This has been a very strange summer, super hot, super rainy, now super dry. The nighttime temps have been near or over 60 and tomatoes love that, they grow very well. At least in my little garden they do. The plants don't have alot of leaves this year, but they do have alot of height and many blossoms.
However, a dreadful however, Autumn is rapidly approaching, a first frost in August is unusual, but not unheard of. The long range forecast is predicting nighttime temps in the upper forties this week , a scary though. Not that this years crop of tomatoes is all that large, because it isn't. All year long we look forward to eating tomato sandwiches every day for a couple weeks, may-be more, in fact usually more, but not everyday.
Uh where was i going with all of this??? Ok got it now. The dry spell...meant watering, and hauling water. The ground became so dry that it formed clumps that couldn't be easily broken up, as i dug new holes to put the compostables in, think they call that "trench composting". It was necessary to bash those pesky clumps repeatedly with a shovel. Never saw that before! really never. The ground was dry , despite the watering. For 5 inches down the soil was more like shale than garden soil, even my new Dollar General shovel was complaining. There was no apparent moisture in those 5 inches!!!
My outdoor chores completed i went inside and pretended to do housework for awhile, then i gave up and fell asleep in my favorite chair.
The thing about old, old houses is the layers of renovations on them make are a bit like soundproofing.......except for the drumming or rain on the roof, which woke me from my much too brief slumbers.
And yessss! it made me happy.
wakening raindrops
their drumming on the shingles
sounds better than music
