The great thing about being a minion to Dark Overlords bent on total world domination is the job satisfaction.

I think I speak for us all when I say that while total world domination projects can seem overwhelming, overcoming the big challenges and the crushing deadlines that Dark Overlords routinely impose can really prop up a person's self-esteem.

Ah, but there is a downside. Total world domination projects are a massive time sink and don't leave minions with a lot of time for side projects like, oh, say, an on-line diary.

When you last saw me I was very shakily recovering from pneumonia. My Dark Hosta Overlords did not particularly care about any health issues I might have. All they were concerned about was their Total World Domination project, which for the moment involves covering huge swaths of my property with Dark Hosta Overlords.

Yesterday I finished lifting, dividing, and replanting the last Dark Overlord. You would think that a Dark Overlord bent on total world domination could be a little flexible about transplanting schedules, but you would be so very, very wrong. Hosta demand that you divide them when they are tiny little spikes and their leaves have not yet unfurled.

Oh, you can divide them after that, and they might live, but they will hold a grudge for years and refuse to grow to their proper size.

Hosta can be a very persnickety Dark Overlord.

Unfortunately, the callous demands of my Dark Overlords has meant that for the last few years other sections of my somewhat overwhelming gardening projects have been totally ignored less well tended than they should be.

Certain thuggish elements (I'm looking at you oenthera and you Lysimachia Punctata) have actually managed to kill a few of my more tender blossoms. Plus, I don't remember giving the frickin' poppies licence to self-seed so promiscuously that they have pretty much wiped out my primula.

With the bidding of my Dark Overlords now finished, I've decided to give a beatdown to the rest of my perennial borders. Believe me, if sap was blood by the time I'm done I'll look like I've been in the movie "Carrie". Fortunately, sap is clear so what is about to happen here will be Our Little Secret.

I know that some of my three loyal readers have been concerned because of the toll the pneumonia took this spring, but let me assure you that there is nothing more healing that to do something that you love. If I was any more healthy, I'd be dangerous.

So I'm well and embarrassingly happy, but between work and the short time I had to move about 1,500 hosta plants there hasn't been a lot of time for anything else. Now I have another short time window in which I can beatdown some thugs, transplant and nurture some of their shell-shocked victims.

Pictures have been taken. Believe me, I will drag you through the horror that was Hostapalooza.

But not just yet.

--Marn