Death and Life, Green

Monday apparently was a day of life and death.

We kacked a fortnight lily this morning. It had grown large, and though it had beautiful flowers, it had also discovered the knack for reproducing itself everywhere. I might add that these flowers only look nice in the early morning or late evening. They hate the California sun and make it a point to shrivel up during mid-day. I could even have dealt with its need to procreate, except that it began to harbor an insidious noxious plant called bindweed under its shadow. I am at war with bindweed, and thus collaborators have to go. Goodbye, fortnight lilies. You were lovely every couple weeks if you got enough water, but snuggling up with the bindweed was the last straw.

Bindweed wraps itself around other plants and chokes them, incidentally. And it covers the plants completely, sucking up all the sunlight. And it sends roots down nearly three feet deep and sends root suckers out for yards and yards. I had it under control in my yard until my neighbor let her infestation grow. She thought it was an ornamental ground cover. Damn stuff.

Yet it was still a day for life, too. Our hopseed tree has been trying to reproduce extravagantly, also, and one of its children was hunkered behind the papyrus. I pulled it out, and after a lengthy soak in "SUPERthrive" planting supplement, we tucked it carefully into a big pot. With any luck, it will grace our patio with its shade in years to come.

The day's threat of thundershowers has weaseled off to the Sierra Mountain Range, dammit, so I have to be content with watching the lightning over the mountains to the east, and listening to my digestion rumble in lieu of thunder. Will Fritos increase the chance of midsection thunder?