He Knew He Was Right

I don't know that I could say anything more sincere than what I said here last Memorial Day. Describing it as a "favorite" holiday is the only thing I sort of wince at when rereading it. As holidays go, its meaning strikes me as important as any. But "favorite" would be a more apt description if I thought of it the way many I know do--as the official start of summer. For the record, I have no problem at all with those who think of Memorial Day that way, for I believe most of us still reflect on this day at some point about those who paid the ultimate price in protecting us, those in the military now, and those who protected us years ago. The posts from my friends on Facebook and Twitter support this, as did the large crowd at my small town's Memorial Day parade and ceremony. To echo what I've seen posted and heard throughout the day--Thank you to all those in the military now and those who served in the past. As I noted last year, my family tree is f...

A few years ago, using my Scandinavian Forest Axe, I felled a cottonwood that had an 8"-diameter trunk and stood over 20-feet tall. That was pretty cool. I've also precisely dropped a couple of 30-feet-tall maples with my chainsaw, guiding them to safe landings. Again, it felt kind of cool, and was certainly a relief when nothing got damaged, myself included. Then there's what I've done with the forsythia , but that is an ongoing effort. Nothing, though, has given me the satisfaction that I took from my fight while planting my viburnum mariesii, chronicled in this wordy post . It's flowering now: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I've posted pictures of it before. As far as plants go, though, it's simply the best $170 I've spent outside. Two neighbors have asked me what it is, and one just looked at it and told me that I should get into landscaping. I thanked him, but it is the shrub doing all the work. Now anyway...a helluva fight occurred in that very spot two y...

I give up. I'm not going to fight it or fret over it anymore. I've been trying for years with maybe a 50% success rate, and I'm glad technology seems primed to pick me up the vast majority of times I'm in the 50% failure zone. I'm talking about basic words like "sincerely" and "initially" that I never seem to type correctly. For whatever reason, I frequently transpose or duplicate some of the middle letters of these frequently used words. But, good ole autocomplete and spell check have my back. I don't even try to spell "sincerely" correctly anymore. I just type "sinc", and pelt out what feels like one or two "er"s. Next, autocomplete bails me out, or I right click on the errantly spelled word and smile as "sincerely" shows on the short list of word choices. It's no coincidence that this post was done on my iPad, as it has a nice autocomplete function, and spared me from having to fully negotiat...

...my woodruff is spreading, and overwhelming my pulmonaria, which I believe I've already explained here is a type of lungwort...

It was a good weekend in Atlanta. A nice, but not at all complete, break from a busy week, as I brought work with me. After an uneventful flight and then hour drive home, I forced myself outside to do a few hours of much needed yardwork. This was followed by some time spent in front of the computer, then watching TV, before crashing at 10:00 pm Sunday night. I slept through the night, waking up yesterday morning just before 6:00am, and picked up my phone to check messages. What!? He's dead? I thought it was a joke. I proceeded to check Facebook and Twitter on my phone with one hand while fumbling with remotes with the other. We really did it. We killed him. Great use of intelligence, great calls by our leaders, and great job by those in uniform! Like others, I'm glad he's dead. He deserved it. He completely and totally deserved those bullets. I read what others posted/tweeted early on, but said nothing myself. It was almost old news by the time I was aware. I li...