Today is Saturday but this story begins on Thursday.
It was a typical Thursday with one exception, the weather people were forecasting rain. We definitely need the rain and they were saying that we had a 70% chance.
Do you know what 70% chance (or any % chance) of rain means? That prediction means that 70% of the area should receive rain.
The weather people were also saying the temp would drop dramatically when a cold front arrived. Wow, rain and a cold front at the same time, how could it get any better than that.
Friday came and the weather people had changed their tune, now the rain was going to be south of us but we were still going to get the cold front on Saturday.
Friday was a good day to work outside, the temperature stayed in the low 80s and it was cloudy most of the day. I clean the weeds out of a flower bed and removed some cactus that was beginning to hang outside the flower bed, making it difficult to mow and weed eat.
Removing parts of this cactus plant, requires special attention, if you do not want to be impaled. I used a set of long handled pruning shears (36 inch handles) to cut the cactus parts off the main plant. I used my pickup and reach tool (36 inches long) to handle the cactus safely. When not working with cactus I use the pickup tool (aka old person don’t want to bend over and pick stuff up tool) to pick up sticks from the ground prior to mowing.
That statement made me think of something I had not thought about in a long time, “Pickup Sticks”. I assume in today’s technical world, that a game like pick up sticks would just be boring.
If memory serves me, and it still does, the pickup sticks were kept in a can like container about ten inches tall. There were about 30 or so plastic sticks, each slightly thicker than a tooth pick, they were about 9 to 10 inches long and various colors.
I am fairly sure this game would be considered as a dangerous game in today’s overly cautious world. Now that I think of it, kids today would not know how to safely play this game, heck they aren’t allowed to play dodge ball using soft round rubber balls, because someone might be hit with the ball.
Even worse than that, everyone can’t be a winner in dodge ball. Your government (owners of your schools) doesn’t want children to be ranked as winners or losers.
Darn, you have gotten me completely off the subject with your old time games, let’s try to stay focused for the rest of the story.
After successfully removing the cactus without being impaled, I decided to tackle another outdoor project on this cloudy Friday. Cloudy is important, as I am to either have a long sleeved shirt on or wear sun block when out in the sun. Also when you don’t have a lot of hair on top of your head, you can easily get a sun burn up there.
I have been wanting to rework the black berry vines making them more accessible from both sides. This accessibility would make it less hazardous when attempting to pick one of the huge berries for personal consumption.
This project was filled with risks. I would need to remove a trellis and then two plastic fence sections from within the man-eating plants. I was able to remove those items and I was attacked only once during the extrication process. I can show you the blood on my shirt.
Next I needed to install two T post to which I would attach clothes line wire that would support the large vine (some of you may not know what clothes line wire is, in the olden days people would wash their clothes and then hang them out to dry on wires that were stretched between to post).
These T post are 7 foot tall and I was required to stand on top a four foot ladder to drive them into the ground. (Not a smart thing for a senior to do)
Now came the difficult part, I had to go to the, “ACE store” to get the clothes line wire. Why ACE, it is one mile from the house and the DIB store is 6 miles away.
The clothes line wire is coated in a green plastic. I attached the wire to the posts with four levels of the wire and then realized, I was not going to be able to get the thorn laden, black berry limbs through the wires.
I then removed the entire fifty feet of wire and started over. This time I was weaving the wire through the bush, attempting to support the various limbs as I installed each of the four levels of wire.
The weight of the black berry bush and the fact that each wire once installed, was pulling the post toward each other, cause me to install a length of plastic conduit between the two posts. This was done in an attempt to keep the posts from leaning toward each other. I will later replace the plastic conduit with a thin walled metal conduit.
What seemed like an hour project took me 4 hours. Partly because I was being cautious (thorns galore) and partly because I had not taken time to plan the project prior to starting.
As you can see, I will need to rework the border. Instead of a 4 X 4, possibly two feet wide and 6 or 8 feet long, in line with the posts.
Let’s see now, we have covered Thursday and Friday what about Saturday.
Today is Saturday and the weather people got the cold front right. The outside temp is in the low 60s. A dramatic drop from 95 down to 62, which is a shock to one’s system. I will need to find a long sleeved shirt when I venture outside.
I hope your projects are without thorns.
Don Ford
For those persons who enjoy pointing out my grammar errors, I do know that one should use either the number (1, 2, 3, etc.) or the word for the number (one, two, three etc.) and not switch between both. Thank you for reading the stories, and then for noticing.
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