Talking Plants

March 12, 2014October 2, 2018 / Diane Henders / 44 Comments

For years, scientists have debated whether plants communicate. They hook electrodes up to their leaves to measure changes in electrical conductivity and then argue about whether those fluctuations constitute “communication”.

Hell, they could have just asked me. Plants talk to me all the time. It’s getting them to shut up that’s the problem.

It happens every time I go into a store where there are plants for sale. I’ll be walking along minding my own business when suddenly a beautiful voice whispers, “Hello, Diane. I’ve been waiting for you. Come a little closer…”

Aw, shit.

I fight the compulsion even though I already know I’m doomed.

But I can’t help it. I have to obey.

Against my will, my head turns. All sensors lock on. My feet can’t help but follow.

And there it is: A plant, seductively waving its vivid greenery, or worse, shamelessly flaunting its magnificent flowers.

I try to turn away. I remind myself of all the other plants currently crowding my house, but it doesn’t work.

Some people complain about having a black thumb, but I have exactly the opposite problem. I have a green thumb. On steroids.

I can bring home a tiny half-dead stick of something-or-other, and within minutes it morphs into a monster that expects gallons of water weekly and the sacrifice of a suckling pig every full moon. The ferns cascading six feet over the ledge in my dining room started out as a single 4” sprig in a gift basket years ago. The nine-foot-tall variegated fig that overshadows the dining room table arrived as a cute little housewarming gift no bigger than a bonsai. And don’t even get me started on my entire wall of Christmas cactuses. (But I have a rare yellow one – how cool is that?)

My point is, I know better. And it doesn’t stop me.

I stay away from greenhouses, but the big-box stores do me in. They put a display right at the door so I can’t avoid it. The plants’ voices are clear and sweet and utterly irresistible.

And they’re on sale.

This week I came home with two orchids from Home Depot (a hardware chain). They were in cute little coloured pots, and they were only $6.50! Never mind that I already had four orchids blooming in my office. I didn’t have those particular colours. And they were on sale! Did I mention that?

A few months ago I went to IKEA with a very specific list of household items. Got the items. Also got a red anthurium. And a couple of the cutest little palm trees, because apparently I haven’t yet figured out that plants with the word “tree” in their names tend to grow into, well… trees.

Before that, it was cyclamens. From Home Depot again. I have to stop going into that place.

More to the point, I have to acquire some device that can block the telepathic transmissions of plants. Or else get a frontal lobotomy.

But I’d rather have a bottle in front of me. And flowers blooming in my office.

Please tell me I’m not the only one who hears the voices…

The irresistible talking orchids

But wait – there are the Singing Plants of Damanhur. Oh, look, I’m not the only one who hears the voices!

Hortiporn Addict

December 4, 2013 / Diane Henders / 47 Comments

I’ve succumbed to my own sordid vices again. I really thought I had overcome them this fall, but I was wrong. One glimpse was all it took.

The seductive cover photo made my heart pound. I carried the magazine home with trembling hands and smuggled it into my pile of innocuous reading material. I swore to myself I’d be strong this time. I wouldn’t let my base instincts overcome my knowledge of what was good and right.

But the illicit thrill drew me irresistibly.

Just one look, I promised myself. I won’t let it consume me this time.

But one page led to another. Each photo was more tempting than the last. Each coaxed and promised, “I could be yours. Yours alone. Imagine running your hands over my smooth, glossy skin. Imagine my sweet taste on your lips…”

All that firm flesh; all those provocative layouts…

Omigod, look at the size of that…!

And then it was too late. All my good intentions evaporated and I fell straight back into the waiting embrace of my worst weakness.

Yes, I’m ashamed to say I was drooling over hortiporn again.

It’s sheer coincidence the catalogue fell open to carrots and cucumbers.

I swear I’m addicted to seed catalogues. They’re terrible things. The vegetables are so big and beautiful and blemish-free. The flowers are so lush and brilliant. And the worst part is, I know damn well the photos are just as air-brushed and artificially enhanced as pinups in a skin mag. I’ll never grow anything that beautiful in my garden. (Yes, I’m talking about vegetables. Jeez. Everybody knows you can’t grow hot guys in the garden… can you…? ‘Cause I’m willing to try if there’s a possibility…)

Every year I get sucked in. The snow swirls outside, and I curl up on the couch and dream of all the delicious and wonderful goodies I’ll grow next year. I forget all the hard work of planting and hoeing and harvesting. Those vivid colours drive the memories of hard labour straight out of my head, and I get out my pen and start making my list.

