As I catch up with things I wasn’t able to post while our internet was down, I figured I’d start with some fun stuff!
(Also, whatever technical problems killed off our secondary account is also affecting our primary account – but at least that one still gets a signal! We will get a call in a day or two about when someone can come by to check the hardware.)
This first photo shows some impressive progress.
That’s Keith, reaching out to touch a napping Leyendecker.
Keith.
Keith, the ball of stress and anxiety that would hiss and run away anytime a kitten came near him.
Now, he will actually curl up with Leyendecker for a nap.
He still doesn’t do much with the kittens overall, but at least he isn’t freaking out anymore.
Which leaves Fenrir as the remaining problem cat. She is more aggressive than Keith was, and will hiss and bat at them. But then, she’ll hiss and bat at some of the adult cats, too.
Then there’s Cheddar. This is him in his usual state.
He has managed to take up half of my king sized bed, with his stretching and splaying!
When he came indoors, almost a year ago, I never imagined he would grow into this big beast!
He used to be so tiny! :-D I’m so glad we were able to get his eyes all healed up.
And now some bonus critter pictures!
Much, much bigger critters.
Our renter’s cows came by the barn for a visit. :-D
In the middle foreground, walking away, is the bull. What a massive, meaty beast he is!
It won’t take long for them to eat up all that grass, and it’ll be shorter than our lawn, after being freshly mowed!
I just love hearing the cows when they’re nearby. We’re not in a position to have cows ourselves, so I get to enjoy them vicariously through the renter! :-D
While my daughters and I were in the city, my darling husband finally got through to our internet provider and had a little chat with them.
We had internet soon after.
The problem is still not solved, though. It’s just a make-do until a tech comes out to check the secondary account’s satellite disk.
When they first brought this up with my husband, they said it would cost us $125, just to have someone come out.
By the time he was done with them, that fee was waived!
Also, we are back to using our primary account for now, and we will NOT be charged double the price per gig. However, anything we do use is that much more on our bill, so we will be rationing our data for a lot of things.
While we do have a signal with this dish, it is not the same as it was, before all these problems started, just a few days ago. Data transfer speeds are insanely slow, and it can take several attempts just to get a web page to load. WordPress has always been troublesome, but it took me about 8 minutes just to get the editor loaded so I could write this post!
Still, it should mean I can catch up on posts with images. I always resize the images into smaller file sizes, so they don’t take up much data. The following photos all uploaded faster than I could get the editor to load!
So these go back a couple of days. :-)
In the last while, we have been regularly putting the kittens and Beep Beep in the basement for the night, then my husband is usually the one who opens the door for them in the mornings. So we still have cat food both upstairs and down.
The cats, of course, always act as though they’re starving, even though there’s plenty of food in the upstairs bowls. What they’re really begging for is wet cat food, and they get that only once a day. The dry kibble is always available.
Since the adults cats now go into the basement regularly, they’re also going for the kittens’ food bowls, so I added larger tin, so that the kittens could still get at some.
Just look at those buggers! They’re crowing around the smaller containers, like they haven’t eaten in a week!
We have been mixing kitten kibble in with the adult kibble. I think the adult cats like the kitten kibble better! :-D
While I was tending to the kitties that day, it was also the day to check the temperature and humidity in the root cellar. While there, I noticed something I had forgotten about.
The two bottles of our most recent batch of mead!
We were supposed to taste test a bottle after different lengths of time. One of them was supposed to be opened up on my birthday. I completely forgot about it!
At some point, I’ll grab one and bring it up for a taste test. :-)
While checking the garden plots, I discovered something unfortunate.
All three beds of beets had quite a lot of their greens missing. It seems we had a deer visiting! She especially seemed to like this Baldor variety.
In the squash bed, I had a more pleasant surprise.
The largest squash plants that I thought were green zucchini turned out to be…
… sunburst squash!
From the number of buds we’re seeing, it looks like we’ll have quite a lot of them over the summer, too. :-)
I had one last surprise that morning.
While checking the usual spots for fallen branches, I went by the fire pit, which hasn’t been used in over a year. I noticed the skunks had been digging in the dirt, right beside it, and something in the dirt caught my eye.
That white you see?
That’s a glazed brick. One of the many we have all over the place.
