{"id":15095,"date":"2018-11-04T21:07:42","date_gmt":"2018-11-05T04:07:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/?p=15095"},"modified":"2018-11-09T09:06:51","modified_gmt":"2018-11-09T16:06:51","slug":"halfsies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/?p=15095","title":{"rendered":"Halfsies."},"content":{"rendered":"

This is National Novel Writing Month<\/a> which means I pledged to write every single day this month.\u00a0 It also means I am doing everything except rewriting the 198 pages of the novel.\u00a0 Not editing, rewriting.\u00a0 Because I decided it was way too descriptive and I also wanted to change it up to start each chapter with an action scene.\u00a0 It’s okay, I can face making the change.\u00a0 I just need to do everything else in the world before facing it.\u00a0 Since I can practically spit clean (that’ s a real thing<\/a>, by the way, and science backs it up) my house in all of 15 minutes I had to venture out into the garden.\u00a0 The fall garden needed a lot of fall cleaning.\u00a0 A lot.<\/p>\n

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I decided I would move forward with my plan to shorten the rows to leave an open area for a bonfire pit as well as large spaces for herbs.\u00a0 Now that my kids are so busy they only eat at home about 3 times a week I don’t need as many veggies.\u00a0 But I do need a bigger bonfire pit suitable for whisky drinking and s’mores (surprisingly good together).\u00a0 Also I need to move the current bonfire pit away from the front engine of the RV–although using the headlights for light is convenient, it kind of makes my guests nervous.\u00a0 I’ve assured them the gasoline tank is a solid 24 feet away from the engine but people are such nervous nellies about fire and gasoline.\u00a0 Plus I should certainly start experimenting with a wider variety of herbs.\u00a0 Homemade herbal tea goes well with living alone, having cats, and spending as much time reading in bed as possible. Also herbal infused or mulled whisky drinks are all the rage and seem so much classier than just sipping it out of the bottle between bites of s’mores.<\/p>\n

Anyway, this meant taking down a lot of trellises, mowing down the brush that had grown up around their bases, and covering next year’s rows with tarps to kill off the winter weeds and grasses that creep into the beds.\u00a0 I figured I could only get half the garden done in one afternoon, but I didn’t mind.\u00a0 Because that meant I could put off working on the novel again tomorrow in order to finish the other half of the garden.\u00a0 The garden gives and gives, even in the fallow season.<\/p>\n

As an added bonus we are in the fourth quarter of the waning moon.\u00a0 This makes it easier to pull out weeds (as well as T-posts), greenery slower to grow back, and a good time for me to divide and transplant perennials and herbs from my other beds.\u00a0 You don’t have to believe this old farmer nonsense about gardening and moon phases but science is finally starting to believe it<\/a>.\u00a0 Feel free to move trellises during a waxing moon and pull as hard as you want on your T-posts.\u00a0 My shoulders prefer my posts to slide out like butter.\u00a0 Which reminds me there is a great technique for brown butter bourbon<\/a> that you should know.\u00a0 Because I think saturated fats are healthy again.\u00a0 Plus, you know, whiskey.\u00a0 And yes, all bourbon is whiskey; just not the other way around.<\/p>\n

Where were we?…..<\/p>\n

So I started off by taking down the string trellis hung around the garden.\u00a0 Several years ago I found some nylon trellis netting in the discount bin at Wally World and I snatched it up.\u00a0 I didn’t believe the packaging that promised it was long-lasting and capable of supporting heavy crops, but I figured if it lasted a single season it was worth the 50 cents.\u00a0 Turns out it has lasted 5 or 6 years now.\u00a0 It can support even a flourishing green bean crop and it hasn’t deteriorated even though I put it out in early spring and don’t usually bring it in until after frost.\u00a0 Oh it’s a pain to keep from tangling.\u00a0 It’s braided so that plants can climb it easily but that also means it catches on everything from the fabric of your gloves to every leaf or twig it touches.\u00a0 Putting up or taking down the string trellises takes a lot of patience.\u00a0 Or a lot of desire to avoid rewriting the novel.\u00a0 Whichever.\u00a0 I considered putting each trellis in its own sandwich bag but ended up piling them together.\u00a0 It looked like a bad mistake as soon as I did it.\u00a0 Best not to think about it too much.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

