S2 has Snow2

I was looking through my 'deck' file of pictures, and found these. I canned these at my brother's place in California, from his incredible apricot tree. Remnant of what was once an orchard, these are an old breed of apricot, not bred for length of staying power in a supermarket. These babies taste absolutely amazing! Anyone who grew up eating REAL apricots right off the tree, dead ripe, will never be able to eat the supermarket kind. There is just no comparison. Last year he had a bumper crop on the tree, and I flew down there in late June, just in time for them to be ready. We canned (well, I canned, he picked) for hours and then we split the bounty. I wish I still had one more bottle, but they are all gone now. This picture was taken on the deck, and the snow pictures to follow were also taken on the deck, which is the only connection. Just saw the picture when going by, and started to salivate. My brother sends me photos of ripe apricots on his tree just to torture me, so here is a little back. That was really fun, Pete. We have to do it again.


Lemon balm, ala snow. The deep freeze has done in the lemon balm, this is it's last hurrah, for this year, anyway. It will be back.












I have two miniature roses out on the deck. Incredibly tenacious plants, and ever hopeful, as you can see. The deep freeze does not appear to be affecting the roses. Amazing, isn't it? This one will be yellow, if this bloom opens. I subbed as a preschool teacher for a couple of months, and at the end of the school year the children gifted me with this plant. This will be it's fourth year out on the deck. I mounded dead leaves around the base of the plant, which is all it has ever needed. This year, who knows. Crossing fingers.



Alder trunks with snow blown on the east side. I know alders are basically the weeds of the tree world. They are 'transition' trees, meant to grow on the edge of clearings for a few years (25 or so), and then fall down and decompose, then feeding the pines and firs that follow. I love to look at them with their leaves off, but the way that these do lean...















One of three bamboos that my friend Jay gave me for my deck...he's moving back to Texas, and I'll miss him. Sniff. I'll love them just the way he did.










Another of the bamboos.












I live on the third floor in my apartment house. This is the top part of a beech tree, that is just outside my bedroom window. It's all gnarled and weird, because of a couple of things. First of all, it is not the way of the beech tree to grow in a row outside an apartment building. As soon as it starts looking lush and nice, they come along and top it, to prevent it from growing tall enough to shed leaves into the gutters. The first year that they did this, I opened my windows and hollered things at the workmen, like, what the HECK are you doing????? It worked, they quit and hurried away from the crazy lady. I have learned to hold my peace, and have a name for what they do (ok, their boss who is my landlord tells them to do it, they were only following orders). It is "The Annual Raping of the Beeches".
They put up with a lot, those beeches, even if they do look like beech balls perched on flagpoles for a few months after they receive their so called beauty treatment. The landlord's viewpoint on landscaping is that all plants must be contained. He's a good guy, we just don't agree about the beeches.




More leaning alders. This one will hit my building when it goes, but it's on someone else's property, so apparently there is nothing to be done about it. On the other hand, it's been leaning like this for quite a few years now, so may I really shouldn't be concerned about it. And I wouldn't be...except for that transitional plant thing.














And just because I like the way snow lays on leaning alders, here is one last one.

I've written at length here, and indented my paragraphs, too. Looks good at the moment, but who knows what happens when you hit publish post? Guess we're gonna find out soon, since I need to crawl under the covers and warm up my freezing self. It's in the teens outside, sorry, but that's just tooooo cold. Like G2 says, we do RAIN. And we do it well.

Nighty night.