Looking around at other spots the skunks had dug up, I saw signs of more.
The fire pit has a ring of bricks around it, completely buried.
It must have taken years for them to be covered by that much soil!
With no fire bans right now, we can actually use our fire pit, and uncovering the bricks will be a good thing to get done, too.
I am really looking forward to being able to do cook outs again!
It seemed our internet woes were solved, late yesterday. Alas, by morning, we had no signal, once again.
My shoes finally blew apart, though, so the girls and I went into the city. Yes, we can find shoes locally, but not anything suitable for my monstrous, deformed feet.
Since we are in the city, anyhow, we are taking advantage of the trip. While the girls are in another store, I stayed in the van to put on my new shoes, and take advantage of having a data signal on my phone, to write this post.
Hopefully, we will have internet again by the time we get home. I have pictures to upload and share! 😊😊
First up, a big Thank You to City Mouse for making a quick update post for me yesterday.
We are still having internet issues, and it’s not the trees!
For those who are new to visiting this blog, here’s out set up, in a nutshell. Because of the house being surrounded by tall trees, which protect us from severe winds and snow, we cannot get “regular” internet. We can only get satellite. There is only one company that services our area. When we first got a satellite, the highest data plan available was 100 gigs. Our normal usage before moving out here about about 350 gigs, with 4 of us using it. We had to get a second account, with a second satellite, just to get another 100 gigs of data. So we would keep an eye on our data usage, then when we got close to 100%, we’d switch cables on the router to switch accounts.
Some time later, the company got a new satellite, which allowed us to get a better plan, but it required moving the satellite dishes to another location on the house. However, their new system allowed us to add another 100 gigs to the primary account. So we’d use the primary account for 2/3rds of the month, then switch cables when we got close to 100% of our data. The secondary account had some issues due to tree branches, but it wasn’t that bad.
When the lock down started, our internet provider waived overage fees for a limited time, so we didn’t bother switching cables for the last couple of months. This month, my husband got the courtesy email saying we were at 90% of our data. Which is the first I knew of their no longer waiving the fee. We switched cables, but by then, we were already at 103%. The overage fees is double the regular cost per gig.
When we first switched cables, we had intermittent signals, but the next day, we lost our internet in the morning, and it didn’t come back. We actually did get a signal at about midnight, but it only lasted about an hour before we lost it again.
The problem is, my daughter’s business is all online. She has commissions to work on and clients to contact, references to download, etc. She can do up to a certain point offline, but then she has to go online.
She and I just tried going into town, with the plan to go somewhere that has free wifi, sit for a while as she used her laptop to do what she needed over a cuppa or a snack.
Instead, we found all the usual places – restaurants, coffee shops, hotels – have their free wifi disabled.
So we went home.
Right now, we’ve switched the cable back to the primary account. As I write this, we have internet, but we’ve lost it a couple of times already. My husband had tried calling the company, only to get a recording saying they were having technical difficulties, then going into a very long list of the different areas that were affected.
The problem is, if we use the primary account, we’re paying double for the overage, while also paying for a secondary account that isn’t working at all. Even the light on the transceiver is showing there is no signal from the satellite, most of the time, but even when the colour changes, showing that we should have a signal, all of our devices show no internet.
But my daughter needs to get work done. So I am posting this for the time she needs to do what is necessary, and then we’re switching the cables back. At some point, we have to get through to the company to find out wtf is going on. And we had better get a credit of some kind for this!
Until then, I will make quick update posts as I’m able, but using as little data as possible in the process, or make posts when I’m in town and have a signal on my phone.
So I am chatting with Re-farmer, old school on 2 landline phones. She has asked me to let you all know that her internet is not connecting with the rest of the world. A healthy, leafy tree is in the way! It will be a day or two to fix, and thought she would let you know she didn’t fall into the outhouse! So she will post as her connection gets fixed or when she goes into town for free wifi! Signing off, The City Mouse
Posting may be sparse for a while. We have no internet. No signal, all day. I am currently writing this on my phone, while sitting in the corner of the living room that gets enough data signal to send and receive text. Barely. So I hope publishing this post works!
In my last post, I mentioned how we were having connectivity troubles with our satellite internet, due to heave foliage.
It’s very windy today.
