From commentor & determined landscaper La Passionara:
The top photo is the mess that greeted me when I returned from a July vacation. The weeds had grown like wildfire in what had been a play area, covered by landscape fabric and mulch. It came with the house, and our grandchildren liked it for the first few years, but they have outgrown it now. So I resolved to get rid of the weeds and put in grass.
The second photo shows the area after someone came by and helped me pull up the old railroad ties used to define the play area and roll up the landscape fabric with the weeds. Reason 2 million why I hate landscape fabric. Once weeds get growing in it, it is almost impossible to pull them up.
The stack of sod a supply company dropped off at my house. Two by three feet rectangles of fescue. I could carry three at a time in my wheelbarrow, and it was slow going for a while. When Mr. LP returned from his walk, he pitched in. He could carry four pieces at a time in the wheelbarrow, while I stayed in the back yard and arranged the rectangles.
With his help, I was close to done just before noon. Now to keep the grass alive until it takes hold.
I know lawns aren’t the best, but I have so many planting beds that I am working constantly to stay ahead of the weeds. Once this is established, it should be fairly routine to have it mowed. Meanwhile, I can get back to planting shrubs, flowers, and ground covers.
***********
I’m in the mood to really appreciate the effort this project took, because it’s been a busy summer and I’ve only ‘finished’ re-landscaping three out of five-plus planned areas. (Me, I *love* landscape fabric, cuz it let me rip out & roll up most of the Spousal Unit’s invasive ferschuggling vinca in one particular bed.) It’s finally cool enough, though, that I can hope to make some serious progress digging up the disgracefully overgrown semi-shaded patch behind the foundation, and transplanting the perennials that have been waiting in pots all summer.
Especially since we’re about at the end of tomato season — still got a few plants ripening fruit, but I know the daylight’s waning so that there won’t be many more. One good thing, there wasn’t much of a harvest this year either, but I proved I could get not-enough tomatoes from 20 pots as easily as from 35, and still have the time & energy to deal with the rest of what passes for our garden. So next year, the goal is to cut back to a dozen or so… just hope our favorite farmstand keeps offering fat tasty heirlooms to supplement my crop!
What’s going on in your garden(s), this week?
OzarkHillbilly
(looks at first photo).…
BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA…. gasp…. wheeze…. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA….
JPL
The great transformation!
?BillinGlendaleCA
I was just doing a Google search for “Carrizo Plain Milky Way” and one of the results looked familiar, it was one of my MW pics from “On The Road” taken in Lockwood Valley.
(Saw the pic out of the corner of my eye and thought, that picture looks like one of mine.)
Lapassionara
@OzarkHillbilly: I just knew you would hate this, and I wish I ived in the woods, like you do. But I have so many places that need work, and a lawn will need less of my attention, once it is established, than the rest of the beds I have.
The goods news is that it celebrated its two week anniversary yesterday, and it seems to be doing fine. The cooler weather has helped.
NotMax
There’s a play area along those lines (only more elaborate, and larger) in a public park here. Planned, purchased and installed by way of a sizeable fund raising campaign.
And since the day the last piece of it was finished (25 years ago?) surrounded, unused, by a high, locked heavy duty chain link fence to keep children and everyone else away. Because after the fact it was cited as being a health hazard due to ALL of the wood having been treated with creosote.
But it looks pretty.
OzarkHillbilly
@Lapassionara: Oh I don’t hate it, I don’t hate it at all. Different strokes and all that and besides, I have my own very large patch of weeds… I mean lawn to mow. ;-) The only thing I dislike more than mowing the weeds is pulling them. Hence, most of my beds look like hell after June 15th or so.
Raven
@OzarkHillbilly: our drought is holding the kudzu back!
NotMax
@Ozark Hillbilly
And it came to pass that Man gazed across the verdant expanses and promptly invented Astroturf.
:)
Lapassionara
@OzarkHillbilly: lawn mowing is the one yard chore that I regularly pay someone else to do.
