Refrigerator Story.

7-3-12 VERMONT: It turned out that the last storm zapped our refrigerator. Yesterday, after dinner, we discovered the ice cream had melted, and then that the freezer and refrigerator were too warm. Resetting the temperatures didn’t help, and, by morning, it was clear that some circuit board was toasted. A serviceman advised us that the repair would be too expensive to justify on an older unit. So, it was off to Home Depot. The new one won’t be delivered for two weeks, but they set us up with a “loaner” until then. I took the opportunity to level the floor in the refrig’s nest. All the floors in this old house are uneven and slope one way or another. I also put a surge protector on the frig outlet.

I feel as though I have control of the weather. Anytime I shovel out the culvert, it rains within a few hours. It happened again yesterday night. After about seven wheelbarrows of sand shoveled out and dumped in a marshy spot, it rained last night. This time there was only distant thunder, but we got another 0.35 inches. This morning the sky was total blue, but I cleared out the culvert this afternoon, and now it’s overcast, cool and threatening.

Back to the garden—yesterday I did a lot of weeding and pruning and added two more artemisia to the bed that used to be the lily bed.

 New blooms: evening primrose.

 
Mallow.

Rosebay Rhododendron. This one has retained more of the pink color present in the opening flower than the one last month from NJ.