Good morning! Hello, there, friend. Did you have a nice weekend? Mine was lovely, thanks for asking. Aside from all the ailments, of course.
Ailments check! Let’s see… I have a sunburn on my arms and neck, because I didn’t think it was “that time of the year” yet, but it was, and I feel so stupid about that. It doesn’t hurt or anything, but Emma helpfully and sympathetically sent me this article about melanoma that talks about how every time you get a sunburn your risk factor for melanova goes up even more. Great, thanks. I’ve been trying to get better about this for the last few years but I’m really gonna give it a go this year. Hats and high-tech cooling base layers n shit. Fingers crossed.
Tennis elbow is on the mend. I’ve added a wrist brace to the situation and it is helping immensely, though I can’t type with it, so it’s off right now. Not quick typing, anyway. I can use a trackpad, hunt and peck, but not actual typing. Which is a conundrum of course since, you know, so much time spent in front of the computer and today is a writing day, but I will manage. Luckily the tendons that are healing do not seem to be the ones used while typing.
And then I was on the verge of throwing out my back this weekend, too much moving heavy stuff. But I have been agressive in my stretches on that and I think I avoided the worst. This is another thing I need to get better about: lifting. I try to lift with my legs but sometimes you just need to use your back.
So, yeah, two days of hard labor, 400% of my move goal for the day, 300% of my exercise goal for the day, each day. Pain really adds up.
Because… gardening!
First off, I have to say getting started with your gardening in the spring is so much better when you have a bunch of winter crops to harvest. It’s like magic. I hadn’t been out there in months but look! A ton of carrots! Are they perfect? No. But they are so, so delicious. And! All my trees survived! Both Apple trees, the pear trees and the blueberry bush all survived the winter. So did my grapes. One of my grape vines has little baby grapes on it this year. It is so cute!
The wheat seems very stunted but… it’s wheat? It has weatgerm at the top? I think I can make flour with it. I don’t know when you’re supposed to actually harvest wheat, though, I think it’s supposed to turn golden first. I will have to investigate. But still.
And I have two giant beds of garlic that looks so, so ready for harvest. Big, thick hard necked garlic. I do not have any garlic scapes yet, though. I thought you were supposed to wait till they flowered and started drooping. But man, these things are huge. They look like leeks!
So that was all very nice.
Started the weekend at 7AM at the hardware store buying 32 bags of dirt. Had to ask for help loading the truck from the weird old man working there. He said if I were little bit older he’d offer to have “the girls” come help cuz older men like that. Okay dude. Anway, we each loaded 16 bags into the truck and this is probably where the weekend back problems started. Drat.
And Jane helped the first morning. We cleaned out the hoop house, got all the weeds out of the tomato area and planted 12 or so tomato plants of various varieties. Then Jane got bored and I cleaned out some other beds and got the cucumbers in, the peppers, and two big salad beds with celery, bok choy, arugula, spinach, lettuce, carrots and beets. The next day I got the shallots and radishes planted.
I had hoped to get the two new birdies beds going for the house next door. The new house has much better sunlight for gardening and a really nice area for a greenhouse, so over time, most of the gardening is going to move over there, which is both super exciting and kind of sad, because it’s so much further away, but It’s just such a better spot for it that it’s the right thing to do. But I didn’t have enough time to get the birdies beds built, so I planted the strawberries, two new grape plants (amazing trellis opportunities over there, so many good fences, and they’re all already built), and some of the potatoes into grow bags.
I wanted to dig up the small lawns in front of the house, but one of them had a blue spray paint line accross it that was not there before so, you know, buried gas line. Don’t know how deep they bury them here but gonna play it safe and build the bed up instead. Which means killing the grass with cardboard, which means no growing in there for the next six months. But that’s okay, I will manage.
Anyway, so sore, so tired, but so, so satisfied. Drip irrigation is back up and running. New house has a well and lawn irrigation that will suffice from now. Assuming it’s on. Is it on? I bet it’s not on. Ah well, it’s rainy this week it’ll be fine.
Gardening!
I really loved having all that spare time over the winter where I wasn’t gardening, but it is good to be back. I am going to streamline things a bit this year. Not gonna make the gardening Youtube videos, alas. Maybe again next year. Too much to do with the house and all.
Oh! And I got my first two insect bites of the year. No idea what did it. Did not see a spider, did not see a bee. This happens every time. I’m convinced it’s something really small. It always happens when I’m gardening. On my legs. They turn deep red, about an inch wide, then I get an allergic reaction, about four inches wide. Two of them this time. They’re okay though with Benedryl and Solarcane. Man that stuff works wonders.
