Yardwork

DH and I spent most of the weekend tackling the yard; a formidable task, given that DH blew out his back and had to be medicated to the hilt on Vicodin just to get out of bed. I suspect the lack of exercise since moving, coupled with the stress and heavy lifting of moving, are to blame. I’m hoping to get him out of the house and walking around a bit more in order to alleviate some of the pain.

But we managed to clear the foot and a half of dead leaves out of the front yard, anyway. I left the backyard for next weekend. First was the trip to Lowe’s to purchase a rake, a shovel, a snow shovel, an ax, you know, standard home implements. DH raked the front yard while I picked through all the deadwood in the yard for usable kindling/firewood. We then scrounged an old tarp, loaded all the piles of leaves onto it, one by one, and dragged it to the back corner of the yard and dumped it. The leaf dumps will become compost piles. It was surprisingly physical work. Wouldn’t our parents be proud? Look at us, voluntarily doing yard work.

While dumping leaves, I discovered an old grill, haphazardly covered, by a locked storage shed. (The storage shed houses the landlord’s crap, and we were told in no uncertain terms to leave it alone. “Crap” being the operative word—there are stacks of boards, bricks, flagstones, old buckets, what I suspect was once a volleyball net, and various other detritus scattered around the yard. I’ve been attempting to pull all that stuff behind the storage shed, so I don’t have to look at it all winter.) The grill was in pretty bad shape—the bottom rack was half-rotted out, the casing was pitted with rust, and there was a propane tank hooked up to it, though I have no idea how full it might be. Nevertheless, I immediately thought, “Hey, maybe we could clean this up and use it!”

Until I opened it, to discover 1. A mouse. 2. A mouse nest. 3. Calcified charcoal, housing both a mouse and a mouse nest. I slammed the lid, jumped back, and made DH poke the mouse nest with a stick until the mouse dropped out of the grill and ran away. Where’s a cat when you need one?

Of course, then I was paranoid all the rest of the day, and kept picturing homeless mice running out of the piles of leaves everywhere.

But we have a clear front yard, new fireplace implements, enough scrap wood for at least a couple of good-sized fires, and a newly restocked pantry. So I’ll call that a productive weekend.