CONFABULATE

[LukeJavan8]

Slug Power! I love it! We have the Whooping Cranes
pass thru on migration, narrowing down their
passage to virtually a few miles going north and south:
other than that nothing as glamorous as slugs.

[Perry Lassiter]

My son's favorite college mascot is UC Santa Cruz Banana Slugs! That should make you purrrrrr!

[LukeJavan8]

Never heard of them until now.
Will check them out. Thanks.
Oh!, and "purrrrrrr".

[wurdpurrson]

Unfortunately, yes. There are slug caps.

As to rainshadow: the Olympic Peninsula in Washington State is bordered on the north by the Strait of Juan de Fuca, the major shipping lane for Seattle and the Pacific Ocean. An east-west coastal area of about 25 miles is protected on the south by the Olympic Mountains. Most Pacific storms arrive south-westerly and are deflected eastward by the mountains to either travel north along the Puget Sound (Seattle's location) or move up behind the mountains and "jump" the north Olympic coast to dump rain on the Strait, Seattle, Salish Sea and on Canada. (Yes Sarah, we can see Canada from my home).

Our little port town and the neighboring one to the east benefit from this meteorlogical condition, in that most rain passes us by overhead before it drowns Seattle and related environs. That stormy skip is called a rainshadow (alt: rain-shadow, rain shadow). We get perhaps 20 - 22 inches of rainfall annually. The ambient humidity stills grows lots of humongous trees, and we garden almost year-round. It's really beautiful. I see the ocean from my north windows and the spectacular Olympic Mountains from my southern ones.

More information than you cared to have, I daresay. No more slugs, please...

[Perry Lassiter]

Actually, not too much. Thoroughly enjoyed all this. Hope you have more stuff to share, though you may keep your slugs. Either of your topics might have been a separate thread, but we veer all over the place these days.

[LukeJavan8]

Slugs was just getting interesting.
But I was fascinated about the weather.
All I ever hear is that it never stops raining in
Seattle and drew the assumption, however false,
that it rained like that all over the west coast of
WA state. Thanks for clearing that up. I also
liked the idea that you can garden all year.
Fascinating. We are under 10 inches of
snow here.

[wurdpurrson]

We did get snow here when the mid-January storm smashed through the Northwest. But then winter rains melted it all within 2 or 3 days. It's rare, and the natives get a bit freaked, for our town has hills and they don't know how to drive on slippery streets. Being from the Intermountain West originally (Colorado and Idaho), we can handle the weather and are glad that the people who are the real danger stay indoors. Now we're pruning, and planning our vegetable garden.

[LukeJavan8]

That has to be so wonderful. We'll have the snow
here until April. Turns to ice, keeps the temps down
and never goes away on the northside of anything.
I'm green with envy.

[Perry Lassiter]

Down here in Louisiana, we're having an unusually mild winter, even for us. Most days it's reached 60-75, with a few nights in 40's or below. Supposed to be 21 tomorrow night. Hope it is warm enough near the end of next week to prune my roses. That should get them blooming early in April. I plan to ck the maps for the Olympic Peninsula, which I know way more about since reading this thread.

[LukeJavan8]

As do I. I've told people about this Peninsula, and
most cannot believe you are planting your garden
when we have 14` temps here with windchills are
below 10 below zero.

[wurdpurrson]

We're mostly planning, but have planted a few cool weather crops like lettuce and parsley. Garlic went in last fall and is sprouting, sorrell and chives held over - the usual. Pruning is the current need; the ancient plum is now trimmed, roses await their turn. Sprouts are appearing in flowerbeds and I must clear out winter grass and enthusiastic little weeds to make room for them. We've mowed the grass several times over the winter. It's time again, but is rainy off and on today. I can still see the Olympics (smile).

This is quite a journey from confabulate.

[Perry Lassiter]

Not sure about that. We've done a considerable amount of confabulation in these posts!

[wurdpurrson]

I stand corrected, sir. Yes we have. We've gotten a mighty lot of mileage out of that word!

[LukeJavan8]

Which is the beauty of the site: we meander all over
the place, and learn a lot in the meandering.

[Philip Hudson]

Back to grass widow, call_copse:
The only origin for grass widow that I have ever heard, and I have heard it many times, is that it is the not-so-respectable title of a woman who is divorced. She is called a grass widow because her husband is on, not under, the grass covered ground, hence not dead and buried. Does anyone else agree with this etymological claim? Can anyone rebut it?