Medical Pre-Testing

I went for my medical pre-testing today at the hospital. I go in on Tuesday morning for my operation. I expect to be out of commission for at least 2 weeks.

The testing was fine. We even got a chest x-ray to round things out. They are very thorough at Parkwest.

Garden Progress

I prepared the buckets for the tomatoes. I checked the trees, and they all have buds, except the crape myrtle. Those aren't going yet. I even have two flower buds on the dogwood! YEA!!!

I repotted a house plant, and potted up some Italian Oregano, and the Basil. I'm ready for greens and squash/cucumbers. I re-planted some of the beans, after the wind pulled over the support and pulled up several of the plants. I moved that planter to where it has more shelter from the wind.

I'm deciding where to put the grapes when they arrive. If the posts are in before my surgery, then I can easily have the plants put in the ground where they need to go. If the posts are not in the ground, who knows if they will even get planted!

Oh well, buckets are about $5 each.

I wrote up a list of stuff that needs to be done before I go into the hospital, and assigned tasks to each day. As long as I follow my schedule, no single day is overwhelming, and everything will get done.

I have this great organizing gene inside me, but it only gets to tell me what to do. It can't enforce things. My follow-through isn't as good as I'd like it to be. Well, I hope to post each day before surgery, and set out my accomplishments and cross stuff off my schedule! So, stay tuned...

Garden!

I found an alternative solution for the garden for this year - containers! Not my ideal, but it will work.

I built my first ever rain barrel yesterday. (You are looking at the overflow side.) It ended up costing about $40 or so, and that works out to less than 1/4 of the commercial jobs. I have a source for the white plastic barrels, too. They look better than a brown trash can. Both can be painted, for sure!

The beans aren't doing well in the planter. I may have to start over. The tomatoes will be going into 5 gallon buckets. Lots of drilling holes, and several cubic feet of potting soil. The strawberries are seeded, as is the stevia. I was able to rescue one artichoke and one brussels sprout. I'll need a flat planter for the greens, so I'll just make it up and leave it outside.

Planting outside here in Zone 6/7 isn't generally done till at least April 15-25. With my surgery happening on April 13 (confirmed), all the planting needs to be done before then. I'll have help around to carry the planters outside, but I want the stuff ready so there is produce this year.

As far as the rest of it, I want my house in decent order before then, too. So, I guess I'd better get off my duff, off the computer, and get to it!

See ya!!!!

Planting!

I planted up the Asparagus yesterday. I didn't do it quite "by the book" as I need large bins, and used short ones. Oh well...

I also set up some planters for strawberries and stevia. That was all I had in me to do yesterday. I have more planting mix, humus and planters, along with a lot more seeds. I got some 5-gallon buckets for the tomatoes, but they all have gunk in them. Maybe I'll toss them and get some pristine ones from the Home Depot later today. I need at least 6, with tomato cages to go in them and a bag of soil each. That's for the 6 tomato plants for this year.

There's no way I can get everything into the ground this year. Just no way I can do it, with the soil conditions, my health, the surgery, and everything. So, this is a viable alternative.

Work on the Horizon & Surgery

Work is on the horizon. I've been hired by the US Census Bureau as an Enumerator. I don't start training till the end of April.

That leaves April to have the Surgery. Right now, we are talking about April 13, but if not, it won't be till May.

I'm about half-done with an e-book that I'll be selling on Clickbank about building a website. I hope that leads to workshops, seminars, and more consulting.