And the catalogues come earlier each year. I got this one a little more than a month after I finished planting the *ahem* several hundred fall flower bulbs I *ahem* accidentally ordered last spring. I was sure the memory of planting all those bulbs would dull the lustre of this year’s hortiporn.

Not a chance. One glance was all it took. I remembered how tasty the summer’s harvest was. And how beautiful it was, at least to my eyes:

I know; it looks like work. But it was worth it!

So the seed companies win again. This week’s catalogue was only the first salvo in their attack, and my defences are already breached. Soon more temptation will arrive from at least two other companies. Then the spring bulbs and nursery stock catalogues will come. And in the depths of January, I’ll cave and order another couple of hundred dollars worth of seeds and plants.

But I can quit whenever I want to.

Honest.

Most people dream of tropical vacations. I dream of this.

* * *

Woohoo! Book 7: SPY, SPY AWAY has just been released on Smashwords, and I hope it’ll show up today on Amazon. (Members of my New Book Notification List will get an email as soon as it’s available.) To celebrate, I’m giving away a signed paperback copy. If you’d like a chance (or two) to win it, pop over to my Book Giveaway page.

‘Scuse My Bear Behind

August 28, 2013 / Diane Henders / 35 Comments

Gardening season has been exciting this year. I had a feeling my impromptu pole dance in the spring would lead to a stellar career, and I was right. This week found me head-down-ass-up in a tunnel of pea vines, belting out Broadway tunes at the top of my lungs.

A number of factors converged to produce this one-of-a-kind entertainment extravaganza. In the first place, I didn’t plan my garden well. In spring when there was nothing but tilled soil, it looked as though there was all the room in the world between rows.

There wasn’t. The peas overran their trellises and joined hands in fellowship above the (now obviously inadequate) space between the rows.

Fine. It’s awkward to pick peas, but lush growth is the kind of garden “problem” I can happily accept.

The second factor is that our garden is out in the middle of nowhere, only a couple of miles from a vast forestry reserve.

Last week I was out there when a cloud of dust and loud rattling announced the approach of a vehicle. Moments later a truck appeared, towing a large cylinder on a trailer. In block letters on the cylinder were the words ‘BEAR TRAP – KEEP BACK 10M”.

Last year a grizzly killed two horses on the farm north of us. And I thought, “This can’t be good.”

The truck paused at our corner before continuing west. That road dead-ends only a couple of miles past our place.

This really wasn’t good.

So when I went out again a couple of days ago, I was cautious. The path to our garden winds through heavy spruce and aspen forest, and after I parked my car in our campsite clearing, I let out a few shouts of greeting: “Hello, Mr. Bear! I’m going to the garden now! Yep, down this path! Through the woods! Scary human being here! Time for you to move on!”

I strapped on my canisters of bear spray and stood debating whether it would be less embarrassing if the neighbours caught me loudly talking to myself in the woods, or singing really badly. Singing won by a small margin.

I don’t know how rock stars manage to sing while jumping around on stage. Granted, I have a crap voice, but I thought I was in pretty good shape. Singing nervously and strolling through the woods to give the bear an opportunity to get out of the way, I was pathetically out of breath by the time I got to the garden. Which made me sound even worse than usual.

The 8-foot deer fence around the garden won’t repel a determined bear, but it should prevent him from accidentally wandering through, so I went inside and promptly shut the hell up because even I couldn’t stand my singing by then.

That is, until my neighbour drove over to warn me they’d caught one grizzly a mile west of us, were fairly certain a second was still at large, and there had been a number of black bears in the area, too.

Hurray.

I abandoned all pretense of dignity.

And this happened:

I’m not proud of my performance, but I didn’t see a bear, either. If there was one in the vicinity, he was probably too incapacitated by laughter to maul me anyway.

Anybody else have a bear tale?

