Dandelions and Thunderstorms - Mother Nature's Incredible Talents

We had a somewhat relaxing Sunday, working on our characters in Lord of the Rings Online, and spending some time in the backyard cleaning the castle steps, doing general tidying of the patio area. We watched the final round of the PGA golf tournament since we had a day without hockey, and with beautiful weather, we enjoyed a kicked-back Sunday. 

It's not often I see perfect dandelion puff 
balls. They're so easily disturbed or blown 
away. Do you remember plucking them and 
blowing the seeds away for good luck when 
you were a kid? It's an early memory of 
mine, and maybe kids don't do that any more. 

When I went out to get the newspaper in the morning (yes, we still get a paper copy of the newspaper. DH enjoys reading it and doing the crosswords. I get the e-edition in my in-box, which makes me happier than having so much paper to recycle, but to each their own. He's the one who pays for it, after all.) Anyway, to return to my thoughts - on my way out to the driveway, I saw some absolutely perfect dandelion fluff balls. So pretty. So after I brought the paper in, I grabbed my phone and took a few photos. It's not often I see these perfect balls. 

They are such a miracle of construction. 
Every little bit of fluff, barely holding onto 
the center, and playing with it's companions 
in a stellar ball of white. I wish I had the 
talent to transform something like this 
into a metal composite. But Mother Nature 
has me beat, by far. 

My next door neighbor must have been out of town (or too busy with the kids) to mow his lawn. DH had already mowed ours twice, but Chris hadn't touched his. The dandelions and weeds were tall and it was looking like crap. Fortunately, he finally broke down and mowed on Sunday. DH said he was tempted to mow it for Chris, thinking maybe he was out of town or something. I had been seeing him in the early mornings, though. So think it was just time getting away from him. 

After cleaning and putting down new gravel 
on the castle steps, DH pulled down some paving 
bricks to see how it might look if we paved the 
steps instead. We both agreed, however, it 
would be a lot of cutting and we really don't have 
the appropriate tools for that. We'll think 
about it, but we'll probably leave them as is. 

DH started cleaning off the castle steps when we went outdoors in the early afternoon. He swept, then started hosing them down and adding new gravel where needed. We've talked about maybe putting paving bricks down instead of the gravel, but that would be a lot of cutting and the steps aren't uniformly sized. It would be quite the chore. We also discussed just putting concrete along with the gravel, but that would be too permanent. We'll live with the gravel for now, and keep reassessing. 

One of my Facebook friends posted this incredible 
photo of a thunderstorm-cell forming over 
the Texas landscape. I had to share it with all 
of you. It's such an incredible view, I thought 
it might make your day. 

On that note, I'm out of here. I hope all of you have a glorious Monday and as always, please be kind to others and stay safe. I'll be back tomorrow. 

The Woodshed Progresses

Apparently I was mistaken, and the frame isn't for my strawberry patch, but is rather a part of the woodshed. That's fine, though. Both projects need to be done, and the woodshed is by far the higher priority - something that's been in the planning stages for several years. 

DH got eight of these concrete blocks. I guess they're really
heavy because he was complaining about how much they
weighed and how difficult it was getting them out of the
truck bed and down to the lower yard. 

The fancy concrete blocks arrived, DH picked them up, and yesterday he was busy digging holes, filling them with Class 5 gravel, setting the blocks at the appropriate levels, and making sure everything will fit together properly. It will be a large shed when it is finally completed, and to "relax" yesterday between physical bouts of pure strain, he researched solar pond pumps. I'm not really sure why, but he said the roof of the woodshed will have the appropriate direction and angle for solar panels. Sweet! Nice to know - LOL. 

Here, he's got the framework around one section of the woodshed, and
is extending eastward into the second section. A third section will still
be added to the left. Yes, it's a big structure, but I think it will be quite
pretty once it's done. The first hole went really well. The second one
was filled with tree roots from a tree we had pulled down, so he had
to cut all of those roots out before he could fill the hole with Class 5
and continue filling and leveling the block for that corner. I'm happy
he's back to building - he gets antzy without an active project. 

Chickie was amazed at the size that DH is making when I showed her the picture above yesterday afternoon. She forgot how many trees we've taken down over the years, and we do actually have two fireplaces, although only the downstairs one has ever been used. We're hoping to be able to use the fireplace again one of these days, and also clear the stacks of logs and wood away from the back of the patio so that we can plant more green plants and flowers. We've been recapturing the lower yard for six years now, and it's getting better and better every year. 

