Who'll start the rain?

I woke up early on Saturday morning. I had a cup of coffee, processed the photos and wrote the Blog entry. It took long enough that I had another cup of coffee before I was finished. I took a whole chicken out of the chest freezer to thaw for tomorrow’s dinner. Then I made soft-boiled eggs for breakfast.

I stripped the bed and started the first load of the weekend wash. Then I watched the news until it was time to shave and shower. I headed out (without a jacket) to my first appointment, a massage at 9:30 AM.

From there I hit Kroger’s for a few staples I was missing. I just made it in time to my second appointment, a haircut. It was when walking in the parking lot that I realized just how much I missed my jacket. It was chilly out there!

Finally I went to Home Depot. This was not a scheduled trip until last night. I bought a new wheelbarrow. Unfortunately, they were all assembled. You would have laughed had you seen how I ended up transporting it home. More than half of the thing was outside the vehicle and barely held on with bungie cords. The Volvo looked like the truck Jed drove out West on the Beverly Hillbillies!

I got home and unloaded the wheelbarrow first, (before it fell off) and then the groceries. I treated the cats, put the bedding into the dryer and then changed to my working clothes. I added a jacket this time and headed out to get some work done before it rained.

First thing was to get the old wheelbarrow up front. I want to take the tire and wheel off (I bought that to replace the original tire a while back) before I set the rest of it out for the trash man. Since I basically replaced the old one with the exact same model new one, I can use the tire again if necessary (it was much wider and more heavy-duty than the original). And, since I soon will be storing the new wheelbarrow in my new outbuilding, instead of outside in the weather like the old one, the new one should last a lifetime (or, at least MY lifetime).

The first thing I did was to put the last load of topsoil in the raised bed vegetable garden. Then I took load after load from the pile (on my side of the driveway) to each rut in the front lawn. I unloaded it, in most cases shovel by shovel and tamped the dirt down.

When I had all of the ruts filled in, I got a bucket and filled it with my grass seed. I spread the seed over each dirt patch and then raked it in. I took a few pictures, mostly of flowers in front.

It was 4:30 PM and the clouds were thickening and darkening. Come on, rain! So, I buttoned up everything in the front and went out back.

I seeded all the filled ruts except for the ones they might use to drive back with the supplies (i.e. shingles or doors) for the shed. No sense wasting seed on them until the shed is finished.

I put everything away for the night and went in to make either a very late lunch or an early dinner. I went with the fajitas and refried beans leftovers. I turned on the news, but got a late-running golf game instead.

Just then, my friend B___ called and we caught each other up on the past week. He was as busy with his boat as I have been with the yard.  He offered me a skylight (still in the box) he had bought for a shed he planned but never built. However, as we talked, I learned it was made to fit rafters with 24” centers. Mine are 18-inch. As much as I would like it, I don’t want to slow down the construction by having start Rick moving rafters!

I was also bummed to learn that it was raining in Mt. Clemens. It wasn’t here!

I made up the bed and then started watching taped TV shows. By the time I was ready to go to sleep, it was almost 10:30 PM and it still hadn’t rained! And, my back hurt…