Really. I made it through last night's cold without a problem (thanks to an extra blanket and a dog snuggled near my feet) and the house temp had made it back up to 65 by late afternoon. Nothing colder is in the schedule from now through Thursday, so I figured I was home free... until my boyfriend walked in and announced that he felt chilled, and a little like he "might be starting to get sick." *sigh* Game Over.
He left for a few hours after supper to go teach fencing lessons, so I turned the heat back down to 60 and headed outside to clean up the less artful leaves--these gorgeous beech leaves get to stay in the shade garden for a while yet, since they set off the black mondo grass so nicely--and get a few more things planted.I am embarrassed to admit that part of my "fall cleanup" this year involved temporarily planting a whole flat of pint-sized herbs, which were probably purchased on sale in late July, into the veggie garden. As I dug holes for sages and lavenders, I was reminded of a post that I had begun back in May about using tough plants like these in my West-facing front garden.
Going back, I discovered that I actually had three draft posts that I had never finished. The "Tough Plants" post from May, midsummer musings on gardening in the vernacular, and a recent post about transparency both in the garden and in blogging.I have figured out why I never posted these three. The "Tough Plants" one felt too much like a how-to, when it was meant merely as a chronicle of my struggles with my Western exposure. "Gardening in the Vernacular" requires me to do a little more research on garden history and architecture in order to help crystallize my own thoughts there. And I have rewritten the "Transparency" post numerous times in an effort to remove any misconception that my words pass judgment on other bloggers.
As part of my fall cleanup, I have given myself some new homework: To resurrect and finish off these draft posts.
Finding them got me thinking, though... how many other bloggers have post orphans like mine? Begun and then saved with good intentions to complete them "soon." Noticed when the next few posts are written but continually shoved aside in favor of the latest garden events. Finally, they drop off the visible part of the post listings page and fall victim to "out of sight, out of mind" syndrome.
It's too easy to forget unfished posts for me to believe that I'm the only one who has them. Anyone else want to share my fall cleanup homework and give their orphan posts a proper introduction to the world--or at least, share here that you have them to make me feel better?!
(Note: If you're on Blogger you can go into "Edit Posts" list and click the link to "Show only Drafts" to find yours.)
26 comments:
You are not alone. I am a newbie draft dodger. I just started blogging and I have some saved up. I have just spent some time adjusting to the time differences. I am glad to hear I am not alone.
I have three draft posts never published. One on garden statues, particularly of saints, one on first memories of gardening and one on garden myths. Plus I have a couple of posts done in Word, if those count as unpublished. You are not alone!
Alas, I am a timely deleter of draft posts that go past their "sell by" date, so I don't know how many I have deleted. I do know I have one entry that is barely four lines long because I posted what I had sitting in draft form instead of completing it according to my original plans.
P.S. I am now very curious about your "Transparency" post. My first thought was to wonder whether I might be guilty of some transgression (however minor) that I ought to be aware of. Please post that one soon and put me out of my misery. ;-)
Lisa, glad to hear that I'm not alone! I write what I want when the mood strikes me, and often it takes me a couple of days to finish a post (or take pictures to go with them) but these "drafts" of mine were definitely orphaned until I happened to think about the one today. :)
Carol, you're such a prolific blogger that it really makes me feel better that you have a few orphan posts on your lists, too! (Please post the one about garden myths. I'd love to read that!)
Karen, I wish I could delete draft posts that easily. I admit that I have to fight some inborn packrat tendencies... lol. Telling the Purple Heart Veterans or the Society of the Blind that yes, I'll have some clothes and such for them to pick up next week helps combat the house clutter... but I can't find similar help with digitized things.
And rest easy on the "Transparency" post--it's basically just my thoughts on the whole advertising/paid post/etc. issue that came up a month or so ago, and how to me the most important thing is not what a blogger allows on his/her blog, it's that they are transparent and honest about their choices so as not to mislead others. It was started after reading a long post over on Garden Rant. And I had been thinking about "see-through" plants that week anyway because of my verbena bonariensis and a couple of other plants.
p.s. I definitely understand having that "first thought" that you mentioned. I often wonder whether my words are taken in the spirit in which they are meant and try to be vigilant about how I phrase things so as not to create any bad feelings, either. I hate the idea that someone might be licking a wound, however minor, that I had no intention of creating. (For example, I still wonder whether you're upset at my post about not planting daylilies in my garden because of the foliage. I think that your follow-up post definitely established that it's my admitted failure to properly incorporate said foliage into the garden that's the issue, not your lovely daylilies... but still I worry. Maybe silly, but I do.)
