My ability to complain is endless. For several years now I have noted the effects of climate change on the Vineyard and, more specifically, on my own gardens.

Then this past week, when it was seasonally albeit normally freezing cold for late January, I did my share of whining.

The woodstoves were working overtime yet it was still chilly in my elderly, drafty house.

Any day now I’ll be unhappy with hot and humid.

I’ve said many times that the weather, like my family members, does not respond to criticism.

While on the subject of climate change, did anyone catch the photo and front-page article in Monday’s New York Times? It was of a rock wall in Switzerland with a tiny path up the side and with hundreds of sheep in single file.

For generations, local sheep farmers have sent their flocks to summer pastures high above the glaciers. They return to the valley in winter. Now those glaciers are melting and things are different and difficult.

The photo says it all. It takes a minute to see what is happening.

The article goes on to say that there is a threat to water — i.e. glacial runoff — in the area.

On a lighter and more positive note, my seeds have arrived.

For some reason, I did not receive my Pine Tree Gardens catalogue this year. As luck would have it, I located last year’s with all the items circled. I rang them, got a real live human being right away — no pesky menu to navigate — and ordered exactly the same as last year.

If it works, why fix it?

Now if I could get the greenhouse in some sort of order, I could get the onions started.

I do finally have some pea shoots ready. My little great-grandson Zappa loves them and cannot get enough.

Also, I am eating some sprouted seeds. I use both fenugreek and alfalfa. Soaked overnight in jars with screened tops, they take less than a week until salad-ready.

They do require several rinsings to remove the bulk of seed debris. I finish them for a few days in colanders.

Sadly for me but happy for her, Violet returns to school this week after a long winter break.

She’s been a big help, endlessly cheerful. She rarely rolls her eyes at me — to my face.

We cleaned up a perennial bed and found emerging crocuses and daffodils. Then the big freeze happened. Brrr; poor little things.

I often go on about the proper way to cut hydrangeas. There are several done to my ridiculous standards lining the path to The Toy Box at the Tisbury Marketplace. Seeing them is better than my feeble attempt to explain.

What a nice surprise to wake up on Wednesday morning to a winter wonderland. There is nothing quite like new-fallen snow covering everything. It covers a multitude of undone tasks outdoors.

Chickens may be God’s comedians. They refuse to come out of the coop. I think they are afraid to step on snow. They put out a foot, rethink and go back to huddle in a corner.

Richard Nixon appointed Earl Butz as secretary of the Department of Agriculture. His mission was to provide the nation with cheap food. With the help of governmental aid to farms. Put a pin in the importance of the state of Iowa for another time!

Along with cheap food — think corn in all its forms — America got the obesity epidemic, ridiculous healthcare costs and, sadly, shortened life expectancy.

Nearly all processed and fast foods have high fructose corn syrup and corn fattens all our industrial meats. Normally, cattle eat grass — not corn.

We pay less for food in relation to our income and other expenditures than other countries. Yet there is constant complaining about prices.

Joe Biden is to blame when industrial chickens catch avian flu and eggs cost more. He’s blamed when gasoline goes up but never credited when it goes down.

Then again, he’s old. Honestly, how often does the media have to state the obvious?

I wonder when they will start mentioning his actual accomplishments and, oh, I don’t know, his experience, wisdom and downright decency.