When I'm seated at the patio table, I'm looking East. Behind me, on
top of the "castle" walls he built a few years ago, is at least three feet
of stacked wood, extending from fence to our steps to the upper
yard. It's a lot of wood, and we still have more trees we probably
should cut down, so we can add more wood to the shed after it is
built if we still have room. The woodshed will be to the right,
between our tool shed and the castle walls. 

I'm sure we'll be spending some serious working time on the shed on Sunday. He needs a second person for some of the work, before it can go back to a one-man show. I think I will have earned my rum on the rocks or margarita by the time we're done on Sunday - LOL. Have an excellent weekend, be safe, be kind, and wear your masks. I'll be back on Monday. 

We Had A Productive Holiday Weekend

I had a lovely Memorial Day weekend, even though I couldn't swim on Saturday and I'm in some serious pain after working in the garden for most of Sunday. Sunday started out with DH and I at Gertens - a nursery that is HUGE. We had been there in the rain the Sunday before, but this Sunday was bright, beautiful, much warmer, and it was packed! It covers acres of land, and the drive in is blocks long, and cars were parked everywhere allowed. We got lucky and found a space in their parking lot, but I heard that later in the day cars extended more than a mile in each direction from the main entrance. 

Gertens is huge. We wandered through the right side and the main
building, but still haven't gotten to the shrubs and trees. Across
the street to the south is their brickyard for landscaping rock and
materials, but we wanted to use Patio Town for our stone. 

We had a specific shopping list, and pretty much stayed with it. On the way out we looked at some flagstone slabs - irregular slabs that DH wanted for our garden. They weren't the right color, though, so after we dropped the plants off at home, we headed over to Patio Town to get stone. 

Patio Town is a local firm for outdoor projects and materials. They're
east of us, near our favorite movie theater, so not too far away. 

We ended up with Wildhorse slabs, and they're quite nice - a soft golden tone that will look wonderful in the garden. I went inside for a short time, but DH was in shortly asking for my help. Four and a half hours later we were done with the job of the day - uncovering all of our buried cables for the internet and the cable TV, gathering them all together into a single bundle, and reburying them along the house. It was a HUGE job - the backyard looked rather like gophers had tossed a graduation party in it after everything was dug up. I'm not sure if my tomato plants will survive the assault. 

Wildhorse is a type of jasper and the stone that isn't
"gem" quality is great for fieldstone because it fractures
in flat layers. It's got a nice warm golden tone to it. 

I was in some serious hurt, so DH did the actual recovering of the cables and filling in the trenches. Then, after a poor night's sleep (pain in my arm kept me tossing, turning, and waking up all night), I awoke to rain. DH went out and started placing stones down, making a walkway that would cover the cables' pathway from the utility pole across the yard. He decided that we needed more stone, so we were off in the rain to Patio Town once again. 

I wish it was this easy. Our house is 50+ years old and we were
digging through old roots of trees, bushes and ferns, a lot
of overgrowth, and various structures like old concrete
pads for non-functional air conditioners. Our trenching wasn't
anywhere this easy (we were also a LOT deeper, up to
two feet deep in places). 

Unlike the day before when their parking lot was full and five forklifts were moving pallets of rock around the yard, we were the only car in a sea of mud, and there was a single forklift driver for the day. I stayed dry while DH chose more rock and had it weighed, they drove the forklift to my car and we headed home. DH spent another two hours in the pouring rain before calling the new walkway good and coming inside for a hot shower. 

I was still in pain when I went to sleep, but I was so exhausted that I had a better night. Still, 3:15 am came early and I'm sitting here, dressed for the machines at the gym. No swimming for me. I'll try to set at doctor's appointment up on my way to work today and hopefully something will be able to help this pain in my bicep tendon. I really miss my swimming, and it may be off the table for months! 

I hope all of you had a wonderful weekend, and were able to spend some of it with family and friends if you celebrated Memorial Day yesterday. Have a great Tuesday and I'll be back tomorrow! 

Holding Back the Flood

It's raining. Normally that would be a wonderful thing. Rain instead of snow means Spring instead of Winter and that's an excellent thing. ... Isn't it? Well, normally the answer would be a resounding "yes" except when Winter's grip is still firmly in place. So we're getting rain - a lot of it - but the ground is still frozen and we've still got snowbanks everywhere, sometimes towering into the massive mountains of snow that you'll see in the major shopping center parking lots. Where does all of this rain go? 

Although this particular photo is from Cleveland, Ohio, their
parking lot snowpiles are pretty similar to what you'll find
here or anywhere else in the snow belt. Huge, high piles of
snow around the periphery of the parking lots. 

