The Garden and Some Other Stuff

It's May 15th and it feels pretty nice out. We broke the record high yesterday, something like 97 degrees. I know most people who see this are already aware of that, but this way, when I look back on this post a year from now, I can say, "Wow, it was 97 on May 14th?" And I should also note a week ago I was in Wisconsin for the fishing opener in Hayward, and this is what that looked like:

(May 5th!)

We got the garden up and running finally, and it was a bit of work. I still had a sizable pile of crap (leaves, sticks, other various detritus) from last fall. I was hoping it would naturally compost itself leaving beautiful black soil, but it didn't. It just became a heavy, wet pile of crap. 

(The garden after I moved the crap pile)

(Said crap pile, ready to be removed)

After clearing the space, I finished fencing in the garden, hoping to keep the critters at bay. (Of course, as I'm writing this, there's a squirrel in the garden, doing whatever the heck he wants. I wish I had a BB gun, do you think it'd be kosher to pop open the screen and shoot animals from inside the house?)

I got some dirt and manure and fertilizer and made some raised plots to plant some seeds. Now that I look at them, though, they look much more like graves. 

(Garden ready to be sowed)

  Our mini transplants weren't looking too healthy after the long winter, so we are mainly planting from seed. We also got some serrano peppers and roma tomatoes as transplants. 

(It's a prison for plants)

Despite all this work, I could see the garden not really working out. But one thing I know I can count on . . . the hops!

(Hops don't care about crappy weather or soil. They're like the Yang Yang's of the plant world (Referring, of course, to star badminton player Yang Yang).)

(Room to grow)

Last year was the first year for the hops (I guess that's obvious, being it was our first year in the house), and they still grew to the top of the shepherd's hook I was using. This year I got a ten foot pole of conduit and used an S-hook to tie the twine to (don't worry, it looks really close to the power lines in this photo, but that's just an optical illusion—I still have a good five or six fee). I zip-tied the pole to the fence, so that's kinda trashy. But it's been working well so far.

Finally, here are a few night shots I took yesterday. 

(View out the back door—notice the slight streak in the stars due to the Earth spinning)

(The front of the house. It was windy, if you're wondering why the tree looks weird.)

That's all for now, peace out, 

-me