I’m going to hang a bird feeder from the top wooden piece once the grass is established, so I will give the edifice a reason for its continued existence.
OzarkHillbilly
@Raven: See? Global warming isn’t all bad.
Lapassionara
@NotMax: underneath the last photo is an ad for “forever lawn of the Ozarks” or some kind of AstroTurf. I don’t know what algorithm our blog host is using for ad selection, but that was just perfectamundo.
OzarkHillbilly
@Lapassionara: Hang a bunch of rebar sculpture on it, a few hubcaps, paint it in all the colors of the rainbow, and call it art.
NotMax
Took a gander at the list of programming coming to Netflix in October. Number of items which piqued my interest: 0.
Luckily it is never a totally comprehensive list and there’s usually one or two things which show up unannounced I find worth giving a try.
narya
They’re tuck pointing the west side of the building (it’s an e-shaped building, with the long side facing the street, and I’m in the middle tier); I wasn’t sure how much the dust would make it to me, so I brought in the basil and rosemary from the back porch, i.e., anything I will eat. the rest of the flower boxes are still producing things that bloom, or, in some cases, seeds from the flowers. Next year I am going to start the boxes indoors. The porch faces north so it’s mostly things that are shade-tolerant.
NotMax
@NotMax
Failed to include a linky to the list.
@OzarkHillilly
Don’t forget a bunch of neon-painted old tire planters.
;)
OzarkHillbilly
@Lapassionara: I do have to say tho that I am not at all fond of the forced conformity that is suburbia. I grew up in it, and I have many friends who live there, but these days it just makes me shudder.
Lapassionara
@OzarkHillbilly: I like your hub cap idea. I don’t see how we solve global warming as long as people think living in a house with a big lawn on a street in the suburbs is the ideal.
NotMax
@OzarkHillbilly
The Stepford Lawns.
OzarkHillbilly
@NotMax: Wow, some of that stuff is pretty damned cool. Gives me ideas. My wife is gonna hate you for that. I’m not too sure I would want to eat anything that grew in a tire planter tho.
Betsy
My borders and beds are just full of weeds and neglect, but it was 93 yesterday and I’m out of juice. Summer
The stuff that out-crowds the weeds is good though: crinum lilies, tea olive, giant zinnias (Benary’s Giants, which never mildew EVEN HERE, even in September), lavender, ginger lilies, and beautyberry (callicarpa americana).
OzarkHillbilly
@Lapassionara: I would definitely have some fun with it.
Part of the beauty of living out here is I can literally do anything I want with my place. If only I could find a roofer who would actually put a new roof on my house.
NotMax
@Lapassionara
You could hang individual varied lengths of skinny pipe and tell people you’re growing wind chimes.
:)
Betsy
Stuck in moderation cause I entered my address wrong
Aside: Why do I always have to enter my stuff now? I never comment any more cause it’s time-consuming
Raven
@Betsy: nobody comes here anymore, it’s too crowded! Chrome will save your credentials.
Amir Khalid
@NotMax:
Why was creosote-treated wood used in the first place? Was it an oopsie by the builders?
NotMax
@Betsy
Nothing on your end, it’s because the spit and baling wire holding the current version of the site together isn’t up to the task. Supposed to be resolved when the new iteration rolls out.
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone ???
Lapassionara
@NotMax: LOL.
NotMax
@Amir Khalid
Fuzzy on the details except that the whole thing was undertaken by some community service group (not Kiwanis, but along those lines) and that they needed an inspection to pass muster with the county before cutting the ribbon. Which they failed with flying colors.
Raven
@Amir Khalid: It used to be used all the time. Railroads ties especially.
The Golux
@Lapassionara:
Ever since I got an electric lawnmower, I actually enjoy it. Just push a button and go, and no engine maintenance.
Ken
@Lapassionara:
And the birds spill the seeds, and they grow back the weeds…
Sorry, trying for a new verse of “Circle of Life” but can’t get the meter right.
JPL
@NotMax: Some of the planters are very cool.
