Last month, portland showed me off as the guy who can write 200-500 words before coffee, many of them spelled right, but this morning I am bogging. This is a bog not a blog. There is a dispute internal to one of the groups I am associated with which has recreational value but is challenging many in that group to the point of the group. It is taxing my patience. Plus I have an sore back again and I am upset with nature for punishing me when I exercise and when I do not. So my mind is not on the idle setting where it likes to rest.

But these are small things. The lilac is out here. Sounds lame but when I was a kid we lived in an old manse in the Annapolis Valley and summer started when the 12-foot tall lilac out the window bloomed, even if it was only 50º F. Later in life, in Halifax, the lilac coincided with the weeks after exams about when you got your first pay cheque from your university summer job and did the only sensible thing by blowing it. After university, I worked for a couple of months in Aalsmeer in The Netherlands in the cut flower packing industry during the lilac harvest, slinging big wholesale packs, dripping with the essence of the flower, almost nauseous from the sweetness of it all.

I've moved a lot. In each place I have left rhubarb roots, pear or apple trees. In the last place we owned, I left a lilac tree.

[Ed.: Boy, that was lame.
Me: better tomorrow - maybe.]