I’ll Tell You What’s Normal…

June 19, 2013 / Diane Henders / 32 Comments

I spend my days skating on the edge of normalcy. So far I’ve been able to avoid unwelcome attention, but that’s due more to good luck than good management. I can get away with my quirks as long as I live in a nice neighbourhood and shower frequently, but put me on a park bench after a hard workout, and somebody’s gonna call the loony-catchers.

This was brought home to me the other day when Hubby was driving and I was sitting in the passenger seat writing dialogue in my head as usual. He glanced over and said, “Writing again, aren’t you?”

I shook myself back to reality and asked, “How did you know?”

“Easy. You had that thousand-yard stare.”

I have what I prefer to call an “expressive” face. What this really means is that there’s a near-one-hundred-percent probability that if someone snaps a picture, I’ll look moronic. Sometimes when I’m absorbed in planning or writing a particularly intense scene, I can feel my face twisting into expressions of fear, anger, or whatever.

Add that to the fact that I almost never know the date and often take two tries to correctly identify the day of the week, and I’m concerned that if I ever get hospitalized and asked orientation questions, they’ll lock me up permanently.

So in the interests of retaining my freedom, I decided it might be smart to write a short primer on what constitutes normal behaviour for me. At least it’ll provide a basis for the authorities to shrug and say, “Yeah, she’s always been like that. We probably don’t need to lock her up yet.”

So here goes:

It is normal for me not to know the day/date. If I’m travelling, I may not always get the city/province right on the first try, either.
It is normal for me to lapse into an apparently catatonic state during which my eye movements mimic REM sleep and my face assumes various inappropriate expressions. It’s also normal for me to be irritated when summarily roused from this state.
It is normal for me to suddenly and inexplicably groan, slap my forehead, and rush to my office to type madly for minutes or hours. This may happen at any time of the day or night, and includes bolting upright out of an apparently sound sleep and scurrying away to type in the wee hours.

With hallmarks like these, it may be difficult to determine what is abnormal behaviour for me, so here’s a handy list of danger signs.

I need professional help if:

I turn down the opportunity to go to a nice restaurant or a blues jam or a drag race.
I fail to fondle fabric when walking through a fabric store.
There’s a garden available and I don’t plant something.
I take my car in for an oil change instead of doing it myself.
I don’t bake when it’s cloudy/raining/snowing… unless I’m reading or writing (those activities trump baking).
I pass up an opportunity to shoot a handgun, rifle, shotgun, bow, slingshot, or any other projectile weapon.
I walk past an unassembled jigsaw puzzle.
I don’t dissolve into a revolting pile of sappy mush at the sight of kittens.
I spill beer. That’s a danger sign in itself, but if I don’t show extreme remorse afterward, it’s already too late – I’m beyond help.

What are your danger signs?

The Happy Hoer

June 12, 2013August 5, 2013 / Diane Henders / 40 Comments

As I mentioned a couple of years ago, I’m a hoer. Very few people are willing to discuss this lifestyle openly and fewer still can comprehend enjoying it, but as you probably know by now, I’m a freak. I love being a hoer.

Last week found me sweating in the hot sun at the side of the road, waving at passing cars as usual. And I’m not ashamed to admit I’ll be doing it all summer long, as often as I can. It’s a way of life for me.

But simply waving at cars seemed a little too passive, so I added pole-dancing to my repertoire just to attract a little more attention.

It was not a pretty sight.

If you’ve been following my Facebook page, you’ll know we spread approximately 10,000 pounds of compost and peat on our big vegetable garden about a month ago. Hoeing in that beautiful, fluffy soil is pure joy. Thanks to some perfectly-timed rain, almost everything has germinated, and last week it was time to put up the trellises for my snap peas and scarlet runner beans.

Since snow is unlikely (though not unheard-of) for the next couple of months, we use our snow-fence stakes to support the trellises.

(For those in warmer climates, snow fences are flexible fencing made of slats or perforated plastic and supported by six- to eight-foot-tall iron stakes pounded into the ground. During the winter the fences control drifting snow by breaking the wind slightly, which causes snow to swirl and collect on the lee side of the fence.)

If you’ve ever tried to swing a 2½ pound hand sledge over your head hard enough to drive in a tall and heavy iron stake, you’ll see the difficulty here. So, thanks to my nice soft soil, I push the stakes in first so I can reach them more comfortably with the sledge hammer.

