Saturdays in the Garden - Screw Ennui

OUTSIDE

It's October!  There is a LOT that goes on in the garden this month and it can, in fact, be a little stressful especially if you live somewhere that winter can come on anytime and is miserably cold and snowy.  Like Iowa.  The A Way to Garden blog does a great monthly garden chores post. I particularly love the number one item on her list:

1. Leave especially ornamental or wildlife-friendly plants standing. Don’t act as if you’re vacuuming the living room; clean up beds tactically for maximum enjoyment by you and the birds.

Most garden to do lists for preparing for winter will encourage the gleeful removal of all dead vegetation.  It is certainly important to do this for any diseased plants but for everything else? As long as you're not too type A? Just leave it until spring.  There are so many living things that use that dead and dormant vegetation to get through the winter and many of them may even be helpful to you come next garden season (like loads of beneficial insects). Just leave it. And take the time you saved to go have a piece of cake to console yourself that winter is coming.

So what's going on here?  We've had some chilly nights but no frost yet so I'm still harvesting some tomatoes, peppers, a last few green beans and some gargantuan carrots!  I finally grew normal sized carrots! It's a garden miracle!  I need to harvest and process the kale and chard for storing as there is a good crop of those.  There are even a couple of plants still flowering - marigolds and a pretty aster that I don't know the name of and have no idea where it came from. Those are the best kinds of plants.  I'm hoping that some radishes and sugar snap peas I planted in early August will bear fruit but I think I will run out of time.  Finally I need to start thinking about planting my garlic and have pulled out a few of the bigger heads from the harvest for re-planting.

LIFE

Though I'm afraid to jinx it by mentioning it, I think I am coming out of a mild case of depression that's been plaguing me the last 3-4 months or so.  It hasn't been debilitating, I've just been unmotivated and uninterested in almost everything.  The word that keeps coming to mind is Ennui which is French and pretentious but in my mind it seems to perfectly encapsulate the mixture of boredom and mild despair I've been feeling lately.  Listlessness and just wishing something, anything, would happen. The change in season has helped as has being home again.  I've also decided that while I need to continue my work towards some of my longer term goals, I also need to bring some activity and excitement into the short term.  One thing I'd like to do is start doing some traveling again.  I love to travel and never do it anymore mostly because of cost and it being hard to get away from work.  Well screw all that.  Life's too short.  I'm not going to be irresponsible but it also doesn't make a whole lot of sense to put things off.  Honestly I'm not sure I shouldn't feel lucky to have such first world "problems". 

So are you a cheerful personality who never has an attack of the doldrums or do you wrestle occasionally with periods of lower spirits that seem to come out of nowhere?  What usually pulls you out of it if anything?    Finally, If you could travel somewhere and were trying to go easy on the pocketbook where would you go?


WATCHING, READING, and BLOGGING

Watching

I finished up my binge watch of Longmire Season 4 last weekend and was....super disappointed.  I haven't really wanted to watch anything since as if all TV has been tainted by unmet expectations:0).

Some friends and I had a girls night last night and one of the women's husbands very kindly picked out a few movies for us to watch.  We picked Serena (2014) which he pitched as a romance.  Ummm..... I guess it's a romance if highly dysfunctional relationships in depression era North Carolina are your thing?  Despite a pretty stellar cast (Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, Toby Stephens, Rhys Ifans) it was terrible.  The nicest thing I can say about it, is that it was a perfect movie to watch and tear apart with friends!

Reading 

Finished Last Week:

•  Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling:  On the downhill portion of my Harry Potter re-read.  I think this book is going to be the one about which my opinion changes the most from first to second read. 

Currently Reading:

• Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe: So maybe some day I'll pick this up again?  Until then it will sit here on the currently read and look encouraging.
• The Founding (The Morland Dynasty #1) by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles: This is the first book in a series that follows a single British family through numerous generations into modern times.  This first book takes place in the early 15th century.  This is such a fascinating idea and I have high hopes but I have to say the characters in this first book are shallow and are doing nothing for me.
• Of Noble Birth by Brenda Novak:  Despite the presence of pirates it is not making me happy mostly because of deficient humor and boring main characters. 
• Leviathan Wakes by James S.A. Corey: Space Opera!
• Uprooted by Naomi Novik: I think this book may be suffering under the influence of too much hype.  I like it thus far (about 1/4 in I'd guess) but I don't feel gushy about it and am definitely not craving it.
• The Dream Thieves by Maggie Stiefvater:  The second book in the Raven Cycle which focuses a bit more on the character of Ronan.

Blogging 

On the BLOG LAST WEEK:

I posted stuff - go me!

TUESDAY:  Review of Unfinished Business by Anne-Marie Slaughter  I really liked this book about modern feminism and work culture.
WEDNESDAY: Review of Akata Witch by Nnedi Okorafor I loved this YA book about a young witch in Nigeria.

 

On the BLOG NEXT WEEK:

SUNDAY:  Re-read thoughts about Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire plus re-watch of the movie.
TUESDAY:  This week's Top Ten Tuesday, hosted by The Broke and the Bookish, is all about quitting which seems a bit of a downer.  I'll either post on this OR I may post a book review of one of the 25 books I have as a backlog because one of the things I want to quit is procrastinating writing reviews!
THURSDAY:  This week's Tough Traveling topic is Creative Cursing which is awesome but since this is the kind of detail I NEVER remember about a book (though two TV shows and one book come immediately to mind) I may just have to enjoy everyone elses' lists.  Join in if you have some ideas - its a fun meme hosted by Fantasy Review Barn.

