Sunday, October 23, 2011

Gardening in Transylvania

Since I was behind on my sleep, I let myself sleep in this morning to catch up. Then I was slow getting moving... so it was rather late by the time I got moving to do some gardening.

This is the chunk of dad's old yard that I plan to devote to veggies:
IMG_5153
IMG_5154

A neighbour has been parking his truck in the back. Annoyingly, he parked such that I couldn't get the wheelbarrow through to the garden, and had to go around to the side gate. (There's a step at the side gate.)
IMG_5155

Although this morning was dry, the clouds did open up shortly after I started. I decided that I didn't care, since I was going to get sweaty and dirty anyway.

Shortly before the sun set, I decided to take a progress photo:
IMG_5156
I could tell that was going to be blurry from the low light, so I turned on the flash... and my camera decided it didn't have enough battery for that. (I had a spare, but didn't feel like digging it out, since it's one that has trouble holding a charge, and might have been flat anyway.)

Shortly after I took that photo, the rest of the light left. Then it started raining harder. With lightning. And there I was, planting onions and *garlic*, at night, in the rain and lightning. I felt like I was in Transylvania or something.

The motion-light didn't have it's sensor pointed in my direction, so I had to keep going over to turn the light back on. After I had some perennials in the ground (which will eventually be transplanted elsewhere), plus two rows that included three types of garlic and a winter onion, I decided that was enough. I got some of everything planted, so even if I don't get the rest in, I feel like I didn't waste what people gave me. (I had intended to do separate rows for the four varieties, but decided that the light and weather dictated otherwise.)

It was *really* pouring by the time I packed it up for the night. I was able to wash my hands by holding them in the drips from the eavestrough (where there shouldn't be drips). The garden tools were wet and muddy, but there wasn't much I could do about that. I put the box of weeds by the trash, took the tools back to my mom's, and then headed home.

IMG_5158
Yeah, I'm glad I didn't bother having a shower before I headed out.

Looks like I brought some of the garden home with me:
IMG_5159
I stripped on the entrance mat, then put everything I was wearing, plus the gardening gloves, in the shower for a pre-laundry rinse. Thankfully Red River gumbo comes out of clothes fairly easily. After doing laundry, there was still a green stain from some of the weeds, but all of the mud came out.

If I'm lucky, I'll get another chance to garden before winter hits, and can get the rest of the onions and garlic in. (I have more than I can possibly use... but it seems a shame to waste the baby bulbs.)

2 comments:

Catlady said...

Well, if you end up with too much garlic next year, and wonder who to share it with.... ;)

noricum said...

Hee!

I think a lot of the garlic will need two to three years to reach a decent size, but I'll keep you in mind! :)