sNOw

Where I DO NOT like snow.

Snow. I am not amused.

Where I like snow. In the mountains.

We managed to escape January unscathed, only to fall for the cruelest of all groundhog tricks: just when I thought it was safe to fully embrace my early spring fantasies, lovely weather turns in the four-letter S-word. Snow? I vote NO.

(The better to see you with)

In related news, my sweet little grandson turned six *months* old on groundhog’s day—and since he saw his shadow, I’m told we get 6 more months of baby. That’s a happy thing. Snow, on the other hand? Not so much.

This week’s column will be extra short, because for the last four hours I’ve been trying to look on the bright side of this whole S-WORD situation and have been treating today like, well, a snow day. I’m still in my PJ’s at 10 a.m., on my none-of-your-business-number of cup of tea, eating a giant shortbread cookie and celebrating my amazing ability to roll so good-naturedly with the variables of life/weather. (Spoiler alert: enough caffeine and sugar will do that for you.) 





Then I realized that my deadline for this column was an hour ago.

S-word, S-word, S-word.

I’m blaming the snow.

Chicken Poop

I woke up this morning one of my first thoughts---after I liberally imbibed sufficient amounts of caffeine—speaking of caffeine, have I mentioned my newest caffeinated obsession? Mad (the Hatter is implied) Breakfast Black Tea Blend. It is delicious.  I finally got around to stopping by Packwood’s newest “sipping” shop and procuring some. And then some more. I’m on my third package. It’s almost worth getting out of bed for. Although, if you could convince somebody to serve it to your bedside, I bet it would taste even better. Room service...caffeine...match made in heaven.

Where was this going? Oh, right—one of my first thoughts this morning was “chicken poop.” No, I’m not having one of those days—see above, delicious caffeine, etc.—I mean real, literal, actual, chicken poop. From chickens. If you’re a gardener, now is a good time to procure some.

First, get some chickens.

I’m kidding. You don’t have to have “homemade” chicken poop, there are plenty of “store-bought” options, from having a dump truck load delivered—which is my preference—to hauling it yourself; by the pickup full or the bag full.

This is the perfect time of year to apply chicken poo to your flowerbeds. You don’t have to worry if the poop in question has been properly aged, because it doesn’t matter. It’s not like anything—besides primroses and snowdrops-- is green and growing and in danger of being burned by fertilizer that is too “hot.” You can apply liberal amounts without fear. And—not to be indelicate—but the cold weather helps keep the “aroma” to a minimum. Applying chicken poop mid-May with open windows...well, let’s just say that the timing could be better.

Why chicken poop, you ask? 

Here is a list of my Top Five Reasons Why Chicken Poo is the Poo to Do:

1.       It’s all natural.

2.       Comes with free feathers. At least the bulk stuff does.

3.       It’s “cheep.”

4.       Things grow better.

5.       Elk hate the taste.

 I’ll often sprinkle a little poo around the garden during the growing season—just a pinch here and there, avoiding the two worst side effects: burned plants and offended neighbors. Offending the elk, on the other hand—well, that’s the point. I know I’d stop frequenting a salad bar that was sprinkled with poo.

Gardening in Winter

I’ve optimistically titled this “Gardening in Winter” because—occasionally—I write about gardening. And it’s winter---some days more than others.

Saturday was one of those “warm” winter days. And by warm, I mean mild. Mild enough that when I took a break from my indoors chores to go for a walk with my neighbor, I hated to go back inside and return to my project. So, I took a walk around my yard to check on the flora and fauna. Sadly, the fauna had been chewing on the flora.

Stupid elk had yanked up my primroses, eaten some of my snowdrops and spread “fertilizer” across my lawn. “What!?” I hear you asking, “How on earth did the ‘stupid elk’ breech your loaner fence? Did the power go out? Did you forget to plug it in again? Have elk developed thumbs and/or been attending night school classes to get their GED’s, and have shorted out your fence with their newly acquired digits/skills?