That's the problem. We don't hate rain, but when the rain has nowhere to go, we get flooding. Bad flooding. The low points in the freeways flood out, the low points in parking lots become temporary lakes, the roadways get lovely glare ice because the water sheets down them, and here, in our cozy home, I will get the job of checking the back door regularly throughout the day today to make sure we're not flooding through it. 

Do you remember this photo from 2016? Here, DH was in full
"build" mode, constructing the curved tiered walls that make
up the western part of our lower back yard. I'm standing just
about where my back door is located. 

The back door is where DH has been building the castle over the past few years,. The curved and terraced walls of flowers and other plants, the herringbone patio we had set two years ago, and the cleared bank for the eventual pergola we were fixing during buckets of rain last summer. The difficulty isn't the construction work, it's the fact that there's no real channel established for the run-off just yet, and right now the water level is almost up to the level of my basement door. If DH gets a chance, he'll try to clear away some of the ice on the patio and create a larger channel for the rainwater, but if he doesn't get the chance, I might be doing that myself in the pouring rain later this morning. 

A year or so after the construction above, we got the patio laid. It's
done with paver stone in a herringbone pattern. They did an OK
job - not the greatest, but OK. We used it often last year, though,
sitting on the patio and enjoying margaritas. 

Of course I also have the usual stuff for my "day off" - shopping (grocery and Target today will make it an expensive day), catching up on reading and writing my daily story for B2MeM, a nice chat with Aearwen this afternoon, and several loads of laundry. I also have to gather our paperwork for our Tuesday night income tax appointment with our accountant. Yeah - it looks like a busy day, even without the rain, glare ice, and ... yeah! 

So here's hoping your weather is a bit better than mine and that you have a wonderful Wednesday. It's a fact that I'm still planning to be back tomorrow, although I might be crabby from having my schedule totally disrupted by floodwaters coming into my den. Been there, done that, and really don't want to experience that again. 

Le Tour de France - Only Three More Days!

The Tour is settling down to a hilly stage today, the time trials tomorrow, and then the ride into Paris with the final sprint stage and the podium awards. Along with the multitude of miles, crashes, peaks and valleys that the riders have left behind them is the realization that this is the closest time spread between the three leaders that has ever happened in Le Tour. Only 29 seconds separates first from third place right now, so even though getting that time back is difficult, it's not impossible and the Yellow Jersey is still not a guarantee as they ride onward. It's been exciting watching this year's Tour and I'm looking forward to the final three days.

Stage 19 is 222.5 km long through the hills. It's a sprinter's stage, so
hopefully Michael Matthews can take full advantage and nail down
the Green Jersey today. The Yellow, however, is still not a given - only
29 seconds separate Chris Froome, Roman Bardet and Rigoberto Uran.

Today's stage is hilly but nothing like the Alps they have now left behind. Yesterday, Warren Barguil nailed the Polka-Dot Jersey for King of the Mountain in grand style by winning in the Alps. Today, Michael Matthews has the same opportunity to pull off a decisive win in the longest stage of this year's Tour and nail down the Green Jersey. Will he manage the win? We'll know in a few hours.

I've listened to audio books for more than 15 years now, starting
when I wanted to listen to something while working out on
my old treadmill. It was helpful when I had my Lasik and
couldn't read for a while, and when print books were too
blurred. Now I read ebooks (constantly), but it might be fun
to listen to audio books once again too. 

Today I'm going to try something new with my swimming and start listening to an audio book instead of my music. I'm finding that I'm shifting my cadence unconsciously to match the beat of the tunes and that sometimes it's actually slowing me down slightly. I thought switching on and off to books vs music might be an answer, so I powered up the other iPod yesterday evening and loaded the book I decided upon. I'll see if this works for me. It would be a total win/win if it does.

Although the grading is the part we really can't do ourselves, we were hoping
that the firm we contacted would be able to do the grading and set the new
patio also. But they are coming in WAY high for the patio portion of the bid
so we might hire them just for the grading and then do the rest ourselves. 

It's Friday, so I hope all of you have a wonderful day. It might not be the end of my work week, but I know it is for many of you and that you are busy planning your weekend activities. I'll probably be researching landscaping services because I think the people we wanted to hire came in WAY too high in their quotation numbers. *sigh* Enjoy your day!

Kinks in the Schedule

DH is awake (it's 3:30 am!!!!). 'Nuff said.

