Swamp funk

I love doing outdoor work and feeling like a homeowner! Only minus the actual mortgage and responsibility. I wandered outside this morning to cut some flowers, and noticed that the one rose bush was looking scraggly. So I got the pruning shears and trimmed it a little, cut out a bunch of dead wood, and tidied it up nicely. But I tend to get carried away when I have clippers in my hand, so I wandered down the backyard and thought I’d prune the other rosebush. Then I noticed there were some unwelcome Japanese maple saplings that had sprung up around it and were blocking the light. So I hacked those back. Then I noticed the magnolia tree had some branches that were hanging down awkwardly, so I got the BIG pruners and lopped those off. By the time I was done I had a hefty pile of tree chunks sitting in the yard; but now there’s room to sit under the magnolia!! How lovely!

A week ago I had a dream that my dad was climbing on a ladder and the ladder fell backwards and he fell down – terrifying. The day after I had the dream, he pops up suggesting he should clean the gutters! Um, no way! Not that I’m usually a superstitious person, but why mess with that shit, right? So I said I would clean the gutters. Smelled like swamp funk, and there was a hole in one finger of my gloves, but when suddenly the gunk cleared and you heard a scratchy rushing noise and gobs of foul muddy leaves came gushing out of the downspout…HA! Victory!