"What's Up?" /Ohhhh, not mulch"

If you don't mind, I think I'm going to be done with the outdoor projects in 2011 (with the exception of the garden, lawn mowing, and plotting what plants I might wanna throw down.)

Yup. I gave myself a deadline this weekend to get the rest of the outdoor frass finished. Last weekend I made my 4 trips to the Home Depot to collect the last of the 100 or so bags of cedar mulch (they had a sale) so that's down. The rain barrel had been sitting by the side of the house looking forlorn so THAT needed installed. The paver block to line the walk way wasn't going to install itself so I had to get THAT in the ground. (To be fair, it would've been done two weekends ago. Except since I couldn't seem to figure out how to remove the correct amount of dirt, so it ended up being a lawn-chunk by lawn-chunk process.)


And did I mention it was f#ck all hot out? Yeah. As I stood in the shower rinsing the black dirt off and picking wood fragments out of the corner of my eye, I wondered why I was there and not with my friends frolicking in the river. As my co-worker exclaimed: "Were you high? You should have gone to the river". Good answer.

I'll let the pics speak for themselves. If anyone knows of any good ground scrubby kind of the "come-back" kind of plants, or knows something about landscaping to make it look pretty...well I wouldn't be adverse to the assistance. In case you're curious, this was all done this weekend.("Before" pics can be found in the archives here and here.)

Now isn't that inviting? Clean? Doesn't that make you just wanna grill? Take that, creeping Charlie. Pictured: Toil. And for the uninformed, the Mazda can fit 12 bags of mulch. 16 if I'm not worried about visibility.

A row O' hostas is begging to be planted here, don't you think? This part of the house gets d#ck for sunlight.

This will, I'm hoping, keep the rain from getting in the basement. The nice thing about chunking out all of that soil is there was plenty of dirt for assistance with grading. I admit, I got panicky and I've been stalling the install as it were since part of it required my cutting away a portion of the downspout. During this phase, I discovered that stucco siding is really good at exfoliating the skin from your knuckles.

More soil for grading. I found some moisture in the wine cellar and the only time I've ever taken in water is when a downpour knocked off the drain spout last year. I'm reminded of my home-inspector years ago, when he advised keeping the soil high here on the South side of the house to keep the basement dry. Good advice, that. A good idea to follow it occasionally, Michael. (Incidentally. The dirt was sitting in a light plastic "garden" barrow. Overnight. And then it rained. Do you know what's heavy? Mud.)

Transplants, courtesy of the Mel's via Moda. That's all I have right now. I'm taking more. Anyone? Backyard is clean and mulch-y, but pretty nekkid.

Re-painted the picnic bench. Go on. Imagine eating some steaming weinies...baked beans...that crappy yellow potato salad and some lemonade. Ugh. I just threw up in my mouth. (*Note, by "painting" I mean I dumped the paint on it and pushed it around with a brush until it was even-looking. This was the final project of the day, and the heat/humidity had me a little addled)

Table courtesy of A and D. I scraped it, then re-painted with this nice textured spray. Doesn't this help you envision polite discourse over mojito's?

This was a completely unnecessary project on my part. I don't know. My herb pots used to live on the picnic table so I had this idea that I could build a small "herb table" to live next to the garden. I had some superfluous lumber and some really, really weak building skills. After a few hours with the cutting, the drilling, the cussing, the new fixes I discovered while building...we have a reeeeeally ghetto herb bench.

Hot banana pepper. I picked up some new (sturdier) tomato cages but I'm still a little chafed that my garden feels like it's taking forever to grow. (Coupled with the fact that Moda and Cap't Dawn's bounty already looks edible) This is what I get for expanding the dumb thing. See why this year? This year? Is the last time I expand the stupid thing.

Flaky and slow. Just like me! We ended up finding two scapes that escaped our notice. (See what I did there?) It made for a delicious and pungent egg scramble mixed with some goat cheese. Slurp.

You know what you don't do?

(pictured- The author post-recovery run on the record-setting hottest day of 2011. I went early to beat the heat but still lost a 4 pints of water. It was like my own mini-Badwater marathon out there! And you know somethi...fahk. I am anti-photogenic. Ugh...)

DON'T CALL IT A COMEBACK!!! What? You think that because the race is over and my wistful memories and the painful exertion that went into the half-Mary was the end of running jibba-jabba? No, No, No, my friends. I have a new toy to play with that you see there dangling out of my mouth like a slobbery tennis ball being handed to you by a golden retriever. I found it in the locker room at work and after turning it in to the lost and found , I waited a month (or until my last day on the job if it matters) before inquiring if anyone had claimed it. To be fair, I'd have walked off with it as soon as I found it but Moda made mention that it's bad race karma to abscond with someone else's running tool. (And it had also been pointed out to me that the karma worked when I twisted my ankle during the run and didn't up and break my foot. I'm just sayin'...) So, when no one claimed it?