Since we switched cables on accounts, we’ve had constant interruptions in service, to the point that my daughter was having difficulties working.
I’d gone outside to use up more of the rain barrel’s water around the yard when the girls came out to take a good hard look at the tree situation.
The satellites are aimed through a gap between two trees. A gap that is mostly filled with leaves right now.
The question was, should we prune?
It came down to a particular branch on one of the elms beside the small gate in the chain link fence.
Now, I’ll be straight about the pair of trees on either side of this gate. I would love for them to be gone. They were planted in a poor location, and their roots are currently pushing up the sidewalk blocks. My ideal plan would be to remove both trees, pull up their stumps, and lay down a new, wider, properly installed sidewalk that would better accommodate my husband’s walker. That is a HUGE job we are in no position to do for many years yet, if at all.
I’m pretty sure that when the current sidewalk was installed, the pavers were just laid down on the grass, and then some dirt was thrown up against the sides so the lawn mower could go over them. I think the paving stones forming a small patio under the kitchen window were install much the same way. Those ones are being lifted and shifted by the roots of the elm tree in front of the kitchen window; another problem tree.
I understand why my mother planted them. They provide excellent shade. The problem is, she didn’t think far enough ahead when she chose the locations. Now, the one by the kitchen is a problem for the roof, as well as the patio blocks and the basement wall. The ones by the small gate in the chain link fence were planted too close together, never mind the sidewalk running between them.
So these are trees that have many issues.
In the end, it was these many issues that had us agreeing to prune away one of the major branches growing towards the house.
That, and they’re elms. We could cut them down to stumps, and they’d grow back. The one in front of the old kitchen had already been cut back significantly, leaving behind a flat top the yard cats now use to hang out on. :-D
I didn’t have my phone with me, so I have no before pictures, but this is how it is now.
As you can see, this is not the first time this branch has been pruned!
This was also our first opportunity to use the pruning paint I found, which is black, so it’s not easy to see in the photo.
The girls had started off using the long handled pruning saw to cut it, but it started to jam. I ended up bringing over the step ladder and a buck saw. Once up there, I could see that where they’d started cutting had a huge knot, out of sight from below! So I started cutting a few inches away. We never did have to cut all the way through; the weight of the branch itself started breaking it, long before. One of my daughters grabbed it with the hook on the long handled pruning saw and was able to pull it the rest of the way down. After that, it was just a matter of cutting it free from the tree, which required one daughter to lift the weight of the main branch while the other did the cutting.
Once it was on the ground, I was able to go at it with the reciprocating saw and cut it into manageable sized pieces for hauling away.
Except for the main body. We set that aside for now.
We were thinking of the possibility of my using parts of it for carving, but I don’t think that will be possible.
It looks like the core of this branch was already rotting away! I think I even see insect damage.
Which means, if we hadn’t taken it down now, it may well have broken in high winds, like branches in the tree in front of the kitchen window already have. Well, that’s a likelihood for any of the trees. The rot just made this one a higher risk.
You can just see the black end of the branch we cut in this photo.
You can also see some of the many dead branches above it.
In this photo, you can see part of the elm tree on the other side of the gate, on the right side of the photo. Lots more dead branches, all out of reach.
Taking this branch down has opened up the yard quite a lot! I remember getting that same feeling of openness when I cut away the broken branches in the elm by the house (on the left edge of the photo, you can see part of a branch from that tree). We still have plenty of shade, too.
In the end, I’m glad we got it done. Whether or not it reduces how often our internet cuts out (which happened again while I was writing this, but only once, rather than the 3 or 4 times when I wrote my last post), we will see. For now, though, we got the one branch done, and will hopefully find a way to get at the dead ones, too. I’d really rather not wait for storms to bring them down, if I can!
While doing my rounds, before going to the city, I went to the usual spots to see if any more branches had come down during the night.
None had, but when I reached the fence near the pump shack, I heard something moving on the metal table beside it.
It took me a while, but I eventually saw a kitten slink under the table itself.
Was that Junk Pile cat’s white and grey baby?
Near where I was standing is a spot the cats use to go under the chain link fence. Rosencrantz, whom I’d seen earlier as I put kibble out for the yard cats, went through, stopping several times to look back at me and give me a death glare! :-D
Just look at that face!
So was that Rosencrantz’s baby I was seeing?
