Journal

Yesterday was very humid and hot (up to 90 degrees), though not murderously hot like last weekend. Yesterday evening, thunderstorms blew through, accompanied by about an inch of rain. Today, it's partly sunny, hot, and humid. Fortunately, an intermittent breeze makes the humidity bearable.

I was able to spare only an hour for garden work yesterday. I continued my project of clearing the back rose bed of weeds. I'm in the home stretch now, down to the southern end where the bed curves toward the house. This is also one of the weediest areas, almost indistinguishable from the lawn.

This morning, I worked on our as-yet-vacant dahlia bed. Early in the spring, we paid someone to remove the sod from two kidney-shaped areas in the front yard. Kay's plan was to make both of them dahlia beds. I spaded one of the beds soon after the sod was removed, we mixed in several bags of Black Forest, and then we planted new dahlia bulbs plus those Kay had saved from last year and from her mother's garden.

By the time we had finished preparing and planting the first bed, I didn't have the energy to prepare the other. It has sat all these weeks, growing weeds. Today, I finally covered it with wet newspaper and spread mulch on top of that.