Yoink.

So now I have a Garmin and outside of the fact that it's supposed to tell me my pace and distance, I can't figure the dumb thing out. So I now own the equivalent of an expensive digital watch on my wrist. Still...I wanted to get used to wearing it. And on my little 4-5 mile putter, it did give me an idea of how long I was going to be out in the wretched heat and when to "turn it up" so I could haul-ass home before it hit 100 degrees. Nothing says nothing like a training recovery run that involves blood, swass, and tears...

(Pictured: Swass)


Anyway, I'm gonna start frassin about the back yard but I still need to figure out a mulch solution (although during the Half-Mary we did see the tree chippings in an enORMOUS pile off of the Plymouth avenue bridge...the remnants of the tornadoes from a few weeks back) and also a plan as to what I'm planting and where. (I'm having a tough time "imagining" what the layout is going to be. I might solicit your help, readers) First and foremost is getting the stupid whirligigs blown off the weed barrier so that they don't take root or turn into a nesting ground for the stupid boxelder bugs that permeate my home when I neglect to do so.

(Remember when you were a kid and you'd watch them twirl and whirl like little helicopters and it was SO much fun? Yeah. I don't either)

It also means keeping them out of my gutters, garden, and flower/herb pots. 2 years ago I forgot to clear them out and they started growing in my gutters that were uncovered and choked out my flowers and herbs like they were in a mixed-martial arts match. It was a sad growing season in 2009...just sayin. Moreover, they actually do provide the nesting materials for the bugs and since I'm not hosting a insectoid orgy I'm getting outside and blowing that crap away from the huis.

(Pictured: It's always a good idea to respect your elders...unless they're getting their groove on next to the outside dryer vent.)


Oh. I'll also be posting my "X-Men: First Class" review soon. Fair warning, it's not what you'd probably expect from this nerd.

Warmer N' Dirtier

(Backyard, from house, taken 4/5/11. My best friend is convinced I need a dog to compliment my yard. A big, dumb, slobbery, hep-hep...yeah no)

I feel confident enough to pull out the plastic lawn furniture, the garden hose roll, and put away the back yard snow shovel...but I'm leaving my ice scraper in the back seat and the plastic is staying on the windows until May...

Truth. As soon as the last vestiges of snow left it was lawn and garden assessment time. (The snow melt not being the only meter. A few days ago I noticed that Home Depot had the cage open to their landscaping area...meaning I'll probably be spending so much time behind those green bars it's going to feel like Shawshank.) You're technically not supposed to start raking/thatching this early in the season, but due to the 1st snowfall having taken us by surprise- the evidence is clear that my work is cut out for me. So first, we run around the house and clear the strange refuse that blows into the yard. (Paper plates from Papa Johns, Ciggie butts, Plastic water bottles) Check the drain spout on the South side of the house to see if it's still connected. (It wasn't. More on the results of that in another blog) And start raking out leaves from the planters and the garden. I can already feel my shoulders seizing up from the excitement.

For your pleasure (I LOVE MY CAMERA)-



Rear house, taken from garage. In 3-4 weeks my yard'll be covered in whirligigs from that giant-ass boxelder tree.
Front planters. This Spring/Summer I'm finally cutting those blocks to fit and might-MIGHT fix one of my co-Voltron's paws that broke off in...gosh, 1987 or so? (I used the leaf-blower to clear them out. Easy peasy)

This is very, VERY important- Wear tough shoes when doing lawn work. This is what generally happens to retired running shoes. (Off topic- I actually took the expensive arch insert I used when I first started distance running and put it in these guys. Oddly enough, after barefoot/minimalist training these last 4 months? Running 25+ miles a week? And then wearing these douchey guys all day in the yard? My f#cking feet/shins/calves/knees KILL me.)

Composter contents. We composted well through the winter time and the results are one-full ass composter. (It's nigh on up to the top. Moda looked in it and said "Look at all the rich soil!" I had to correct her by telling her that it was coffee grounds.) Anyway, turning it with a pitchfork is going to be a bitch. Anyone have any bright ideas on bio-friendly compost speeder-uppers? (tm)

GARLIC NUBBIN! In another 2 months or so, these'll have some nice scapes on them for cooking.

There are always some casualties. This one was dug up by a bun-bun or tree-rat. I was mildly despondent, but Moda reminded me that we planted "a shit ton" of garlic last fall.


Probably my favorite part of Spring...grillin. I know people who grill year round and that's great. Once the cover goes on and the first snowfall happens, that's it until Spring. (Probably not the best idea for longevity purposes to keep it outdoors all winter, but what'll ya do?)


Did I mention that sometimes the cover goes on and you forget to take the foil off from the last thing you cooked on it? I think this was...chicken? Maybe salmon? I'm pretty sure this was back from when I was drinkin hard LQ and just couldn't be bothered with clean up. Grrrrrooooss.