When language freaks dream

Last night I dreamt I'd walked into some kind of jumble sale. It was mostly Christmas decorations and old books. But among the dog-eared childrens' classics, an unexpected treasure: Colloquial Kashubian. I think I squeed. Despite the name it had the classic mid-century "Teach Yourself" blue/yellow colour scheme (although badly faded with age); furthering the confusion, the publisher was neither TY Books or Routledge but someone I'd never heard of.

I set it aside to continue browsing, but failed to find anything else worth buying. When I went back to it, I made a crushing discovery: The book was only a publisher's dummy. Not only that, a mangled one so that the pages which were included weren't even fully legible. Heartbreaking! I had a lot more crazy dreams before getting up (e.g. talking my way into the quarters of an Orthodox bishop on a Russian oceangoing ship, crashing an Italian wedding with a female celebrant, etc.) but that's the one the really stayed with me.

Two months in the garden

As you may remember, my mantra through all those weeks of wet weather was always, "At least it's good for the garden". How good? See for yourself!

Here's our little plot back in May. The rosebush belongs to our neighbours. Directly behind the tutelary spirits is a freshly-planted jasmine. The bunch of oregano to the right is the only thing left from the previous plantings (except for the sweet william nicked by another neighbour). Those spindly plants around it are bee balm a.k.a. Oswego tea or bergamot (Monarda didyma). In the lower left, a few sad chives:


Here it is two months later with the addition of rosemary (at the base of the sculpture), lemon thyme (lower right), sorrel (Rumex acetosa; just behind it), borage (staked up), and lemon verbena (Aloysia triphylla; in front of the trellis). You can't really see the tarragon, which is hidden by the sorrel, or the newly-planted lavender, which is already blooming.

So far, the lessons are:

• Don't bother with tarragon. It's in a sunnier spot than the rosemary and it's done nothing.
• If we want a climbing vine in back, jasmine is probably not the best choice.
• Borage and chives would've grown fine from seed.

My biggest weed problem has been yellow wood sorrel a.k.a. sourgrass (Oxalis stricta). After throwing it away for weeks, I finally tasted some and realised it would make a fine cooking herb (particularly given the slug-wrecked state of its namesake). Now I'm planning to let it grow out until I can acquire enough for tea.