I cause trouble

Here,
here,
And here.

This is what I said: I commented that Voices seemed mainly to consist of “people showing off their gardens which is cool” (emphasis mine). Actually, I think that’s the purpose of Garden Voices. Which is fine. Previously on Gardenweb, which I have been reading for about seven years at least, posters struggled to include images with their commentary, in order to illustrate certain design problems they were having, or particular plants they wanted to identify. Putting up images was harder then, and most of the threads were all text. Now, with the wonderful world of image-friendly blogs, we can show our gardens in full, living color, not just talk about them. How fabulous is that?

But I must say, my favorite Gardenweb thread, and one that remains my favorite over any lavishly illustrated blog, is the “All-Ugly” thread. It was a long, long series of posts, where each poster made their contribution, describing what their ideal trashy Southern front yard would look like. Offensive? You betcha! Hilarious? I would say so. The planters made out of painted tires; the ragged canna; the rusted toilets, washing machines, and pick-ups that had become garden objets; the dogs running circles in the bare earth around a tree that had been wacked with the lawnmower too many times…well, I can’t reproduce it here. But as each post appeared, the aggregate of the thing is what made it work. And it was all text.

Everyone uses blogs for a different purpose. For me, it’s an exercise—and fun. I try to limit the images because I prefer words, and I feel funny about making it seem as though my garden is anything much. Because it isn’t. I’m just not that good. I love plants, and I love gardening, but I’ll never have the skill and design sense of such gardeners as the ones I blogged about here. Though I will take any opportunity this blog affords to make my garden look way better than it is. So, there you have it. I'm a show-off. Guilty as charged.

Now, let’s have a drink! It is Friday, after all.