She made her way to the pump shack, then settled down in front of the door, keeping an eye on me. I could no longer see the kitten under the table, but then and orange head popped out of the hole at the bottom of the door!
I’d actually enlarged that hole last year, when Pump Shack kitten was living in there. (We haven’t seen Pump Shack cat, nor her mom, Guildenstern, in a very long time.)
It took a while, but the other kitten did eventually come around.
Of course, there’s that little sapling in the way! :-D
This is most definitely NOT the grey and white kitten I saw before. This one has more white, and also has patches of orange in it.
So this is a first time sighting of these babies!
These would be the younger siblings to Keith, David and Junk Pile cat.
Shortly after this, my older daughter and I headed for the city. Having gone looking around online last night, I had several possibilities for washing machines that I wanted to check out at Home Depot.
Once at the store, I went looking at the machines. I wasn’t too surprised that there were fewer than what I saw online. Aside from the prices, I had also looked at ratings. GE had some of the lowest ratings, while Whirlpool had the highest. Those were out of budget, though. Plus, I wasn’t seeing any on display.
I had an employee acknowledge me when I first got there, asking if I needed help right away. I didn’t, yet, which worked out for him, since he said he needed to go to the back for a while. This gave me lots of time to look at the machines before settling on this one.
It was a GE, but not the same model I was seeing on the website that had the lower ratings. In fact, I don’t recall seeing this model online at all. The price was also easier on the budget than others on display. There were several cheaper ones but… they were also TOO cheap! And I don’t mean just on price.
There was also the issue of size, which turned out to be more of a non-issue. Where we have the washer and dryer is already tight. My daughter at home measured the width and messaged me the info. Our machine at home was 26 7/8ths wide. We could go up to 27 inches, but that was it. The machines were all either 26 7/8ths inches wide, or 27 inches wide. This one was 27 inches wide.
I then waited for the guy to come back.
And waited.
After a while, I asked a nearby cashier if she could see if someone was available, on the possibility there was someone else in that section.
There wasn’t.
So I waited some more, wandering around a bit.
Which is when I discovered there was a whole other section of washers and dryers I’d somehow managed to not see.
Of course, that’s when the guy came back.
I told him I was looking for a washing machine, mentioned that I’d just noticed the other section. After a quick walk around, I showed him the one I said I’d decided on.
“No,” he said.
I could only laugh. He did explain, though.
Basically, the brand sucks. He’d never use one himself, and wouldn’t sell one, if he could avoid it. His recommendation was to go with either Whirlpool or LG. I’d seen both brands were highly rated, but I hadn’t looked at any LG models online.
The first one he took me over to was a Whirlpool. It was over budget but, more importantly, it was 27 1/2 inches wide. That half inch would make a difference.
He showed me a couple others he recommended, both LG, that were 27 inches. The closer one we came to, I told him straight up was out of budget, so he showed me another one.
After going back and forth, I went with the cheaper LG.
This is it.
It cost $100 more than the GE, but it was still within budget. Well. Almost. After taxes and whatever fees were added on, it ended up costing $835 and change. So $35 over budget. It is also a higher capacity machine, at 5.5 cubic feet instead of 4.9 cubit feet in the GE I was looking at.
Unfortunately, they do not keep an inventory of stuff like this. It has to be delivered from the national warehouse in Ontario.
Expected delivery to the store: Friday, the 24th.
That’s more than a week away.
Now, I could have decided not to buy it, then tried going elsewhere, but that would most likely have meant going to another city, at a competitor’s location where we got our replacement hot water tank. That store has higher prices for the same makes and models, though, so even if I were able to find an identical machine, I probably could not have bought it.
So I bought the machine. If we really, really have to, we can go to town and use the laundromat.
As he did the computer stuff, and put me into their system, we had time to chat. I told him about our washer dying yesterday, and how we had to decide if it was worth fixing. I told him about finding the plastic part under it, and he cringed. I mentioned the screws, and he cringed a bit more. Then I mentioned the puddle of oil, and he did a whole body twitch while in the middle of typing. :-D
After the transaction was done, he made sure to let me know to expect a call on Thursday, the 23rd. If there was no call, he said to call him early on Friday (I made sure to take down his name). The delivery trucks stop running at 4:30. Once they stop, there would be no chance of it arriving until Monday, so it would have to be early enough for him to make some calls about it.