WereBear
One of my honors seminars in college was about horrors of the lawn-monoculture obsession, and we designed and planted a meadow garden under a big ironwork piece that was a pain to mow under anyway.
I loved it. Want to recreate it someday.
Ken
Does anyone have any experience with retention ponds? My church did some construction and the city required one to hold excess runoff. It’s about 20′ by 10′ and there’s always a few inches of water (we’ve had to use mosquito pellets).
The builder provided reeds and cattails, and they’ve come in well this year. Judging from the natural ponds around here, the plants will die over the winter and grow back from the roots next spring. I was wondering if we needed to cut them before winter or in early spring.
OzarkHillbilly
@Amir Khalid: @NotMax: Here’s the deal: Pressure treated wood was used for all sorts of outdoor construction because it would last a long time. I built a number of these things out of PT wood during the 80s and 90s, Then around about 2005 or so (iirc) a study was released that showed that some of the chemicals used caused cancer or were toxic (iirc it was the copper arsenic). I don’t know the details of the study or what levels they were speaking of, but it was a kind of a “No Duh…” moment and it became verbotten because, well, children.
I am unsure if there was in fact any danger to children playing on these constructs or if it was just another typical over reaction because, well, children.
They now use a whole different witch’s brew of chemicals which I am sure are just as toxic, but it is no longer used in playground equipment, because, well children.
Funny how nobody ever reacts thusly to, well, carpenters.
OzarkHillbilly
@Ken: No need for cutting in the wild.
OzarkHillbilly
Not exactly garden related but I have to share this porcupine that won’t share his corn on the cob.
Immanentize
@Ken:
Whatever you do with a pond project, just do not coat it in creosote!
Like Raven said — railroad ties were (are?) Creosote coated as were telephone poles. Most of the older poles around here are still tar bottomed.
NotMax
@OzarkHillbilly
At one point during the 70s found myself lying supine on the ground, slapping creosote on the underside of porch decking with a big ass brush. How to clean up spatters on the skin? With leaded gasoline and a wire brush, of course.
Immanentize
LaP. I know that took a lot of time! Great work. As you know, water water water now. We had to pull down a couple of big white pines that had crested (started growing like lollipops instead of an upside down cone) and a diseased Norway maple. That exposed a big chunk of my small yard to sun death rays and after two years of neglect and the weed invasion, we had to redo a part. Probably lost 20% of that sod from bad water attention…. I was bummed, but then I learned up here near Boston, 20% loss is considered a huge success. Year two post effort and it is filling in, but not without crabgrass and clover. ?
Immanentize
@NotMax:
Creosote, leaded gas for cleaning everything in every engine I worked on, scraping and sanding lead paint, Shell no-pest strips hung all over the house in the summer. Imagine what we could have accomplished without all that brain poisoning. I suspect we could have cured Republicanism by now.
zhena gogolia
@NotMax:
I think I’m going to have to join Netflix just to see Olivia Colman as Queen Eliz. II.
zhena gogolia
@Betsy:
Supposedly this will get fixed in the new site.
OzarkHillbilly
@NotMax: Oh yeah, gasoline always works so well. I figure with all the chemicals I’ve used to clean various substances off of me, I’m a walking miracle. I should have died of cancer decades ago.
NotMax
@zhena gogolia
AFAIK they still offer a 30-day free trial. And if you’re like me and are never going to stream things on more than one device at a time there’s the basic membership, which only recently got bumped up by a buck to $8.99 per month.
debbie
@Lapassionara:
Dish flowers seem to be a thing.
NotMax
@NotMax
Amended for greater clarity.
never going to stream things simultaneously on more than one device at a time
debbie
@OzarkHillbilly:
Had no idea porcupines “spoke,” but I’d swear I heard “Mine!” and “I like!” among the squeaks.
debbie
@OzarkHillbilly:
I used to use kerosene and Comet to wash off printer’s ink when the waterless hand cleaner ran out. :/
Immanentize
By the way, for those following the Saga of the Immp, I received this text last night:
Restless youth meets the big city. I responded “Hurray! Not a tattoo!”
