It is a good thing my brain is still fairly young and flexible. These past few days have sent me for several loops. The torrential rains and various unseen gremlins conspired to try and make me blue.
First, it rained and stormed on Friday, but by 4pm was clearing. I packed and set off for Behnkes and the opening reception of the Flower Show scheduled from 6-9pm. Got there and found -- nothing. Lots of customers and full sunshine, but nowhere to set up our booth and no one on staff who could answer my questions. Apparently, management had canceled it many hours earlier on account of rain, but not bothered to tell me nor stuck around to see if the weather turned.
Second, the rain started again very early Saturday AM and made setting up the Silver Spring Garden Club's Garden Mart at Brookside a real muddy mess. It was chilly too - which made for stiff blue hands and slow moving legs. Still the Mart went on and the hardy gardening crowds still came. (Pictured here is one of our customers - a true budding gardening.) It started to dry up mid-morning and by closing time was a lovely day. Three weddings followed us at Brookside, I think their combined prayers may have helped! I spent the rest of Saturday afternoon and evening running through the Georgetown Garden Tour and the Capitol Hill House & Garden Tour. I'll share photos from both those and all the other area tours I can get to - will do a special wrap-up story in the July/August issue of the magazine.
Third, got up again at the crack of dawn on Sunday. This time to make it to the WUSA9 studio for the 8am news. I pretty much arrived, set up, went to get a cup of water, and then they came running out and said "you are on the air in 60 seconds!" -- apparently the other guest was way late and as I was on-time and already set-up so they flipped our segments -- I saw her changing in the newsroom as I left - I gave her the stink-eye too. Despite all that, it went VERY well and we got a lot of tomato tips in. The anchor held my magazine up the entire segment and was very enthusiastic plus easy to work with.
Next, Monday dawned and my slate roof which is mounted on top of a two-foot thick concrete base that I thought was impossible to penetrate -- sprung a leak. (My house is a former electric substation - the ultimate in recycling!) I woke up to a steady drip-dropping down onto my dryer and the pile of mending in the laundry closet next to my bedroom. I put a bucket there and ran out the door to tape a radio interview. I'm living in denial now - will deal with scheduling a roof repair later.
Today, I woke up to sunshine and warmer temps. Got a yoga class in and slogged through a good bit of paperwork. Tomorrow it looks like another great forecast then several more days of rain so I've determined that I'm not going to do
any inside work and will treat myself to a full day of gardening -- I'll hack back my weeds, tie up the wandering tendrils, plant all the annuals, and generally try to tame my jungle. In the evening, I'm off to the Garden Party benefit at the
Woodrow Wilson House. My hat is all designed thanks to a creative second-wind that hit me last night. I may add some fresh flowers right beforehand. Hope it stays dry through that event.
My latest radio interview with WAMU: Metro Connection is now archived here. Entitled: Gardening with Kathy Jentz: An Obsession With Tomatoes. Their description: "It's time to plant! And time to grow the best crop of tomatoes we've ever grown. For some it's an obsession. Here to help us sort out our tomato issues is Kathy Jentz, editor and publisher of Washington Gardener Magazine."
