Gardening 2023

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Hot out there today but we had cloud cover at the garden this morning.  Got a lot done.  I cleaned out and organized all the pantry tubs with all the stuff they had in them.  I'm still on a cleaning kick.  The electricity is out at the Extension.  One of the boxes was sizzling.  Hopefully fixed today and I can post some pictures later.

Ken showed up which is unusual for him.  He had my new Pantry Garden sign!  Really cute, really classy.  Not at all close to what I commissioned and I'm going to have to stain and paint the sign I wanted him to replace.    Love this one though.  He has the grasshopper.  Says it needs touching up.  Marsha was thrilled, not. 

Since we cooled off, I started pushing the fall projects to start.  Got David to start removing the rock from where we are putting our award bricks in.  He got almost half of them out of there.  He's going on vacation for two weeks so I'll probably have the rest of it out of there by the time he gets back.  Maybe he and Kevin will get inspired.

There's shade in the back of the building in the morning.  Found Melanie back there dreaming about the Chocolate bed.  We were talking about design and I said Beka would come up with something.  She said something about no, it was hers and another person's to design.  I like when people take ownership but really they don't have it.  I'm the lead over the Foundation Beds which this is a part of.  Beka is my pro designer and the leader of this project.  We have the final say.  It will be okay though.  Beka will gently guide them along.  We'll come up with something we all like.  And if they walk around saying it's theirs, as long as they keep it up and follow my directions, it is.  I'm pretty easy going but I give up no land.    Keep your fucking gun, I want property.

Steve did another section.  He's slowing down but I'm still wondering what's behind that destructive energy he's got going on.

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When the electric box sizzled it blew out the copy machine, shit.

We had temps in the low 80's and cloud cover.  Got out there and removed most of the rest of the rock.  I ran out of buckets to put them in but I got the rest of them in a pile.  The clean rock can go right to it's new home but the ones that had to be dug out need a bath.  Does no good as a weed block if it has dirt in it.  Put glyphosate on the weeds at the water station where we need more rock.  Bitch Weed had started to grow in there.  Not sure where I'm putting the rest of the rock.  Need Kevin to tell me what I'm doing there next to move the project forward.

We're about to go back in the 90's for a couple of weeks.  I'll slow down to just watering, early in the morning.  Moving the plants at home under the trees.  Grass doesn't grow at these temps, the weeds still do. 

[cineater]

No I didn't go a day without gardening in my world.     I had the rare day off from a work session at the garden.  The potatoes got harvested.  They got the area mowed down so the electric company would spray and drift bad stuff over into our area.  Marsha is taking care of the sapling so hopefully the property is just a bypass when the electric company comes through.  Only got one text and my answer was throw it away.  The trainees had their second meeting on renovating my beds.  They were to take a soil sample and take measurements on the beds.  I know they talked plants.  Hard to hold the reins on that but get the design down.  Opposite of what most of us do.  We get the plants and the design or lack of it just happens.

Marsha has her surgery on Tuesday.  Sucks to be put back down again.  Her brain is out of the chemo fog but something has changed in her.  She's now thinking of how to say stuff without pissing people off.     Yeah, I live with that too.  Never one to not say it, eventually, and it comes out a little more blunt then I want it too even when I think it over.  But if you make it a fight, it becomes all about the fight, not the solution.

Anyway, came home and got my yard mowed.  I see why my neighbor likes looking over into my yard.  He's not just checking me out.    From his view, my yard is cool and inviting.  All the shade and greens.  Who wouldn't want to walk into that?  It immediately draws you in and relaxes you.

[cineater]

Only a five foot section of grass left to mow and I could not do it.  Fortunately Steve came along and offered to finish it and clean up the mower.  It was either get in the AC now or puke.    As it is I don't remember walking from the greenhouse to the tool shed.  Should have got there at 7 instead of closer to 8.  Two hours of hand mowing in full sun and I'm trashed.  Fuck the trimming.  I might be able to get that Wednesday morning if I get there at the crack of dawn.  At least the guys driving the big mowers get a breeze if they drive fast enough.

Several people showed up to get somethings done before the heat comes on but they didn't stay long.  Eli wanted a garden update.  Walked him around and showed him all the projects going on, new shit, etc.  He's so impressed with us.  We make him look good when he reports to the university.

