Paradise Regained.

10-9-08 VERMONT: I’m back up here in paradise with Chloe and Sam. Judy is still in NJ doing dog stuff with Nick and Gus. I arrived yesterday to find the house taken over by the neighbors, who we invited to stay while their house is being renovated. Ii’s nice to have the company. The addition to Steve’s and Diana’s house seems to more than double the size.

On to more important things, there were four inches of rain in the gauge when I arrived and we got another 0.35 inches last night. There has not been a frost here. Almost none of the garden plants has gone dormant, and there are still lots of flowers: roses, ecinacea, black-eyed susan, sedum, helenium, monkshood, cimicfuga, golden rod, catmint, asters, boltonia, turtlehead, feverfew, dandelion, yarrow, hollyhock, phlox, thyme, mallow, witchhazel and the others I’ve forgotten to mention.

The veggie garden is ready to be put away. I took down the electric fence, mowed the overgrown pasture around the garden, pulled out the tomatoes and their cages, pumpkins and dill, and stacked the harvested pumpkins. I also mowed around the barns, and put up the storm doors.

Big news, Steve looked out the window a few days ago at dawn and saw what appeared to be a person with an umbrella standing by the pond. When the person moved, she turned into a bull moose who trotted off to the woods.

The color, fall foliage color, is good now, which is much earlier than the last few years.

In the blogosphere, I saw a certain person described as a "right wing robot" and in another blog as a "mud-slinging marionette", but you'll have to guess that person's identity.

New blooms: cimicfuga, witchhazel, asters.

Here's some nice color across the road, and two happy girls.