Sharon's blog: Figaro, part 2

	Figaro

It took hours. Hours of huffing and puffing and begging and pleading and words I don't dare write.

But finally and against all odds, Figaro is inside for the winter.

It was rainy and cold but on Tuesday I hosed down the potted ficus and let the rain rinse him off. That was while he was still on my deck.

Wednesday wasn't much better but in late morning he and I began our trek across the deck to the door. Now my door has a ridge at the bottom frame, just high enough off the deck to cause a bit of a dilemma. It took another hour before I could nudge Figaro over that ridge.

In the meantime, my two house cats, neither of whom would step paw outside even if their lives depended on it, watched, knowing somehow that those words I can't print weren't directed at them.

Somewhere along the way, I lost the saucer that Figaro's pot sits in. I found it back somewhere on the deck and brought it in, placed it in the spot where Figaro would reside, just as he does every winter.

The saucer is large enough to accommodate his large pot, which also means it has a lip of about 2 inches. I wedged the saucer against my feet and started pulling Figaro upon it.

Figaro tilted, knocked the yellow lamp and orange watering can of poppies off the table. The poppies are silky fakes and the can is metal, so's the lamp, so that didn't matter. The cats thought the world had come to an end though and one jumped clear up into Figaro, screeching when he could find no foothold.

Figaro uprighted himself and left the saucer tilted upward. I'd only managed to get the edge of the lip beneath the pot.

By now the cat's outta the tree, leaving a mangled limb or two, but that didn't matter either since Fig has lots of limbs. I began trying to push that saucer and pull the pot so they finally would be in their rightful positions again.

It didn't happen.

I rested, had lunch, looked outside to see if a neighbor might be home.

Nobody.

By this time it was early afternoon, I was a little disheveled and disgruntled to say nothing of being highly irritated.

I started all over.  Again.

Same thing. The lamp fell over, the watering can rolled off and the cats ran for parts unknown. The saucer still tilted.

I called my neighbor. Between the two of us we got Figaro upright and in his saucer in a matter of, oh say, maybe a half hour.

"Do you need help with the other two," she asked.

"Huh? What other two," I gasped.

"The pine and the other ficus," she who was still full of energy said.

"No thanks," I lied. "I can handle them."

With a renewed sense of rightous indignation and determined that I would not again be outwitted by a plant whose life and death I held in my own hands, I walked her to the door.

By dark I had the other two reasonably cleaned, inside and in place. The cats were in hiding. The floor had been swept and I'd managed a shower after clearing the air of those blue words.

I glanced around.

I had forgotten to trim Fig's top. It was bent at the ceiling.

Norfolk pine	Other ficus

I'd used the ladder on Tuesday when I was cleaning Figaro. It was back in the garage and I'm not real excited about dragging it inside right now.

Later.

Figaro is just going to have to live with his bent top.

Let the winter begin.

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