Even our dull corporate buildings look almost pretty this time of year. The crabapples and redbuds are in bloom all along the parkways, and the air smells sweet (even for this area, which often smells faintly of jet fuel owing to our location right under the approach/takeoff path for O’Hare.

The whole area is greening up, and the landscape companies are out in force. You can tell that spring has arrived when the yard waste bags burst into bloom in all their brown-paper glory along the curbs on Garbage Day.

I have next week off – I threw the week in on a whim last fall, thinking I’d change it to something for an actual vacation. But in the back of my mind, even then, was that I’d use the week to do stuff around the yard and get some plants in. I didn’t do that last year (except for the kitty garden, which was a qualified success) and I missed it. This year I need to get a lot more done.