It's just darn near impossible to communicate 100% effectively online when the two people "discussing" cannot "read" those nonverbal clues that help so much when we're conversing in person, you know? I know that's why my posts (and comments) are often longer than they have to be... caution and over-explaining are preferable to me, I guess.
Or maybe I'm just long-winded. :)
Well, isn't that an interesting turn of events for you... garden fall cleanup turning into garden blog fall cleanup. I love the beech leaves shot! Really a great pairing of the leaves with the mondo grass. Cindy at Rosehaven Cottage
I've enjoyed reading your blog - what is the silvery leaved plant on the left in the top pic? :O)
I thought I was going to say no, I don't have any drafts (I tend to kind of built the draft on my head and publish imediatly after I write), but as I went looking I found a draft about the uses of santolina in the garden. Somehow I never got the perfect picture to put in that post...
Cindy, I guess my mind takes strange twists! If only it would lead to garage and basement cleanup, too, I'd be set for the winter... lol.
Gina, thanks for stopping by! That is brunnera 'Jack Frost,' a shade-loving perennial that gets covered in tiny blue flowers in the late spring as well. I love that foliage, though--more than I thought I would. :)
gintoino, ooooh... I hope you resurrect that one--with pictures, since I can't read your native language. I have some silver santolina but I don't think that I use it to its advantage.
Kim, I have a couple of those drafts, too - some just never went anywhere, but one is an entry for my Passalong plant series. I keep adding on to it, planning on using it as a way to post flower photos in midwinter.
Maybe your Gardening in the Vernacular will eventually be a fireside chat?
Annie at the Transplantable Rose
I haven't been honestly blogging long enough to back you up on the post draft thing, but I'm with you on the heat thing. I'm always thrilled by cooler temps because it means the bed is that much more cozy... Add another blanket and you're good to go. Matt does not agree, he turned on the furnace while I was in DC. Ah well, it does give me one less excuse to stay IN bed.
At least you "write" your drafts down! I have about a week's worth of posts swimming around in my head and now I'm battling what feels very much like the flu so who knows if those posts will ever see the light of day?
Over on my recipe blog, I have some drafts so old, that I don't even remember making the recipes let alone what I thought of them. Guess I should just delete them, shouldn't I?
Ditto on the drafts. Sometimes I think of a topic, but when I write about it the tone is wrong or it's boring (even to me) or it's too ambitious/long, or whatever, and so it just scrolls off the screen. I didn't know you could find them easily after they've scrolled off the screen, so thanks for that tip.
Heh, guilty as charged! Usually I'll put in the pictures at work, then finish the post later or at home. In fact, my most recent post sat in draft for about a week before I finished it and changed the date to current. I'm kind of surprised I don't have more...guess I'm a real-life packrat but not a blogging one ;-)
Those beech leaves are great - what a fab excuse to put off raking them! I have a draft about plants when they don't look their best that can wait until winter - don't you know that you're supposed to save all those drafts for the middle of winter when there's nothing in going on in the garden to write about? :^)
I too love the beech leaves with the black mondo grass. One draft and the ones in my head which I remember when I see some of the pictures I've taken and never used. Winter will be time enough to post some pretty pictures.
I'm like you with the heat. I wanted to make it to November also without turning the darned thing on, but last night my wife announced that she was cold...
Most of my orphan posts are ideas that seemed good at the time, but never developed. Sometimes I get an idea and can run with it; other times I struggle to string two sentences together. When that happens, I usually just post a cool photo and leave the posts to languish forever in the "drafts" folder.
Very guilty several in draft, and a lot in a 'working on' folder on the computer.