NotMax
@NotMax
Will also add that the lower priced membership means streaming at less than 4k levels. Which for these older eyes is a barely discernible difference in viewing, as well as less data clogging up the stream for those with download speed on the lower end of the spectrum.
debbie
@Immanentize:
Clearly Immp’s having a great time!
Spanky
@Immanentize:
Tomorrow is another day.
NotMax
@debbie
Also too, bars of Lava soap hefty enough to crack skulls. In a pinch, Rokeach kosher soap.
;)
NotMax
@Immanentize
“Be sure to bring back the skin plugs. I want to have them bronzed.”
:)
zhena gogolia
I know I’m going to get flamed for this, but I’m kind of regretting canceling my subscription to the NYT. I’m still getting it until 10/11. Damn, no one else has such good crosswords. And their editorial today comes out strongly for impeachment.
zhena gogolia
@zhena gogolia:
(off to church now, will check in later to see how badly I’ve done)
Immanentize
@Spanky:
And we live to fight that day….
Immanentize
@NotMax:
When Lava was unavailable — or even when it was — Fels Naptha (strong lye) soap
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Spanky: Oh that’s just mean. LOL
On another topic, my publisher (Inspired Quill) has won two Midlands Enterprise Awards, one for Best Independent UK Publishing House and one for Most Eco-Friendly Literary Enterprise. My publisher is very self-deprecating and says it’s one of those things where 3/4 of the entries win something, but I’m still pleased for her.
Immanentize
@NotMax:
Hmm, now you raise a possible issue — is he getting his ears jus pierced, or is he getting ear spacers?
I will find out this evening.
frosty
@Ken: Stormwater ponds are my line of work. Hard to tell what it was designed to do but from your description of water a few inches deep, cattails and reeds (phragmites?)* it sounds like a failed dry pond which is great mosquito habitat. Wet ponds should be deeper and would support fish to eat mosquito larvae. A stormwater wetland would have a variety of depths and plantings.
As far as cutting back, if designed to be planted the vegetation is there to take up nitrogen and phosphorus, which would help prevent algae growth and oxygen depletion downstream. They ought to be harvested and landfilled or the nutrients will just leach back into the water negating the whole design concept.
Your church could probably get an engineer to the site for a couple of hours to verify all this for not too much money. Or the city/town/county DPW which is required to inspect it and keep it maintained. On your nickel, oftentimes.
* invasive, poor habitat, and almost impossible to get rid of. A good indicator of lack of maintenance. And never part of a landscaping plan.
NotMax
@Immanentize
To this day keep a container of Boraxo in the medicine cabinet.
frosty
@Immanentize: My oldest went for the tattoos instead of piercings. Oh well at least I got him out of high school clean. Youngest bates needles so we won’t see either with him.
Another Scott
@NotMax: They could name it DJT Playset or something.
:-/
Cheers,
Scott.
LivinginExile
@OzarkHillbilly: Put a new roof on my garage last week. 6+ squares and tore off old shingles. It was about all the old man could handle. Still need to do most of the house, and it is steep enough I need to use brackets. Can’t believe I use to be able to carry two bundles of shingles up a forty foot ladder. Now maybe half a bundle up an eight foot step ladder. Oh well.
OzarkHillbilly
@debbie: I heard words too.
Lapassionara
@debbie: those seem very nice. Thanks.
scav
Maybe replace grandchildren with roses and wisteria to ramble over the wooden thing? Give it something to do in retirement.
— Save the grandchildren for other purposes, of course.
OzarkHillbilly
@LivinginExile: My roof is mostly 10/12 ans 12/12. No fucking way. I am too old and too arthritic to even think about doing it. I had to put new decking on the 3/12 porch roof in preparation a few weeks back and that was enough for me. I still managed to carry the 90# roll roofing up onto it without too much difficulty, but that’s a far cry from the rest of my roof.
Immanentize
@frosty:
Hadn’t thought of that, after his recent experiences, the Immp really is needle averse too! Silver lining!
mrmoshpotato
@NotMax:
Which volcano would you like to scrub with today?
