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

Yes Chip and Judine are still kicking at least last I talked to them in mid January. Jose is taking over most if not all of the nursery care and propagating. I am sure he is busy. They have talked with me about setting up a community garden in a part of the nursery and have I've yet to get back with them. I am hoping someone with the Comal Master Gardeners will step up as I am about 30 miles north of there and can't commit to the time and travel at this point to get it off the ground. It is always a good idea to call ahead and yes they have always closed down over the holidays and still are closed on Sunday and Monday. They were propagating for Hoffman's Nursery and have on and off done quite a bit of biz with them. I haven't been on garden web for sometime and just stopped in to say hi y'all and hope you all keep growing whatever makes you happy and enjoy. Happy Growing David

I second the idea of talking to the local appliance store and seeing if they'll put you in touch with their movers/installers. You might get, "Well we won't touch it officially, but if you want to talk to the delivery guys about doing it on the side, that's between you and them." Reminds me of when I wanted the RO hooked up to my built-in fridge. I called a bunch of stores but nobody would do it. I had a guy out from one of those same stores adjusting the fridge doors and he gave me the same story until I waved $40 under his nose. Took him less than 10 minutes; I bet he was one happy camper on the way out but I was happy to have it finally done.

Of course with the gas dropping like it has all week the b@stards jacked up the price by 10 cents for our Thanksgiving weekend - they ALWAYS have excuses for the holiday weekend which is a load of cr@p...how are they going to explain this one this week? MMMmmmmmmmm? Add my name to the list wanting a bailout. I keep telling DH we are extremely fortunate only having a cat and banking ahead when we have the opportunity (we both do contract work so it's not a luxury but a necessity). I've been shopping at charity shops for years and we are not shy buying xmas gifts...this year I've already started xmas shopping at the charity shop and plan to use my sewing skills for xmas among other skills. I'm also starting early on my home baking to utilize the sales as much as possible. Retail will have the toughest xmas since the depression. I mentioned too that this year I'd still like to give an xmas donation to our local animal shelter because I am sure they will need the help more than ever, although it will be much less than last year. I count my blessings everyday and thank my parents for teaching us over the years the skills they learned while living through the depression. As for cable, we're so dissatisfied with shows moving over to specialty channels we've been buying box and used movies since we have drastically cut down on going out to the theatre and restaurants. We just can't afford it. Even our home improvements have stopped for now until we are sure of our winter income. I shake my head at those who have teenagers in the house - it must be really, really rough.