It takes a lot of pressure to push those stakes in. Fortunately, I’m no lightweight. Put 155 pounds behind an iron stake, and it’s going somewhere… though not necessarily where you want it.

So there I am, hanging off the top of the stake with my legs drawn up to make sure I’ve got all my weight on it.

A car drives by, catching me in the act, and I start to giggle. This does not improve my balance or coordination.

No, I didn’t fall on my ass. That would have been decorous.

Instead I flailed my legs madly to maintain my balance without letting the stake topple. And I laughed harder.

Then I realized how I must look, and I lost it completely.

Since I’m apparently quite allergic to dignity, I decided this was too funny not to share. So, I give you: The Happy Hoer. (Yes, snow-fence posts are ribbed with iron protrusions every couple of inches. I’m not sure why, but I can only surmise it’s “for greater sensation”.)

Thinking About Drinking

September 5, 2012 / Diane Henders / 27 Comments

It’s autumn, and I need a drink.

It’s partly because autumn is my least favourite season, but mainly because the crabapples are ripe. If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you may remember I mentioned I love food and I’m helplessly addicted to gardening.

The result of those traits is a back yard containing an apple tree, a crabapple tree, grapevines, raspberries, gooseberries, rhubarb, haskaps (a very cool variety of honeysuckle with fruit like blueberries on steroids), strawberries, asparagus, a hazelnut tree, and a greenhouse full of tomatoes and peppers. My “real” garden is about 3,000 square feet of vegetables outside the city.

The back yard in mid-summer when it still looked nice

The star of the backyard show is the crabapple tree. Every year, it droops under the weight of its crop – deliciously sweet-tart, juicy blush-pink apples. (The variety is Rescue, in case there are any other hungry gardeners out there.) Every year, I cart away a couple of wheelbarrow-loads of crabapples. I make jelly, fruit leather, applesauce, and spiced crabapples. Then if there are leftovers, I ferment them into hard cider.

This process begins with an explosion of pulverized crabapples and ends with a product that ranges from rotgut to rocket fuel to rot (if I don’t get a high enough alcohol content).

Juicing was a laborious process until a few years ago when Hubby bought me one of those newfangled kick-ass juicers – yet another reason why he’s on the best-husband-ever list. The new juicer works like a dream… except for one thing. No matter how fast I slam the pusher into the chute after adding a handful of apples, the shredding action is so aggressive that bits spray everywhere. The first time I used it, I was picking apple flecks out of my eyebrows and off the ceiling.

This year I wised up and did the juicing on the back deck where I could hose everything off afterward. (The neighbours didn’t even bat an eye. After the radish/toilet incident, they’re probably afraid to ask.)

Once all the juicing is done, it’s a glorious exercise in hope. What yeast should I use this year? What part of the process will I tweak to get the absolutely perfect batch of cider? Then there’s fermentation, racking, fining, bottling with just the right amount of added sugar to get a delicious sparkle in the finished product.

Then there are months of anticipation. It takes about a year before the final product is ready.

Then comes the first taste… and the final classification: rotgut, rocket fuel, or rot. But I keep hoping somehow, some year, I’ll magically produce something drinkable. Well, something other people might consider drinkable. I drink it anyway…

But in the mean time, all that work and hope has made me thirsty. Think I’ll crack open a bought beer. At least I know it’ll be good.

What’s your favourite autumn beverage?

Oh, and loosely related to gardening: I can’t believe I actually managed to snap a bee in mid-flight in my garden a few days ago:

Bee in flight just below the smaller sunflower

Heeere, Mr. Gopher…

August 8, 2012July 30, 2020 / Diane Henders / 15 Comments

Warning: This article contains graphic descriptions from an active zone of conflict. It may be disturbing for sensitive readers.

Tensions were high as hostilities escalated this week in the West Garden. In the past two weeks of conflict, dozens of innocent carrots and potatoes have lost their lives. This week the death of two promising young head lettuce plants caused me to declare a jihad against pocket gophers.

After a brief attempt at mediation last week, negotiations broke down when the gophers walked away from the table. (It so happened the table was appetizingly laid with Warfarin, but I see no reason to let facts get in the way of a dramatic story.)

The point is, I offered the gophers the opportunity to vacate the disputed territory or die an honourable death on their own terms, and they refused to do either.

