and inhale the smell of all that newly turned dirt and those lemony flavored new shoots and baby leaves. Ahhhhh. :)

We have house plants galore, but the ants seem to avoid them. I'm betting that's because they're mostly ivy and other inedible things, though.

Happy gardening!

[botias.livejournal.com]

Aw, you know how it is! Thanks, beans. *blushes* If I did continue 'Persephone' would you still be willing to beta?

Lemony flavored? Would that be the Summer Savory and/or Cilantro? I've never grown either before, but I hear that Summer Savory is lemony and can be used instead of basil in pesto recipes for a different twist.

Well, the ants don't eat the houseplants, they form a colony in the dirt. I can't blame them. It's a lovely warm, sunny window sill and the cactus soil is well-drained and seldom watered. A big contrast to the conditions outside. Once things warm up and the rains stop the colony/colonies move outside again. The commute's probably a bitch. ;)

[louise39.livejournal.com]

That is some garden. What variety. I will plant mixed lettuce in pots near the back door but right now there is snow. Plant date will be about April 15. Summer veggies go in ground after May 15.

My house plants have no ants but my hibiscus [which overwintered quite well until January] now has the dreaded 'white fly' infestation and I may lose it. All my ivy cuttings died. I don't know why. Just dried up and withered away.

'Persephone', which I printed, is a fic I enjoy re-reading. Hope you become inspired to continue.

[botias.livejournal.com]

Sounds like our spring is about a month sooner. :)

White fly... >:( Grrr!! That happens to me with ivy sometimes.

Thanks! Me too! :D

[zanthinegirl.livejournal.com]

It's not time to plant yet here; i'm envious of your early spring!

I'd love more persephone. It's a gorgeous story, and so snarky. I miss it!

[botias.livejournal.com]

Some people are a big fan of clearly defined seasons, but I've never been one of them. :)

Thanks! *tries to work up to it*

[lotorsgurl.livejournal.com]

How do I get my tomatoes to grow beyond three inches.My garden looks like post apocalyptic earth.I got weeds a-plenty but not veggies a-pleanty.Some nut-job over the course of lastnight planted marajiauana in my garden.I took it out this morning.I guess I am gonna turn on the security cam I got For my garden last year I caught teenagers stealing my veggies.Anyone else have that probelm also?

[botias.livejournal.com]

Sorry you are having so much trouble. :) My recommendation is to add lots of compost and use a hoe where necessary on the weeds. I don't live in a very nice neighborhood, but fortunately I have a high fence. Wow, teenagers stealing healthy vegetables! They probably need it.