dead things can also grow, can't they?

I have today and tomorrow off from work, because Remembrance Day is a holiday for the civil service and I thought a four-day weekend would be rather nice. (And so far, it is.) So I took the opportunity to take twospots' advice from my previous post, and planted the peonies.

Luckily, it's been a fairly warm week and the warm weather seems to be holding. I was out in just jeans and a hoodie and felt perfectly comfortable, so I'm hoping that the ground is still warm enough (despite some overnight frosts) for the roots to establish themselves. If they're still alive, that is.


This is what the roots looked like. They were soaking in water because that's what the Internet said to do, if the roots looked dry. (They looked like branches with globules. I decided they fit the definition of "dry.") My father-in-law told me not to be alarmed by their state, and that they were actually supposed to look this way. Since he's the one who lives on a farm, not me, I believe him — with some skeptism.


Anyway, I dug a hole, I made sure the eyes were about a half to an inch under the soil (there were multiple eyes) — you can see it in the above picture (I hadn't finished backfilling yet), just like the Internet said. And then I mulched it with leaves, just like twospots said. I am doing my very best to follow instructions to the letter, and not get creative. Creative is bad.


So now we wait. This whole waiting for four-to-six months so see if things are actually working (see: tulips, garlic, peonies) is just killing me, though. Who wants to wait so long to be disappointed?

(I am trying to be optimistic, but it's being tempered by what my brain tells me is pragmatism. Remember the strawberries? The tomatoes? The entirety of my far-too-grandiose plan for the garden? I am trying to learn a lesson here, is what I'm saying.)

Finally, does anybody have any ideas what these are?


They are little, and white, and everywhere. I have been pulling up clumps of them. They appeared around the end of summer, early fall. I assume they're weeds, since they're growing like them — but, then again, my garden also spews forth rosemary and sage like weeds, so who knows.

On the upside, my neighbour was also gardening today, and we had the longest conversation we've ever had (it lasted maybe 10 minutes). It turns out that he doesn't know anything about gardening, either — their front yard was landscaped with hardy bushes and rock paths by a previous owner — and they had a "wild flower garden" in their old place, too, that they didn't know how to deal with. So at least they don't see our front yard as a sign of moral degeneracy. Phew.