Aleta
@zhena gogolia: Olivia Colman, queen of hearts
Yarrow
@Lapassionara: The new lawn looks great. That is a lot of work but looks nice now it’s done.
If you decide you don’t want the wooden play set anymore you can advertise it as available for free on Craigslist or Next Door or Facebook marketplace or something like that. List it that whoever wants it has to dismantle it themselves.
Some neighbors had a poorly created and unsightly fountain type thing in their backyard when they bought the house. They didn’t want it so advertised it on Craigslist as available for free but whoever took it had to dig it out. Sure enough, some guys showed up, dug it out and loaded it up on their truck.
OzarkHillbilly
@mrmoshpotato: Stay away from the Vesuvius, it’s a real killer.
MomSense
I share your hatred of landscape fabric.
Good god y’all what is it good for absolutely nothing. Say it again.
Apologies to Edwin Starr.
My garden is completely neglected due to the cold that won’t leave. The Montauk daisy is about to bloom and the hydrangeas are turning a lovely rose color.
Skepticat
If any of you would to feel immeasurably better about your gardens, yards, and homes, I’ll share my Google Drive showing photos of the devastation of my small island in Abaco. There is not a leaf left on the few trees standing, and the only green is the hideously invasive zoysia grass that many people gave up battling and let take over as “lawns.” Google Earth Pro has updated visuals of Abaco; if you see anything but dark brown, you have the old version.
And one of my cats is hospitalized with an emergency vet for acute renal failure.
I’d ask what what else could go wrong, but I’m afraid the fates might show me.
StringOnAStick
@Yarrow: Craig’s list is great for getting rid of what you don’t want but someone else does. When we bought this place it had a hot tub that blocked the best inside view and it was causing the deck to collapse. It got here via a crane so it had to leave that way so having a crane or paying for one was the “price”. Craigs list solved that. It’s amazing how resourceful people are when you offer to give something away. I’ve given away excess perennials, house plants, magazines, etc. Posting a “curb alert” works really well too.
JPL
@zhena gogolia: You don’t need a subscription to the paper for the crossword puzzles. You pay for that privilege separately.
JPL
@Immanentize: It must be nice being young. Glad he is having a good time.
NotMax
@mrmoshpotato
Ixtaccíhuatl. Because it’s fun to say out loud.
rikyrah
@Immanentize:
Take victories where you can ?
StringOnAStick
@MomSense: I spent a couple of years working for a xeriscape designer/installer and landscape fabric was standard but I never understood why. We either cut huge holes in it for every plant as we planted, or had to cut it away from snubs that were being strangled by it. As far as I could see it did provide a way to keep the drip irrigation tubing covered, but that made it harder to find under the mulch and on any slope at all the mulch just slid downhill on top of the fabric. Weeds get through anyway, one molecule at a time but from seeds on the upper surface. We did several rehab landscapes where there were two or three layers of fabric with mulch on each layer so thick that rain couldn’t get to the soil. At least that was easier than the one yard where they’d used rolled asphalt roofing; it took hours picking up all the chips of that stuff suffocating the soil.
rikyrah
?????
Kenidra4Humanity (@KenidraRWoods_) Tweeted:
Omg lmao y’all have to watch Trump’s impeachment song. This is the best thing I’ve seen all day ?
“You can take pence, he can get out too!” ?? https://t.co/o4jZW4Aoqz https://twitter.com/KenidraRWoods_/status/1178092324640956416?s=17
Aleta
@Immanentize:
(Despite having none) I totally see his point : )
Sounds like the trip is good medicine. Glad for him. He must be a wonderful kid.
Betsy
@Raven: Thanks, Raven!
ThresherK
HRC and Chelsea Clinton have written a book together, and they’re in a piece on CBS Sunday Morning.
This was recorded after Nancy Pelosi’s speech on Tuesday. HRC is a model of restraint and part of me wants her to just say “I Told You, Motherfuckers!”
PS Chelsea Clinton is 39? When did that happen???