Yesterday's schedule sucked, but we survived. The laundry got done, the landscaper got his meeting and dinner was cooked. On the negative side, the repair I needed to do didn't happen, forms I needed to submit by the end of the month didn't get scanned and sent, and the LOTRO update that loaded so easily onto the desktop computers has been hanging up on my laptop and taking hours upon hours to upload. I'm hoping I'll get that conquered today, but no guarantee the way it seems to be working. *sigh*

Here are a couple of pictures for you. Remember that photo of our pathetic rusted shed? DH pulled that down in a day and here's what the area looks like now. I guarantee that ground hasn't seen the light of day for decades.

The shed used to be right behind that tree with its back almost against the
chain linked fence of our neighbor. No shed there now. It was a lot easier
for him to take down than he had feared. 

And he's been moving wood. If we get things graded, we needed to move the wood that we're keeping off the land where the machines will be working. Right now we're stacking it onto the first tier of the castle walls. This isn't permanent by any means, but it can stay there until we get the land regraded and the structure built that will house the wood. The city has specific regulations, etc for wood racks and sheds.

This is about 2/3 of the wood we'll save and rack up. We've moving it to this
tier so that we can level the soil behind me and build the rack to hold our
firewood. After all of this I'll contact a chimney sweep to get our chimneys
cleaned, flashed and capped. Then we'll be set to enjoy fires in the winter
once again. 

So onward we go, running into municipal and utility deadlines and issues whichever way we turn. We'll also have Chickie's annual family reunion vacation coming up at the end of  July which will require both DH and I to work for the week - no castle work happening that week at all. Have a great Thursday and I hope your day starts a bit smoother than mine has so far.

Rolling With the Punches

Schedule messing - it's frustrating and sometimes challenging. We're usually pretty set on schedules - I get my Wednesday off and Chickie gets her Monday, we all get Sunday, and it works pretty well. But the occasional screwdriver is thrown into the works, and when it's a screwdriver that you really need to pay attention to, you switch things up to make sure everything operates smoothly.

Bever Landscaping can do beautiful work, although their reviews
are all over the place. (But then, so are my reviews, so I'm taking
them with a large grain of salt.) We need professional help with two
areas of the yard, so I'm looking forward to seeing what Peter has
to say when he looks the project over on Wednesday afternoon. 

Last week DH had me phone a local landscaping company, one whose work we've admired for many years at the State Fair, We need professional grading done on the Castle project, and the patio needs to be laid in a specific way to assist with the proper drainage (the actual reason we're going through all of this work in the first place). We thought they probably wouldn't be able to drop by until after the 4th of July. But they were really prompt, and can sandwich a look at the property on Wednesday afternoon.

Wednesday's work schedule may be rather like a revolving door - I'll
be out of the shop, then in, and then out once again. what a mess! 

Problem - I'm the one who is off on Wednesdays, not DH. So, we're having to shift some things around. I'm hoping that I'll just have to work for a couple of hours, but it's still going to throw my personal schedule into a tailspin. I like their response time, though. We had contacted a different landscaper two weeks prior, and I have yet to hear peep from them.

We've cleaned out the old shed and it's ready to take down. I think
DH will be attacking it with a crow bar today, maybe adding
a cutting wheel to the angle grinder too. Since it's part of
the grading, they'll need to see as much as possible. when they
come on Wednesday. 

So we'll make it work. Whether we switch days off completely and I work on Wednesday and take Thursday off, or whether I punch a large hole in my day, we'll make it work somehow. It's got DH stressed, though. He wants to have some more stuff done in the area we're talking about before meeting with the representative. He'll be working hard today to make it all happen. It's a bit of a mess, but it is what it is.

We just need to roll with the punches. Sure, everything may
not be as cleaned up as we wanted for the quote, but it's
the next step and I'm sure enough will be cleared to allow
Peter to take a good look at the project. 

Here's me ... rolling with the punches once again. Have a great Tuesday and keep your heads up above the waterline! I'll be back tomorrow.

Landscaping, Wood and a Birthday

It's the weekend and I'm running late. I'll be swimming in the 50-meter pool today and it'll be a cold run in and out from the building - our temps are in the upper 50's F (approx 13.8 C), about ten degrees lower than we normally are at this time of the year. But it makes for great sleeping weather, so I'm not complaining. The water will be warm so as soon as I get moving, I'll be just fine.

Maybe we should make our firewood piles into artwork like this example?
At least it would be something interesting to look at, but I'm not sure I'd
have the patience to construct this type of art. 

We'll be taking several loads of old firewood to the landfill tomorrow. DH moved a huge stack of wood that we had been accumulating for years to the upper yard in preparation for grading the lower yard. I have calls out to two landscapers for quotes for their grading services, but haven't heard back yet. Hopefully this can be scheduled soon so that we can move on with the project.

