Lovely photos Melissa, I love donkeys... Glad to hear you're getting some precipitation, that's the best news of all.

They are indeed very nice photos. The donkeys are so cute, and I, too, am really glad to hear that you are getting some decent weather finally! We had snow here yesterday,but by evening it turned to rain, and has all been washed away by now. The river is full and impetuous,and there's a violent wind from the south-west; I could definitely do without THAT. All the schools are closed today...

Great! I just love donkeys! Glad you're having some wintry weather, it is springlike over here.. My theory about weather being the opposite between NW and SE Europe is proved correct again. I hear lots of snow has fallen in Britain and on the NW of the continent.

LOL, Virginia!!!

Those photos look like heaven to me (donkey included, such smart animals) and this will set you up up nicely for the next year.

We are in dire straits in that respect, have had 1% of normal precipitation for this time of the year, high winds that are wreaking havoc with the fires, and humidity from 1 to 4%. It's a source of constant stress, with no hope for relief in the near future, or who knows when at all. Strangely, the roses are doing fairly well because we are able to water them and it's not as hot as in summer, although 78 degrees in not normal for this time of the year.

Melissa....I'm so happy to hear you are finally enjoying lovely, cosy winter weather. It was a long, hot summer for you. Here's wishing you a rain and snow filled winter!

Back again, after 30 hours without power. The weather proved more lion-like that I had expected. The rain continued to fall, the ice to collect on plants and structures, then the rain came. The result was a notable ice storm. With the power out and our living room flooded we passed an unpleasant evening--the flooding stopped when the rain did, and the lake in the corner of our living room vanished; it was strange--but it did pass. DD made it home safe. Yesterday morning we emerged to a world of smashed trees. The very common black locusts were the worst, a good proportion of them snapped like matchsticks, the sight lowering my already poor opinion of them another notch. But 'Archduke Joseph' came down, bringing a good chunk of the persimmon with it; poplars, willows, Leyland cypresses all over were hit hard; most surprising, I saw quite a few large branches down from native oaks, and one moderate-sized specimen snapped through the trunk. We have weeks of cleanup ahead. The roses came away much better than I would have expected; not much damage, and established plants will grow right back again. This is just the second ice storm I've ever experienced: we had a bad one in western Washington in the winter of 1996-97; but this one may have been even more damaging. Another surprise was to find the ground dry when we stepped out of the house yesterday morning. We haven't gotten enough rain this fall to replenish the aquifers; my guess is, the thirsty soil drank it right in. We got a lot of rain yesterday and it should help ground water levels.

P.S. Ingrid, I've been so taken up with our own difficulties that I didn't have enough attention to spare for yours. I hope you get rain, because I would hate the kind of weather you're experiencing. Rain and cold, preferably minus the ice storms, are wonderful: water is life.

Melissa, What a storm! So sorry to hear of damage like this. It is great you got rain, but so too bad about all the extra work.

Oh wow...what a terrible storm! It's so scary when trees and limbs come down. We have many large trees on our property, so I know what you mean when you say a week of cleanup ahead of you :) Take care during the process!

Pretty winter trees and hello, little donkey! Plants, enjoy your winter rest.

What a terrible storm that must have been. Hope you've managed to get on top of the situation and get back to normal as soon as you can. Trying circumstances... Sorry too about your A Joseph and Persimmon, it wasn't long ago we were admiring them here.

Melissa, your post about the storm damage and Marlorena's brought the thought: change our enemy, change our friend. It can be hard to stay on top of things. I hope the damage is not too overwhelming nor too discouraging.

Cath

Melissa, thank you for being able to spare a thought of me among all that devastation and discomfort. This is the worst I think you've gone through and so much work added to what you already have. Nature doesn't care, it does what it does indiscriminately, but please know that we hear all feel so badly for you. It's been a strange Christmas season with your travails, bart's hints of a bad situation and my husband having an emergency MRI yesterday after his fourth fall, increasing weakness and overall deterioration. The scan was not normal and he's being referred to a neurologist. Will let you know more as time goes on. Take care.