ThresherK
@ThresherK: Ugh, FYWP. There is a small segment in the piece where HRC is asked about impeachment and says all the obivous and right things in a firm, polite way.
Yarrow
@StringOnAStick: Wow! They had to bring a crane to get it for “free” and they did! I was amazed at how fast the Craigslist ad worked for my neighbors. We were friends so I wandered over to see what was going on, since I saw these guys going into their backyard and filling the truck with stuff. They told me they just put the ad up that morning and by noon the guys were there.
It was this kind of weird concrete fountain thing. Totally unusable and it was in their way so they couldn’t enjoy that part of the yard. The guys had to break up the concrete to take it away but they did. I have no idea what they were going to do with it.
Betsy
@NotMax: @zhena gogolia: Thanks for the info!
Yarrow
@StringOnAStick: A friend who is a landscape designer says they don’t use landscape fabric. She says it doesn’t work to keep the weeds down and that a significant percentage of weeds come from the top, carried by birds or wind or whatever.
JPL
@OzarkHillbilly: Thank you for posting that.
Another Scott
@Skepticat: It’s horrible what you and your neighbors are going through. :-( Here’s hoping that things get better day by day. Best of luck to your kitty as well.
I made another donation to the Bahamas Red Cross via https://www.bahamas.com/relief
Hang in there.
Best wishes,
Scott.
Amir Khalid
@ThresherK:
It feels like it was only yesterday, doesn’t it, that John McCain was making cruel jokes about 13-year-old Chelsea’s looks.
JPL
@Skepticat: That sucks and you are so right. It’s going to take decades before it recovers. Your photos showed such devastation that it’s difficult to imagine.
Yarrow
@Skepticat: So very sorry about all of it. Terrible devastation.
MomSense
@StringOnAStick:
Asphalt roofing? Holy hell that’s a nightmare. I had to pull out about 50 arborvitae and yews that were planted so close to the house they were rubbing against it. Everything was mulched with RED mulch. Why? Why the red mulch? There was also a drip strip that was mounded soil covered in landscape fabric and lightly sprinkled with stones. Basically it was a raised bed of weeds around the perimeter of the house. I still can’t believe how fucking terrible it looked.
The good news is that it made the house super cheap to buy because everyone who looked at it thought it was a dark house that needed a lot of work. Once the stupid shrubs and trees came out, I ended up with a house that has natural light all day long.
Pulling all those root balls out was a slog, but totally worth it.
japa21
I am trying to come up with terms that truly describe the venality of Lindsey Graham and I am at a loss. None in my not limited vocabulary seem to be sufficient.
He just said the Salem witch trials had more validity than the impeachment inquiry.
Another Scott
Popehat – FINE. Let’s talk about hearsay.
Interesting.
Cheers,
Scott.
MomSense
@Skepticat:
I’m so sorry. Puts our garden woes in perspective. Where on the island was your property?
Abaco has such historic significance that I hope won’t be lost in this tragedy.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Skepticat: How awful. Strength to you and your kitty too.
WaterGirl
@Betsy: It is maddening, but take heart. The new site saves your information.
Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho
@Skepticat: I’m so sorry. You are wise not to tempt the fates, or “taunt the wretched” as James Kirkwood put it in P.S. Your Cat is Dead. Your situation certainly reminds us that a garden is disarray clearly trivial. I wish I had more useful thoughts than “thinking of you.”
WaterGirl
@Immanentize:
Please please save this entire sentence and then nominate it as a rotating tag through the form on the new site.
What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?
Meanwhile WaPo today has a very long article on Hunter Biden in the Ukraine, making the point ad nauseum that although no corruption or illegally occurred, and there’s no evidence Joe did anything wrong or influenced US policy to help Hunter or the firm he sat on the board of, it sure did show poor judgement! Then they go on to ask whether it showed poor judgement on Joe’s part to let his son do something like that.
