On this chilly, icy March day, I’m convinced that I just raised the temperature in my office by simply opening the color-saturated pages of seed catalogs. Mmmm-hmmm! Better try and get control of myself, and get those feet back on the ground. Seed catalogs share a certain language, and each one seems to speak its own dialect. What they all have in common is the need to read carefully, and maybe the need for a black-and-white filter for the distracting visuals.

About the visuals: In this age of digital photography, it should be simple to take an honest, attractive picture of a plant in the garden. When it comes to printing catalogs, though, technology seems to whirl us back to the days of hand-tinted holiday portraits, or at least the heyday of Hollywood technicolor.

Word to the wise:  if it looks too good to be true, it probably is…

If the picture shows a bushel basket full of tomatoes or a vase full of cut flowers, ask yourself, "Why couldn’t they get a good one of the plant with fruit on it?" Quaint drawings are lovely, too, but they raise the same question for me.

True blue (as in sky blue, royal blue, blue if it’s a boy blue) is a rare color in flowers, restricted mostly to Delphiniums, Forget-me nots, Hydrangea and a handful of other flowers. True blue flowers tend to be a bit difficult to grow in this climate. I have never seen a blue rose yet. Period. End of Story.

But I am keeping my favorite pages open near the window in hopes that the snow and ice will take a hint.