Happy Birthday to my friend Aearwen. I'm thinking lots of positive
thoughts for you and Bill. 

So, short and sweet today. Have a really fantastic weekend and I'll be back on Monday. Oh, and a shout-out to my friend Aearwen for her birthday. It's been a really tough year for her, so my birthday wish is that this coming year is easier and happier. *Hugs* and birthday balloons for her.

Grading - It's Not Just For School Papers

We had a lovely, almost lazy Sunday. We hauled one load of branches and logs to the landfill, but except for that, we settled down, watched the final round of the US Open Golf Tournament, and generally relaxed. I think we both needed a day to do exactly that. On Tuesday morning I'll pick up DH's chain saw from the repair shop and we'll be off and running once again.

There are actually two wires, one right next to the smaller
tree stump which still needs to be removed. The rusted
small shed behind the other tree will be removed and
destroyed. City regulations now require five feet
between structures and the property line, and they no
longer allow metal sheds like this. 

I need to contact our local utility company today and see if they will need to move a guy wire that they have in our back yard. When we do the regrading later this summer, it might be covered up by as much as two feet of dirt and they may choose to relocate it rather than have that happen. The rusted shed in the background of this picture will be disassembled and trashed and we're going to get a new,, larger shed installed on the graded earth.

We'll be getting a Tuff Shed installed on the cleared and graded earth later
this summer. He's still debating between two sizes, but eventually he'll make
up his mind. We can't proceed with that until we have the ground graded and
the new wood rack built since the wood is on top of the land that we'll need
for the shed. 

When I look at what DH has done in the back yard this year, it's not as visible as the castle walls of last year, but he's done a tremendous amount of work. The whole area used to be solid trees and bushes and now is open and vacant, awaiting grading and new construction. We're almost at a standstill until we get the grading done, so that's the next step. I have a feeling the entire project will take one more year to complete, but I'm still so impressed by what he's accomplished.

Basically, we need some large equipment to get down into our lower yard and
do something like this - it won't take long, but it's more than we can do.
We also need some rather specific grading for the patio area to achieve
the drainage that we'll need. Time to call a landscaping company. 

Have an excellent Monday. I managed my mile in the outdoor pool on Saturday - it's harder in a lot of respects because of the greater length - but today will be back to the 25 yard pool and a more standard workout. Enjoy your day!

Storms, Rains and Construction

Storms rolled through last night, but I think they are past us now and we'll have excellent weather for a few days. Why does this matter? Well, during the days (very early hours) it means that both the indoor and outdoor pool will be open so my indoor pool won't be crowded with lots of people. Overnight, it can rain all it wants to, but I like having both pools available. Right now, rain won't happen again until Saturday (according to the latest forecast). Of course, we all know what weather is like - it confounds the forecasters all the time.

I have strong memories of the spring winds that went down along
the front range when I still lived in Colorado. They were harsh and
you could quite literally lean into them and they would hold you up. 

I grew up in Colorado where we said the weather changed without warning all the time. I remember driving through a driving rain as I headed down Colorado Boulevard one afternoon, and suddenly the rain was behind me, as if a wall had been erected, and I was in bright sunlight. Weather along the Rocky Mountains can be bizarre and totally unpredictable with rain, snow, strong winds and lots of sun-bright days.

In the Great Plains, where there aren't a lot of trees in the way, you can
actually see the leading edge of thunderstorms. Here is a beautiful
example of a shelf cloud and it's corresponding dump of rain. 

Up here, in the Frozen Northlands, we tend to have even more unpredictable weather, but our seasons are a bit more defined. Our skies have more grey days because we're a more humid environment - it's the land of 10,000 lakes, after all. Today will be one of those sunny/cloudy days that we have so often, but I think last night's rain was all we'll see for a while.

I think our wood storage shed for our firewood will end up looking similar
to this. Our city actually has a little pamphlet with their rules and regulations -
size, height, number of inches off the ground, etc., that we have to build within. 

DH has started work on the woodshed. We need to get that completed and our woodpile moved over before we can start any serious work on the storage shed or the patio. He's planning how many palettes of patio pavers he'll need to buy already, though. Best estimate - 5 palettes at 486 pavers per palette, each palette weighing more than one ton. A lot of stone to move down to the patio area one wheelbarrow at a time. He did it last year for the stones for the walls, and he'll need to do it again later this summer for the patio. What a job!

