Color COVID

At what point do I get to wake up somewhere other than Vladimir Putin's America? Here it is- May 9th- and I'm swaddled in my winter clothing, picking through the woodpile searching for a few sticks to burn? It's actually flurrying with the sun out and we're all still quarantined from COVID 19 and WTF!! When I walked back from the mailbox, it was near white-out conditions...
I have begun the lovely task of assembling annuals, perennials and shrubs and vegetable plants to populate our many gardens and beds but I had to hustle them all back into my studio so they didn't freeze to death last night. And what of the hummingbirds?!  There have been a bunch of them- right on schedule!- flying around and landing on our feeder; I may have to install a nectar heater! But where do they spend the night?

This isn't half of them! The seedlings and tender things are all over our dining table and every available window sill. (We have temporary shelving on several windows...) Even today, the wind is so strong and sharp that they're all hunkered down inside.
So I had an exciting adventure yesterday morning. I called our local hardware/feed store and ordered and pre-paid for the horse food I need so that I wouldn't have to enter the building. As is typical protocol now, they said they'd leave the two bags on the rear loading dock. I drove our trusty car (running like a top!) to the back of the store, put it in reverse and hoped for the best. I say this because the driveway leading up to the loading dock is seriously narrow and surrounded on both sides high concrete walls and a chain link fence too boot. Add to the already trying circumstances is that I have my sunglasses and face mask on so that the mask was causing the sunglasses to fog slightly. I carefully calibrated that the right passenger side of the car was the trickier side to gauge my proximity to the imposing wall and backed up... BAM!!! Oh, I hit something!!
I pulled my car forward, exited and went to survey the damage. Trusty the Car looked fine but when I turned around, I realized that I had hit the corner post and it had caused the chain link fence to bow out. Yikes!

See? Nothing! Bernie didn't even get scratched! (I had feared having smashed a taillight or dented the fender area.)
Needless to say, I was mortified and knew I had to do the right thing. So I gloved up- already in my mask- and entered the store, which of course, was packed with customers and there were no sales people free. I exited and instead confessed by cell phone what I had done. I also walked to the back of the store and found three (3!!) male employees on the loading dock (all wearing masks) shaking their heads and... LAUGHING! Like "hahahaha; dumb blonde!!" In this case, I really didn't care as I confided just how stupid I felt and offered insurance information if they needed to press charges or put in a claim. But they were great and made plans among themselves to straighten it out. (In truth, it wasn't that bad!) They actually asked if I had gotten my two bags of beet pulp okay (yes, but need I remind you, these weigh 50 pounds apiece!) and told me to "have a nice day". I told Bob that the next time he went to our hardware store, he should view my signature "Damage by Rita" installation. I may avoid the store myself for a while as I'm certain they'll all be giggling at me when I come in...

Could Have Been Worse!

I never thought I'd say this but I would have taken snow! There is an inch of ice on everything. Sparkly-yes! Luminous-yes! Pretty from the house-yes! But it's miserable out there. I guess I really don't need to tell you this if you live anywhere in the NorthEast...
This morning, at 6:00 when it was -1 degree, I was half way the barn with Maggie's bucket o'slops when it dawned on me that it was dark and incredibly cold AND very slippery. If I happened to fall down no one would know (as Bob was still in bed) and I'd no doubt freeze to death. (No one that is except Robin who was already back on the terrace, waiting to go in- unusual behavior for her!) Fortunately, I'm here to write this blog so I obviously kept my footing and all is well. (How beings like Maggie stay outside is beyond me. She seemed fine, swaddled as she is in her heavy-duty high neck waterproof horse house coat.)

(Our fence, crested with Bob's magical miniature houses, are delightful in the ice.)
So we were smart and cleared the ice off the cars yesterday, figuring that they'd probably freeze shut overnight. I was deep into ice-encrusted snow removal when Bob pointed out that the tree directly above the car was leaning precariously and endangering both me and the car. I got the keys and Bob moved the car across the driveway by the truck. A half hour later, safely back in the house, I had a urge to look out the back door. Guess what:

Bob had had a premonition! The tree fell down and would have crushed the car! (in which we had only the day before replaced the starter motor.) There is indeed something to be said for trusting one's instincts! Boy winter sucks; but we had it cleaned up within an hour- that's Bob with the chain saw to the left above. But haven't I mentioned recently that that's all we did this year??!?!?)