The new washer will be delivered to the store. We’re too far away to have it delivered to our place. Which actually helped a bit, since it kept the price down. There would have been a delivery fee on top of everything else, but he was able to waive that.
So we’ve got more than a week without a washing machine.
And I needed to do laundry, yesterday.
While we could make the trip into town to use the laundromat, we’re not going to bother. At least, not yet. My daughters have already done a load of their own laundry in the bath tub, and I’m about to do the same.
The one good thing about the new washing machine not coming in right away is, we have time to haul the old one out and clean up the mess of oil under it.
By the time we got home, I was surprised it wasn’t even 2pm yet. If felt like it should have been more like 4 or 5!
This has been a very expensive month. I had to buy the push mower. Then I had to buy the parts and pieces to fix the sink. My daughter bought the new stove, and now we’ve bought a new washing machine. Meanwhile, we’ve got the riding mower still in the shop (at this point, I’m hoping they’ll continue to take their time getting to it!), plus my mother’s car will be ready for the end of the month. That one, at least, I’ve got almost 2/3rds paid off. My older daughter is still getting regular commissions, but my younger daughter is not going to be able to find a job for some time, given the pandemic situation, and our Premiere extending our “emergency” status for a couple more months, in spite of the lack of cases in our province. So it’s not like there’s any way for the income to increase with the outgo!
Unfortunately, it means a lot of things we’d hoped to get done this summer, likely won’t happen. We need to buy plywood for a floor on the trailer, and more for other projects we had in mind. I was hoping to buy materials to create a base for the cordwood outhouse we were planning to build this summer. While there is a lot we can get started on to prepare that won’t cost money, we do still need to buy some things, like mortar ingredients, and I was hoping to have concrete paving stones as a “floor” to build on. That project will likely have to be pushed back to next year. Plus, if anything else breaks down, there’s very little left in reserve. I’m just thankful we had as much as we did, set aside, to cover these. I just can’t help but think, how on earth are we supposed to come up with $10,000 for a new roof, when stuff like this keeps happening?
But, thanks to my husband’s private insurance and disability income, the bills are being paid, there’s food on the table, and gas in the tank. Being hear at the farm, we’ve got a roof over our head (even if it needs replacing!) and are secure as “caretakers” of the property. We are much better off than so many others, and have much to be thankful for.
Well, there’s one thing that might help, on the financial side. Our internet provider has had a new tower built in the area.
When moving here, the only option we had was satellite and, because of plan limits at the time, we had to get two of them to provide enough data for our needs. (Getting internet is a necessity, since my daughter’s business is entirely online now.) Even then, we had issues. Eventually, we were able to double the data one of the plans. Meanwhile, we lose connectivity fairly easily. Particularly in summer, when the foliage is full. The primary account’s satellite is usually fine, but the secondary satellite is barely a couple of feet to the side, and the branches block the signal more frequently (I’ve lost internet several times, just writing this post!). As we reach the limit on the data plan for our primary account, we switch cables on our router to the secondary account – and we switched cables just this morning. We have been regularly going over our data plans, and while the company waived those costs for the past couple of months, due to the lock downs and more people being stuck at home, that ended this month.
My husband talked to the company and will arrange for someone to come by next month to do a site survey (when we’ll have money to pay for the survey). If they can get a signal to the new tower, we would be able to move away from satellite completely, have only one account, unlimited data, and save almost $200 a month.
Yeah. We spend over $300 a month, just to get internet out here, with limited data and frequent loss of connectivity.
After shifting the dryer, then moving the washing machine, my darling daughter squirmed her way behind it to see what she could see.
Besides cat fur dust bunnies from hell and miscellaneous objects that somehow made their way under the washer and dryer…
…and the round plastic cap?? of some sort, that was oily along its edge…
…and the rusted out screws…
…and the puddle of a yellowish oil.
We tipped the washer as much as we could, so she could look at the bottom to see where the plastic thing came from, or the screws, or maybe where the oil was coming from. Unfortunately, we couldn’t tip it enough for her to see. At least not without sticking her head in the puddle of oil.
The next thing to do was to pop off the back panel, to see if the drive belt was off or what else might be the problem.