”

The answers are (in reverse order) 1: Not yet. 2: No—stop blaming the victim. I only did that once. Ok twice. 3: No power outages, thank goodness. 4: There was no fence to breech. The fence was a “loaner,” and apparently some rancher on the east side needed MY FENCE to protect his cattle from wolves. I know, right? Like beef is more important than primroses!

So last Saturday I did a little gardening. I replanted what remained of my primroses, sprinkled dirt back over my snow drops, and started obsessing over a fence again.

Turns out that winter gardening has a lot more in common with warm weather gardening than I’d like.

Christmas Detritus

It is mid-January and I don’t want to brag but I’ve already uprooted my Christmas tree, packed away all the decorations, and rolled up the strands of 1,700 lights and safely secured them in the closet until next year. Some people might point out that “safely secured in closet” is actually code for “shoved them in closet, slammed door quickly”, and I would not quibble with that assessment.

Every year, no matter how hard I try to remove the ornaments in an orderly fashion—putting all the Rodney Reindeer in one pile together, taking off the blown glass hearts one by one—it never fails that immediately after “safely securing” them in the Christmas closet—oops! Look, there’s one more ornament hanging on the tree, all buy its lonely self. 

Sigh.

After Christmas is a perfect time to rearrange furniture, to head into the Brand New—or in my case, The Slightly Used—New Year with a clean, fresh slate. It’s also a good way to seek out all the errant Christmas tree needles that have migrated to unexpected places. That’s why my dustpan is full of this time of year: fir needles and glitter plus this ornament that the cats have rolled under the rocker. Fir needle, glitter, an ornament AND Nerf gun “bullets”.

Beautifully wrapped mayhem 

One Sume Tradition that has grown up over the years is the epic Christmas Eve Nerf Battle.  The tradition has its roots in a Mullins Christmas Event from my childhood that involved a cork “pop-gun”—the kind of cheesy plastic rifle that shot corks attached to strings for easy retrieval—and the marble game of Aggravation. I don’t remember the rules, but I do remember how much fun it was to shoot the person whose marbles you had just sent back to “Start” --- adding injury to insult, if you will. Fast-forward a couple of decades to a Christmas Day dinner that included beautifully wrapped Nerf guns at each place setting. A wild rumpus ensued, and a tradition was born.

I expect to find Nerf bullets in odd locations until July-- when opening day of squirt gun season commences.

Happy January!

Happy January! I don’t feel I can realistically say “Happy New Year,” as 2019 is already slightly used, but I was traveling right after the New Year and I don’t really feel like I’ve fully appreciated that we’ve all arrived-- smack-dab, ready or not-- in 2019.

When I first went to work at the Shopper, lo these many years ago, I needed to set up a date in the program we use for classified ads—some sort of infinity date that would carry over my much-needed items into perpetuity. I chose 2020.

In hindsight (See what I did there? 2020? 20/20? Hindsight? Sort of a play on words/vision joke? It was a clever image—ha! Image! I did it again! —and I’d hate for you to miss it. And yes, I’m the funniest person I know, thanks for asking. Where was I?)

In hindsight, setting 2020 as my infinity date turns out to be rather short-sighted. (Please note that I’m not pointing out the rest of my subtle repartee; the onus is on you, Gentle Reader, to savor the delicious witticisms. And no, I did not get a Thesaurus for Christmas, why do you ask?)

Anyway—my point is that eons ago 2020 seemed impossibly far away, and now every time I write the current date I am reminded that ‘Impossibly Far Away’ is, in fact, less than a year away. (Note to self: remember to change classified date settings before you lose all your perpetual items.) Time---stop me if you’ve heard this one before—flies. 

All the above is just my way of working the conversation around to the fact that I haven’t made any resolutions. Yet. Nor have I completely packed away my Christmas decorations—my tree is still standing, wearing only its billion twinkly lights. I’m in no hurry to take it down, as the lights are so cheery on dark days and the tree is still fresh and green. So fresh, in fact, that I wonder if it has perhaps sprouted roots? I should probably check. 

Should I happen to make procrastination one of my resolutions, I’m very confident I’ll be able to keep it. 

Eventually.