Very nice indeed, Edward. Belle of Ashwood is lovely, and I like your new one, Voluptuous Beauty. Mary's Baby is a favorite of mine because of the lush color and texture, but Heavenly Angel Ice!!!Ah that's a real winner. kay

I am not posting any pictures today because I don't feel like getting wet. The rain is here. Radiation Biohazard is an average looking bloom with above average performance. It was my longest bloomer last year at 6 weeks and it has been going for 4 weeks so far this year. I appreciate it most at the end of the season when everything slows down. How Lovely You Are is similar to Elusive Happiness. It is supposed to have better branching and bud count. Once both are large clumps I may decide to only keep the best one in my garden. Rita, if you need another yellow Elegance of Summer is a beast of a plant and I strongly recommend it. North Wind Dancer looks great every bloom and it is easy to take excellent pictures of it. The branching and bud count are superior. In my garden it requires a peony ring to keep from flopping but I think it is well worth the effort.

Thanks Kay, Avedon, and Jean! Except for the seedling youngster, the rest aren't at their best now. I guess they are tired. The Prez was a lot more ruffled, America The Beautiful more beautifully pink, and Wind Frills is a lot smaller now. Fujitani looks rather pale. It will be interesting to see which one blooms last. Nancy

Hi Y'all! I tried to go back to sleep early this a.m. after being up for a couple of hours and it was hard to sleep because there was so much thunder and lightning. Then, when I was finally dozing off, the weather radio went off TWICE within about a 30-minute time frame. The first time was to tell me that G.M.'s county was under a Flash Flood Warning. The second time was to tell me that our county was under a flash flood warning. I did finally fall back asleep and get about 3 more hours of sleep. Randy, I remember thinking to myself in January or February that I hoped we'd have lots of thunderstorms this year because I love falling asleep or waking up to the sound of a good rainstorm, and I REALLY missed that during the drought. What a fool I was!!!! Today what I am really missing is heat and sunshine...and sleep! Go ahead and complain about the lack of sunshine and heat whenever you want. You're sure to get a lot of agreement from many of us that we want some heat and sunshine too. Courtney, Do you have a space heater? If you have one that blows warm air, you can speed up the drying of your concrete with it. That is, assuming the rain isn't pouring there like it has been here. Right now, I am on a new calendar and a new clock, different from the one we used for so many years. DH's hours have always been 'odd' because police work is not an 8 to 5 type thing, but the hours have been horrible since his most recent promotion. He's hardly had any days off, but it is finally beginning to settle down a little. However, between him getting up in the middle of the night to go to work, and our son working 24 hours on/48 hours off, our regular routine has disintegrated and no one around here is getting the right amount of sleep. Everyone is also on a different meal schedule. It has been crazy. AND, whenever we have a time when we are all three at home (4 counting son's girlfriend who is here at the house a lot) and we are about to eat a meal together, the fire pagers go off EVERY SINGLE TIME. It is uncanny. In between rain showers I run outside and pull weeds. At least the weeds come up out of the wet ground more easily than they otherwise would. Oh, Courtney, flip flop tan lines! I haven't had those in so long since our snakes and scorpions scare me too much for me to wear flip flops! Merryheart, My rain gauges do that too and I suspect it has something to do with the angle at which the rain falls or the angle at which one of the gauges is leaning. The rain gauge that is nailed to a fence post 3' above the ground always has a slightly higher reading than the one that is stuck into the ground. I think the one stuck in the ground tends to lean over a little now and then, maybe, and not catch quite as much rain. We are having 1.5" of rain a day.....1.5 inches on Thursday, 1.5 inches on Saturday (I emptied the gauge at bedtime) and 1.5 inches so far today. You have had so much more rain than us! It is coming in waves here as it rains a little, stops, rains some more, then stops again. I think it is going to be a very long and soggy day. I have been hearing the Carter County street maintenance guys on the scanner as well as some of the Carter County fire departments. It sounds like they had to close and barricade some roads in your county to keep people from driving through high water. I have also heard them discussing the removal of "sand bars" washed into some roads. It is pretty quiet here, except for one reported 'water leak' at an intersection in town. I find it hard to believe there is a water leak, but think that maybe there is a backed up storm gutter or something. Well, it is rainy and quiet here and that means it is a good time to clean the house this afternoon. Dawn