(Well, I knew the answer right away, Thinman, but I got gold stars a week or three ago and didn't want to appear greedy!) Pattioh - thanks for the memories! And I hope Fenway lives forever, despite it's butt destroying seats! For the duration of my last three years in the Northeast, my office was but a short spit from Fenway. Landlord was inclined to 'double dip' by renting the office parking lot for night games - what he didn't plan on was the nightowl tendancies of my company (i.e we didn't vacate the parking lot at 5 pm and he not only couldn't sell our spaces, he had to park the game cars so they didn't block ours - oy vey!). Oh, the stories I could tell about the scuffles we had!

We thought we would catch some of that south wind, and rode the bus to Norman, got on our bikes and rode back to the State Capitol. The real wind didn't pick up till we were back in OKC. I took this picture, when we got back to the SC.

mekales, Looks like a black-capped chickadee (one of my favorite birds). I enjoy listening to them too. Their name is based on the chickadee sound they make, and I like hearing their "fee-bay" territory sound, probably because I like the bird so much. Here's a link for you to take a look to help you decide. Lori Here is a link that might be useful: enature.com page for black-capped Chickadee

Early June isn't all the far behind, Holly. My notes show that I have never planted my warm season transplants (like tomatoes, peppers, eggplants) until about May 20th. Direct seeded warm crops like beans, cucumbers, and squash I don't plant until June myself. Rain and thunderstorms predicted until at least Tuesday, I would wait. If you are direct seeding, they will probably take longer to germinate and you wont feel like you've gained anything anyways. The only reason I have anything in my garden right now is because this year I really went heavy on the cool season stuff, the lettuce, cabbage-type, and root veggies, things like that. If this cold weather keeps up, I'll be glad I did haha. As far as the climate stuff, yeah I agree with Liz, this is pretty typical weather. Don't forget that we just broke out of a solid 10+ years of a drought cycle which made us all used to a warmer, drier pattern. So now that the cycle has turned, we must readjust to the cooler, wetter weather until the cycle turns yet again back to the hot and dry. So I guess, yes, we could say that this is our new "normal" at least for now. This could last a few years, or much longer, or much shorter, there is really no way to tell. Thanks to our geography (high altitude, widely varying topography, and distance from any significant bodies of water) there is really no such thing as getting a handle on Rocky Mountain weather, lol. As soon as you think you've got it, it will change again. The cyclical pattern and extreme variation from week to week, and year to year is the normal climate pattern of the High Plains and Rocky Mountains. Yeah, Eastern gardeners have a more predictable and regular climate to work with while weather is the major limiting factor for our Western gardens. However, we don't generally have the same level of pest and disease issues that they do. There's a trade off for everything ;).