Saturdays in the Garden - Hoppers giving me the Stink Eye

OUTSIDE

August.  It's like the last hurrah of summer before the heat mellows and becomes more bearable.  Overall it's been a rather enjoyable summer with very few really uncomfortable days.  The garden is soaking up the heat and the result is my first ripe pepper.  These are the "Healthy" variety of heriloom peppers - more of an Italian variety.  They seem to be producing well and I'm super happy with a ripe pepper this early in my garden which is usually SO slow.

Also my Kale has rebounded from being munched on pretty heavily early in the season and it's looking lovely.

My Juliet tomatoes are becoming ripe.

Finally, I've had a third good picking from my green beans which is good for my garden.  The plants are not looking good so this may be it for them.  They do this every year and I need to investigate why because I'm pretty sure they aren't supposed to be done by now.

 Also, I ran into this guy (or gal) in the field.  I thought he/she was pretty adorable with his jaunty nose-like protuberance but I don't think he returned the sentiment.  I got the distinct impression he was giving me the stink eye. I was like "Hey, you're the one hanging out on my net" and he/she was like "Yeah, but your net is in MY prairie."  And yes I speak to the critters I run into when afield. Don't you?  I'm not sure of the species but think he/she is in the planthopper/leafhopper family.

LIFE

I've got lots of news under the Watching and Reading category so I'll keep this short.

I'm mostly preparing to spend a LOT of time on the road and in the field starting a week from now.  I'm half looking forward to it because I enjoy exploring the prairies, half dreading it because it complicates my schedule in a big way and causes some anxiety.

WATCHING, READING, and BLOGGING

Watching
I haven't been watching much of anything lately.  I kind of fizzled on my Doctor Who re-watch after season 2 but will likely pick up at season 3 again soon.  Nothing else has struck my fancy so I've been reading and catching up (sort of) with the blog.

Reading
So I have a couple of fun things to report!  Well they are fun for me.  First, I won a book!  Fantasy Cafe hosted the giveaway for Magic Shifts by Ilona Andrews! It's book eight in the Kate Daniels series which is one of my absolute favorites.  I just recently finished books 5 and 5.5 in the series so I have a couple of books to catch up on before diving into this one.   So far it looks like the book is well liked by fans of the series (4.6 stars on Goodreads).  So yay!  Winning books is the BEST.

Secondly, in preparation of being in the car a lot for the next six weeks I went to the library to stock up on some audio books and scored HUGE with a bunch of great YA/Middle-grade titles many of which I've wanted to read because of other Book Bloggers' recommendations.  And that was just the longest sentence I have ever written. Anyway, check out this bounty:

Finished Last Week:

• The Neverending Story by Michael Ende: This was actually just okay for me.  I think it would work super great for its target audience (middle-grade) but it's one of those that didn't translate well for me as an adult reader. 
• Cold Days by Jim Butcher: As per usual, even though there were moments of wanting to hit something, in the end, I loved it.  I've already gotten the next book in the series, Skin Game, which is the last book to read before I am completely caught up with the series.  Then I'll have to wait.  Sigh....

Currently Reading:

• Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe: So maybe some day I'll pick this up again?  Until then it will sit here on the currently read and look encouraging.
• In the Garden of Iden by Kage Baker:  Immortal cyborgs in Elizabethan England!  Need I say more? Getting close to the end on this one.
• The Founding (The Morland Dynasty #1) by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles: This is the first book in a series that follows a single British family through numerous generations into modern times.  This first book takes place in the early 15th century.  This is such a fascinating idea and I have high hopes but I have to say the characters in this first book are shallow and are doing nothing for me.  This book is officially on hold at the moment but I'll get back to it one day soon. 
• World After by Susan Ee: The second book in the Penryn and the End of Days series.  It's super grim - grimmer than book one - and I'm loving it.  What is wrong with me?
• The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater: Just started this today in audio.
• Of Noble Birth by Brenda Novak: A historical romance that features pirates. 'nuf said. 

On the BLOG LAST WEEK:

SUNDAY: LONGMIRE - the First half of season 2. The third in a series of obsessive posts about this show.  Sorry. When will season 4 come out???
TUESDAY: Top Ten Tuesday: Fairy Tales Rebooted.  Meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.
WEDNESDAY: Review of Changes by Jim Butcher. In a nutshell, not my favorite installment in the Dresden Files series but I like how it shakes up the series.
THURSDAY: Tough Traveling: New Beginnings. A fun meme hosted by Fantasy Review Barn to explore all the beloved tropes of the SFF genre. This particular trope seemed to be EVERYWHERE or it may just be that I really like it so gravitate towards books that use it. 

On the BLOG NEXT WEEK

SUNDAY: Fourth Longmire post featuring the second half of season 2.
TUESDAY: The Top Ten Tuesday topic this week is the top ten authors by which I've read the most books.  Hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.
WEDNESDAY:  Book Review TBD.  Probably Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling.
THURSDAY: The Tough Traveling meme this week is highlighting Forbidden Love in Fantasy land which sounds fun:).   Learn more over on Fantasy Review Barn.

I'll end with a good quote to remember when things are busy: