About Summer Wine. I bought it from Heirloom about 7 years ago. It is one wonderful rose! The bush is healthy and grows fast. The blossoms are among my earliest and then the blooming time goes on for a long time. Their fragrance is mild but pleasant. It has the most gorgeous big orange hips on it all winter until a hard freeze. Mine was badly damaged last year when the winds of 80 mph blew the copper tellis with it over. I had to cut away most of the rose to get the trellis back up. Well, it bounced back like a rubber ball and was covered with roses this year, and is even now sprawling out and over the other shrubs. I may cut it way back once the hips blacken, because that does not seem to phase the plant at all! And oh yes, there is one late rose blooming on the tip of a vine that is hanging in the exact center of my office window. Over the past few days I have watched it unfurl and bloom in a brilliant raspberry orange. Summer's light and heat turn it to a lovely soft pink with buttery yellow, but I like the early and late flowers best with their more intense colors. This is one of the most disease free roses I have. It is also one of the first I would plant again if I ever had to move. Do give it a strong trellis though. There is nothing wimpy about it!

CBS Evening News, network, devoted the whole half hour of news to him. I enjoyed watching it. They are dedicating 7pm, 6pm Central, to an hour about him on Sunday. I have set the Tivo for it. That is in place of 60 Minutes.

Larry, I have to agree with you about The Far Pavillions. My sister in law kept telling me how wonderful it was and how much I would like it. I'd take it out of the library, look at it and end up taking it back, unread, a few weeks later. She even gave me a paperback copy for my birthday (she was persistant) that sat on my bookshelf for months. Finally, one day I picked it up and started reading it. I couldn't put it down. I read all but the last 3 or 4 chapters in one sitting. I'd have finished it that night except I couldn't keep my eyes open any longer.

I spray fungicides. I live near Ken and you cannot have a rose garden in this part of the country without spraying. Unless you are willing to let all the roses lose their leaves. I don't spray for bugs, except for thrips, and that is spot spraying on unopened buds only. Integrated Pest Management is a method where you decide what to do about each issue. Black spot is something we have to be pro-active about here. If I spray preventatively, I will actually spray less than if I waited for the BS to come. I don't want to use chemicals incorrectly. I follow the labels and use caution where recommended. It's a personal choice, but I don't fee that spraying fungicide every few weeks has had a negative impact on my yard. I only spray my roses, The spray goes on the roses, not into the air. I have a lot of other plants in my yard. I have a butterfly garden with bunches of plants that attract butterflies that doesn't get any spray at all.