drought

Climate Anxiety

As I write this, on November 7th, it’s snowing. Real snow, that’s sticking. A couple of inches have accumulated already, and will probably persist into tomorrow, as the temperature is near the freezing mark. A brisk northeast wind is adding to the feeling that winter has arrived early.

Let me just remind readers that I live in Victoria, British Columbia, where snow is rare most winters. Green Christmases are normal here. I don’t know if this is the earliest snowfall ever, but it’s the earliest I’ve experienced in my 30 years here. I haven’t really started on fall garden tasks. I haven’t even raked leaves, as many are still on the trees, and still green.

A freak early snowfall is one thing, but this is the fifth in a series of weather extremes in the last two years. The first was the “heat dome” of June 2021, during which many high temperature records were shattered. On June 28th, my max/min thermometer recorded the unheard of high of 37C. In the BC interior, a small town was destroyed by fire on a day that saw temps near 50C. Exactly one year ago, torrential rain (287 mm. or 11 in. recorded here in November 2021) caused major damage in several communities and minor to moderate flooding all over southern BC. Right after Christmas 2021, came a week of extreme cold. That max/min thermometer recorded a low of -10C on December 27th, something I had never experienced here.

The next extreme was a three-month drought last summer. Almost no rain fell between July 7th and October 21st. Summer lingered endlessly. When rain finally started, it was pretty much at normal levels into November, but after the most recent system exited the region, seriously cold air moved onto the south coast from the now chilly interior of the province. According to meteorologists in Washington State, a “backdoor cold front” is pulling this cold air onto the coast and turning any precipitation that occurs to snow.

After all this, I’m apprehensive about what might come next. Blizzards, heat waves, tornadoes, hurricanes? The dynamics of weather have changed. Prediction models aren’t working any more. Everything’s unprecedented.

Weird light at sunset. Orange light due to wildfire smoke. — *Orange sunset caused by wildfire smoke.*

This makes me realize how much I’ve taken weather patterns for granted, and how disturbing it is to realize that weather is no longer predictable, that extremes may occur at any time. I can no longer tell myself that such events are freakish and rare, and once they’re over it’s back to normal. I’m not sure what normal looks like any more. Add to this similar extreme weather events in other parts of the world (terrible floods in Pakistan, destructive hurricanes in Canada’s Atlantic provinces and in Florida, heat waves and fires in Europe and California), and I feel a constant buzz of anxiety in the background of my days, even when nothing is happening.

We’re told to adapt and prepare, to assemble emergency supplies and “grab and go” bags in case we have to evacuate. (Of course we should already have done that, since we live in a place where a major earthquake may happen any time.) I can’t argue with that, but there’s a difference, I’ve realized, between knowing something unwelcome and accepting it. Acceptance is necessary before action is possible. In between these two states is a period of creeping unease and unfocussed anxiety.

Is any one else feeling climate anxiety? How do you deal with it?

Update: Most of the snow melted the next day, but temperatures are still several degrees below normal. The next week is supposed to be mostly sunny and dry. No floods expected, at least in the short term!

A Strange Start to Fall

Here on southern Vancouver Island, fall has been cancelled and summer continues.

Our normal temperatures for early October are a low of 8C and a high of 16C (46 to 61F). The past week has seen highs topping out in the low 20s (low 70sF), and this trend is forecast to continue for at least the next week. This after above average warmth in August and September.

And it hasn’t rained since early July.

On the plus side, these dry, windless, not-too-warm days are great for gardening and other outdoor activities. On the minus side is the giant water bill I’m anticipating later in the year, and the continuing drudgery of hauling watering cans and hoses around. Ironically, our routine summer watering restrictions ended on September 30th, which means we can now water whenever it pleases us, for as long as we want (keeping the bill in mind, of course).

More seriously, the long rainless period has adversely affected entire ecosystems. Salmon are dying in dried-up rivers. Forest trees, already stressed by the “heat dome” of June 2021, are struggling. These are quiet disasters, unlike intense and dramatic ones like floods and fires. But the effects are potentially dire. Fewer salmon means fewer killer whales and fewer bears.

Returning to the garden, it is true that with shorter days and cooler nights, plants are preparing for dormancy. It’s not like May, when everything is making new growth and setting buds. Plants don’t need as much water now, but they usually enter dormancy with several good soaking rains. So I’ve kept up my watering program, hoping to send the little green dudes into their off-season in at least a dampish state.