This week, I found more impudent gopher mounds and more dead vegetables. And I got serious.

I’m beginning to feel like Bill Murray in Caddyshack. I laughed when he sculpted a squirrel out of plastic explosive. I thought his deranged expression was funny.

Little did I know that this week, I’d feel that expression on my own face. And I’d be seriously wondering how he procured the C4.

However, I’d like to think I’m still slightly saner than to blow my entire garden to hell just for sake of eradicating some pocket gophers. I went with a subtler method: poison gas.

Gassing gophers was a whole new experience for me. Growing up on the farm, the rifle was always handy by the back door if we needed to get rid of animal pests. (Yes, those were the days before gun control.) So it was with trepidation that I read the warnings and instructions on the packet of innocuous-looking little cylinders.

The instructions helpfully described how to find the horseshoe-shaped mound that indicated the location of the main burrow, and provided all sorts of useful advice about the danger of burns and poison gas inhalation. Hooray.

But I was a woman on the edge. This was a Holy War. Nothing would stop me.

I found the burrow. I dug down and identified the direction of the tunnel. I donned my heavy leather gloves (to prevent burns) and ascertained the direction of the wind (to prevent gassing myself).

I test-fitted the cartridge in the tunnel to make sure I wouldn’t smother the fuse when I put it in…

And nearly shit my pants when I lit the first fuse.

You know how in the cartoons, the fuse makes this hissing, spitting noise and sprays a rooster-tail of sparks? You know how the cartoon characters get all freaked out when the flame zips along the fuse ‘way faster than they expected?

It was exactly like that.

Turns out they only guarantee a minimum of five seconds on the fuse. I spent approximately two of those seconds gaping at the smoking, spitting cylinder of death in my hand before stuffing it in the tunnel, shoving dirt over top and running like hell.

All in all, it went exactly as planned, but with a good deal more adrenaline.

I won’t know until next week whether I got him. But if I find more mounds, I’ll have no choice but to go Rambo on his ass.

So if you see a deranged-looking middle-aged woman standing out in her garden at sunrise armed with a compound bow and broadhead-tipped arrows, just smile, nod, and back away slowly.

Heeere, Mr. Gopher…

I’m A Hoer

September 14, 2011September 14, 2011 / Diane Henders / 19 Comments

I admit it. I’m a hoer. Now that the weather is beginning to cool off, I’ll soon pack it in for the winter, because it’s pretty much a fair-weather pastime for me. But most nice warm days in the summer, you can find me by the side of the road, waving at all the passing cars.

A few weeks ago, I even caused an accident because drivers were gawking at me. That’s no mean achievement, when you consider the fact that I was out in the middle of nowhere, and the average traffic load on that road is about one car an hour.

I’m talking, of course, about hoeing my garden. Wait, what were you thinking…?

And before you ask, no, I wasn’t wearing anything gawk-worthy. Quite the opposite, in fact. Dirty, baggy jeans and T-shirt, with a too-big long-sleeved shirt over top, along with my white Stetson (I’m from Calgary, I can get away with it) and a pair of geeky sunglasses.

I have a big vegetable garden by the side of the road at our acreage outside town. I don’t know what the protocol is these days, but when I grew up in the country, you waved to passing cars, whether you knew the driver or not. So I waved, as usual.

Apparently, the two drivers were lost, and the one in front decided to stop and ask for directions at the same time as the one behind turned to wave at me.

Seconds later, there was a crash, and then I was gawping like an idiot at the sight of two cars mashed together on an abandoned gravel road in the middle of nowhere. Pandemonium ensued as one of the passengers went into hysterics.

I’ve never actually witnessed hysterics in real life. If I get a Chrysler suppository or some other unpleasant shock, I’m more the ‘swear-loudly-and-hit-something’ type. So observing hysterics first-hand was… enlightening.

Fortunately, nobody was hurt, the drivers apparently remained friends, and the two cars limped off into the sunset. I think I heard one of the drivers mutter something about giving up and going home. I stood there, hoe in hand, feeling vaguely guilty about the whole thing.

I’ve heard that hoeing is a dangerous undertaking, and now I understand why. So if you happen to pass a badly-dressed middle-aged woman working in her garden in the country, please don’t be offended if I don’t wave.

Just throw money. I’m a hoer, after all.