Dupont:

Starting to take indoor plants outdoors. The Canna from last year, having spent the winter in the house! is now out in a large plastic bin, surrounded, to look better, by the hollow chunks of the fallen branch which I will put some other plants into the hollows. Mibni rose bush, doing fine in house, went into a sunny spot in the front garden. On Sunday, I will pick up veggie plants from le Jardin de la Resistance in southern QC. Try to plan a couple visits down there at the same time.

I am pecking away at weed whacking the tall grass and spent dandies, without murdering the wild strawberries or my fine crop of yarrow! The battery is only good for about 30 minutes then a 4 hour charge! But that is enough for my shoulders and back! I may be about half done. The mosquitoes drove me in tonight, impending rain for a couple days.

Construction going on down the road, 100 yards or so. It was dreadfully derelict and then demolished so this is predictable. Will be interesting to see what comes up. Our block is a total mix - old, elegant, small and almost derelict, etc!

Long email to the "girl" who grew up in "my house". See if I can help her with disintegrating marriage. Karen. The misuse of the name Karen is disconcerting - as a pejorative. I know a lot of nice Karens.

So, between rain showers, I can clear planters, etc out of the DR onto bins on back porch. And get back to sorting the papers that have spent enough time in the sunny windows to be tolerable. Switching from winter to summer - finding fans...

Sitting here, wondering how much more of Quebec I can tolerate; the new language law, just passed, is offensive to Anglos and self-defeating for young Francophones. There is no guarantee we will even be able to access health care in English. That is scary.

But for Robin with his complex business, I would stay in Ontario permanently. Yesterday, working in the yard, the woman from next door and the one from across the road, stopped for a visit. I managed a bit of French but Sophia is bi-lingual and helped Luisa and I make rudimentary conversation. I like them both but it is hard work. This aft, I saw Luisa at our end of her yard so did not go out as I just could not! She is going to Portugal in a couple weeks. I will go to Beaver early next week. It is such a relief to be in Anglo land! I would like to sit and visit with Sophia but she rarely comes out of house. This has been a rough couple of years.