With the string out of the way I detached the cattle panels from the T-posts.\u00a0 I use everything from baling twine to zip ties to attach my posts so it’s a lot of clipping and scissoring.\u00a0 Luckily, I keep a holey bucket in the garden for capturing all the little pieces as I cut them.\u00a0 That keeps them from ending up wrapped around the lawnmower blades where they’re pretty tricky to remove.\u00a0 I used to flip the lawnmower over to cut off any entwined strings but that always made the lawnmower stop working.\u00a0 Apparently turning the lawnmower upside down is a big no-no.\u00a0 And don’t think you can just tip it to the side either.\u00a0 ‘Cause the side you’re supposed tip it on has something to do with the location of the sparkplug but I can never remember what.\u00a0 It seems like this is a problem someone should have fixed by now but until they stop with the electronics and make it simpler to get twine off the lawnmower blade, I’ve settled for gathering it all in the holey bucket as I work.<\/p>\n

I love the holey bucket.\u00a0 Don’t you have any tools around the house or farm that are just a scrap piece of nothing, a throwaway, that work perfectly for a specific job? I had an old tent stake that was a perfect emergency bolt for closing the barn top door.\u00a0 I kept it on a wire hook next to the door and I blamed the kids and screamed at them\u00a0\u00a0<\/del>wept when it went missing.\u00a0 Because it was so absolutely perfect.\u00a0 Likewise, the holey bucket can’t carry liquids but I use it all the time for other things in the garden.\u00a0 It’s especially good at corralling the bits of twine and zipties as well as holding the scissors and wire cutters as I work my way around the trellises.\u00a0 I can even leave stuff in it without covering it because if it rains the water drains right through.\u00a0 Brilliant!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Once the cattle panels were out of the way I started sliding out the T-posts, garden stakes, and rebar that I had holding them up.\u00a0 But when I went to stack them against the pole where I keep those sorts of items, I discovered it was all overgrown with weeds.\u00a0 Which meant I had to stop what I was doing and weed that section of the garden, making a clear place to put the posts.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

That’s the thing about the garden.\u00a0 She’s got a bad case of ADHD and she doesn’t take her meds.\u00a0 She dangles a million jobs in front of you and even if you are avoiding the novel it takes a bit of discipline to get anything accomplished at all.\u00a0 I made a quick detour and weeded the fenceline from the posts to the start of the climbing roses.\u00a0 Only about half the job but enough to keep moving forward while still leaving another half for tomorrow.\u00a0 I’m not gonna lie.\u00a0 The half that requires weeding around the thorny roses is not appealing.\u00a0 The waning moon doesn’t do squat for thorns.\u00a0 But now I had a nice clear place to pile my T-posts.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Cattle panels came down next so I could mow over all the brush at their bases.\u00a0 With them came the marigolds, tomato plants, and basil that were still lingering.\u00a0 It’s hard to explain what that rush of marigold scent was like—the feel of summer sun on my shoulders, the buzz of the garden in full bloom. The tomato vines gave way and with each snapping stem they threw off waves of that distinct tomato-only scent<\/a>, which transported me back to when they were just seedlings in the greenhouse and running a hand over their growing leaves released that amazing promise of summer.\u00a0 And the basil, oh the basil-inspired whir of the blender and the taste of fresh pesto on everything from sandwiches to pasta to veggies themselves.\u00a0 There is no substitute for real scents of life.\u00a0 No candle or air freshener could ever compare to standing in the garden as those heady smells flood the senses.\u00a0 Plus, the marigolds made an appealing addition to the burn pile in the new bonfire pit.\u00a0 Very Day of the Dead-ish.\u00a0 Because the garden may be scattered but she’s also very stylish.<\/p>\n

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Oh, also the other half of the garden still had its share of marigolds.\u00a0 More than its fair share.\u00a0 Plenty of marigolds to get us through the blahs of the first frost. I planted these marigolds around the watermelons to keep down squash bugs.\u00a0 I think the marigolds ate the squash bugs and the melons.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

