It's raining again. But you knew that, didn't you? You can see it on CNN. Ah, but it's different to *experience* it, believe me. California is wet in a uniquely complete way. Freshets of clear water spring from any gopher hole in the hillsides, creating spontaneous little waterfalls that join the many other rills and falls that work their way toward ditches, creeks, rivers, ultimately the ocean. The earth is literally spurting water. It can't hold another drop. It all has to go *somewhere*, but there isn't anywhere, really, for it to go at this point. Walking in my garden is like walking on a wet sponge -- the water oozes up around my boots at every cautious step. Every depression in the ground is a puddle or an impromptu lake. The California hills, glittering emerald in the *very* brief moments of sunshine we've had in the last 45 days or tawny as the flank of a California cougar in the hot summertime, are not built on anything very solid. Much of the state is steadily and slowly moving somewhere else. It is the consistency of a plate of jello, slowly sliding downward -- eventually to the ocean, I suppose. The roads are clear evidence of this inexorable movement, a reality puny humans still haven't managed to either stop or circumvent. Roads are slipping, cracking, disappearing in long eerie chunks, being covered with trees loosened at the roots by the endless water, or wide swaths of mud and rock that are released from far up hillsides bordering the narrow, winding highways. It's too wet to garden -- you just create little tramped-down muckholes if you try. The roses in one part of my yard have had standing water around them for over a month now! They look OK! Could this be possible? And it's warm. The Banksiae roses are blooming -- not just little, anomalous early blooms -- real clusters, blowing their April bloom period, I'm sure. The daffodils are nearly over and the tulips are starting, their heavy blooms blown into the mud with each new storm. Even the daffs Suzanne sent from WV have bloomed here, while I'm sure they're still dormant in their original beds. An iris that came from the Cangemi's garden, apparently shocked by its new surroundings, has shot up an improbable, long stem with a *bud* on it. This is two months ahead of even *my* irises. More rain is predicted. And yet more. I wish I could hibernate, but I have to be at the ready in case one of the 70 mph winds finally rips my greenhouse loose from its substantial moorings (this year we lashed 6" wide strips of polypropelene webbing, used as tie-downs on big trucks, across the greenhouse at several points and anchored the strips on each side with long stakes deep into the ground. So far, it's all held together, creating a pretty aerodynamic greenhouse. But we're always watching. Gauging the wind. I can't keep up with r.g.r. You'll see me less and less but I'll manage to drop in occasionally. Various computer/server problems make the newsreading a lot harder than it used to be and I have even less time for it. I'm glad I have good email correspondences going with many of the fascinating folks I've met here. It's about all I can manage. I am so out of touch with a lot of the threads that I feel I have nothing to say. I guess I'll make the occasional 2-cents worth of commentary, we'll see. Gotta put on my boots and trek out to shore up the fence. See ya around. Alice