And so the false equivalency begins. Trump and his clan engage in corruption on a daily basis, but we have talk at length about Biden’s judgement even though he didn’t do anything corrupt. Meanwhile if they wrote equal length stories about everything Trump and his children did that had the slightest whiff of bad judgement or corruption, they’d have to write 200 pages a day, every day, and wouldn’t have space to cover anything else for years. But one Democratic candidate’s son showed slightly poor judgement so….both sides have something to answer for.
Ohio Mom
@zhena gogolia: You can subscribe to the crossword puzzles online. Then go over to Rex Parker’s blog and listen to him complain how bad the puzzle is.
We gave up the Sunday edition as a cost-cutting move back in the Great Recession. I’m about ready to give up the daily paper, mainly because the costs add up and I am swimming in news from my favorite internet sites, and I am tired of lugging the recyclables to the curb. Ohio Dad will insist on keeping the online subscription, mainly for Krugman.
What you are trying to do, go cold turkey, is very radical for any ingrained routine or tradition. Be kind to yourself.
@Immanentize: I don’t know if you are still here but after you left to drive Immp to the train station, another commentator mentioned he’s been stomachless for ten years and doing fine after the initial adjustment period.
I went to get my ears pierced back in my twenties when my then current BFF suggested we go together.
She moved out of town several years later, we lost touch, but my fond memories of our friendship are forever because well, I carry them in my earlobes. It’s such a big season in Immp’s life, seems like a good time to mark it. And now you always have a gift idea for birthdays and Christmas, you can get him an earring/earrings.
MagdaInBlack
The area where I grew up had a wee bit of rain.
https://www.mywebtimes.com/lists/2019/09/28/0ef02b65a3fa4a6183052ad0f947a950/index.xml?page=1
Spanky
@Ohio Mom:
It was Thin Black Duke, and I wanted to post an alert too, so thanks.
Ohio Mom
@Spanky: We moght have to post another alert because this thread seems about over.
Cermet
I’m starting in a big way on building my roof top astronomy observatory. While the roof top area for the observatory is just over 3 and half stories up, that roof section is a shallow slope so easy to work upon. I’ve installed anchors to the massive chimney nearby to provide a place to better secure the still higher base platform (the observatory will be a further half story higher than the roof.) I also have most the main platform treated wood on the roof (I installed electrical service on the roof so I can use hand tools and have power for the astronomy equipment, too.) To be safe, I’ve also built a 3 story scaffolding system in the front of the roof area I’m work near – working that close to such a high roof edge is un-nerving without it. Not a garden project but outside work non-the-less … ;)
LivinginExile
If anyone needs a rage boost, Hugh Hewitt took a dump at the W Post this morning.
Spanky
@Cermet: Roll off or dome? Do i remember correctly that you put in a pier all the way from the ground?
Spanky
@LivinginExile: Hewitt does that every day. He’s (one of) the Post’s cover for being unbiased.
You want rage, though, consider
They’re retroactively classifying emails from Clinton’s tenure and holding those people in violation. I’m sure the ultimate goal here is to lock. her. up.
Renie
@Spanky: I don’t even understand how they can retroactively reclassify these emails and then go after people now for potential security violations. This makes no sense. And what’s the story about Barr & Pompeno being in Italy looking for dirt on Hillary? trump needs some new b.s. this email stuff is getting old
debbie
@Spanky:
They’ll be one of Trump’s bargaining chips. //
StringOnAStick
@Yarrow: it has been a couple of decades since I did that work so I don’t know if he still uses landscape fabric but I evolved to telling people it’s a waste of money and I’m suspicious that it impedes transmission of rainfall to the underlying soil, plus how are birds supposed to forage for worms and bugs through that stuff.
When I converted our entire property to a xeriscape, I used no landscape fabric. The amount of weeding I do each year takes maybe 1/10 of the time it would take to mow if we had grass instead. Our bird and wildlife numbers are much higher too.
