We
had a whole day and a half of sun. Yippee! Yesterday was overcast and
even rained a bit, not here but where my sister and I were, estate
sale day and all. This morning is overcast and the concrete is wet
and slippery but that's probably from condensation. Remember last
Monday when we had a freeze that night and Tuesday when it didn't get
out of the 30s and another freeze that night? Yesterday we hit the
low 70s and today it's supposed to get up to 76˚ with can you
guess some rain predicted.
My sister's grandkids who live in San
Antonio came to visit her last weekend and they reported that the
wildflowers were really beautiful on the drive down through the Hill
Country. Not so much here. While rain is good for wildflowers,
apparently a lot of rain isn't. The bluebonnets in my yard did not
like the over 7” we got last week but they have started to
bloom...sparsely...and I haven't seen any bluebonnets or indian
paintbrush or evening primrose in any of the fields around here and
they should be full of wildflowers. I've seen one field full of
yellow but nothing along the highways I travel. Last year they were
gorgeous.
Not only are the bluebonnets in my
yard not doing well, they aren't getting fertilized. Where are the
bees? All these little white dots should be red. No bees, no
fertilization, no seeds for next year.
The field behind me has finally
started to show some indian paintbrush, also sparsely. It should be
shimmering red and blue.
I'm still working on this
reimbursement application. What a headache having to rummage through
all my receipts and bank statements and charge card statements and
lists of payments to Rocky and what they were for trying to make
sense of it.
papers to the left of me, papers to
the right of me, here I am stuck in the middle
Rocky is my neighbor and friend and we
mostly worked on a handshake, no invoices, no receipts so now we have
to generate those. So Thursday morning, a guy from the electric
company came to the house to 'service' the meter and we should shut
off our computers. I hadn't been doing that since I started filling
out the application, a writable PDF file online, because I was afraid
I would lose all my entries so that was the last thing I wanted to do
so I saved it to my desktop and shut down. Whatever that guy did took
about five seconds, the TV didn't even go off, and when I
started back up and opened the PDF file surprise! all my data
was gone. Needless to say I was a little aggravated so last night
when I had re-entered most of what I lost, I printed those pages out.
I can be smart sometimes, just not always right off the bat.
I should be out there working on the
garden beds or at the very least going to the Hungerford C0-op and
getting my tomatoes (I've got the one bed I can plant and if I plant
nothing else, I'll put in tomatoes) but it's windy as shit out there,
the wind chimes noisily carrying on and the prayer flags fluttering
horizontally, and I really want to get this application finished so I
can get it reviewed on Monday by the agent here that is only
available Mondays and Fridays and get it sent in. First come first
served and all.
Last weekend I finally got all the
pictures but one back up (and some moved around) that were taken down
for the demolition after Harvey including my whistle and ocarina
collection. Yay!
OK, back to all the paperwork.
Paperwork always gives me a headache. And we know that anything to do with the government is way more complicated than necessary. Sometimes I think it's because they want you to give up - they want to keep that money! Love the collection - some real gems in there! I wonder if all the rain has kept the bees at bay. I love Indian Paintbrush and let them flourish anywhere on my property they want.
ReplyDeleteI think they make all of that so complicated that you'll just throw up your hands in despair and say, "Fuck this."
ReplyDeleteI'm proud of you for persevering.
It's the most beautiful sunny day here today. Warm and breezy. Lovely.
Keep us posted on the wildflower situation. I hope they begin to catch up and I sincerely hope the bees come around.
Love your whistle and ocarina collection! Hope the paperwork issues regarding the reimbursement are resolved soon. My sister who lives in Gulfport, MS, reported similar weather to yours. We had snow showers this morning with rapid melting and sunshine in the late morning. Now it's clouding over again. Roller coaster weather.
ReplyDeleteHow frustrating to lose all that data. Ugh. But what a nice window to work at; my computer is in a dark corner. I hope your bees come back pronto.
ReplyDeleteThe tax law changed so much last year, and nothing is deductible, so this year I quit saving and recording. I hope it's not a mistake. On the other hand, I am stunned at how easily I abandoned habits of a lifetime.
ReplyDeleteLoss of bees would scare the bejammers from me.
I recently (like last week) learned something about that white/red spot on the bluebonnets. Here's the scoop:
ReplyDelete"Bluebonnet flowers are made up of many florets. Each floret has 5 petals: the banner petal, 2 wing petals, and 2 petals that make up the keel. The banner petal forms the upper part of the floret. The center of this petal is called the banner spot, and it is this spot that acts as a target to attract bee pollinators. When the pollen is fresh and sticky, the banner spot is white, seen to bees as reflected UV light and appearing to them to be a nice landing spot. But as the floret and its pollen age, the banner spot turns a reddish-magenta color and becomes ignored by the bees, who can’t see red."
Here's a link to the whole article: fascinating. It seems that you have some nice, healthy bluebonnets that are ready for the bees. Do you suppose the bees are on Spring Break?
I'll have to read it. I was under the impression that the spots turned red after being pollinated so maybe I will get seeds though I haven't seen any bees on them. of course it always seems to be raining.
DeleteWe are freezing and with snow on the grown, so no blooms outside. We are expecting rain sometime next week, but the sun should be out until then. I'm ready for spring... It's sad (and worrying) about the unfertilized flowers. I see fewer bees each ear...
ReplyDeleteI hope the paperwork gets done soon!
Strange that rain bothers you. Here I am thinking that Texas must be so dry that you’d welcome rain in Spring. I would also have thought that rain is good for wildflowers. Perhaps it’s all the opposite where you are; we get all worked up if Spring is dry.
ReplyDeleteI admire your tidy desk, I bet papers are easy to find. Good luck with your paperwork anyway. I dislike it so much I leave piles to grow until there really is no getting away from them any longer.
I had to laugh because the picture of my desk and work table was totally staged. and even though those stacks look organized I'm still totally confused.
Deleterain is good for wildflowers but too much is not. we've had an extremely wet winter, almost two inches a week for the first 8 weeks of this year, and then a late freeze last week. our summers are very hot and dry though. long about August we'll all be begging for rain.
I greatly admire your whistle and okarina collection. Makes me think again as I am currently shedding stuff incl. weird collections of things, just threw out all of the ancient very large and hollow seed pods and empty bird's eggs.
ReplyDeleteYour desk served as a sharp reminder that we need to do our tax returns.
Getting a glimmer of above freezing today, but not for long
ReplyDeleteIf it were left to me, I would hire anyone to sort out numbers , I.JUST. CAN'T, I have made up receipts in the past, for little things, that was fun!
ReplyDeleteOh, that's so annoying about the paperwork. Argh! Hope you get it settled soon. That's worrisome about the lack of bees on the bluebonnets!
ReplyDelete