Bulbs, Boards, Bad Skin

The cold, dark, and dreary weather has come to Southern California, seemingly foreshadowing what is awaiting me as I journey north in a week. I'm not being melodramatic. The change in Daylight Savings Time is doing it to me. I was super excited yesterday night when 1 AM meant 12 AM, but my enthusiasm faded away this morning when I found it super hard to get out of bed at 9 AM, which was REALLY 10 AM, and also later on when I was driving outside at 4 PM and had to turn my headlights on. An extra hour and nothing good comes out of it. Shame on me. I really am more of a spring and summer person. Every year as it gets darker faster and colder, I look and feel increasingly like a scaly lizard. A rough-skinned reptile that wants to crawl under a rock and hibernate until the sun comes out again. Winter, don't really dig it, with the exception of Christmas, the best holiday in the world. BUT, I am plenty excited at two things that are to come with this drabness.

1) Tulip planting time! I've been freezing the bulbs for the past 5 weeks so that they can be ready to plant next week. Gardening forums have told me that because Socal has a longer autumnal season, it's harder for tulips, which thrive in colder conditions, to grow properly. So many people who live in warmer weather freeze the bulbs in advance to simulate cold climate. By mid-November they'll be ready to go, and this cold rainy weather has made the ground nice and chilly so my bulbs are going to be wrapped in soil conditions that are just perfect for them! I'm a first-timer at planting tulips, so maybe it's beginner's optimism that's making me excessively excited. I expect to see this come February and March.

Actually if I'm lucky I'll maybe get this.

 

 But actually I'll probably get this. 

Gardening is no joke man. It's tough. Plants and flowers and trees need nurturing too.

2) SNOWBOARDING. At the end of last season I was barely able to start carving. This season, I am going to PERFECT it. Ok, maybe not to the point of perfection, but I'd like to be halfway decent. See you on the mountain!