StringOnAStick
@MomSense: Argh, arbovities; I detest those things! After about 20 years of exposure to them thanks to my landscape addiction I am now horribly allergic to them, getting contact dermatitis that sent me to the ER and now every accidental exposure requires a week of steroids to stop it. it’s only those landscape juniper s that cause it, I’m fine with native juniper. I accidentally used a hotel shampoo with juniper on the ingredients list and broke out within an hour.
Arborvities and other landscape juniper s are cheap, easy to grow and often xeric, but I can’t even let one brush my arm. My town gives away free mulch made from yard waste and I have to avoid it because there’s always ground up landscape juniper in it.
zhena gogolia
@Ohio Mom:
I’m starting to realize this. It’s kind of a way of life. And although the paper is certainly nowhere near as good as it used to be, it’s hard to cut it off.
Redshift
@Renie: The way I read that story is that the State Department investigative division has been completely corrupted, and they’re trying to give a black mark to any staff who worked for Democrats so they’ll have a new “scandal” to hype if any of them are hired.
Scratch that, it involves too much long-term planning for these incompetent yahoos. They’re just trying to abuse their power to punish the other “team” because they’re awful and don’t care a whit about the country.
Redshift
@zhena gogolia: I get most of my news online (though I have an online subscription to the Post, I don’t read it directly much) and I do worry about confirmation bias. The editorial gatekeepers were/far from perfect, but they do throw stuff at you that you might not choose on your own.
Aleta
@Cermet: That’s so cool.
@Skepticat: I’ve been through the cat emergency vet rehydration for kidneys a couple of times. Fortunately it helped a lot, even for a far gone cat after it took another day to travel to a vet. I did the subQ fluids thing for over a year for each cat, and if you happen to need cat care in Maine when you travel, feel free to contact me via AL or Tamara.
I hope for comfort for your cat and healing for your island home and people.
Ohio Mom
@zhena gogolia: Some of earliest memories are of my mother sitting in her chair in the living room, taking a break from housekeeping and looking after me and my brother, doing the crossword puzzle.
As I got older (and she took to doing the puzzle in PEN), I often heard mutters that the paper was not as good as it used to be. Some things are eternal.
Skepticat
Thank you for all the kind words, jackals. You don’t know how important and comforting it is.
@MomSense:
My property (I no longer can say “my home”) is on Scotland Cay, one of the outer cays. There were few houses and thus not a sea of debris, only many piles; only 11 of 77 houses are habitable. However, most were second homes for Americans with money and many had insurance, so those people are in relatively good shape. (Me, not so much.) Great Abaco and Marsh Harbour, however, may never really recover, and too, too many of Elbow Cay’s and Man o’ War’s historic treasures are trash. Not their spirits, though.
@Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho:
I can’t decide whether to laugh at or cry over the book title, given that I’m hoping against hope that isn’t true right now. Latest word from the emergency vet is fairly optimistic, though. ;-D
@Aleta:
Thank you for the very kind offer, though I’ll probably take the cats further south with me; they’ll be easier to retrieve if/when I can get back to the island and it’s feasible to take them, and I’d miss them too much. I have more experience with administering subQ fluids than I wish I had, and I too have had several cats with bad kidneys I kept going and comfortable until cancer took them. My paws are crossed for this time (except for the cancer part, of course!).
Mo MacArbie
A degree of snobbery helps with quitting the crosswords. After all, I had already given up on Monday through Wednesday years ago.
frosty
Thanks to everyone for the discussion on landscape fabric. I’ve got it on all our foundation plantings which all have to be redone and it’s torn and showing where the mulch is thin. Now I know I don’t have to replace it. You saved me a bunch of work !
Anne Laurie
@Yarrow:
Our property is part of *two* Superfund sites, and the worst of our ‘weed’ problem is woody invasives that runner for distances underground — ailanthus, bittersweet, hog thistle, several others I haven’t bothered to identify. In my experience, landscape fabric keeps those ‘shrubs’ from popping up for at least a few years at a time, which is a blessing. And the wind/bird-borne weeds are much easier for me to pull from the mulch on top of the fabric than from the clay-heavy construction fill that passes for ‘soil’. Far from a perfect solution, but it has its uses!