Friday, March 29, 2013

A few projects.


I’ve been taking a little break from writing on purpose. Or trying to, seems some ideas from the next book, “An Ill Wind Cometh,” have been making an appearance on their own so I’ve been writing them down. Soon I’ll be working on the Rip Tide manuscript to get it ready.

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The last few days I managed to plant Cosmo seeds in a number of places where they should work as a windbreak. Even got the strawberry starters in and part of the soaker hoses where they will be for the coming year. These little lovelies are some of the garlic I planted last year (yes, you can plant garlic in the fall and leave it through the winter).






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I finished up part of our porch roof in the last few days. It should be nice to have some times to sit out there and do some writing or possibly reading. Obviously, there's still more to do where that tarp is stretched in particular but didn't have the money for the material so I made do with what I had. I've had many mention the lights, they are solar path lights. Love the fact that they turn on at sunset and turn off at dawn. About once per year I have to replace the batteries, the lights experience severe temperature changes which affects battery life. I think the highest temps are around 120F, the lowest are around 0F.

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Built bookshelves in the office and they work pretty well, they are made out of what had been some benches at the store I work on my day job. Got the office painted also in this rather nice blue color called, "Timeless." 

Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Home gardening this year.

Started turning the soil yesterday and my shoulders are letting me know today I did too much of it. Didn't think I worked all that hard on it at the time as I thought the soil turned pretty easy, guess that wasn't the case. A little later I'll do a little more so I can work out the shoulder some more, probably beside the shed where I plan on planting the Cosmos this year. Of course been working on the soil for three years now. 

Going to try soaker hoses this year since it's so dry here, setting it up almost like a drip irrigation system in the garden.  They get more of the water to the roots than sprinklers do, should also keep the leaves free of mildew not that it's been much of a problem since it's so dry here. More there's an issue with not all of the water reaching where it needs to be since it evaporates so quickly. Quite often, the humidity is at 20% which is almost as dry as a desert.

I'm off for now, will post pictures here on the blog of the garden once it starts producing. Might even do another post or two about the garden but that may be a bit yet as I'm about to start on the first complete rewrite of, "Rip Tide." As of last night I even have a couple of elements of the next book, "An Ill Wind Cometh."

Update: Just finished digging up the area where the Cosmos are going to be planted. Now, I will only plant the Cosmos by the fence line, they should make a natural wind break and they seem to grow just about everywhere. Interestingly enough, I planted some garlic right there last year and they've started growing. They didn't seem to grow last year and apparently I didn't dig them out. The tops are about 1 1/2 inches high. They were hidden underneath some pieces of thin pipe that I had removed so I could start turning the soil. I had been using as dividers around the garden the last year or so.

It always nice to find such surprises. Also dug up some very fat worms which I of course buried again so they could continue churning up the soil, they do such a good job of it. Hint: if the soil is loose you'll have less weed problems since they like compacted soil. The worms castings make excellent fertilizer also which is another thing that you need in a garden. Will be using a little fertilizer this year, will be mixing it in a gallon watering can. The issues with poisoning come from the profligate usage of fertilizer, you've used too much and so got it on what you're wanting to eat.