The back panel turned out to be completely different from anything we found while researching stuff online. My daughter could not see where or how the panel came off. From her angle, it looked like all one piece. From above, I could see where there was a seam between panels under the power cord, but that didn’t help her any.
As she struggled with it, I made the executive decision.
Tomorrow, we’re going into the city and getting a new washing machine. It’s not worth the hassle to fight with and fix this old machine.
It’s going to decimate our contingency fund, but that’s what it’s for, I guess. Thank God we have it, but nothing had better break after this!
After looking around online, I found the best prices at Home Depot, of all places. Not that there is a lot of difference, really. We won’t be able to get top of the line, but we won’t have to get bottom of the barrel, either.
So everything is all put back again, until we have to drag it all out again tomorrow. We’re going to have to figure out how to work around that dryer. The entry way isn’t very big.
*sigh* I think we’re going to have to shove the table to the side in the dining room again. The only way I can think of doing this is if we bring the new machine into the dining room, pull out the dryer, pull out the washing machine, put the washing machine in the dining room, clean up the mess under it, install the new machine, put the dryer back, then haul the old machine out to join the old stove in the junk pile.
There are two steps between the entryway and the dining room that we’ll be hauling these over, too.
At least washing machines are light!
Well, I guess I’d better start heating to bed. The earlier we start for the city, the faster we can get this over with!
I want to end this on a fun note, so I have some photos to share with you. When heading out to do my evening rounds, I wanted to do some watering to empty our rain barrel a bit.
As I started towards the sun room, however, I found a furry visitor, eating cat kibble! Stinky was back for an evening meal. When he saw me, he started to head for the sun room door, so I decided to head towards the barn and check on things. With the winds we’ve been having, I wanted to make sure there was no damage, plus I wanted to give Stinky time to finish eating and leave.
When I came back, I found…
… two of them!
It’s been a while since I’ve seen two!
I watched them for a bit and took pictures – the zoom on my phone’s camera sucks, but it’s better than getting too close! :-D
This bigger one is the newcomer for this year. We had two coming over regularly, last year, and it may be these are the same two – or the little one is an offspring.
The bigger one ambled off and disappeared under the storage house.
The little one stayed to snuffle and nibble at the fence post we used to hook the chain to, when using the come-along to move the new cat shelter off the trailer a couple of days ago. After a while, he disappeared under the clothes line platform. At that point, I went ahead and did the watering from the rain barrel I wanted to. The rain barrel is right near the platform, but as long as Stinky was under there, he was well sheltered and would not see me as a threat.
So our washing machine is being weird. It agitates, but when it gets to when the drum should spin and water drained, it just… doesn’t.
It’s possible the drive belt is off. We can’t check it yet. The laundry that was in the machine had to be hand wrung out and went into the drier. The girls were then sweethearts and manually removed as much water as they could, before checking it over to see what going on. Which is when they found the drum is very loose.
The only way to check, though, it to take the panel off the back. We can’t do that until the drier is done. We can’t pull the washing machine forward very far, because there is a step blocking it. We have to wait until the drier is done, then put that out, so that we can pull the washer out around the step.
Meanwhile, I’m looking up the costs of a new washing machine. Depending on what we find, we may have to choose: do we spend the money to fix an old machine that has a high probability of breaking again in the near future, or do we dip into the contingency fund again, to get a new, energy efficient machine with a warranty on it. Who knows. It might be an easy fix. Or we might not even see the problem, even after opening it up.
We should know better, tonight.
Meanwhile, I was able to head outside this afternoon for a bit of work in the old garden area. I’m tired of damaging the blade of our lawnmowers when mowing in the old garden area, by hitting lumps of dirt I don’t see in the grass. Right now, while it’s still short, is the best time to do something about it. Since we’re limited in tools, that means manual labour. :-D
Basically, I went looking for the lumps with the tops flattened from betting hit with the mower blade, then dug at them with the potato fork, to break them up and loosen the soil.
In the above picture, I have actually broken up one of those lumps.
You can see why I keep hitting them with the mower!
The root systems are holding the sod together quite a bit, but they will be broken up further. After going over them with the fork, we’ll go back with hoes and break them up further, spreading the soil into the low areas and leveling things off as much as we can.
