|
|
Post by Clipper on May 17, 2020 10:59:08 GMT -5
Bright and sunny. Almost too much so. I finished laying the straw to mulch the grass seed that I planted yesterday in the front yard, and rolled it in with the tractor tires. Wet it down and will run the sprinkler again this evening. Onward and upward we go. Scraped the hand rail by the back porch. The treated lumber must not have been dry enough when Kathy's nephew painted it two years ago. We used a good Behr latex exterior primer and paint mixture, but it started to peel a bit lately. I took a putty knife to scrape it and the paint peeled up in sheets like vinyl. I also scraped a couple of window sills outside the kitchen windows that were starting to peel a little bit. They hadn't needed painting since we had the replacement windows installed over 10 yrs ago. I will get out the calking gun and re-calk them before I paint them again.
Spring brings a lot of work. I still have brush to chip. a pile of limbs up in back that will make a major bonfire, and shop work to be done, making Kathy a treated lumber planter, 4'x12'x 12" deep for her cantaloupe plants to run from. Whether to attempt to put in a garden is still up for debate. I really need to get to that cardiac rehab and rebuild my stamina and strength. Even though I am staying active I get tired easily and spend as much time sitting on my dead ass in the carport as I do working in the sunshine and fresh air. Cardiac rehab would bring me reassurance and let me know what my heart is doing under load as I exercise so I will not be so leery about working hard outside in the sun. I mainly need to be pushed with exercise while hooked up to their monitor so I can learn how much I actually CAN do safely. I tend to work outside for hours at a time and the last thing I need is for Kathy to find me boobies up in the back yard. Did any of your who have experienced a heart attack found yourselves a bit paranoid and afraid of a repeat performance? If so, how long did it take to get back to normal so that you were not worrying every time you work yourself up to a good sweat and get to breathing hard from exercise?
|
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on May 17, 2020 14:25:28 GMT -5
You are a very busy bee! Don't over stress and over work. I got so tired reading all you did that I will put off washing my floor till Monday. Maybe. If I am in the mood. I hate mopping. See no purpose in it at all since I am only going to walk over it all anyway. Twice a year is more than enough.
|
|
|
|
Post by BHU on May 17, 2020 14:46:10 GMT -5
Got the garden ready yesterday. I was going to rent a tiller but the nearest rental place is in Rome, so I passed on that idea. I have a hand held tiller made by B&D that runs off a lithium battery. It's good for a smal area & does a decent job of working the soil. I had to stop once to recharge the battery. I don't go crazy with the garden. A few tomato plants, long hots, some basil, this year some swiss chard, zucchini, romane lettuce & that's about it. I've giveen up on cucumbers, I never have any luck with them & the produce stands just about give them away.
Clipper, I've never had a heart attack & I'm no expert by any means but I think your body will tell you when it's time to take a break. Take it easy, especially in the heat, you'll get there.
|
|
|
|
Post by chris on May 17, 2020 15:01:49 GMT -5
90? You definitely dont live in NYS . LOL. I. would not be surprised to still see snow fall. (Hope not. Put a few flowers ou on the balcony.
|
|
|
|
Post by Clipper on May 17, 2020 17:03:55 GMT -5
You are a very busy bee! Don't over stress and over work. I got so tired reading all you did that I will put off washing my floor till Monday. Maybe. If I am in the mood. I hate mopping. See no purpose in it at all since I am only going to walk over it all anyway. Twice a year is more than enough. Hahaha! You crack me up PB. If I lived alone I might not be all that fussy about the floors either. When I was single I always just took off my shoes when I came into the house, kept the dishes washed and the bathroom and toilet clean. |
|
|
|
Post by Clipper on May 17, 2020 17:07:56 GMT -5
Got the garden ready yesterday. I was going to rent a tiller but the nearest rental place is in Rome, so I passed on that idea. I have a hand held tiller made by B&D that runs off a lithium battery. It's good for a smal area & does a decent job of working the soil. I had to stop once to recharge the battery. I don't go crazy with the garden. A few tomato plants, long hots, some basil, this year some swiss chard, zucchini, romane lettuce & that's about it. I've giveen up on cucumbers, I never have any luck with them & the produce stands just about give them away. Clipper, I've never had a heart attack & I'm no expert by any means but I think your body will tell you when it's time to take a break. Take it easy, especially in the heat, you'll get there. I have one of the small tillers also but ours has a 2 cycle gas engine. It is great for cultivating or tilling in small spaces like in the flower beds where the 24 inch 6 hp tiller doesn't fit well. Unfortunately this damn clay soil around here is like cement after sitting all winter. I have added compost, sand, and bagged topsoil and it is difficult to till. It is surprising how it grows things amazingly well though. If I do a garden at all this year it will be small unless I can find someone with a tractor mounted tiller or plow and discs to prep the soil for me. It gets into the 90's for days at a time here in summer. I have always been able to work outside most of the day, with my t-shirt wringing with sweat as long as I took breaks under the carport with a tall and cool glass of water or a sweet tea. Now it seems that I just run completely out of steam when it gets hot outside. I have lost my tolerance for the heat and humidity. I am heading out in a few minutes to turn the sprinkler on for awhile and to sweep the garage and blow the loose straw off of the driveway and carport with the leaf blower where I opened the bale and took it a little at a time to the front yard with a wheelbarrow. I am glad that you have your garden ready to go. It will be a couple more weeks before people around here get into full gardening mode. |
|
|
|
Post by clarencebunsen on May 17, 2020 19:13:19 GMT -5
We got our patio cleaned today. Removed the winter accumulation of leaves. That was a wheel barrow and shovel job. Pressure washed the floor and side walls. Hauled out the tables and chairs. Barb gets upset when maple seeds start accumulating 1 minute after she sweeps. At least the maples are healthy.