Lots of drafts. Had to laugh when Carol said she had THREE. I even have a draft that I keep that just has a list of ideas for blog posts! LOL.
Annie, maybe that will be so. I am so obviously not a planner... it's occurred to me reading these comments that maybe the idea is to keep some of these in reserve for later posting. I never thought of blogging that way before.
meagan, I've never known you to need an excuse to stay in bed longer! *grin* I'm surprised that Matt is a bit of a freezebaby--I figured he'd exude heat, being a fiery redhead and all. ;)
old roses, I never said I write all of my drafts down! lol. I'm sure, now that you mention it, that there are posts that swirled around in my head and never even got recorded for posterity's sake. Yikes! (And I never realized you have a recipe blog, too--I'll have to go check that out.)
entangled, I know what you mean--I think that some of the worst ones (most boring) were ones that I actually went ahead and deleted right away! lol. The three that are left are the ones I kind of liked for some reason or another but haven't been able to finish yet.
lisa, we do the opposite! I often put in the photos at home so that I can go back and add in or tweak the text during my lunch break at work. :)
mr. mcgregor's daughter, I didn't know that... but now that I'm reading all of your comments I'm starting to get the hint! I guess I know what I can blog about in January right after I get done talking about all of my good intentions for the new year. *grin*
layanee, now that you mention it... well, I do have some pretty pictures that are just waiting for the right post to give me an excuse to show them! :)
david, I feel you on the heat issue. The things we do for the ones we love, right?!
So what kind of total does your "Drafts" folder have right now? It must be bad since you didn't actually post the number! *grin*
bare bones gardener, I actually kind of like the idea of having a working folder on your computer. Somehow I didn't see the "Drafts" folder on Blogger like that, though--I just saw mine as forgotten orphans!
Kylee, come on, 'fess up! I want a number, darn it... lol.
*cough*43*cough*
A post about cold and drafts...interesting.
When we woke up a couple of mornings ago the temp. had dropped to 61f indoors, brrr, so I turned on the heat to take the chill off until the sun warmed things up.
We have bunches of green mondo grass growing in several places in our yard but I don't recall ever seeing black mondo grass which looked extremely nice contrasted with the beech leaves. What kind of beech is it? Our little beech F. sylvatica rotundifolia only turn a pale yellow and is not very colorful.
No drafts. I don't have enough material/ideas to begin with ;)
Kylee, wow! Between your actual posts and your drafts... well, I aspire to be as prolific a writer as you are. :)
Ki, you seem to have plenty of material/ideas based on what you show on your blog. (And pictures--I'm always impressed with your illustrative pictures.)
I have no idea what kind of beech this is. (I wish I were better at tree IDs than I am.) It's a little taller than their 2-story house, its branches span the entire (approx. 45ft wide) lot, and it's the best climbing tree I've ever seen with thick lower limbs and a tangle of upper branches. It has to be very old based on the girth of the main trunk.
The black mondo grass is so cute that I couldn't resist buying some. It's started to spread (slowly) and I like the way it looks next to the 'Jack Frost' brunnera. There is some yellow creeping jenny (also spreading very slowly) that looks like it may want to mingle with these guys as well... that would be a rather "Pacific Northwest" kind of combination for sure!
I have orphan posts. Mostly because I've run across something just fascinating that I really want to share with everyone but then I didn't get around to doing the research so it got lost in limbo. Will I finish them... very possibly.
Will you know which are which?? Maybe I'll let you know, maybe I won't, maybe I'll actually do some more research, maybe I'll flit around google until I land upon another garden fancy. Who knows?
I have mixed feelings about how tos as well though I originally conceived my blog as trying to address difficult to find info or info that I didn't find readily compiled someone and had to painstakingly piece together myself. So I feel guilty sometimes for show and tell posts.
That said, Check out my purple cabbage covered in fall leaves. I love it!
Kim, no unpublished posts here. It's all I can do to sit down and actually get one written, much less "save them up." I like the idea though, something handy when no inspiration strikes!
Ah yes, the turning-on-the-heat game! We all play it to some extent, don't we? I think you held out for a long time, mine's been on since that Sunday snow we got a couple of weeks ago!
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