He's looking at Holland Pavers that will look similar to this, although he
still is in the design stage. When it is complete, it'll be lovely, but we still
have a lot of work left to do. Lately he's been planting plants, ground
cover, and flowers along the curves of the castle wall. Now to work on the
wood shed, then we can start the patio area. 

So, as I pull my suitcases out of the closet to start thinking about packing for my trip next week, I'll also be thinking about work schedules, construction deadlines and goals, and how rainy days can throw wrenches into our summer plans. Here's hoping for overnight rains and sunny days. Hoping your Wednesday is fabulous, because we all deserve a fabulous day.

Thump!

It was back to reality with a "thump" today as my alarm went off at 3:15 am. Time to rejoin the real world after two days off. I ended up gaining three pounds over the holiday weekend (WAAAAY too much food) but I'll be in the pool in a little more than an hour, beginning to work that back off. We had mini steaks and burgers on Sunday and brats and cheese-stuffed hot dogs on Monday, not counting bunches of side dishes and desserts. It's no wonder I gained, but it could have been much worse.

The mini sirloin steaks DH bought were grilled perfectly! 

I leave for Bead & Button Show in a week so I supposed I'd better get my suitcases out of storage tomorrow and actually take a very careful look at what items I need to have along with me. I've had some years where I packed weeks early, and a few where it was packing on Sunday to leave on Monday. I'm a pretty accomplished packer, so it's not traumatic, but I still have to actually think about things. Silly me.

Rolls of sod are a quick and easy way to get grass going, but placing it so
that it doesn't have annoying seams can get tricky. We ended up using six
rolls of sod at the top of our stairs to help keep soil erosion during rainstorms
to a minimum. 

DH worked on the castle all weekend. On Sunday we started the day by stuffing Minion full of dead branches to take to the landfill, then we went to Home Depot for landscaping rocks and gardening stuff. We ended up with six rolls of sod too and he spent most of the rest of the afternoon getting the sod placed and planting the various plants he had purchased along the curves in the wall.

Saturday's swim in the outdoor pool resulted in this nice bruise
on my knuckle from hitting the lane rope. It seems totally healed
now, though, so even though it looked awful for a day or so, it
wasn't all that bad. 

On Saturday I had my first session in the 50-meter outdoor pool. I was very pleased that I managed to swim pretty well, but I'm much slower than most of the other swimmers. Fortunately the two people I was circling with were at a similar pace, but I guess that speed is one thing I will have to try and work on over the coming year. I'm a bit torn today about swimming indoors or out. Out is a lot of fun, and certainly does test my stamina, but the lanes are slightly less wide and I hit myself on the lane ropes more often. I'll play it by ear and go where it's less crowded.

Hope you have a great Tuesday. I'm going to enjoy the water one way or another today.

The Castle Recommences

Thanks to everyone for mouse input. It's been very helpful. Tomorrow I hope to get out to the office supply store and put my hand on some of the display models to figure out what will work best in my hand. DH used my computer yesterday for a while and he hated my mouse even more than I do, even though it was behaving itself relatively well yesterday. Oh well, I know it's a problem and I'll have to try and resolve it.

It's going to be a week of cooler weather with rain. Great for
the flowers, trees and grass, not so good for my personality
or DH's progress on the Castle. 

We're back into some cold and rainy weather for a few days, which is a bit of a bummer. DH had resumed work on the Castle last week, moving loads of dirt from a pile he left in late fall so that he could start work on Phase II of the construction. He was looking forward to continuing this week, but the weather might not cooperate. He'll have warm temps today, but that will fade with rain that will appear in the late afternoon. The rest of the week will probably be too cold - at least Thursday will be. Friday will be chilly, but he may go out and work for a while anyway. He has a lot on his agenda for this summer, so it's full steam ahead once more.

As a reminder, this is what DH accomplished last summer in our back
yard. I call it "The Castle". It extends a bit beyond on each side, but it's the
best overall photo I have of the stonework. This was all done by hand, no way
to get machinery into this part of our yard. 

On that note, I'm making this quick and simple today. I'm rushed and I also have a birthday wish to get posted, so I hope all of you have a wonderful Tuesday and thanks once again for the input on computer mice that you have and love. It's nice to know that there are contented people working with them out there. Happy Tuesday!

Late Today - Memories and Changes

Yesterday afternoon I got hit with a sudden sore throat so I decided to take things easy. I went to bed early and slept in until 6:00 am today to try and knock this cold out of me before it really took hold. Of course, that means today's blog is late, but I'm still here and here we go ...

The photo is dated October 23, 2016. We were almost finished here, but
as I recall, he did work another week or so on it. Still, not too bad
for a summer's work project and I'm so very impressed with all of the
work he did! 