|
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on May 17, 2020 19:48:56 GMT -5
I do my gardening at some grocery store. Even my fishing. We've come a long way baby.....A garden if any kind is a lot of work I did that in my 30's and 40's. The end...
|
|
|
|
Post by BHU on May 18, 2020 18:23:47 GMT -5
Picked up plantings today. Long hots, swiss chard, flat leaf parsley, cherry tomatoes, basil. Went to 2 places & neither one had Better Boy so Its back to Jet Star. And the zucchini looked pathetic so I passed on those. I could probably find plantings at Lowe's but I'm not paying $5 bucks for a single vegetable plant. No way.
|
|
|
|
Post by Clipper on May 18, 2020 19:32:32 GMT -5
You don't have any luck with cucumbers but they grow like crazy here. I won't plant many this year because we still have 5 or 6 jars each of bread and butter pickles and dills. I will plant enough to have salad cucumbers and to supply the neighbors. I plant them so the climb on trellises that I built and covered with wire fencing. Last year I was picking at least 12 or 15 about every other day right through the entire summer. Kathy canned about 30 pints of bread and butter pickles and about 15 quart jars of dill pickles. Everyone loves her bread and butter pickles so we give a lot of them away to friends and neighbors.
It is tomatoes that I don't have much luck with. I used to grow Jet Star tomatoes when we lived up there, but haven't seen them anywhere here. Better boys ended up with blossom end rot two years ago, and last year with the drought they didn't get real big, and the skins were so damn thick and tough that you just about needed a steak knife to cut them. I planted beef steaks one year and they were doing well but the wasps started eating them and leaving scars all over them that would turn to rot. Go figure, Who the hell would think that wasps would eat up tomatoes.
I have had my problems with pests. One year I planted zukes and summer squash and the squirrels decided that they like them and ate holes in them. One year I planted sweet corn and I thought racoons were getting into it, so I went out one night with a gun and a flashlight only to have a skunk come waddling out of the garden, headed right toward me. Needless to say I didn't shoot it or disturb it in any way, haha.
|
|
|
|
Post by BHU on May 23, 2020 7:31:36 GMT -5
Got my planting done a couple days ago. Tomatoes, zucchini, flat leaf parsley, basil & planted swiss chard instead of cukes. I also did a couple grape tomatoes in containers that are out on the deck. Lowe's had Better Boy & I was going to plant a couple of those but at $5/ each, I passed on those & went with Jet Star. Next week temps will be in the high 80's. Maybe the grass seed I planted 3 weeks ago will finally take off.
|
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on May 23, 2020 18:38:58 GMT -5
Yeah it was very hot today but from what I see in weather patterns it is gonna be real steamy here next week with temps above 90 and humidity to match. I actually went down stairs today and swept in the front entrance . Some residents asked why I said it hasn't been taken care of since this isolation. They didn't seem to care!
|
|
|
|
Post by Clipper on May 23, 2020 20:39:49 GMT -5
I mowed today and did a little more work cleaning up the garden plot. Raking up the debris and the old landscape cloth I had between the rows. I mowed the lawn and did a little weed eating. I am thinking that I may try tilling the garden myself, a little at a time. I can't find anyone that will come with a tractor and do it. However much I am able to get tilled up will determine how big it will be this year and how much I will be able to plant.
I start cardiac rehab on Wednesday. 2 hours a day, 4 days a week, for 9 weeks. I am going to try and schedule the sessions for afternoon so I can still take advantage of the mornings to do stuff around here before it gets real hot, and do the rehab in air conditioning while it is too hot to work outdoors.
Tomorrow morning I am going to trim up some bushes along the hedge row up back that hang out where they hit me when I mow, and then I will chip the debris so I can but the chipper/shredder away for a while and get out the tiller. I am finding that with the stay at home business the days go by better if I stay busy.
|
|
|
|
Post by BHU on May 24, 2020 13:39:42 GMT -5
I've never used landscape cloth in the garden. I was thinking of putting it down this year, but said the heck with it. That stuff ain't cheap. Every year I have an abundunce of crabgrass in the garden & if I don't pull it, it will overrun everything. I don't like using herbicides in the garden so I have to weed it by hand. It's a real nuisance.
|
|
|
|
Post by clarencebunsen on May 24, 2020 14:03:38 GMT -5
I got about 1/2 the back yard mowed today. Stopped to fill the gas and found that my grandson had emptied the gas can the last time he mowed and hadn't told me. Got gas but now I am too tired and sweaty to finish the job.
|
|
