"nature kids, they don't have no function"

..a line from an all time favorite of mine, Pavement. But, am I a nature kid?...

Sorel, Caribou  - Love

And it's raining today. Still warm out, still brown out, brown-out. Thought I'd put on my iron-clad weather protection boots that I can't promote enough (love you, Sorel Caribou, love you) and trudge around to the side of the house to do some gardening. Uh huh. Dressed in a rain coat, some mittens callin' for a muddying, and the beloved boots, I dragged on through the thicket and the muck wielding an extendable pair of hedge clippers, pruning sheers, a small rake, snow shovel, and the saddest iTunes playlist you could want on a dark January day. I hacked away at dead shrubs and the occasional, heartbreaking, premature, springy green growth that inhabits my little garden plot. I completely uprooted a plant that I have always loathed, one that spouse has always cherished for its evil, sun-blocking, "privacy" vines, threw its wild tendrils into a manic pile of downed, heavy branches and newly decimated ivy growth, and then stood back laughing at it while holding my hedge clippers high to the sky and bouncing up and down. I feel so accomplished. I say - take that, January! I mock you with every pinch of my sheers! No snow? No bugs! No reason not to garden.