The Pleasures of A Rainy Monday ...

Here comes the rain again ...

And what a beautiful sight it was to see.  Note the use of the past tense. Judging from the radar, the showers have moved on to the east.  The sun is doing its best to shine the clouds away and given the current temperature of 74, it's about to get steamy out there!  I'm heading out shortly to take my mother to her follow-up appointment with the retinal specialist.  She thinks there's been some improvement in her vision since the treatment with Avastin and I hope the tests they run will show that she's right.  

Birthday celebrations (mine & others'), Thanksgiving prep and execution, and good weather for gardening have all conspired to keep me from blogging much.  There's lots going on in the garden, most of it good.  Saturday I planted 30 each of  Narcissus 'Thalia' and Grand Primo'.  Another 30 Narcissus 'Geranium' await interment.  There's a drawer full of bulbs from Southern Bulb Company in the outside refrigerator and a few impulse purchases from Cornelius Nursery.  Later this week I'll do my best to get those in the ground and scatter Linaria seeds.  And Agalinis seeds. And Oriental Poppies.  And Bluebonnets.  And whatever else needs scattering.


One of the Linaria that reseeded from last year has a bud on it!  If it gets nipped by the expected low temperatures tomorrow night, I'm going to be really bummed.  Predictions seem to range from 31 degrees to 36 degrees ... since last Friday night's predicted low of 31 didn't materialize, I'd be surprised if it gets that low tomorrow night.  We did have a light frost Friday night, though.  I've found damaged foliage on Lantanas and a Pandora Vine. The Zinnia seedlings weren't affected but the mature plants drooped a bit.


There's a bloom on the Philippine lily out front, which surprised me, but then I went a-Googling and discovered that it's a late summer/fall bloomer.  I'm not sure I like where Otahal put them ... I'll leave them alone and see if plants around them fill in enough to make me happy with their placement.

I'm 99% certain that I spotted an American Goldfinch in the back garden yesterday!  I'm looking forward to the arrival of the hungry hordes.


I had to leave before I could publish this, so I'll add an update on my mom now.  I'm happy to report that the doctor saw great improvement in her vision and the condition of her eye since her previous visit.  She received another injection and instructions to return in 4 weeks.