A Girl with a Rake and a Dream

We had some unseasonably warm weather over the weekend. Or was it seasonable? Winter has been so terrible that I've lost all concept of normal. BUT, seasonable or not, I was motivated by my own summer backyard photoshopping to get out there in the yard and make things happen!

First, I cleaned up and organized some of the JUNK around the garage. (Remember last year when I totally cleared and cleaned up both sides of the garage for painting... yeah, both sides have become a dumping ground yet again.)

Then, I dug out my handy dandy rake... oh wait, I didn't need to dig it out. It was on the side of the garage. Nevertheless, rake in hand, I set myself on the back of the backyard. (You know, the skid steere/trailer parking area.) And I raked until my blisters popped and then kept on raking. Then I went inside and baked cookies. (Oh, the strange and random life I lead...)

So with probably near to two or two and a half hours of sheer raking agony, you'd probably expect that I'd have finished the entire back of the back yard. Wrong. I finished half of the back of the back. And not even the most horrendous half. Looming just to the other side I have more then just leaves and sticks to contend with. I have logs! As in, there used to be a log pile there a million years ago. And there are still some gross old logs hanging out under a buncha gross old leaves.

I've got to find out whether or not the logs are salvageable, and if so, make a new and neat pile. If not, I need to chuck them down the hill with all the leaves and sticks. And if that wasn't bad enough, this section of yard has NEVER been nice. The good twin next door used to be lush, shady, grassy, and wonderful. Its evil twin has been leaf'd upon, log'd upon, and neglected for eons. And that means layer upon layer of disgusting old leaves, decomposing logs, prickers, bugs, and possible snakes/frogs... all the more reason to get a-rakin before spring really springs back.

Mike has some strange notion that come spring, he's going to re-grade the entire garage area so the garage doesn't flood again with snow melt and heavy rain. You know what I've got to say to that... Uh-huh. Not that I'm not in favor of such a thing. In fact, when I was cleaning the yard, I discovered that over the winter, Mike dug a huge hole in the yard to get sand with which to spread over the then icy driveway! And so now I have a freakin huge hole to contend with.

And I'm wondering if I should just bring in the pro's with a skid steere that doesn't have street tires on it that dig in and ruin the lawn. Grade the yard, fix the hole, push the malarkey down the hill, and then spread loam so we can seed. I wonder how much it would cost? I can't remember how much it was when we had Nick Mitchell grade the front after the house lift.... but I remember how incredibly happy I was with the work.

Like I said before, Uh-huh.

In the short term, I need to have Mike move the camper back to the gravel driveway now that Dodge #2 is gone. Then, I need to finish raking the back of the back and move on to the front/mid of the back. And I want to buy those two trees this spring too.

Hurricane Earl A'Comin

Ah, Cape Cod on Labor Day weekend. Time to kick back, roll down the windows, and prepare to sit yo' ass in traffic for the next two hours. And, oh yeah, there's a hurricane a'comin!

Having already lived through the "I Survived Hurricane Bob" t-shirt craze, I can't wait to add an Earl to the list of incredible Northeast natural disasters. But, since we're always under construction at home.... and since we're always a mess in the yard... we have some doings to do to prepare, and we don't have much time in which to do them.

Take in the porch furniture
Take in tools and other small items littering the porch
Secure all lumber
Take in the plants
Move the grill inside
Secure the trash hut
Move all machines inside the garage
Move all machine parts inside the garage
Secure Dodge #2
Secure the boat and camper
Put all trash in the trash hut and secure it again!
Take in Mikey's bus
Start up the generator and make sure it works

So far, the latest info from weather.com shows Earl hitting us sometime late Friday, early Saturday - with wind gusts of 90-100mph. Although they admit, these are only just educated guesses.

This will be our first hurricane in our home, but I doubt it will be the last.

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