Vicki Lane's Blog, page 528

Not a Knot Garden

When I first began to garden, one of the To Do's on my list was a Knot Garden. I drew up plans and even began to price plants. The dream lasted for quite a few years as one of those Someday projects.

Someday I'll have the time, the money . . . but then I realized that without major bulldozer work I also didn't have a large  flat area near the house to accommodate the garden of my dreams.  Ah, well...

But I was determined at least to have a herb garden -- parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme -- as well as dill, rue, lovage,  tarragon, fennel, basil, oregano, pineapple sage, cilantro, catnip,, bay, pineapple sage, perilla, and clary sage ... 

Most of these are in what we call the Box Garden -- not tiny hedges of perfectly trimmed boxwood, alas. but eight long boxes of soil.
The herbs are above the wall and in the four end boxes while the four center boxes are used for vegetables -- this year they hold  lettuce, beets, onions, sweet potatoes, collards and broccoli. 
It's not elegant like a knot garden but it's do-able  -- and it suits our rural idiom. The bay laurel and rosemary are in pots, as they must winter over in the greenhouse.
The bay below was a tiny sprig in a cup when I bought it about twenty -five years ago. 
 Willowbrook Park blog (from New Zealand) has a nice overview of knot gardens for those of you who might be tempted . . .
Meanwhile, at last I'm putting in a lovely knot garden -- in the book I'm currently writing.  

Summer Solstice

Another turn of the wheel. 

Summer begins and the sunrises have gone as far north as they can. Tomorrow's sun will be just a hair to the south, heading for the Fall Equinox when it take center stage in our eastern view. . .

. . . continuing northwards toward December 21 and the Winter Solstice --when the Great Dance begins anew.

Between the Rains

Inspired by Desiree's gorgeous closeups of water droplets over at Driftwood Ramblings, I went out between yesterday's rains and looked for pictures.

Drip . . .

Drip. . . Drip . . .

Drip. . .

Hanging with the Jersey Girls

Note to Self

When adding binder twine to the tomato trellisesat the top of the garden . . .
Do not accidentally kick the cylinder of twine. . .
For it will roll (very fast) downhill till something stops it.

Bugz

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Up Close and Personal

I really like weeding -- sitting in the garden and getting up close and personal with the vegetables.  Hoeing is hard on my back and not nearly as precise.
Yesterday was beautifully cool -- and rain was on its way so I wanted to get caught up with the weeding and hoeing. A few rainy days and what were tiny green specks in the dirt can become great lolloping weeds. 
Chipmunks have planted sunflowers for me here and there. I'll thin this clump down to two.

William is watching from his post in front of my lone artichoke plant.
The caveman approach to gardening -- a rib bone is great for tight spots. (The soil in the box beds comes from the chicken yard where our food scraps go to be turned into compost. Bones often show up and I make use of them.)
Shade cloth really extends the growing season for lettuce.
Imagine how virtuous I felt when just as I was finishing the last bit of weeding and hoeing, the thunder began.
Of course, there was still time for one more day lily picture. . . And then the rain came.

Don't Panic

I received a little flurry of emails this evening from folks who'd pre-ordered the mass market paperback of Under the Skin from Amazon. They'd been informed that their orders had been cancelled as the paperback was no longer available and they wanted to know what was up.
As I mentioned the other day, Random House has decided to issue UTS as a trade paperback, not a mass market. Thence the unavailability of the mass market paperback. (E-books are not affected.)
I emailed Herself, my editor, and she said that they would be updating Amazon quite soon -- that the decision to change formats only became official this morning.
So the trade version will be available for pre-order. . . again . . soon. 
Herself also said that they were working on a new and different cover -- I was reasonably happy with the blue road one but will be interested to see what they come up with now.
Many thanks to those of you who pre-ordered -- sorry for the inconvenience.  

Mmmmmmm

FAQ --Sex and Violence

Q: I am a new prospective reader who does not like sex and violence in my books. Thanks.
A: This showed up in the space for comments on a recent request to sign up for my Goodweather Report newsletter. 

It puts me into a quandry. I don't think my books are particularly known for sex and violence -- in my opinion, the sex is pretty minimal and the violence is often, (but not always) offstage.  But it's hard to write about murders without some violence.

And I write about life -- which is sometimes messy -- and people -- who tend to be far more interesting when they're flawed.  There have to be obstacles and crises -- and I hope to engage  fully the emotions of the reader -- not just give them a comforting back rub.


But I do understand the person who says -- "I have enough bad stuff in my life --  I'll take the back rub." 


The thing is, a fair number of folks have told me they find a visit to my fictional world comforting . . . there've been only two, so far, who've taken me to task for undue sex and violence.

So what do I say to this prospective reader?  How can I know what her comfort zone is? Probably, since she felt it necessary to mention,  it's pretty limited. She'll be safe with the newsletter though -- no sex or violence there.

  I've struggled with this question before -- both HERE  and in the post  NOT HER CUP OF TEA.