The Garden and Writing Life

Here’s a photo of the sun on the cottonwoods. They’re losing leaves, especially since today dawned in the 30’s (Fahrenheit).

And here’s what I figured out about Word Press. The site stopped working on Microsoft Edge, but works well–at least for composing–in Chrome. Why that should be, I don’t know.

Maybe someone out there can tell me?

The somewhat scary thing is that I got into my admin by accessing zipcoffelt.com. Can anybody do that? Since I was using a previously unused browser, shouldn’t Word Press have at least demanded a password?

I’ll have to watch to make sure I don’t have any unauthorized posts on the blog.

So. Now that I’ve figured this much out, I’ll resume the regular schedule on Sunday. Or maybe this was a sign from the Universe to mix things up.

What do YOU think?

WEEDS!!

Last week, I spent days digging weeds out from around the my trees. I then hauled mulch to each tree and carefully created the “donut hole” to keep the cedar mulch from touching the trunk.

That was last week. Today is Monday and as I walked around my trees, what do I find? Weeds. Growing through the fresh mulch.

So here I am again, pulling weeds that by rights shouldn’t be there. Is gardening frustrating? No doubt. But so is everything else, or so it seems.

Take this blog, for example. When I try and key words into the paragraph blocks, the screen flips back to the top of the page, so I can’t see what I’m keying. It’s never done that before, What gives, Word Press? Is it me? Is it you?

And I keep getting the “WordPress.com is not responding” message, so have to recover the page. Meaning I have to keep saving or simply plan on losing it all. When I start a new paragraph block, it takes a while for the “type words here” message to show up. Like 30 seconds or even more.

I have a lot more to say about weeds, but not here and now. Oh well, maybe I’ll figure this out.

I keep thinking about the old IT staff joke about PICNIC. Problem in Chair, not in Computer. It’s probably me. Help!

Guess I’ll save my discussion of weeds for another time. Anybody else having a Word Press problem?

Sunny Sunday

Sunny with a caveat.

We had two-and-a-half inches of rain last night–more rain than we needed, and now my yard is once again a swamp.

To make matters worse, Word Press is doing funny things today, so I’m not sure how this post will turn out. But.

Here’s a fern baby from my Japanese painted fern. It was a single frond when I moved it from the north side, and seems to be doing well. The full-sized ferns I transplanted died the day after being moved–upsetting because they were a few years old and very beautiful. I’ll be happy if this one survives, which it seems to be doing.

Well, I have a lot more to say, but Word Press just isn’t working for me. I keep getting a “Recover Web Site” message and I’m not sure why. Does anyone out there in Word Press land know?

Egress

For all the years I worked from home in a basement office, I had fire on the brain. With my horror-story sensibilities, I’d ask myself how I’d get out of the two foot by three foot window that–frankly–no one had ever opened.

Thus began the “egress discussion” that Jim and I would indulge in every six months or so. How to get out of the basement? This year, we finally decided that we’d look into getting an egress window dug. The impetus? HGTV. Of course.

We found Foundation 1, a local company and last week, they came out to hand dig around the foundation and put in a window. Here it is, Day 1.

We kept hoping it wouldn’t rain and, except for a light sprinkle on Day 2, we got lucky.

The prep for this was to utterly destroy my north bed where I had ferns and hostas. I was able to transplant most of the ferns–newer plants. My Master Gardener friend, Linda, graciously gave a home to the baby hostas springing up all over. Sadly, I lost the five-year-old Japanese Painted Fern, which had multiplied times three. I did save one of its babies, so there’s hope.

We did find a few frogs in the basement at the start of Day 2. Hmm.

Here is the window at the start of Day 2. A hole in the wall and a big pile of clay. That clay is a bit of a caveat on a five-star review. I can’t plant in it and the pile is high around the window, supposedly keeping out water. Since it rained an inch the day after the window went in, and our basement stayed dry, maybe there’s something to that. We’ll see if it settles as promised.

And the finished project at the end of Day 2. Of course, we still have to fix the interior wall, but we now have an escape hatch, complete with ladder.

A temporary but significant mess. And noisy.

We always say that this project is the last project. Maybe…

Yet Another Stormy Sunday

Another unnecessary inch of rain overnight. The grass is spring green and growing faster than we can mow. But the trees know it’s almost autumn, dropping leaves like crazy.

Out of the house most of the day to hear Madeline sing the blues at One Block South. Boy howdy, that girl can wail.

Tomorrow is Monday and back to the grind of cleaning up veg and flower beds, along with final preparations for #PitchWars on Tuesday. Or maybe it’s Wednesday. I should check.

A happy new week to you all.

Encouraging Rejections

No one likes rejection, right? But the other night, I got one of the nicest rejections ever. I’ve had a few of those along the way, and they always cheer me immeasurably.

The rejection in question was in response to a query for my novel, The Last Summer Queen. After apologizing for taking six months to get back to me, the agent wrote that they didn’t take novels like mine, but that after reading what I’d sent, she’d been tempted. And to please keep them in mind if I write another novel.

Now I had to question what reasoning allowed me to send a novel that didn’t fit, although that’s a longer discussion for another day. But yes, indeed, I have a novel in the pipeline that, judging by what she said, might work for her. If only I had time enough to write it now.

An encouraging rejection is not an acceptance, after all. But it is encouraging. And I was … encouraged.

Totally fits with my Embracing Rejection approach to submissions.