So it could have been worse... but it's bad enough. There's ice everywhere, it's fucking freezing outside and my curator is cancelling (again). But we do have power and food and the wind wasn't as bad as predicted (which means fewer broken trees and less chance of loosing power) but we're getting "shack-y whack-y". (That's an updated form of cabin fever, according to our mechanic friend Bob). Can we believe that Wednesday is supposed to be in the 40's and rainy?
At least the lousy weather was good for something: I finished my piece, "Your Words Have Consequences".

Nice Pictures

I don't know; maybe it's because it's too awful to contemplate the level of destruction and mayhem that has been visited upon our garden but it seems really hard to get "good" pictures. In this shot, you can see the magnolia was spared (thanks for something!) but that's my garden under all those reclining monster tree carcasses! And while I'm eternally grateful that bob and I and Robin and Maggie are okay, our yard and property are definitely not okay!
And as anyone who knows me knows, my garden is very important to me!!

Large sections of our yard look like this. Like Bob said, it's hard to know even where to begin cleaning up. Our friend Joe came over today and helped chain saw away a tree that crashed through the fence next to our neighbor's house and remove another large oak that fell near Bob's studio so that we can drive debris down and make a giant pile (or ten) in the woods behind Bob's studio.

So we have some damage to the house in the back. The storm didn't entirely crush our house- like some unfortunate neighbors!- but we can't get the tree down even with the skilled assistance of talented friends. The insurance people have been notified. We'll see what happens there. I know (and have been warned) that insurance "adjusters" will try and save the company money and try and get out of paying for damages as much as possible. But we're tenacious and I am making a list of all my plants and shrubs that were smashed. I have quite a lot of valuable plant material that is not salvageable!
How about one more?

This is a perfectly healthy spruce that was uprooted and toppled in Maggie's pasture. Poor Maggie was totally freaked out and has spent the last three days sort of hanging out in her barn. We removed a couple of smaller trees that fell in her auxiliary grazing area so that she could get out and graze as she's blocked by the above monster from the lower field. What a mess!

Timber!

It's never a dull moment! I was expecting to put up a posting about our recent trip to Vermont, but instead I'm blogging about several large trees that decided to take a nose dive in that storm last night. Driving back from Vermont was wet and a bit windy but when we arrived home, the weather picked up significantly. We even lost power for like three seconds- just enough to disrupt the clock on the stove, the computer etc. I heard that 150,000 homes lost power, so we were lucky!

This morning, I was washing the breakfast dishes when Bob came back in from outside and said, "Go look at the driveway..." I had images of our car or truck smashed to bits or my studio roof being burdened by giant branches. Amazingly, the trees that fell down did minimal damage. (Interestingly, they fell exactly where Bob was saying he was going to drop them as he was planning on cutting them down. Both were dead!) Well, no damage to cars or house but...

One of Bob's sculptures took a bit of a beating, but fortunately, it's nothing that can't be fixed. It really is pretty incredible that these trees fell, missing all of the Japanese maples and a large planter that is located there; the trees even missed the vegetable garden fence. It was like precision landing.
I am surprised that we didn't hear these trees fall, but the remnants of the tropical storm- intense rain, really strong wind- probably masked the crashes of the trees. Nothing like experiencing extreme weather (and on the anniversary of Super Storm Sandy!) to confirm the reality of climate change. What with the fires on the west coast, the drought and extreme heat in California and the multiple category 5 hurricanes, we're fortunate that we received only several inches of rain and some wind...
And we are still waiting to really, truly celebrate our 29th non-anniversary. Even farther north in Vermont, there still hasn't been a hard frost. We keep thinking, "Maybe tonight..."

Not For the Faint of Heart

Be forewarned that this post contains graphic images of blood and gore. We were moving tremendous amounts of boxes and art materials yesterday in a push to finish (please! Oh Goddess!) complete our heroic move. I had even borrowed the van from work and all went splendidly until I somehow dropped a huge box or maybe it was a bookcase... Whatever, the outcome was that I stumbled up against a flagstone topped stonewall and gashed my shin. Boy did that hurt! Fortunately, Bob had a Bandaid ready but I was disheartened to see that I had bled all over one of my (current) favorite pair of socks and the cuff got ripped through my jeans. What a mess.

As if that weren't bad enough, I stood up prematurely in the van and gashed my head. And then, when schlepping yet another painting into the house, I managed to lose my grasp and wallop myself roundly right into the same shin, reopening my damaged leg. Sort of the insult to injury theory... any one have any salt they'd like to rub into my wounds?

Here's a close up; I took this one looking upside down at my own leg: Ouch.