Because of last winter’s copious rain and a cool, wet spring, I didn’t start using my soaker hoses until late July. I expected to stop watering before the end of September. I was wrong. Moreover, I have discovered something about soaker hoses, which I use to irrigate several perennial beds. They’re fine for normal summers, in which the rainless period lasts for two months or less. But when the garden dries out completely, soakers simply don’t have the reach of sprinklers. So even though they’re a less responsible irrigation tool, I’ve been relying on sprinklers for this late-season watering binge.

Despite the abnormal warmth and dryness, there are the usual signals of the turning year. Heavier dews and occasional foggy mornings. Winter birds—juncos, northern flickers, spotted towhees and others—are back, bopping around the garden and foraging. Hardy cyclamen are in bloom.

Hardy cyclamen blooms with ferns and fallen leaves

But tomatoes are still ripening on the vine.

And asters are in full, glorious bloom.

Light purple asters and geranium "Ann Folkard" in back garden

So is this dahlia.

Pink dahlia cut flower on dining nook table

There is a lot to be grateful for on this Canadian Thanksgiving weekend.

Featured image from Pixabay; other photos by the author.

Managing

Nearing the bottom of Bin #2

One of the big garden jobs that actually got done in May was Compost Management. This means: 1) Shovelling out the remaining bit of finished compost from Bin #1 (the smaller one). 2) Building a new heap from all the accumulated stuff in Bin #2 — cut down perennial stalks from last summer, last fall’s leaves, old stalks cut down in fall and spring cleanup, and fresh material from recent tidying jobs. All this is layered and arranged in Bin #1, new material on the bottom, old on top, dampened down, and allowed to mellow until next spring. 3) Meanwhile, new stuff will be deposited into Bin #2, where it will pile up through the rest of the summer, the coming fall, until next spring. Whereupon the job will be repeated.

Bin #1 full, #2 splendidly empty

What happened to the former contents of Bin #1, i.e., last year’s compost? Most of it was distributed around the garden this spring with supplements mixed in to make a “feeding mulch.” Some was used to make soil for potting up tomato plants in May. The last wheelbarrow full is sitting in a neat pile near the shed, until needed for mulching or mixing.

At the weary end of forking and shovelling the half-baked brown stuff (mostly leaves and fern fronds), I discovered a tool I’d been missing — a three-pronged cultivator with a wooden handle. I must have inadvertently dumped it into the heap along with a bucketful of garden debris. It doesn’t show much damage from its year in the heap, only a bit of rust. Painting the handle red might be a good idea to avoid reburial.

Watering anxiety and rain envy begin now. Our very dry May hasn’t had visible effects on plants here, but it has affected the gardener. I’m apprehensive about the next two or three (maybe four) months. If the trends of the past few years continue, we may see almost no rain until late September. Water from the end of a hose is a poor substitute for rain, which has the great advantages of even distribution and no cost.

For the past month, whenever I exit the front door of my house I’ve been getting a visual treat from the ceanothus or California lilac, its branches almost solid with puffs of tiny flowers of a magical blue. They’re really popular with all kinds of bees.

Years ago, I bought a packet of California poppy (Eschscholzia californica) seeds. They were called “Thai Silks” and featured colours other than the standard bright orange. I recall one plant, long gone now (they’re annuals or short-lived perennials) with double lemon yellow flowers. Even now, some of the unusual colours persist — cream, cream with pink or red flushes, different shades of pink, and extra-dark orange. It’s a surprise every year to see what colours show up.

I don’t know about other gardens, but here plants fall into three categories — those that struggle and eventually die, those that grow ferociously and try to take over, and some that prosper in a quiet, reliable way. Guess which one is predominant. Well, to be fair, the pushy plants attract more attention so it seems there are more of them. But they do need to be managed, i.e., pruned, restrained, or dug up.

The next Big Garden Jobs on the agenda involve pruning. That lovely ceanothus has a habit of growing sideways, which means it ends up overhanging walkways and getting too friendly with people who use them. And the Oregon grape you can see behind the ceanothus is frighteningly vigorous. I wrestle with it every year, trying to keep it shorter than 12 feet and digging up suckers. It’s almost too late, though; I should have tackled it right after it finished blooming in April. Well, there’s always next year…

Allium christophii blooms and Phlomis foliage

Allium christophii and Phlomis fruticosa foliage

When I’m not deadheading, edge-clipping, checking on recently-planted things that might be getting overwhelmed by the incumbents, or lugging cans of water around, I do stop to admire plants that are performing as expected.

