De-lurking here to say it's not just you! We had a strange spring with wild weather swings (up to 40F from daytime to night), and I have to say...this is the crappiest rose season I've had in 8 years. Very abundant number of buds--probably the most ever--but the quality of the individual flowers just stinks. Like the worst thrips damage ever, but each and every rose has it. Some roses had stunted/balled/withered buds, others had blackened petal edges, still others didn't bother with blooms. My Queen Elizabeths, easily the most prolific roses in my garden, haven't bloomed yet. There are some old, established bushes that hardly went beyond their pruned size and only spewed a few deformed buds. Thrips are normally a problem on my light colored roses, but this blight is affecting every color. The later developing buds are better--if on the small side. It's the roses that developed first (late April to early May, which is quite late for us) that were the worst. Surprisingly, the roses that seemed to shrug it off best were some of my David Austins--Jude, the Dark Lady, and a few others. But some of the DA's (Abraham Darby) and other shrub roses and climbers (like Sombreuil) were just horrific. My mom came over and said "you know, if you just look at the roses from the house, they're not so bad." Sigh. And we had such a lovely, rainy winter (for us) that I was sure the rose flush was going to be awesome. And the numbers were truly impressive--hundreds of buds on some of my small (3 ft) bushes, which is the best I've seen. But again, the actual quality of the buds was the worst I've ever seen. Some tried and true winners from my garden were hard pruned just because I couldn't bear to look at their browned/blackened/crinkly/balled horrible little blooms. These included: memorial Day, Queen Elizabeth, Sheer Bliss, Peace (sob), Marilyn Monroe, Daybreaker, New Zealand, Just Joey, blue Nile, Evelyn, Abe Darby, Charles Darwin, Autumn Sunset, Golden Something(normally gorgeous downturned sunny yellow blooms, but this time they didn't even open!),Chicago Peace, Tamora, Pink Peace, Mirandy, Mary Rose, Secret (double sob), McCartney Rose, Tiffany....I could go on, but I'm feeling kind of nauseous. To put it in different terms: I have over 160 rose bushes with few repeats, and this year I have only brought six cut blooms into the house. SIX. But who can really blame the poor roses? Last week we hit 100 degrees on Monday, and on Thursday the high was 54 with rain (snow in Flagstaff, poor buggers). What is a plant to do in these conditions? Apparently, they sulk. Now it's getting to be blistering hot again, with humidity in the single digits. Spider Mite season. I won't likely see a good bloom until September, and then the deer and javelinas will be moving in for their Autumn feast. I'm thinking of getting into daffodils. At least the lilies, Shasta daisies, coreopsis, and cannas are doing well. And the glads look like they might actually open this year (last year they were all duds). I'm off to sulk myself. Heather

Some things I did when I knew my garden was going to be temporary were: 1. Planted expensive perennials in movable containers 2. To "camoflage" the containers, I planted easy to grow, inexpensive annuals - usually seed paks, around the base of the perennial planters. Check out the Annuals forum for easy things in your zone, some will re-seed too, so you don't really have to treat them as "annuals" since they come back from the seeds they drop on their own. In my dry winter zone 7 a lot of things probably re-seed that might not in your area, but here a list of some of my "aggressive" re-seeders: Alyssum Morning Glory Honesty (Lunaria) Nasturtiums Monarda/Bee Balm Amaranthus (Love-Lies-Bleeding) Hollyhocks Sweet Peas Coreopsis Nigella (Love in a mist) Oregano (the herb) By planting these, you can get some quick color and plants this year around your planters, and if they successfully re-seed, then the plants will keep coming back. If the landlord complains, you could always claim ignorance and say that you only planted annuals thinking they would only be around the year you planted them :P

When my mother went to assisted living, she refused to part with anything, & her sister rented a storage building to stuff everything into. The sister called me one day & said that the storage building was being emptied at last; she & my brothers & their wives had gotten everything they wanted... so I could come get what I wanted before the rest of it went into the dumpster. This is my family. so I drove down there & sifted through what was left & took some things & found some really old textbooks that were falling apart. I knew they must have been kept for some reason, so I called this aunt, & she hightailed it back to the storage building & grabbed those books. Her mother had been the first girl in their family to graduate from high school; back then, students had to buy their own books, & if you couldn't buy the books, you couldn't take the class & graduate. These were her mother's school books, not valuable on the antiques market, but family heirlooms. My aunt's son now has them. & the moral of this story is... Do *not* let anyone into that garage with the agreement that they can keep whatever they want until you've put your hands on every object in there. & get a friend or family member to be there with you 1) when you're going through stuff & 2) while you're keeping an eye on the people who are cleaning it out.

@Bunny Texas Toast is garlic bread. Well I think it is just toast too but if you google texas toast it comes up with garlic bread and even recipes for how to make "texas toast". I don't think a holiday meal, etc. or picking up something to take to a dinner when you don't have time to cook, is like buying "convenience" foods routinely. Of course, each to their own. I can see the time-saving benefits. The reason we buy very few convenience foods is because many times they are not as healthy as the real thing, so many additives, too much sugar, too much salt, etc. That kind of thing. But the thought of boiled eggs kept in a bag or container of some kind - well I just can't. I think they would smell and I think the texture would be affected. Jojo, that may be true, but it blows my mind to think that someone doesn't know how or can't make a boiled egg. Every generation is different though! PS I just had my boiled egg and toast!