[cineater]

Peeling Patio Eggplant with a potato peeler is dangerous!  Once it's peeled it browns over like an apple that has been exposed to air.  The more finely chopped herbs work better but still eggplant is just like a chip for the dip.

Marsha is down at the hospital asking for thoughts and prayers tomorrow.  Really she's just sending out a group text so her husband can text when she's out of surgery.  I know what's going on there. 

Was able to move the fall tours forward to contacting the newspaper and the magazine, whoohoo.  Bringing it in a little early.  I can relax until the next deadline for the email and facebook posts.  Really hoping the magazine runs a story.  Not sure if we are in time for that but it will go under events.

So this heat thing with me.  We were coming back from New Jersey on the bikes.  It was 105 and we were out on the interstate for three days.  It got so bad in the afternoons we would try to get back on the highway only to take the next exit to find AC.  The last night out my legs were like stumps, elephant legs.  Could barely get my boots off.  Since then I can't cool off when the temps get above 90.  I'm sure I had heat exhaustion.  I was in my early 30's.  Been dealing with this a long time.  My outdoor temperature preference is in the 50's in full sun, no wind.  I'll work my ass off in that.

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A little shower and it's like a sauna out there.  The plan for tomorrow is get to the garden at 7, start the water and harvest some bush beans.  Out of there by 10.

My pants almost came clean.  No more wild strawberries.

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A little before 7 and out at 10:01.     I had a medical test so it was a have too.  We had the harvest done and then I remembered we might have some blackberries, we did.  Harvested beans, leeks, eggplant, tomatoes, cucumbers, okra and zucchini.  I think it took me an hour just on a half a bed of beans.  You think you've got them all only to find more.  Hot but we had cloud cover most of the morning.  Happy pantry team this morning.  Put in some more beans.  Greg order turnip seeds.  When I called him Scarlet, went over his head.  Isn't that what they had to eat after the war and she said her famous line about not being hungry again?

By the time I got back at 11:15 everybody had cleared out but Kevin.  He was working on the seat of the zero turn.  They got in the poles for the pantry sign in but forgot the brackets and he didn't have any zip ties.  You are not using zip ties!  That is something I would do.    Marsha would think we were idiots.  No update on her.

We got a little rain after noon but by 3 it was full sun, open oven door.  I'll go back Friday morning to water the pots.  I've got the garlic tops to cut off and get ready for storage but I can do that in the house.  Miserably hot out there.

[cineater]

I had already eaten two of the brownies before Phebe said they were made from eggplant.  Her cooking class in a couple of weeks is all on eggplant.  I need that. 

Marsha went home from the hospital today.

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Gardens survived the wind storm just fine.  The parking lot was green from all the leaves.  Making mental notes of what I needed to do while I was blowing it off.  Not mowing the grass for you this week guys.  Was thinking I would crank it out in the morning but forgot I have Saturdays harvest to run over to the food pantry.  Guess I could get up there early and come back to the house for coffee and get the harvest.  Then again I kind of wanted to start the brush fire.  Is any of this under gardening?  Especially the part where I just flat out stink.  You'd think all the sweat would wash that away.

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Cloud cover!  Worked my ass off.  Really don't care for the new battery operated weed trimmer everybody at the garden wanted, except me and Kevin.  I swear it's heavier or maybe not as well balanced as the gas trimmer.  Not as powerful.  Might be fine for your home grass but not the garden grass.  Not sure what we have for grass but it's not what you have in your yard.  Got my bush trimmed, more coffee and the harvest over to the church right when they opened at 9.  Stopped by and got my groceries and came home and started burning the brush in the drain basin.  Got about 3/4th's of it burned up.  Had too much ash in the firepit to finish.  I tried to light the pile on fire with the hot ash floating around in the air but it never caught. 

And since I was up and running, the neighbors had a nice brush pile going so why don't we just trim your bushes I've had my eye on?  While he was in the shower, she and I took them down.  I need to dig out some honeysuckle bushes that have got in there and trim it way back but we'll do that this winter.  Looks better from the street but I butchered it cutting the honeysuckle out.  And then I came home and mowed the grass.  I was napping on the couch by 2. 

WTF, we have a flood threat for Wednesday.

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When you do a brush fire, you only do brush!  I look over and he is throwing a log on the fire.  No, you're taking up space and access to the coals.  Then he starts throwing leaves on it.  No, they are wet, in a clump and smothering the fire.  Eventually though, we burned up all the brush, larger pieces of wood and leaves.  Tim said he would cut up the trees when he gets back from the lake if Brian doesn't get to it.