Ornamental grass Stipa tenuissima, Penstemon blooms and Lambs' ear stalk

Ornamental grass Stipa tenuissima, Penstemon glaber flowers, a lambs’ ear bloom stalk, and a few remaining forget-me-nots.

Clematis “Pink Fantasy”

Coming to Terms…

This hot, dry summer — and the likelihood of even hotter, drier ones as the climate warms — has forced me to come to terms with the realities of gardening in this place: four big Norway maples on or near my 6,000 square feet; only six millimeters (about 1/4 inch) of rain from mid-June to mid-September; thin, sandy soil into which compost is instantly absorbed.

I’ve lost my inclination to struggle against these facts.

The essence of gardening is creating artificial environments — making plants grow in places they would never exist under natural conditions; tinkering with plants to change their natures; assembling plants into unlikely combinations for aesthetic purposes. That takes cleverness, imagination and energy. Doing what it takes to keep a garden going is the whole point of gardening. A garden is a place in which to dig, plant, weed, prune, edge, trim, water. And, for a few minutes every now and then — admire the results. That’s the payoff (and, of course, edibles in the case of food gardens).

The trouble for me is that the combination of shade and dry, root-filled soil has made gardening here more of a slog than a pleasure. Those withered August leaves in the featured image perfectly represent the situation.

An obvious solution is to have all or most of the trees removed, but that’s a huge, expensive and disruptive undertaking. Moreover, the trees are inhabited by a myriad of life forms — bugs, birds, squirrels and others. And mature trees take up more carbon than young trees, so cutting them down — even non-native, “junk” trees like Norway maples — isn’t a good thing to do, simply for the rather frivolous reason of growing better perennials.

Another obvious solution is to give up. But I can’t even articulate what that would mean in practical terms, so it’s no solution at all.

No. The only solution is to work with what I have, adjusting my expectations accordingly (sort of like self-publishing, actually). I’ve already identified the plants that tolerate the conditions here. Any that can’t cope have either vanished from the scene or, in the case of must-haves, been moved into pots. Delphiniums, blue poppies and a couple of hostas grow here in pots (or barrels) or not at all. That’s the way it is.

Potted Hostas near pond.

Another approach would be to dig up roots, pile on fertilizer and pour on water to counteract the natural tough conditions. But digging in rooty ground is a miserable business, and I already pay enough for water. Besides, the trees would love extra water and fertilizer.

I must accept the conditions as they are and use techniques that work within them to achieve results that meet realistic expectations.

In thirty-five years of gardening, I have learned how to arrange plants in beds and borders, and how to make those beds and borders look good, no matter what they contain. I could make a garden out of utter weeds if I had to — spurge laurel, thistles, dock, brambles and bindweed. “Weed” is only a label.

Some of the plants that do well here, that actually prosper despite the shade and the poor, dry, root-infested soil, are what I consider near-weeds. The two champs are campion (Lychnis coronaria or Silene coronaria) and toadflax (Linaria purpurea). Having worked with them for a couple of decades now, I know how to manage them. Left to themselves, they get seedy and show their inner weediness by midsummer, but deadheaded and cut back at the right times, they are long bloomers that maintain colour in beds that are otherwise a mass of blah by late July.

Campion

In fact, I’m envisioning a set of posts for next year that will feature these plants and how to grow them well. With pictures showing the different growth stages and effects of deadheading/cutting back.

I recently read something that suggests true gardeners have an insatiable appetite for new plants. They pore over catalogues and nursery websites seeking the latest varieties. Well, I consider myself as much a gardener as anyone, but I don’t buy many plants. Many just can’t take the conditions here, especially since most nursery plants are grown in super-fertile, moisture-retentive growing mediums (or is it “media?”) that are the horticultural equivalent of steroids. Transplanted into my ground, even into spots prepared with hearty digging and added compost, many new specimens either cling to their original clump of super-dirt and slowly dwindle, or go into shock and don’t bother dwindling but die immediately. Any plant I buy now is one I have researched thoroughly and can reasonably expect to do well here. One piece of advice I’ve heard is to wash off the growing medium nursery plants arrive with and plunge them right into the dirt that will be their new home (after reasonable preparation, of course). They have to adapt or die, and if chosen wisely, they will prosper.