I'm very sorry to hear that Ingrid, we wish you both all the best, and keep our fingers crossed.

Sending healing thoughts to you and your husband, Ingrid. MRI's are not fun, but I hope that is the first step to a diagnosis and treatment.

Melissa, I hope the storm damage was not too bad, and that you continue to get some much-needed precipitation?

Virginia

Hoping for the best, for Bart and your husband, Ingrid, among many others who are having challenges. This is all the opposite of the peace I was hoping for people in the new year.

We're all getting older (and thank goodness, considering the alternative). Ingrid, I'm sorry to hear that about your husband, and hope you get good news. I know he's always been a strong support for you.

Folks, you don't need to worry about me. Yes, no question but that the storm did a lot of damage: smashed and splintered trees all over the property, and it's going to take months to clean up the mess. I was quite downhearted a day or two after my first survey of the carnage. And I haven't even been down in the woods yet; heaven knows what I'll find there. The worst was an oak planted ten years ago, a focal point, that was uprooted and that DH hasn't been able to bring back upright with a comealong and heavy rope, as he did with the likewise uprooted young Italian pine.

The positive side to all this is that most of the damage was done to trees I'd like ultimately to get rid of anyway, and it gives me a lot of the never-adequate organic matter. I was quite cheered by the sight of the half-destroyed elm close to the top of the Rose Road. I hate elms, but have never cut this one down because it was healthy and large enough to cast badly needed shade. But now Nature has done much of the job for me, and perhaps that elm is on its way out at last. Idem for many other elms, for zillions of black locusts. I have mulch, I have limbs for terracing our steep slopes, I have trunks and big branches to cut up for steps, I have room opened up for better trees than were there before.

It was interesting what was and wasn't damaged by the ice. Locally, the storm seems to have done its destruction in the hill zone, with little or no activity down in the plain from what I've seen. Up here the woods have a good deal of damage, with even some fair-sized oaks damaged or even destroyed. The leafless black locusts, which grow all over the place here, and elms were heavily damaged, with many instances of moderate-sized trees snapped in two. On the other hand, our small olive planting, though the trees had some broken branches, came through with much less harm than I would have expected, and the Italian cypresses were for the most part not badly hurt. Our one young cedar of Lebanon was unfazed. Of course the soft-wooded poplars and willows suffered heavily, but I was surprised at how battered one maple I saw was; I haven't looked at others (we have many down in the woods). It hasn't rained since the storm, but if I can trust the evidence of a bucket left out then, we got five or six inches of precipitation in that episode, which is enough to make me happy. Temperatures have been nicely chilly: real winter. I'm all for that. It hasn't been too cold to work outdoors.

P.S. Life can be quite frightening, and the world situation, and the political situation in the U.S., aren't reassuring. I feel this, too, with DH getting older and with the experiences of his surgeries this past year, and given his tendency to push himself hard. Every time he disappears for an hour and I don't know where he has gotten to, I worry, has something happened to him? The worry is chronic, and not likely to ever to go away. Even DD, young, beautiful, and healthy, has a condition that's being monitored by a neurologist.

None of this is easy to deal with and I have no advice to offer, except, perhaps, get out in the garden if you can. Digging and pruning do have a way of easing anxieties. A cat in one's lap is helpful, too: the world may be falling to pieces, but the cat sits in your lap, purring, wise as the Sphinx.

O, Melissa and Ingrid, my heart goes out to you both, and heartily hope that your loved ones will be well. My own problem is pretty scary: the chest infection didn't go away and a bronchscopy revealed malign cells in my lung,so now we are waiting for the results of other tests to see what the situation is and find out what might be done. So my heart is not light. It's also hard to work outdoors since I feel so weak: shortness of breath AND my bum hip combined.