Harvest has been postponed to 11 tomorrow to let the rain pass.  Eggplant cooking class moved to the 16th.  Dropped 5 buckets of rock around the propagation water station.  Had to duct tape the door to the greenhouse to keep the trim on the door.  Guess we can't put that off any longer.

They changed the forecast to "extreme rain event" over the next two days.  Shit.  Ran up and got everything off the floor of the greenhouse and the hoop house.

Fire pit still giving off heat at 10 at night.  Has about 6 inches of ash.

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That was a nice compliment.  I was talking to JoAnn.  Kevin told her I was a wonderful supervisor.  Had him doing things he never thought of doing.  That's really good considering he had my job for about 5 years.  And really I'm not a supervisor, I'm a facilitator according to our bylaws.  They treat me like a supervisor but truth be told I'm just really good at facilitating.  Yes, I'm a gardener enabler.   

We're all panicked about the rain tonight.  As soon as the weather cleared today, we were out there harvesting everything we could.  Last year at the end of July we lost all crops due to flooding.  The group seems pretty psyched about the cooking classes.  I wonder if I can get Phebe to cook up some okra?  It looks disgusting to me but I'm trying to be adventurous with my veggies.  And damn it, I'm not doing this alone, everybody must try it.  Except for the ghost peppers.  If you haven't had experience with hot peppers, don't reinvent the wheel, they are fucking hot!

[cineater]

The worst of the rain went south.  We have a storm coming in around two but it's no threat.  I did notice today some of the tomatoes split.  Caused by the heavy rain.  The skin didn't grow fast enough for the incoming water.

Got in a plan for the chocolate garden.  She did a good job.  I don't really like the layout.  She's got some hard scape I don't think we can afford and uses too many annual plants you have to buy, grow and replant every year.  It's not very accessible for public viewing but wasn't going to be.  They can really only look at it from the bottom.  It's the maintenance path that makes it look like you're looking at the garden from the side.  And she needs to pack some more plants in there or she will be weeding all the time.  It's not the final plan although, it's going to be her bed, if she likes it, I can live with it.  Not my thing, it's her thing and Beka's job to go over it with her.

[cineater]

Okay I offered the creamer up to the group but if they don't take it, I'm taking it.  I've been reluctant to take it because it weighs like a 100 pounds and it's going to take moving it around the yard to find just the right spot.  Below is what it was new. It's rusted up cast iron now but I like that.  Room for 3 places to put pots.  I've been attracted to this piece since I first saw it, interesting, not sure if I love it but it's in my head.


Update:  One of them is interested.  Just when I decide it's mine, of course.  It will be better displayed at the gardens and I will appreciate it there but I will be thinking it could have been mine.  Have to share, god damn it.  Marsha will freak.  I offered her this piece years ago and she barely glanced at it before turning up her nose.  She did get my cast iron bell with a pig on top of it.  I wanted that for myself too but nowhere to put it.  I have a thing for cast iron.  She did take the cast iron apple press for under the apple trees but come to think of it, I haven't seen that in a while.  It was pretty beat up maybe she pitched it.

Update again:  All three of them like it.  They haven't seen it in person yet but Beka was ready to go get it sight unseen.  Interesting piece.  It's got a home, took me a few years.  Haven't mentioned the sheets of tin from an old roof I happen to know about.  I was saving that for another project I may someday work on.  We could use that to make the decorative chocolate boxes.  Not real sure how we would deal with the sharp edges, public safety thing.

[cineater]

I can't tell you how fucked this is.  Usually the gardens order their plants from the plant sale.  The plant sale coordinator doesn't want to have to keep track of those orders any more.  I get it, it's a lot of work to keep track of those orders, make sure they order enough seeds for the garden and the sale, and then make sure the garden plants get separated from the sale plants.  But if you have both groups ordering seeds, that's a lot of wasted seeds and more shipping costs.  Thing is all those plant sale people who order seeds are all garden leads.  You going to have them to do it twice?  And isn't the point of using the same plants on display in the gardens to show off what we sell?

I'm hoping the seed orderers talk some sense into the coordinator.  And I can just be a bitch about this.  We get to buy plants before the public.  I can have my leads go in and buy the plants they want and turn in the receipts for reimbursement.     It would throw off their numbers for what they want available to the public and effectively null those sales as money makers for us.

