Xavier the Savior and his crew are prepping the soil, getting rid of stumps and bricks, finishing the path around the garden, and taking down some dead trees. Tomorrow, lots of red blooming spring bulbs go in, etc.

Xavier the Savior and his crew are prepping the soil, getting rid of stumps and bricks, finishing the path around the garden, and taking down some dead trees. Tomorrow, lots of red blooming spring bulbs go in, etc.


… an owl’s attack on a rabbit in UD‘s backyard. Or a cat’s attack
on a bird. Many predators visit UD’s land.
Stage One: Clear a biggish circular area at the very top of our property. Decades of twigs, vines, trash trees, and odd elements (some previous owner lay down a small square outlined in bricks) had to be raked and lopped through, leaving a well-established vinca/English ivy ground cover. A rough circular dirt path already sort of exists; parts of it also need to be cleared.
Happy Soldier Mr UD carries a red rake full of leaves away from the garden (on the left).


Dog poses in the garden-to-be, amid stumps and bricks.
This stage will continue for awhile. In line with the garden’s purpose, I listen to Life Wisdom (Alan Watts, Carl Jung, the Stoics, others) while I work. One immediate problem: They mainly disagree with each other.
I’m thinking a lot about elements. A fountain definitely appeals. A fire pit. Solar lamps. Aromatic plants. Grasses for motion… Yet the place is pretty shady, closely circled by very big old trees…

I mean, it’s natural. A spider (see it in the middle at the top?) somehow fashioned a web — from my nearby dogwood? from the electrical wires? — seemingly in midair.
And yet SOOOO rich is the United States – there’s so much incredible (often unconscionable, IMHO) wealth in private hands – that the numbers somehow, amazingly, fail to impress.
***********
UD thanks her sister.
Dr. Bernard Carroll, known as the "conscience of psychiatry," contributed to various blogs, including Margaret Soltan's University Diaries, for which he sometimes wrote limericks under the name Adam.
New York Times
George Washington University English professor Margaret Soltan writes a blog called University Diaries, in which she decries the Twilight Zone-ish state our holy land’s institutes of higher ed find themselves in these days.
The Electron Pencil
It’s [UD's] intellectual honesty that makes her blog required reading.
Professor Mondo
There's always something delightful and thought intriguing to be found at Margaret Soltan's no-holds-barred, firebrand tinged blog about university life.
AcademicPub
You can get your RDA of academic liars, cheats, and greedy frauds at University Diaries. All disciplines, plus athletics.
truffula, commenting at Historiann
Margaret Soltan at University Diaries blogs superbly and tirelessly about [university sports] corruption.
Dagblog
University Diaries. Hosted by Margaret Soltan, professor of English at George Washington University. Boy is she pissed — mostly about athletics and funding, the usual scandals — but also about distance learning and diploma mills. She likes poems too. And she sings.
Dissent: The Blog
[UD belittles] Mrs. Palin's degree in communications from the University of Idaho...
The Wall Street Journal
Professor Margaret Soltan, blogging at University Diaries... provide[s] an important voice that challenges the status quo.
Lee Skallerup Bessette, Inside Higher Education
[University Diaries offers] the kind of attention to detail in the use of language that makes reading worthwhile.
Sean Dorrance Kelly, Harvard University
Margaret Soltan's ire is a national treasure.
Roland Greene, Stanford University
The irrepressibly to-the-point Margaret Soltan...
Carlat Psychiatry Blog
Margaret Soltan, whose blog lords it over the rest of ours like a benevolent tyrant...
Perplexed with Narrow Passages
Margaret Soltan is no fan of college sports and her diatribes on the subject can be condescending and annoying. But she makes a good point here...
Outside the Beltway
From Margaret Soltan's excellent coverage of the Bernard Madoff scandal comes this tip...
Money Law
University Diaries offers a long-running, focused, and extremely effective critique of the university as we know it.
Anthony Grafton, American Historical Association
The inimitable Margaret Soltan is, as usual, worth reading. ...
Medical Humanities Blog
I awake this morning to find that the excellent Margaret Soltan has linked here and thereby singlehandedly given [this blog] its heaviest traffic...
Ducks and Drakes
As Margaret Soltan, one of the best academic bloggers, points out, pressure is mounting ...
The Bitch Girls
Many of us bloggers worry that we don’t post enough to keep people’s interest: Margaret Soltan posts every day, and I more or less thought she was the gold standard.
Tenured Radical
University Diaries by Margaret Soltan is one of the best windows onto US university life that I know.
Mary Beard, A Don's Life
[University Diaries offers] a broad sense of what's going on in education today, framed by a passionate and knowledgeable reporter.
More magazine, Canada
If deity were an elected office, I would quit my job to get her on the ballot.
Notes of a Neophyte