With posts and panels out of the way I mowed everything I could chop up.\u00a0 I didn’t pull up this reproduction of the tomatillo plant.\u00a0 Apparently it reseeded itself and created this adorable plant with teeny tiny tomatillos with bitty blossoms and delicate husks.\u00a0 It was just too cute for the burn pile so I left it climbing away in its cage and mowed around it.\u00a0 It’s a simple joy to leave things be just because you enjoy their presence.\u00a0 It made me smile when I looked at it.\u00a0 And that means something.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Next up was the Tarp Pile of Death.\u00a0 As I remove tarps in the spring I pile them neatly at the top of the garden.\u00a0 There they remain, surrounded by a gradually thickening weed border, and providing a haven for all the snakes, spiders, ants, millipedes, wasps, yellow jackets, and other necessary creatures that are best left alone.\u00a0 It’s only when the temperatures have dropped enough to kill or least slow down these bringers of pain and death that I consider disturbing the pile.\u00a0 \u00a0Still I do it carefully—just a couple fingers gradually dragging a tarp slowly away from the pile, so that it can release all of its dangers while still giving me a headstart on an escape.\u00a0 \u00a0I think this picture is blurry because my free hand was shaking so bad.\u00a0 Scary, huh?<\/p>\n

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Even these tarps have memories for me.\u00a0 The biggest one came from a friend after her home renovation.\u00a0 The contractor used it to cover part of the roof as he worked on the dream house she had planned for years. I still have the tarp but she divorced her husband years ago and left him in that dream house as she went on her own way.\u00a0 Another one of the tarps was used to cover the sawdust pile that I used as bedding when we had over 200 ducks on the property.\u00a0 Ducks and ducklings and my kids eating cereal bars on the truck tailgate as we watched our hand-raised flock move down the conveyor belt to the stunning line.\u00a0 Whose life was that?\u00a0 Was it mine<\/em>??\u00a0 Another is simply the floor mat that came with the carrier system we had for our dogs before we even had kids.\u00a0 Before we had kids.<\/em>\u00a0 It was supposed to keep our dogs in the back of the vehicle behind a set of bars, their muddy paws on the plastic lining.\u00a0 I don’t think we even used it more than twice for the dogs, but it has been keeping garden beds weed-free for many years now.\u00a0 \u00a0Guess it’s true—to everything there is a season and a time to every purpose under the heaven.<\/a>\u00a0 And tarps are good for all of them.<\/p>\n

With the sun getting lower and the time for picking up Middle from work and Little from a friend’s house approaching, the push was on.\u00a0 I got the tarps laid out and turned over the the row I was going to use for transplanted herbs. And then a funny thing happened.\u00a0 Instead of tarping the end of that row for next year I just kept on digging.\u00a0 I decided I would go ahead and plant some winter crops.\u00a0 Just some spinach and lettuce.\u00a0 Maybe broccoli and brussels.\u00a0 It’s late in the season but with a row cover they should do just fine.\u00a0 So I finished turning over the entire row.\u00a0 The earth was soft and easy to dig, the garden was encouraging as ever.\u00a0 The garden believes all things are possible.\u00a0 Go for it.\u00a0 Start over.\u00a0 It’s never too late.\u00a0 Why not?\u00a0 ADHD is so exhausting but it can be so much fun!<\/p>\n

It really was beautiful sight.\u00a0 All that rich compost revealed and waiting for planting.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I finished just as dusk fell.\u00a0 The crickets and frogs started up, the moonflowers opened, and the solar twinkle lights on the garden entrance flickered on.\u00a0 Those lights aren’t strong enough to provide any real light in the evenings.\u00a0 I tripped over a cat once standing right in their glow.\u00a0 But they make me smile when I look at them.\u00a0 And that means something.\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Oh, I still had half the garden left to do.\u00a0 Yikes.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

But the light was gone, the boys were home, and we all needed dinner and a shower.\u00a0 Which is when I realized National Novel Writing Month’s dirty little trick.\u00a0 Daylight savings time just ended this month.\u00a0 So it was dark outside by 5:30pm—leaving no more time for working outside and lots of time left for writing inside.\u00a0 Very sneaky.\u00a0 I didn’t rewrite the novel at all.\u00a0 But I wrote this blog post.\u00a0 Which counts as writing every day.\u00a0 For the most part.\u00a0 It’s sort of halfsies.\u00a0 But sometimes halfsies is just enough.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is National Novel Writing Month which means I pledged to write every single day this month.\u00a0 It also means I am doing everything except rewriting the 198 pages of the novel.\u00a0 Not editing, rewriting.\u00a0 Because I decided it was way too descriptive and I also wanted to change it up to start each chapter […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15095","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15095","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15095"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15095\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15126,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15095\/revisions\/15126"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15095"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15095"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15095"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}