Plus they want the leads to seed up their own seeds.  Okay but those people work those seed parties, handing out what needs to get seeded.  Who's going to do that job while they are seeding up their own plants and for other leads who can't be there?  And were going to be germinating more seeds so we're taking up more of the growers lights.  You increased the number of containers and use of growing medium.

Did I say the coordinator is Marsha?  Believe me she is damn good at plant sale but this is fucked up.  Maybe it's chemo brain.  Maybe she's just tired.  We'll do it her way.  We'll make it work.

Holy shit!  Went to scratch my neck and one of those big katydids was in my hair and now it flew behind my desk.  Scared the shit out of me.  Where's Terrapin?  She was just playing with one of them in the garage.  Those things creep me out.

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Woohoo, I'm going junking tomorrow for the gardens.  Susan's church is having their annual garage sale.  Beka says text her pictures if I find stuff we can use for the new bed renovations.  She's in charge of the work session tomorrow.  Wouldn't you know it, I take the day off and all my other senior leads are too.  Hopefully, nobody comes because we are expecting rain and I'm just a text away.  Beka can handle it but she has the trainees in class.

This is kind of cool.  There is cocoa mulch.  It's made from the shells of the cocoa bean and it smells like chocolate!  Hershey use to sell it and apparently had them using it around town.  I'll have to find some of that for the Chocolate garden.  There's a warning it's toxic to dogs.  We're not a dog park so I'm using it.  We'll just put up a warning sign.  Wonder how long that smell lasts?

[cineater]

Really didn't find any good junk for the gardens.  A couple of aluminum plates for the side of the tool shed to decorate that up in the moon garden.  3 pairs of binoculars for the bird walk tour.  A pair of garden jeans for me.  I need to get my shopping list and go to the flea markets on Sunday.

They finished the plans and plant selections for all 3 bed renovations.  I should be getting them soon.  What worries me out of all of this is Beka said total cost around $500.  Normally not a problem but they are cutting the budget back to put on that convention.  The garden budget is always the first to get cut.  Always under funded.

[cineater]

Marsha has rethought how we will do the seeds.  Basically after the plant sale people plant up what they need, the garden people will plant what we need in a separate container out of the leftover seeds.  This works except you know who's going to have to coordinate that.     It's okay, I'm at all the seeding events.  Instead of working it, I'll be sitting there seeding.  And I have the option of seeding at home.

She sounded good today.  Still at home and can't drive but she's feeling good enough to want to leave the house.  She's digging into the manual for how to run the convention.  Give her a minute, I bet she takes over the lead on that.  I'm not stepping up for that job but I'll work my ass off for her is she takes it on.

Anyway, quarterly leads meeting coming up.  Same day as the GNR concert.    It all happens at once.  This is the one where I see how much money people aren't going to spend.  I still have $7,000 in the budget but fall is when we do all our big projects.  We've got some bricks to install, a long path to dig out, wood to replace in the pantry beds and plant markers to order.  Historically, the gardens have returned good size chunks of money at the end of the year.  We kind of run out of steam in the fall.  I know they would like me to return some of that money but I'm on a roll and they are indicating the budget will be cut next year.  I have tours schedule for September and October and we're tearing the place up.     We'll make it work.  I have a feeling I'm going to be saying that a lot.

[cineater]

Texting me at 4 in the morning is just fucking rude.  I would have ignored it but I was annoyed with myself for leaving the phone in the living room and not putting it on the charger.  Yeah I'm going to respond.  Didn't even apologize for waking me up.  Actually a disturbing dream had me half awake.  Wasn't real but it sure felt like it.

Anyway, I'd be out the door at the garden but it's sprinkling a little.  Today's to do list:  Weed my beds, run the trimmer and if I don't run out of steam mow the grass.  I may put digging out where the bricks are going to go on my list for after my nap.  I'll see where I crash.  Moved Wednesday harvesting to Tuesday morning due to a likely rain out.  E-mailed the team.  I'll text them at a more appropriate time.  They come close enough to me to kill me for texting them at 4.   

[cineater]

10 hours.    It only took an hour to be weed all my beds and then I got rained out.  And then David panicked thinking we had to harvest the tomatoes today.  Thought he was starting on that but then I get there and no David.  He came back.  Got the trimming done and the hand mowing.  If you trim with holes in the knees of your pants, you might as well have been wearing shorts.