Oriental Hellebore (in March)

Another fact I have to live with is that this is a spring garden, not a summer one. From March through May the soil retains moisture from the winter and early spring rains, but from June to late September, water comes from a hose or not at all. Late-blooming herbaceous plants (asters, dahlias, colchicums, autumn crocus) are fairly reliable, but shrubs and trees are not. I once lusted after Franklinia alatamaha, a small tree that produces white camellia-like flowers just as its foliage begins to turn red and orange. I wasn’t able to obtain one, which is just as well, as it’s native to the southeast U.S., where summer rain is not unknown, and it’s generally reputed to be hard to grow. In autumn and winter, my trees may be appreciated as colours and shapes, but forget about fall bloomers here.

The Norway maples. Imagine the roots!

What about native plants? I planted Oregon grape (Mahonia aquifolium) and snowberry (Symphoricarpos albus). They do well — too well, in fact. I’m always digging out their suckers. I also have some native ferns, camas, barrenwort or inside-out flower (Vancouveria hexandra), and a patch of salal (Gaultheria shallon). But this was disturbed ground long before I arrived on the scene, so making a garden of native plants alone wasn’t practical. Those Norway maples, remember? And anyway, our native landscape in late August is pretty brown and uninspiring. In spring it’s a different story, of course. So on my patch, natives and aliens have to rub along together.

Today I moved some colchicums to spots where they’ll show up better and add zing to the late summer scene.

Colchicums, called “autumn crocus” by some, but they’re not crocuses at all.

Asters are starting to bloom.

Aster frikartii “Monch”

“Pink Cloud” and “Monch” asters with fading peony foliage and a few Rose Campion flowers.

Those asters again.

As long as I can find a thrill in scenes like this as the seasons go by, I’ll keep gardening.

Strange Days

The south coast of British Columbia is in the middle of a heat wave. High temperatures are in or near the 30s (degrees C; 85 to 100 F), but more than that, easterly winds have brought a haze of smoke from fires in the interior.

The light has a strange coppery hue. As it rises and sets, the sun is blood red, and the moon is a rich gold colour even when high in the sky. Parts of the garden are on life support delivered by hose and watering can, and some plants are doing peculiar things.

The foliage of this columbine plant has turned a dark purple, almost black.

Having an afternoon sleep (siesta?) is the thing to do, but on getting up I feel weirdly disconnected. I wouldn’t be surprised to hear chanting from somewhere in the neighbourhood, or to meet a small dragon in the woods. It’s as though some unknown prophecy is manifesting. And in those days the sun was the colour of blood, and fires sprang up, and strange beasts roamed the land…

All this is fancy, of course. People close to the fire zones, who have been evacuated or lost property to the fires, are living the grim reality.

We’ll all welcome cooler temperatures — and rain.

Rain Envy

When I hear about devastating floods, as in Louisiana just now, I wish rain could be better distributed around the continent. Especially now, when I have just spent an hour raking leaves. Not yellow and orange autumn leaves, but dead, dry green leaves jettisoned by the Norway maples, along with zillions of maple seeds, as the trees respond to what has become a hot, dry summer.

Norway maple seeds and withered leaf.

In April and May we had at least three hot spells, with temperatures freakishly above normal for several days. June and July were relatively cool, with just enough rain to stave off a drought, but the last six weeks have been totally dry. I delayed starting my usual summer watering program well into July, hoping to encourage plants to toughen up and send their roots well into the ground. That’s the advice of seasoned gardeners such Beth Chatto, author of The Dry Garden. She claimed never to water once plants were established, but I can’t make myself do that. At first, I limit watering sessions with sprinklers to two hours every two weeks for each area of the garden (noting dates so I can keep the schedule straight). Eventually, though, it becomes clear that this isn’t enough. Either I have to start watering at least weekly or give up and let the plants struggle on as best they can. By late August, most have made as much growth as they’re likely to, and most have finished blooming, so they really don’t need as much water as they do earlier in the season. (That’s what I tell myself, anyway). But parts of the garden look really bad right now. I’m not going to post pictures — too depressing.

