Seven year wait

Seven years ago (I think) I planted prairie roses in my yard. They have done OK, as they have spread about a bit in the yard. However, I've never seen them flower. Until today.

I'm pretty excited about this one bloom, and it looks like there might be a few others coming.

One of the reasons, or maybe THE reason, I haven't seen blooms on my prairie roses before this may be due to the fact that they seem to be infected with whatever the heck this orange stuff is.

It comes off in my fingers, and there doesn't seem to be any bugs about. I'm not exactly sure what it is. One suggestion is that it's some type of rust, which is one of the myriad of things roses are susceptible to - so I'm told. I tried cutting them back and cutting out the parts that have the orange stuff. We'll see if that helps.

Quote of the Day

Why move unless it improves on stillness? Why speak unless it improves on silence?

- William Hutt, noted actor, especially for his roles in Shakespeare, Canadian, who died this week.

Inland Empire

Saw Inland Empire yesterday, which is the latest film by David Lynch. Man, I still don't think I can fit it all together. There was definitely some nice camera work and interesting production. Also, there were bits of dialogue that I thought were funny - though not obviously jokes.

However, what the whole storyline was supposed to be about might be a little beyond me. It centres on an actress who gets a role in a film. Or does she get it? Or does she already have it? There's much talk about whether it's today or yesterday or tomorrow.

And then there's the old Lynch trick of switching another actor/character for the one that we've been following along in scene after scene. And when a character shifts from interacting with one set of characters to another set - some of whom may be played by the same actors, although it's not clear if it's actually the same actors - it's more than enough to cause me to scratch my head and say "HUH?"

In several scenes of this long - it's almost three hours, kids, so be sure to visit the restroom before the film starts - I couldn't help but think: "umm, how is this moving the story along? what is this contributing exactly?"

So, I'd say Inland Empire was a good, interesting film, but at almost three hours and being difficult to follow, I'd understand if anyone gave it a pass.

Fforde sf novel, not Prefect

I read my first Jasper Fforde novel this week, and I quite liked it. It was Fforde's first book about the Special Operations officier Thursday Next. Sounds sort of James Bond-y, except that Next lives in a world that's not quite like this one. It's set in England, but they are still at war with Russia over the Crimea, and Wales is an independent country on not completely friendly terms with England.

Then there are the things that Next is involved in. She's a LiteraTec, which is one of the lower (in prestige) or higher (in number at 27) levels of SpecOps, or SO. However, Next is recruited to work at a lower level, S0-5, for a special assignment, which goes bad, leading to the deaths of two fellow agents.

Taking much of the blame for the botched job, Next moves from London to her hometown of Swindon for another S0-27 job, but with thoughts of revenging her fallen colleagues on her mind.

However, doing so necessiates blurring the boundaries of fact and fiction, which is why the book is called The Eyre Affair. Next penetrates the novel Jane Eyre, literally, to save its heroine.

It's quite a fun read, so I'm looking to read Fforde's other books in this series.

SSC

Short Shameful Confession: I've never seen The Sopranos.

"I've been everywhere, man..."

Well, apparently I haven't been everywhere according to TravBuddy.

The battle has been joined!

I have begun my yearly battle with the gout weed that's in my yard. Gout weed spreads by the roots and has taken up too much space in my yard. Moreover, it's bland looking - just green - and about knee high, which makes it difficult to see anything else even daylilies - at least until those flower, which is still more than a month away I think.

The gout weed battle is likely a losing one, as it'll probably come back in the places I've ripped it out of. Nevertheless, I can hopefully give the other plants near it more of a chance of doing well before the gout weed comes back.

I also transplanted a few ferns from the north side of the house to the south side, but still in a shady spot. They'll likely die back this year, but should come back next year without a problem.

Still have other plans for the yard including putting in some sitting areas and trying to get rid of some grass with the newspaper covering method.

Great game!

The Sens and Ducks will have something to live up to after I saw the semi final of the French rugby league - Super 14 - today. It was Toulouse-Clermont, and the home team took the lead by half time. But a great run for a try by one of the Clermont players got them close early in the second half.

Then they went ahead on a penalty, and sealed it with a drop kick during play to win 20-15. It was fitting result in the sense that Clermont had two tries while Toulouse never put the ball in the Clermont end; their points were all off penalty kicks.

Toulouse had its chance late in the game with Clermont up 17-15, when they were only a couple of meters from the Clermont end line. However, when playing the ball back from a scrum a Toulouse player pitched it back hitting a team-mate, which led to an open ball that a Clermont player was able to grab and punt down the field.

There were many "oh la la"s by the announcers as they watched the replay of that Toulouse error.

Mother Nature is missing out

I planted some more things in the garden, and cut the boulevard grass today. As I was doing so, this thought came to mind: "Why isn't there a bug specifically eating dandelions?"

I think Mother Nature is missing out here by not having something - anything - eating dandelions. There's a great surplus of the plants - at least around my yard, so said bug - or mammal, or marsupial, I'm really pretty open here, would have no shortage of food.

So, I say forget genetically modifying wheat or corn or whatever. Let's genetically engineer a dandelion eater. That's what the world needs now.

Or my little bit of the world anyway.