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That sounds like a return to medieval jousting, which may be somewhat appropriate - lower the visor, snatch a bloomstalk, point it forward, spur the steed: it's show time!
I left y'all in discussions of roller coaster freezes in late March, hopped aboard a plane and came down in Bangkok, Thailand, with a week in Hong Kong on the way home. Since I saw only one iris the entire trip, some kind of a strange Chinese plant blooming by the warden's shack at the Mai Po Refuge in Hong Kong, I shall not elaborate further on that.
Have been furiously weeding and getting ready for the bloom season since my return in early April. Hired a kid to do periodic weeding, and he did a great job - on one bed (I currently have 26).
Really opened for the first time as a display garden Mother's Day weekend, with signs vectoring traffic to Malone Hollow from the four-lane, and it worked quite well. A steady stream of folks, all of whom placed orders. This past weekend the word must have gotten out, because both days had 3-4 cars at a time in my newly rocked parking area.
I planned to go commercial as supplemental retirement income, and if it keeps on developing next year, I may decide on early retirement! (A fantasy).
Otherwise, the three high points since my return to USA were selling the lead article for the next issue of State of Franklin Magazine, an iris detective yarn called, The Chester Inn Caper. For those of you who don't have access to this historically-focused magazine from Greeneville, TN, the culprit was Alcazar. The editor can be reached at:
tamarac@greene.xtn.net
If you like the kind of hard-boiled detective who would see the tracery of varicose veins on a dowager's pasty-white cheek and be reminded of San Francisco (Mohr 1927, Dykes Medal same), drop a line to Tamara Chapman at the above address and see what it would cost to get a copy when it comes out.
Greeneville was good to me again this weekend when the America's First Frontier Chapter AIS held a non-judged show this past Saturday, with a popular balloting, and one of my eight entires, Sweet Musette, was the top vote getter.
The third high point was a garden visit from the Frost Queen, Linda Mann, whom iris-talkers realize has decided to devote her life to the study of freezing weather on iris. I learned a ton of stuff from Linda in the brief while she was here - like why some of my beauties were not blooming (frost in the terminal bud - which sounds to me like an oxymoron) and why some of my TBs looked like SDBs (frost again). Ironically, the varieties that do well for me are rotting at Linda's spread, and her triumphs are not blooming for me, and we're both in East Tennessee!
Being a life-long Chicago Cubs fan, I'm used to suffering defeat and saying, "Wait'll next year." Iris at risk fit very nicely into that scenario.


James Brooks
Jonesborough, TN
hirundo@tricon.net
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