One of the joys of gardening is to see the plants one has chosen doing well, growing to their maximum sizes and blooming when they’re supposed to. Participating in the cycle of sprouting, growth, budding, blooming, withering and dormancy is what it’s all about. But a drought short-circuits the process and leads to oddball scenarios like raking up bushels of dry green leaves under a hot summer sun. And instead of a graceful transition into fall colours, I’m seeing an abrupt case of the browns.

The weather forecast for the next week includes three days with high temperatures between 27 and 30 degrees C (81 to 86 F). After that it will cool down to 21 (about 70 F) but there is no rain in sight.

On the plus side, tomatoes are ripening on the vine, and in the front garden (less beleaguered by Norway maple roots), asters are showing a million buds, some of which are starting to open. That’s where I go to reassure myself that some things are working out as they should.

Aster “Pink Cloud” starting to bloom, with lots of buds waiting to open.

Purple aster, pink nerines and ornamental grass “Little Bunny”

The (Once and Future?) Drought

Here are precipitation (i.e. rain) amounts for my garden for the past several months:

August (up to & including the 27th): 1 millimeter

July: 16 mm (which is a bit more than 0.6 inches)

June: 4 mm

May: 2 mm

The really atypical numbers there are the ones for May and June. Normal rainfall amounts for those months are closer to 20 mm, or almost an inch. Add to that the warm winter of 2014-2015, which resulted in low snowpacks in the mountains of British Columbia, and you have the Drought of 2015.

Not that it has affected this small garden very much. In fact, things here are more or less normal for late August — tired and messy in spots, not bad in others. With asters preparing to bloom, and the good old mulleins and delphiniums putting forth their second efforts, things generally look better than they have in other Augusts.

Dependable mullein with second flush of bloom

Delphiniums

The reservoir from which the area gets its drinking water was enlarged some years ago, after much controversy. This has proved a real boon, because we have not gone beyond Stage 1 watering restrictions (which are pretty mild) since the summer of 2001. It’s like having a giant rain barrel in the Sooke Hills. Other areas, however, have not fared so well: the Sunshine Coast (well-named, except the sunshine comes in liquid form much of the year) was under Stage 4 watering restrictions for several weeks. That meant no outdoor water use at all. Only certified farmers could water anything. Some gardeners resorted to lugging bath and laundry water in buckets to keep plants alive.

Other effects of the warm winter and dry spring: low river levels and high water temperatures (bad for salmon), depleted reservoirs, brown lawns, dead shrubs, stressed trees, high water bills (mine for April through July was $224 Cdn), stressed farmers and grumpy gardeners.

The drought finally broke on August 28th. We have had more rain in the past four days than in the entire preceding four months. This may be an early start to the fall-winter rainy season, but a return to warm and sunny is likely in September.

The big questions are: how much snow in the mountains this winter? And what about El Nino? It has been predicted to be a “monster,” although this may be media dramatics. Then there’s the “Blob” — a huge area of warmer-than-normal water in the eastern Pacific. Lately it’s reported to have split into two smaller blobs, but no one knows what the combined effect of Blob + El Nino might be.

One thing does seem clear — the trend here is toward warmer, drier summers. It seems weird to have company in my perennial frets about drought. Usually when it comes to summers, it’s a chorus of “More, hotter, longer!” Maybe fears are developing that the California drought is creeping north. In any case, local and provincial governments are making noises about adapting and preparing. Cities are rethinking their choices for street trees and wondering about developing standards for grey water systems and cisterns in new houses. Gardeners may be thinking about cisterns and giant water tanks as well.

With plentiful water from the hose, this has been another good year for tomatoes after a whole string of bad years from 2010 through 2013.

Tomatoes and Echinops

Hopefully, sad scenes such as this won’t become more common.

Mostly dead Erysimum “Bowles Mauve”

Ending on that hopeful note…

Colchicums

The Garden in July

In July the garden starts to look tired. Individual plants put on a show as they come into bloom, but enough things are past their best that the whole thing gets a bit rough, like someone who got all gussied up for a party but stayed too long. And of course, July is one of our driest months (along with August and sometimes September). The watering can and hose can’t replace real rain. A couple of days ago we actually had 4 mm., ending a drought of several weeks, but the next week is predicted to be sunny and dry again.