I took advantage of being out there with the fork and removed some of the larger weeds and tree saplings.
Well… almost the tree saplings.
I’d gone through the area last summer, pulling many of them out, or cutting them with pruning shears. While breaking up hills of soil, I spotted one that was larger and a definite tripping hazard.
Guess how I know that? :-D
I discovered that I was not going to get this one out, without other tools.
It was actually growing out of a long root.
There are NO trees near this. The closest ones are the strip of self-sown trees along where the squash beds are now, and the tree at the end of that strip is a maple. Maples don’t send shoots out like this. Poplars do, but the nearest poplars are along the fence, among the lilacs. There are more along the other fence line. From the direction this root is running, those further away poplars are the more likely source.
We’re talking about 100 feet away.
I left it until I can come back with cutting tools, later.
Then there’s stuff like this.
This is a burdock root. I keep mowing over them, and they keep coming back, because of roots like this.
And this is Rolando Moon, helping me…
More specifically, this is Greater Burdock, or Arctium lappa. We have it growing all over, and it can make quite a barrier to some of the sheds and equipment! While it can be used for food or medicine, it’s not something we actually want to cultivate, and we certainly don’t want it in taking over.
I wasn’t able to get all of this root out. It broke off, instead. Those roots go very deep!
I worked only on the West side of the old garden area.
It looks a bit like a bunch of giant skunks were digging for grubs! :-D
There is a smaller area to the East of the squash bed, but that area is much worse for hills that need to be broken down, and there’s at least one large rock that I hope to be able to take out. It all depends on how much of it is still buried. It was the heat and wind that drove me indoors early! But not before I checked a few other things.
The stack of wood from the maples we had cut away from the roof has given us a handy seat to stop and rest at. I was going to take a bit of a break there, before continuing on.
That seat is now occupied…
This stack is at the maple grove, but the red ants that built this brought spruce needles from across the North yard, all the way to this log! It’s about 40 or 50 feet, just to the edge of the spruce grove. They’d have to go past the mulch we put down last year, to get to where the needles are! I was seeing ants going in and out of cracks at the other end of the log, so this nest goes all the way through.
Well, this is a log I won’t be using for any projects. !!
I also checked on the grapes again.
I just love these baby grape clusters! Right now, these grapes are as big as they were, fully ripe, our first summer here, when we discovered the grapes in among the spirea. Last year was their first year cleared of the spirea and trained up the trellis, and there were no grapes at all. I’m sure that summer was one they needed to recover from the changes! I’m very happy to see how well they’re doing now – even after I accidentally killed one of the vines! Which you can see on the left of the photo. Other vines are climbing up the dead one, so I’m leaving it there.
Another area I checked on was indoors. At the beginning of the month, I’d rigged up the dehumidifier that was down there when we first moved in. Here is how it looked , after running for a while.
That damp spot had been an actual puddle. The well pump was covered in condensation, water was collecting under the pump, the pressure tank and the hot water tank. The new well pump, still in its box, was sitting on pieces of wood to elevate it, but the wood itself was getting so damp, I added some pieces of foam – they look like pool noodles with a cut from end to end, and I don’t know why they’re there – to elevate it even more.
This is how it looks now.
Where the puddle had been is now just a dry stain. There is no condensation on any of the pipes, and everything under the tanks and pump are now dry. There is only one spot, where the concrete has broken away, that is damp.
On the other side of the divider wall is where the new screened window is, and even that area has just a damp spot in the lowest area. Even the areas under the furnaces are just damp not wet. I unplugged the blower fan to let the motor cool down, but right now, even with the continued rains, I don’t think it is an issue anymore. When it was just the blower fan going, it did help, but the concrete was still wet enough that a white mold was starting to grow. There is no sign of that, now. I was a bit concerned about the screen window, since it’s “roof” had fallen off. There is nothing to prevent the rains from going in through there, other than the fact that it is so low.
There is a possibility of more storms or rain tonight. There is an odd weather system coming our way right now. Instead of a large mass of rain with patches of more severe conditions in it, the radar shows mostly clear, with dozens of tiny storms, moving across the prairies. There’s just no way of knowing if something will hit us until… well… it hits us!
And now it’s time to check – again – if the drier is done, and we can check out what’s wrong with the washing machine.
The Re-Farmer 