Ok, I just looked up our house in the City Directories, to see who lived in it before the family we bought it from. In 1918, and 1927-28, the A. B---- family lived in the house. According to the 1920 census, the family had 2 sons, Alfred and Philip. (By 1930 they'd moved to a house on a nearby street.) Here's the thing - we know a B--- family with roots in Cincinnati! We shared a nanny with them when we lived in NC. The dad's father is named Philip - wrong age to be the Philip who lived in our house, but if it's not the same family I'll eat my hat. I'm guessing those boys from 1920 are the grandfather and great-uncle of the Mr. B---- we know. Wild!

There's nothing quite like the feels engendered by turning on a computer and getting the boot screen.

I think it's new computer time. I'm trying to shop, but the combination of my notebook computer and my home wifi is verrry sloooow for some reason. It looks like I can get more computer for my money in a laptop, which seems wrong.

Oooh, flea would make an excellent Watcher. Aside from the concussions.

Surely a buffista would have the good sense to wear a bike helmet when out and about in pursuing that vocation?

naw ... we like to live dangerously

I did not order something and totally forget about it! Turns out my package was a little gift from a team event that I didn't get to attend, but it didn't fit into my inter-office mail slot.

Now I feel like I need to buy myself something.

Some lady from Cincinnati emailed work asking if we could send her kudzu seeds, since she'd read online that we have some on the property. I had to double check the date to make sure it wasn't April 1. Boss is replying to her, which is good, because otherwise she'd be getting macros of Cousin It looking landscapes with lolspeak captions.

Juliebird, fyi, one of the local garden places is celebrating Mulch Madness (thought you'd appreciate that).

Mulch volcanoes for everyone!

(No, stop, don't do that).

I'm still in plant-ordering madness (in a way, it's an effective strategy to keep the costs down, as things are quickly becoming unavailable), and then there's the bazillion roses to prune. My mulch madness probably won't happen until mid-May.

Ground is still too squashy to do anything outdoors. But I've started dressing up some planters with heather from Home Depot (they were outside, so already hardened off!) and sheet moss, some spray-painted sporangium (green and gold shimmer), natural mushrooms on picks, sprigs of dried lavender, and birds nests with fake spotted eggs. Second set was with green and gold mushrooms, heather, and curly willow.

Still trying to figure out the planters that are frozen solid that I can't get the winter plantings out of.

Timelies all!

Argh, so itchy. It's not so much the dry skin, though that's annoying, it's the area on my back that started itching yesterday and has a bunch of raised bumps. This has become a recurring problem, and I don't know what's causing it. If it were bug bites, shouldn't I have more in more places? And wouldn't Gary be getting bitten too? He's not.