Lavender and Thyme

Visits by urban wildlife have added to the roughing-up. A few plants were nibbled by bucks who arrived via the driveway, but the real damage, especially near the pond, has been done by a family of raccoons. Deer are like burglars who take valuables such as rosebuds, hosta leaves and other choice delicacies, but raccoons are like vandals who break in, drink your booze and trash the place. Despite my weekend repair and cleanup jobs, the place is soon a mess again — groundcovers stomped, taller plants broken and flattened, rocks around the edge of the pond rolled into it. Out come the clippers and rake and another cleanup begins.

But there are always some good things…

Daylily “Lusty Leland”

and unexpected delights…

Santolina in bloom

It’s still prime time for bee-watching.

Lavender with bee

Even the most common plants, lit up by the sun at just the right angle, look great.

Fireweed (Epilobium) with bloom stalks of Stipa gigantea

So all the deadheading, edge-clipping, raking and watering are worth it. Onward! (Hoping for more rain, though).

Summer Rain

Summer rain… Those words are magical for me, because I live and garden in a region where it’s a rare phenomenon. (To be truthful, we on the south coast of Vancouver Island have very little to complain about, climate-wise. But we complain nevertheless).

This summer has been relatively cool, but very dry. We had only one millimeter of rain in July, and the parts of our landscape without artificial watering have taken on shades ranging from brown to golden to bone-white and dead-looking.

My lawns (actually remnant patches of mixed grass and subtle weeds among perennial beds and vegetable patch) retain a bit of green, but have been gradually browning over the past few weeks, like their gardener’s increasingly suntanned skin.

The main gardening activity these days is watering — with sprinklers on designated “watering days” — Wednesdays and Saturdays on my side of the street — and with the trusty watering can almost every day. I have a lot of plants in pots — tomatoes, dahlias, delphiniums, Stargazer lilies (just coming into bloom) and a dozen Meconopsis (blue poppies). I grow all these things in pots because the open ground is too full of wretched tree roots — but that’s another story. The soil in their pots is all these plants have to draw on, so regular watering is vital.

After several weeks, watering becomes a burdensome chore. The gardener grumbles about being a slave to the hose and the watering can. Notes of complaint appear in the daily weather record: Very dry. Still dry. Extremely dry. NO RAIN. People who exclaim about the “beautiful sunny weather” are apt to get a dissenting lecture or at least a non-committal grunt.

But today it’s raining, for the first time in more than a month. The air is soft, moist and full of fragrances. A mist rises from the pavements. The rain barrels are filling up. There are three and a half millimeters in the rain gauge so far and the radar image on Environment Canada’s website indicates more to come. We might even get a whole five millimeters before it ends and a predicted warming and drying trend takes over.

Five millimeters is the boundary between what I call “psychological rain” and Real Rain. Psychological rain brings a slight relief from the prevailing dryness, but is not a remedy for it. Beyond five millimeters, there is wetting of the soil below the surface. The gardener gets a reprieve from watering for a day or two, because the best thing about rain is that it waters the whole garden, all at once (except the parts overhung by wretched maples — but that’s another complaint).

Not everyone is rejoicing. Golfers and planners of picnics and outdoor weddings are no doubt gnashing their teeth. But I refuse to feel guilty. I didn’t make this summer rain, but I’m glad it’s here.

Hell Month Begins

Looking back at the weather notes I have kept for the past decade, I see it every year — “Garden looks like Hell.” The early bloomers have gone to seed, have been cut down or withered. The roses have black spot and more spent flowers than fresh ones. There are dry green leaves and twigs all over the ground, pulled from the trees by the latest windstorm. A scurf of withered leaves and faded rose petals covers the pond, in which the water lily leaves are starting to die and blacken from lack of light. It’s Hell Month again.

It actually lasts more than a month, most years, from mid-July well into August, ending when we finally get rain, some years as early as mid-August, others not until September.

Remember re-enchantment? It’s really hard to achieve right now. There are days I’d rather go to the beach or stay in the house and work on this blog than venture into the blasted garden.

But I did spend a couple of hours this morning cutting things down and edging.

Results of a heavy deadheading session

Remember this: when in doubt, edge. A fresh edge to the lawn adjoining a perennial border will make that border look better, even if you do nothing else. And if you manage to whack down or pull up the seedy and weedy, the results may very well stave off Hell Month for another week or so.

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