Sunday, July 17, 2016

my dedicated day of worship


I took down the tea cup bird feeder that usually hangs outside the window I sit in front of sometime early June. I looked up one day to see one squirrel on it and two more waiting in the shrub. I was getting more squirrels than birds. Not only that but the dog would go berserk every time she saw a squirrel on the tea cup, jumping frantically at the window. During the next several weeks and up until I left for Scotland, the squirrels were coming to the shrub every day, many times a day, looking for the tea cup. Sorry guys. I'm going to hang it back up in the fall and hopefully, they will have sort of forgotten about it especially with pecans being available. In the meantime, I have the totem bird feeder out in the middle of the yard which I just put on a higher/longer piece of rebar so I can see it easier.

It's Sunday, my dedicated day of worship, and by worship I mean work or wander in the yard planting and weeding and feeding and trimming and watering and in general nurturing the natural world. Right now (now being about 2 PM) it's 95˚, 43% humidity, 40% cloud cover, and what it really feels like is 103˚. I have to stay in the shade to be able to do anything out there at all so I am limited on what I can do when.

I raised the aforementioned bird feeder, moved another of the glass flowers to the fence in the Little Backyard; dug up, separated, and repotted the large clump of ox-eye daisies; pruned some stuff, gathered up all the pots with dirt but no plant and emptied those, got the little pump working again for the water lily pond which is full of little baby minnows. But now it's even too hot for shade work.

The yellow ginger, less affected by the heat, is tall and blooming while the white ginger looks sere and droopy by mid-day. 


There are six bloom heads producing flowers, the most since I moved it from the city house.

The morning glory bush is sprawling across the yard since I didn't cut it back after winter, a big mistake because it will plant itself. It's still a favorite and I'm going to plant one on my absent neighbor's property, maybe.


The flowers, like morning glories, close by noon.

Minnie, more than ready to come in out of the heat, jumped in my lap, climbed up and over my shoulder to lay down across my neck, straddling the back of the chair.






10 comments:

  1. You are definitely keeping the Sabbath holy.

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  2. Love the ginger, I would like to be able to grow a lot of your exotic blooms.Went to a party yesterday and the cake was slowly melting.

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  3. That's my kind of worship!

    While you took down your bird feeder, we took away our squirrel feeder -- We were getting more pigeons than squirrels!

    Minnie is so funny. It's great how dogs just want to be nearby.

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  4. I missed my window for going out to water this morning (between 6 and 8) and now it is too late. Hopefully, I will get out this evening but right now, it is just too damn hot.

    I think half of the bird food put outside is eaten by either the squirrels or raccoons. All creatures need to eat.

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  5. Those are the most beautiful color of morning glories. Have never seen them.

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  6. Sunday being spent as a Sunday should be spent. We belong to the same house of worship.

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  7. It must be pretty darn hot for Minnie to prefer the back of your neck to the heat outside.

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  8. My cat lives in the same place. I spit a lot of long hairs out. He's lucky.

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  9. There was an inch of rain up north of Houston this afternoon. We didn't see a drop, but they say there's a chance for coastal showers again tomorrow. With luck, you'll get some of that rain, to spiff up those beautiful flowers you have.

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  10. Our bird feeder gets plenty of squirrel AND bird action. The squirrels are SO FUNNY to watch.

    Love all your flowers, as usual. And your fabulous canine wrap :)

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