4.     What is your best memory of last year?

Wow, so much happened last year, it's hard. But I think I'd have to say watching DH make "the castle" in our back yard was pretty amazing. I never thought he would do something so extensive and so wonderful. It large, all-encompassing, and not finished yet, but so close. This year will begin stage two of the project. I'm not sure how many stages actually exist, but it's going to be absolutely amazing!

There is always hope. I believe that much evil is caused by
circumstance and environment. In a place of no hope, it is easy to
give up and hard to push through to see possibility.
Spread love today and start those ripples moving in a
positive direction. 

5.    Can people change?

Of course people can change, we see evidence of that every day. Good people can become horrid, bad people can become saintly. I think it is this possibility of change that makes me have hope because even the worst person usually has the change of altering their behavior or demonstrating compassion and love. Of course, there are always sociopaths to show that my optimism is totally misplaced!

Here's hoping you have a wonderful Wednesday. It's my "day off" and I'll be running all around from the bank to the store. I'm also planning to get the 17 boxes of paperback books out of my front entryway and over to Half Priced Books. Someone else will be delighted to own them, and I'll be delighted to have them out of my house. The small amount of cash will also be welcome. I'll be back tomorrow, hopefully feeling much better, and back on my normal schedule.

What Will We Do During the Cold Months?

Today is a day off for DH, but it's going to rain - the weather people say up to an inch of rain today. That will make a brisk autumn day rather miserable for working on the castle. We picked up 34 new capstone blocks on Sunday and he is hoping to get those cut and glued down this week, but the October weather may not permit it. Certainly today he'll just be working on putting rock into the interior of the steps, not gluing which requires dry conditions. So here's where we're at after a summer of work.

The steps are almost complete. He's cutting the last of the capstones
and gluing them into place, then filling the tread with river stone.
Apparently it takes 2-1/2 bags of stone for each step. The home supply
stores aren't carrying stone over the winter and we don't have quite
enough rock, so he'll end up backfilling one or two steps with dirt for
the winter. 

We have steps and two tiers on the north side, and two curving tiers on the south. We're almost completely finished with the north portion and just need to capstone the south. Next year we'll be pulling away more dirt to reset the patio. He's stressing over how much to pull down and how he wants the new stones to be set. I assume he'll stress about that all winter long *sigh*. It's a DH thing.

So here's the big view. The new capstones are on the wall to the left, the
steps are getting glued, the tier on the right has been capped and the
left tiers are almost there. The four stones at the bottom left
of the last step are the new patio stones we will use. He's thinking
about patterns and heights. 

All I can say is that it's beautiful and totally unexpected. I never thought a simple project to help us with drainage would turn into such a huge thing. It's kept him busy throughout the summer which has been great! When he's busy here, he's not breathing over me when I'm trying to get things done either at the shop or at home. We still have a lot left to do before the back yard is complete, but it's been an amazing summer/fall.

Not my cartoon, but certainly my sentiment. I am a creative person in
many media and I have stories to tell visually and in writing. I'm hoping that
I will get a better handle on how to make a novel progress from beginning
to end and also how to self-edit without too much secondary editing.
That's my real problem because my thoughts outpace my fingers. 

I haven't written anything, at least not that I've put up for public scrutiny, except for my blog. I used to be quite prolific, but as much as I enjoy playing in Tolkien's universe, I really want to dive into some original works. So I jumped in last night and signed up for a year-long on-line writing course. I'm hoping that by the end of it I'll have a good grasp on those plot tendrils that keep waving in front of me. At the very least, it will be good to write again. The best part is that even though it is a year's class, I'm not pinned into a year's time. I can work through at my own pace and go back and take any of the lessons as I need to. I know myself - time is a premium and I'm NOT giving up my gym time to sit on my ass and write. Nope - not going to happen.

Although methodology tends to have a lot of similarity across classes,
the approaches differ. Will this new class be what I need? Maybe. If not,
it won't be the first time I've wasted money in search of that elusive
novel. I have hopes for this class structure, though, and I've been saving up.
So it's an early holiday gift to myself. 

Speaking of the gym, time to grab my bag and go. The pool calls and I'm still trying to knock one more pound off before Halloween candy and Thanksgiving turkey makes it more difficult. I have things to do and places to go, so have a wonderful Tuesday!

Sunday - Capstones and Compost

Sunday was a lazy day and that seemed to be echoed by our two sports teams in their play yesterday. The Vikings took their first loss, looking haphazard on the field of play, and the Wild just couldn't get it together on the ice at all. But DH and I had a productive day despite the fact that we watched a lot of losing plays on the football field and the hockey ice arena.

