All the snow melted last week, and we have have a temporary descent into
mud season (can you believe Wikipedia has an entry on this?).
Who knows? If we don't get more snow, mud season might be here for weeks and weeks.
My feeling is that winter is a lot easier in the country and mud season is easier in the city. The reason: we have a lots of room for all the snow. It doesn't pile up on the streets the way it does in the city, making them narrower and obliterating parking spots.
The big meltdown: Toby taking in the scents
But mud season is definitely easier to cope with where there are sidewalks and there's pavement, and you don't need rubber boots. (You should see me in my stylish hunting boots.)
I was thinking it might be nice to get out and start some tree and shrub pruning, but it's still too sodden to be walking on the grass. Maybe next week, when it freezes up again.
In the meantime, the dogs and I continue our walks over at our neighbor's golf course, which is on higher ground, and that brings me to the other scourge of mud season: skunk mating time. What could be a more appropriate activity for mud season???
Not a February doesn't go by when Buddy (the neighbor's dog) and Toby don't get skunked. It happened yesterday: Buddy - who's a real dog's "Dawg" - and I saw the critter at the same time. I started yelling, but no luck. Toby came around to see what the commotion was all about, and he got some spray too, but not as bad as Buddy, who wouldn't leave the thing alone. You think they'd learn.
Luckily Toby came when I called, and he was good enough to let back into the house after a dousing with an anti-skunk product I had around. Buddy's owners took him straight to the country kennel that does grooming, but he still smelled quite a bit today. (He's banished to the mud room). Toby had his first professional grooming at PetSmart today. He handled it well, I was told. Now he smells of cheap perfume, but he sure looks good.
Post Script: John to me while we're doing the dishes: "The trouble is when February dissolves like this, there's still a long way to go before things get better."
© Yvonne Cunnington, Country Gardener
Here's what it looked like as the creek at the front corner of our property over-ran its banks today. We always get flooding after heavy spring rains. The reason: the golf course ponds are high to save water for the summer, so there's bottleneck. And before the water even gets to the golf course, there is a too-small culvert at the tree farm road where the creek runs. Fortunately, the worst flooding is on their property, not ours. 
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