14dabucs's Blog

There are dishes in the sink, laundry on the floor, and dust under the table, but I simply CANNOT stay inside and do housework today.  It's like a crime to be indoors on a day like today.

 

The laundry can wait until this evening, as can those pesky dishes.  Since even my Coreopsis is popping out of the ground, I am headed up to Handyman for as much cedar mulch as I can fit in the back of the truck.

 

Pictures will be forthcoming.  See you all later!

 

Well, consider me a freak... my husband certainly does. Like I said on Glenn's blog, we live in a house that was a foreclosure. For some reason, everything (and I mean everything) in the yard was cut down. Over the past four years, I've worked to get things a little more colorful. Our yard presents a number of challenges as there are drainage problems ( we live on a huge hill and our backyard is one bog slope towards the house). We've done some digging and other things to alleviate the problems, and there is nothing like piddling around the yard on a gorgeous day. Right now, the yard is trashed. In hopes of putting pressure on myself to stay on top of the yard, I am sharing pictures from last year.

Feel free to share pictures of your yard and offer tips on what I can do to improve mine (I need mulch!)

First is the bit in the front. Japanese Maple (diessctum, I think) with iris, liriope and celosia.

Strawberry patch in the backyard. If anyone has clues how to keep birds away, lemme hear them. I used netting last year and it failed miserably.

Dinky herb garden with lemon balm, lavender, dill (I live the smell of dill), chives and some eunonymous.

Planter. Can't remember what is in here although I think I ended up planting the rose stuff and also the fiber optic grass.

Another planter. Now I remember replanting both planters. The Bloodgrass in now in front of the Japenese Maple, if it survived the winter. The caladium tanked when we were on vacation in August.

My attempt to produce a nearly all-white garden in the front yard. Definitely a work in progress and I am not-at-all patiently waiting to see what comes back, it all should, as it is all perennials. Key word there is "should."

Planter in front. Did I mention I love dill?

Herb garden later in the year. Dig the dill!

Coreopsis (moonbeam) and dwarf Korean lilac in backyard

Hardy hibiscus (we shall see) and Witch's broom in backyard

Color added to the patio

Bub's Birch tree, planted a few months after he was born.

Hey all... I was talking to Pops this morning and getting a lesson in what exactly a GFS is when he started telling me about this model that two meteorologists in Milwaukee came up with to predict the band of heaviest snowfall in a winter weather event. It's called T"he Magic Chart." Anyway, it works an awful lot of the time, and I was wondering if any of you heard it or use it or if it even works here since we are in such a kooky area precipitation-wise.

... and you sure as heck cannot live without them. You know, meteorologists are the most under appreciated people out there, except for maybe people who work in sewers.

For 33 years, my father has toiled in a thankless job. If I tell someone he's a meteorologist, people usually respond with something along the lines of "Oh really! What station?" I used to tell people no, he's a REAL meteorologist, not some AMS certified yahoo. Now I can't even do that because it seems like TV meteorologists now have degrees too.

Over the past 30 years of my life, I spent a lot of time at the office at the airport, and the new one that was off-site. I remember the old teletype machines that would click incessantly, giving the office a buzzy feel. There were mainframe computers that took up entire rooms, a console of ancientness that could magically call up the forecast from anywhere, just at the touch of a button. Perhaps best of all was the radar room, all dark except for the glow from the scopes. Perhaps that influenced my later choice to become a scope dope (AKA operations specialist) in the the Navy... who knows.

Owlie Skywarn with his lightning-flash eyes was a constant companion in coloring books and if I had one cloud chart, I had a billion of them. Sometimes I missed my dad tucking me into bed because he was working the evening shift. Other times we had to play quietly so Dad could sleep off the midnight shift. If the weather was bad, that meant Dad was stuck at work or we were out in the yard looking for funnel clouds. Of course, as a teenager, the weather often worked in my favor. I could always count on being able to stay out until at least one if there was severe weather instead of worrying about my midnight curfew. Mom slept a lot heavier than Dad.

The benefits extended past broken curfews in my teen years. If my birthday fell on a weekday, Dad would come up to school and take me out to lunch, my choice. Dad went on field trips with us, while Mom was the homeroom mother. In the summer, Mom got a break and Dad would take us out for the day. As I got older and moved away, I could still call Dad and get my own personal forecast. As my husband and I got into boating season, we could always check in and find out if that mess on the radar was headed for the lake or not. I will admit that after that first summer of boating, Dad did give us a marine weather radio. I think it was a hint.

Anyway, for every Christmas morning Dad was not there, there was a Christmas Eve he was. For every play he missed, a lunch with special memories was made. Now he talks about the younger guys relying too much on computer models instead of learning the lay of the land, and while he's messed up a few forecasts, he's saved a number of lives.

So before you complain about the weather next time, or wonder what happened to that major winter weather that didn't happen, stop and think about the people that work around the clock to give you at least a general idea of what to wear the next day or how the outlook is for your trip and tell your weatherman (even the tv ones) "thanks."