Attention, talented and creative Grumpians! Jennifer in Wilmington, North Carolina hates the bushes in front of her house and desperately needs your suggestions. She writes:

Dear Grumpy Gardener,
We have too much green in the beds in front of our house. Boxwoods (not doing well in this location), with Indian hawthorns in front of the boxwoods (previously "rounded" to look like green meatballs), and monkey grass in front of the hawthornes. Can you give us some suggestions for adding color and a solution to the hawthorns shaping or placement? Thanks!

Here is what she's dealing with:

The other side:

Shocking as it may be, some miscreant impostor on Twitter is calling himself the Grumpy Gardener. Use this link to find the real deal: http://twitter.com/grumpy_gardener.

I just received a press release from the Humane Society that should cause us all to stop and think. We are urged to carefully consider the matter of pool safety for wildlife during the coming swim season. Here is a shocking quote:

"According to the most recent statistics, there are more than 8 million swimming pools in the U.S., and an estimated 1 of every 1,027 pets drown in pools each year. Yet, this tragic figure doesn’t account for the tens of thousands of wild animals that suffer the same fate.

For example, think of a small frog that jumps in for a refreshing swim but finds the water’s surface too far below the pool’s edge to crawl out, or a field mouse that leans over the edge for a quick sip only to fall in and swim around until exhausted."

I just know I won't be able to sleep tonight for thinking about those poor frogs and field mice. So if you have a pool and don't want to live a life of tragedy and guilt, here are some things you can do to protect wildlife.

1. Post signs that say, "Not responsible for tiny rodents and amphibians. Swim at own risk."

2. Hire a certified Life-Frog trained in CPR.

3. Place life preservers made from tiny rings of styrofoam attached to dental floss around the pool in case of emergency.

4. Do not permit frogs and mice to swim without proper supervision.

5. As a last resort, lower the water level in your pool to one inch.

Don't let an innocent frog croak!!!

I've tittered, tottered, and often been tattered, but never before have I Twittered! Until today. My first tweets are up on twitter.com, a site whose function I have yet to fully understand, but people insist is essential to meaningful interpersonal communication. Kinda like beer.

The only question Twitter asks is, "What are you doing?" Then you're supposed to tell the world, expecting of course that the entire world puts itself on hold until it receives your latest mote of intelligence, which must not exceed 140 characters in length. Hey, maybe Einstein can stun the world with something succinct like "E=mc2", but my brilliant observations cannot be thus abbreviated, lest their profound meaning be obscured.

Do you people really want to know what I'm doing all day? Some of it will be interesting, some of it will be boring, and some of it will be downright disgusting.

But hey, I know some of you already Twitter, so if you want to take a chance, look for random thoughts from the Grumpy Gardener.

Are you Twittering with excitement?

For the first time since Katrina, I spent the day touring beautiful gardens in New Orleans. All the people there said they just loved my articles in Southern Living. Then I discovered how they really felt when I walked into a garden and saw this sign.

OK, please tell me you get the pun of this clever title. Because I think what I did with these nice little bulbs is very clever and I'd like to think that you are too.

"What's that awful smell?" my son demanded the other day. "It's all over the neighborhood."

Had our next-door neighbor reopened his glue factory? Had week-old shrimp rained from the sky? Had banking execs awarded themselves more million-dollar bonuses? Nope. The stench was emanating from the prettiest trees on the street.

I hate liver. Hate it, hate it, hate it! Hate the way it looks, hate the way it smells, hate the way it tastes. That's why it's so weird that one of my favorite native wildflowers is liverwort.

For many people, the magical sudden appearance of crocus blooms are the surest sign that spring is nigh. As happy as you are to see crocus, squirrels and chipmunks are even happier.

Are you looking for a plant with stunning flowers and handsome foliage that's easy to grow and only a total idiot could kill? Then you want a nun's orchid.

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Snow in Alabama is as rare here as an honest politician. So when I woke up to a blizzard yesterday morning, I calmly assessed the situation and logically concluded that the world was coming to an end.