Ailments!
New house is coming along. Got the painting done it looks great. Going for a dark living room, rich colors, no one’s living there full-time, it doesn’t get enough sunlight, has a lot of brown, let’s just embrace that. Blue for the master, light blue for the office, bright white for the garage, deep red for the half bath, kept the light green in the master bath. Found a very small amount of mold around the master bath vent need to get that checked. Who does that sort of thing? The HVAC people? Yes, right? Got the septic checked and pumped, learned that you’re not supposed to rince paint in a septic system whoops. That is good to know. It was getting pumped anyway, so it was okay, but the dude was still painting, so I had to tell him to not rinse his brushes that last day. He only speaks Spanish. My Duolingo was useless, of course, why would they teach you “rinse” or “paint” or “septic.” But I think we managed. Found out where the leach field is, it is not being mowed, so I’ll need to go do that.
Got the roofer in to inspect the roof, it’s old and not great but not terrible and would be fine for another few years if we didn’t want solar so that is a thing. Roofer is proposing a GAF Solar Roof, which will cost an arm and a leg but less than two arms and two legs for a new roof and then solar. May just bite the bullet, may stall. House is obviously not using up too much power, but it has such a good south-facing roof and it’d be possible to completely run it on solar precisely because it’s not using too much power. Alluring.
Got most everything over that we immediately need, except for two couches, will do those next weekend. Need to pick a living room rug, preferably from the ones we have. We have a lot of extra rugs it is absurd. Need to make the bed in the second bedroom. It’s not ready for habitation yet but I think it will be in… two or three weeks? Could do it quicker in a pinch.
Anyway, lovely weekend. On Friday before I left work I was deep, deep, into a doc. Immersed in it. Cranking away really making great progress. I was so obsessed with it, after dinner I came back downstairs and worked on it for another hour. It was all I could think about. I was in the writing zone. Now, I couldn’t tell you even what it was about. I have ejected all of that knowledge from my mind. Gonna take me a few hours today to get it loaded back up. Back in the Barbarian days I would often work whole days on the weekend. Nowadays? Big ole nope on that one.
We had one Daddy-Jane dance party this weekend. Thursday was a quick one, grammy bedtime, I had Friday off, did Saturday, had Sunday off. Saturday we did a pretty long one, we got different Charlie XCX song in, Depeche Mode, then she said “play me some stuff I’ve heard before but not too many times,” so we revisited Goldfrapp, the Breeders, and Madonna’s “Hung Up.” I tried to play her “Like a Prayer” after that but she disliked the intro so strongly she wouldn’t give it a chance. We wrapped it up with Robyn doing “Dancing on my Own” at Rothskilde in 2019 and it was just great. Made me miss big festivals. Been a while.
She was pretty good this weekend all in all. Emma took her to a garden party and it started to rain and she had a little episode upon discovering that the Airstream was not open for a rain shelter and then later apparently she threw a bunch of pebbles in the air too close to other kids, but she came home and we all talked about it. Managing emotions. It’s tough for the best of us. She’s doing better than I was at that age, that’s for sure.
She’s still a bit needy at bedtime and it’s messing with mine and Emma’s evening alone time, but also it’s kind of nice to lay in bed with her. I wish I could just sleep there, but I have my CPAP. And of course she’d lose it sleeping with me with the CPAP alas.
Anyway, big week. Tomorrow we have Samia at Cat’s Cradle. Jane is obsessed with her but I can’t bring her, alas. Wednesday we all have Kindergarten orientation, gulp. We’re still on the fence about the whole thing but figure orientation is worth it before making a decision. Then Friday is a recharge day at work — still the best HR policy ever — and then next week I am off to Alaska.
I hope they serve fake beer in Alaska.
For your enjoyment here is a photo of Jane stage diving to the Breeder’s “Cannonball.”
Got a better, alternative universe W Hotel mix for you today. All new stuff except for Dan Deacon, which Youtube reminded me of during Daddy Jane Dance Party, and I listened to for the first time since it came out and man that album is so good that guy really knows a thing or two about making groovy music. New Church since we went and saw that tour and it ruled. Oh that Charli XCX and Rina song is oldish, but it’s so good and Jane loved it’s weird-ass desert pagan video.
Talk tomorrow! Non-domestic topics! Well, maybe one.
AAAHHHH, jane stage diving!!!! the best.
sorry about your ailments!