Dahlias and Zinnias...

The cutting bed is so full of flowers that I went up this morning to cut some of the blooms to make room for more. In my haste to get to class, I shoved my gleanings into a pitcher of water. When I got back, I not only liked the chaotic confusion/profusion of flowers, (some gracefully drooping, one looking like it was blasting off and several peering out from the middle of the bunch). I also liked the backdrop of the little blue birds in the painting on the wall behind it.

While I was at it, I picked a couple of dozen ripe tomatoes, and am now making tomato sauce. Meatballs are next.

An interesting footnote to the "jungle" clearing story is the return of a missing penguin. The woman who lives across the street from the empty house had a little line of wooden or plastic penguins, a bit bedraggled after many seasons of weather exposure. Apparently some people really disliked them, because they disappeared under cover of darkness awhile ago. In spite of the owner's hand lettered sign asking for their return, nobody obliged. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that her dogs roam unattended on the street, fouling lawns and gardens, despite the pleas of neighbors. Some have gone so far as to build fences.

This morning one penguin, considerably the worse for wear, reappeared in his former spot. Our theory is that someone chucked all five of them into the jungle. A chipper is scheduled for Friday. I wonder of the other four are doomed to become mulch?

From our lofty perch above the fray, we can afford to be smugly amused by it all.