Posts Tagged ‘landscaping projects’
Country City
Out here in the rural countryside, Cyndie and I spent yesterday morning wrangling unwanted vines in an area of our woods that has received little attention during our ownership. We rewarded ourselves for that effort with a trip to the big city for dinner with friends and live music at a new venue.
I have a new project in the early stages to make some changes to the landscape around the house. One of the important fixes will be the routing of a downspout at the corner of the garage leading to our front door.
The plastic conduit didn’t work. I’ve decided to change to an overhead route for the downspout and will try constructing an arbor out of vines to support it. We’ve been cutting down so many large, woody vines this year that I would like to make use of the wealth of interesting wood.
Pulling the vines out of all the branches they were clinging to was an exhausting effort. I’d like to use as many of the small runners coming off the main trunks as possible to tie things together for an arbor. I didn’t want to just cut them off, which would have been much easier.
In the afternoon, we drove to Minneapolis for dinner at the home of our friends, Pam & John. We started on their front porch in the warm sunlight…
When the sun moved on and the porch became more shadowed we headed inside for a scrumptious early meal. After dinner, we drove to the new Zhora Darling restaurant at the site of the former North East hallmark Red Stag Supper Club. Pam and John’s son, Sam, plays drums in FénixDion. Last night they performed in a pared-down trio version of their membership.
It made for a very fulfilling day and contrasted wonderfully with the long stretches of days when I have [happily] done little outside the house. Sometimes it feels like I’ve been waiting the last few weeks, oh, even months to dig into an outdoor project and then go frolic around in Minneapolis.
We did make it home in time to turn on the latter portion of the NCAA Women’s basketball game between Iowa and UConn. I’m okay with Caitlin Clark and her teammates getting to play one more game. I’ll be watching.
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Half Day
I felt a little like I was “quiet quitting” yesterday when I chose to wait a half day before venturing out with pruning tools in hand to clear more brush along our northern property line. It was cold outside in the morning and I knew it would be warming up eventually, what with the bright sunshine we were experiencing.
A little extra time in the recliner doing some reading and writing meant outdoor chores could wait. I guess that is a luxury one has when you are your own boss. I just won’t be giving myself any “going out of your way” awards for my partial effort.
In the morning frost, one of our fence posts caught my eye because the lines of the grain pattern were accentuated by the ice crystals.
The horses didn’t show any signs of being bothered by the brisk start of the day and remained wonderfully mellow while morning feed pans were served.
My slow start, which pretty much kicked off right out of bed –for no obvious reason I was seriously lacking in motivation from the moment I stood up– carried over into the afternoon when I finally did get outside to cut branches. I was in no mood to crank up and maneuver the chainsaw. The ratcheted lopper and a good old pruning handsaw became my weapons of choice.
I guess I am gambling that the weather predictions for the days ahead will prove accurate and there is no rush to finish any of our ongoing outdoor projects before snow and cold bring an end to landscaping endeavors.
Mentally, it seems I am more than prepared to engage in extended indoor activities at the earliest opportunity. The idea of not even getting out of bed loomed large on my mind at the moment Delilah made her body-shaking, ear-flopping announcement that it was time to get going yesterday morning.
It was hump day yesterday, after all. No wonder I was feeling unmotivated. Now it’s Thursday and I am ready and rarin’ to go. Except, the days of the week make no difference in my schedule of activities.
I can report, however, that just because I no longer commute to a day job, every day definitely does NOT seem like a Saturday.
Taking a half day off every so often gives me a chance to appreciate that every day is almost like a Saturday if I choose to think of it like that.
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Relative Something 