I've lost track of how many days in a row that it has rained here in Chicagoland, but it was at least six. Today (Sunday) was the first day that we didn't have any rain, and I made good on my promise to myself that I'd do some yardwork when the rain let up. In fact, it was a picture-perfect day for doing things outdoors, with a nice wind, sunshine and temperatures in the low 70's F (22-23C).
Before doing that, though, Jennifer and I spent some quality time playing Sid Meier's Civilization V. Civ V is the latest iteration of what is probably my favorite PC game ever. It's one of the first PC games we purchased- I'm pretty sure Space Quest III was the very first (I remember playing that on our Commodore Colt in CGA!), and after that we got A-10 Silent Thunder (this game prompted our very first video card purchase). After that, it was either Railroad Tycoon or Civilization. Strangely enough, the last two were both Sid Meier games.
We're not huge gamers, but we both really enjoy Civ V, and we played for about an hour. Jennifer announced that she needed to get the turkey in the oven, and that would take about two hours. This was perfect, as I was ready to tackle the yard. So, I saved the game, and she headed to the kitchen, and I got together my gardening gear.
Around here, we pass things down. When the kids were little, for example, clothes were often passed down from one sibling to another, and if they were really good quality, three kids got to wear them. As the kids have long since grown into adult sizes, we don't do that anymore, but when Jennifer's or my shoes become unserviceable or unpresentable in polite company, they become yard shoes. So, I grabbed my official New Balance yard shoes, my wide-brimmed straw hat, and headed out the door. My first stop was the garage, where I grabbed some clippers, and then I was off. A liter of water and two hours later, my task was done. I almost forgot to mention my task. Normally, yardwork for me is cutting the grass, but today it was weeding and culling. Our sunflowers are coming up, but are competing with a lot of other foliage, most notably mints, weeds and wild morning glories. So, I did a lot of clipping where practical, and uprooting where necessary, to help the sunflowers grow.
I haven't posted any pictures in some time, so I thought I'd share a few today. The first three are mainly sunflowers, and the last one is budding ornamental onions. The onions could have been props on the original 1960's Star Trek television series. Before the flowers bloom, they look like pods with needles attached. When they finally blossom, the white outer case splits and withers away, exposing a very delicate, fluffy flower ball. They also produce lots of easy to harvest seeds. In addition to the onions and sunflowers, we grow roses of sharon, hollyhocks, basil, ornamental parsley, sage, and dill. Dill is another 60's Star Trek prop plant wannabe. It's very wispy and alien-looking, and incredibly aromatic; a few years ago, it was plentiful in our yard, but has become rarer in recent times. This year, I'm letting the surviving plants go to seed .
Nothing new to report on the data front.
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
