Thursday, August 18, 2005
Here's something I don't think there can ever be enough of: my two favorite left-handers, playing on my cousin's front lawn.
(OK, so he's only tending toward left-handedness so far, but you never know...)
(OK, so he's only tending toward left-handedness so far, but you never know...)
Wednesday, August 17, 2005
Last weekend the temps were in the 90s and the humidity was up there, so I did some yard work.
Saturday morning, though, I watched two other guys work first: we had a big oak tree in the back yard cut down. (It leaned toward the house, and was gutted with rot, probably thanks to the previous owners piling that baboon's-bottom-red fake cedar mulch around the trunk that the ants love so much.)
The younger guy, who would be doing the climbing, had guessed it to be 75' tall; his partner, older, and staying on the ground, dismissed that estimate and thought it was a good 80'. Whatever its height, they had the thing down, cut up, and packed into their trucks in under three hours. And they took down a huge dead branch that was hanging over my brand new shed, too.
Once they left, I scrubbed the swingset with bleach & water, and then removed a yew stump and relocated an azalea. (The shrub removal was listed on our weekend's To Do list as "W; Dig up ewe in back yard" which amused me until I started doing it.)
Sunday after church I stained the swingset and moved the same azalea, plus two more. And Man alive! are there a lot of rocks in my yard: the Irish who fled Cork's potato famine in the 1850's left behind better soil than this. I think we collected enough loaf-size stones just digging out holes for the the azaleas to make a pretty raised bed around them. I mean, I sure hope I can find something useful to do with them, or else I'll have to move the things....
Note for future reference: chlorine bleach & water softens the hands enough that just a little shovel work will tear off big sheets of your palms. Shoveling more the next day just gives you blisters on your blisters.
Saturday morning, though, I watched two other guys work first: we had a big oak tree in the back yard cut down. (It leaned toward the house, and was gutted with rot, probably thanks to the previous owners piling that baboon's-bottom-red fake cedar mulch around the trunk that the ants love so much.)
The younger guy, who would be doing the climbing, had guessed it to be 75' tall; his partner, older, and staying on the ground, dismissed that estimate and thought it was a good 80'. Whatever its height, they had the thing down, cut up, and packed into their trucks in under three hours. And they took down a huge dead branch that was hanging over my brand new shed, too.
Once they left, I scrubbed the swingset with bleach & water, and then removed a yew stump and relocated an azalea. (The shrub removal was listed on our weekend's To Do list as "W; Dig up ewe in back yard" which amused me until I started doing it.)
Sunday after church I stained the swingset and moved the same azalea, plus two more. And Man alive! are there a lot of rocks in my yard: the Irish who fled Cork's potato famine in the 1850's left behind better soil than this. I think we collected enough loaf-size stones just digging out holes for the the azaleas to make a pretty raised bed around them. I mean, I sure hope I can find something useful to do with them, or else I'll have to move the things....
Note for future reference: chlorine bleach & water softens the hands enough that just a little shovel work will tear off big sheets of your palms. Shoveling more the next day just gives you blisters on your blisters.