The capstones are trapezoidal in shape, but DH has been doing
a lot of cutting to get the stones to match exactly across the steps
and along the curves of the tiers. He'll still be working on
capstones next year, but wants to get as far as possible this year. 

We started the day out by going out to the home supply store. We needed more capstones for the castle. He's been working on topping the tiers and wants to try and get as far as possible before the weather and colder temps shut him down. Considering that next week begins November, I'd say that Mother Nature and the calendar gods will succeed, and he will have to hibernate for the winter months. The home supply store had 34 of the capstones left, so we bought all of them. It will get him just that little bit closer.

Do you have some brilliantly-colored leaves
on a nearby tree? Bring a bit of color into your
home for a few days. These lovely maple leaves
can warm up a cool room just by being on
a side table. 

We had a windy weekend and a lot of our leaves are down. Soon it will be time to take out the rakes and blowers and get the leaves collected. Many people will be taking them to the various compost collection points around town. The lines for drop off at these get excessive at this time of the year, but next spring everyone gets to reap the benefits - strong, black earth that they collect in containers to take back home for their gardens. The cycle of life and death continues as each brings the turn of the next.

The leaves and other vegetative materials are brought to the
composting sites where they are moved by large earthmoving
equipment. In the spring, people will return and collect their
spoils - black dirt for their gardens. 

I'll be starting today out by a quick drive to White Bear Lake for my swim time in their YMCA followed by my every-two-weeks chiropractic appointment. I'll get the opportunity to rinse and repeat on Wednesday, although my appointment that day will be for my car to be winterized and have an oil change, rather than my back being adjusted. Either way, I rarely go to that Y twice in a week, so I'll startle the girls in the pool there on Wednesday. Today they'll just say hello in the locker room before we all begin work on our form and lap times.

We take our composting very seriously here in the Frozen Northlands. After
waiting in long lines to deposit our leaves, we wait in long lines once
again to pick up our pay-off - black dirt. Here is one of the earthmoving
machines turning a bucket full of black dirt. 

I hope each of you have a wonderful Monday. I'm hoping that my Denver Broncos don't follow the examples set by my Minnesota teams when they take to the field tonight in Monday Night Football. It would be nice to put one into the "Win" column. Have a great day!

Whatever Happened To Issues?

We're winding down to election day here in the USA and it's been vicious. For months! Actually, for well more than a year. I'm not just talking about the national election for President, but also the local elections for any national or state-wide ... even city-wide offices. All I have to say at this point is "What's up with this?".

The ads may be all attack ads, but I still feel obliged to vote. It was a
hard-fought battle to get the right for women to vote. I'm not about
to minimize that struggle and pass on my civic obligation. 

Once upon a time, elections and their associated advertisement were focused on the issues. The candidates wanted the voters to mark their ballot for the candidate who would provide them with representation to vote in the laws they thought would be beneficial, and represent them on the national or international stage without embarrassment. Well, I have to say, at this point it's looking like anyone voted into office next month will be an embarrassment - local, regional or national candidate.

My correctly sealed and witnessed absentee ballot went into
the mail yesterday morning. Huzzah! Now I won't have to
stand in a long line to vote, and DH, if he decides to vote after
all, can head over to the polling place any time during the day
and miss the "going to work" rush. 

Nonetheless, because it is my civic duty and I can't shirk that, I did cast my absentee ballot over the weekend and dropped it into the mail yesterday morning. I was pleased with one aspect. It's been a long time since I last voted absentee, and I know the last time I wasn't able to vote in anything except the Presidential election. This time my ballot came to me, exactly the same as I would have had if I had been standing in a long line in the cold to put my marks on the paper. I had all of the candidates, even the judges and those without anyone listed as running against them - all of which were specifically for my little piece of the greater metro area. That pleased me a great deal.

He laid out capstones on the steps to see what needs
adjustment. A couple of steps are slightly off true, so he'll
be seeing what he can do to adjust them a bit today, then
he might start gluing some of the capstones on. 

Today DH will be working on capstones, and maybe re-doing one or two of the steps. The castle is looking pretty fantastic at this point. We'll need to get a palette of capstones ordered in the spring to put on the tiered walls, but that's next year. We're almost finished with this year's work (and weather in which working is sensible). He's been getting his exercise working on the castle, I've been getting mine in the pool. Time to go sweat in a large, chlorinated area of water once again, so I wish all of you a wonderful Tuesday.