Some time ago we had a storm here, too, though not as bad as Melissa's was, I think. What happened was that it snowed,and there were fierce winds, but this was before the leaves had dropped,and the temperatures were not that low, so the heavy, soggy snow caused many big, thick limbs on the oaks to split and break. There's no way I can clean up the damage in all of my woods,of course, and it is sad to see those ugly wounds on my oaks. But the bright side is that, as Melissa points out, it gives you lots of branches for terracing,etc. One of the worst-damaged trees is this beautiful oak ,and it is sad indeed to see all those raw wounds, but even with this, there is a good side: this tree does block the morning light in summer,causing a large and prominent area of my garden to only recieve sun very late in the afternoon,which was pretty bad for roses. Now, I think that since the wind "pruned" off a lot of the branches,this area may have become rather good for roses: more morning sun and filtered light at midday.

Best wishes to one and all.

bart, I'm shocked and dismayed at what you're going through right now. That has to weigh on you every minute of the day. My hope is that it was caught early enough since many times there are no symptoms of lung cancer until it's too late. I'm hopeful that in your case it was caught early enough since you don't indicate that there is an actual formed mass. I'm sending you positive vibrations and hope that there will be good options for treatment for you. So very sorry that you're having to go through this. Take care of yourself first and let the garden take care of itself.

Melissa, I can understand your concern about your husband, although through the years he's always seems as strong as an oak. I wish we could just stop the clock before problems set in. I hope that your daughter's problem can be managed successfully. Having a child affected must be doubly painful, and I do hope there will be a positive outcome.

Thank you all so much for your concern and good wishes for my husband. You are all great comfort to me right now.

Sorry to hear this bart, hope you get good news on that front.

I'm hoping for a great medical team for you, Bart, to help you deal with this serious situation. We're all pulling for you. I know your roses are too.

Bart, you have my best wishes for a good outcome. Keep your heart up! and, in this dark time of the year, create all the warmth and light you can, good for mind and body. I don't know who your doctors are, but the last year has left me pretty impressed with socialized medicine, Italian style. Americans don't know what they're missing.

Ingrid, DD's just got something the doctors are keeping an eye on. It may be nothing. I sometimes think that, if we were aware of everything questionable that was going on in our bodies, we'd all be horrified.

Bart, wishing you the best. You're in my mind.

Bart, I very much hope that your situation will turn out to be better than it sounds. As Sheila says, we are all pulling for you... and hoping you'll take it easy, and not fret about the things you can't do right now. Focus on getting better first.

It was my experience that getting a diagnosis- even though it was a scary one- was a relief because I finally knew what was wrong. My doctors let me know what I needed to do, and I did it, and I'm now in remission. I hope that you can also shed the anxiety of not knowing what's wrong, and will be able to travel a path to better health without too many bumps along the way.

Please keep us posted,

Virginia

Thank you all for your good wishes. They are truly needed and deeply appreciated.I totally agree with you, Melissa, about the Italian medical system. Americans really do not know what they are missing. True, a socialized medical system does have it's failings,mainly on a burocratic level,but the bottom line seems to me to be that these doctors and health-care professionals tend to be seriously dedicated people.

I just wish I had more strength and energy to be able to do more things in order to help prevent my mind from wandering down dark paths.

bart, if you can't get to a library, can the library come to you? I know there are bookmobiles in some parts of Italy, and reading can be a wonderful distraction. What do you like to read?

I wonder if you'd like to get cards or letters? A friend who lived in Italy many years ago used to complain about the reliability of Italian mail services, but hopefully, that has improved since then? I wish I could mail you books, but it looks like there is no longer an international book rate to make that an affordable option. Drats!

Virginia

I'll keep you all in my thought and prayers, Melissa, your daughter and husband, Bart, and Ingrid, your husband. Your right, Melussa abiut the garden being the best place to relieve your stress. I have a kitten that helps me and catches crickets while I weed :) I will have to take a picture sometime. Thinking of you all, Alana