busy home weekend
Our ReplayTV has failed to load new schedule listings for the past week. (Two weeks actually, since it usually has listings for a week in advance.) I'm hoping doing a factory reset will clear the problem, but that means losing all the programs that have already been recorded. So we've been watching a lot of TV this weekend. The last reset we did was 19 July 2006, but it seems to generally have some kind of crippling problem about twice a year. (I have got to get some PC hardware and tuner cards so I can install MythTV and be done with all this.)
Sunday we did a lot of yard work. We had arranged to rent a roto-tiller for last Sunday, and it wasn't available when we went to pick it up. We ended up with one today, and using it was hard work. Those garden tillers look so easy to use in the TV commercials. Very misleading. It's probably easy to re-till established beds, but breaking new ground is nothing like that. (I have a much greater appreciation for the term "sod busting".) I plowed two strips across our front yard, wrapping around the corner - pretty much where the pine trees used to be. The tree guys ground out the stumps, but there are still some roots close to the surface that stumped the tiller. anniemal brought compost from the back yard for me to till into the broken ground, which seems to be mostly clay. The tiller was very heavy. We arranged cinder blocks into a staircase to get it out of the van and back in later. Conveniently, the rental came with a full tank of gas. Our mower is electric, so we don't have a can of gas sitting around. (Hmm, that ought to be worth a discount on homeowner's insurance.) We're both going to have a lot of sore muscles Monday....
Annie's got lots of seedlings started and ready to transplant, and lots more seeds to plant. We have to figure out how we're going to set up something trellis-like for the viney plants. And she spotted some white violets blooming in the yard, so she wants to transplant those too before they meet the mower. She's got plenty to keep her busy.
The last surprise of the day was finding a plastic jar of peanut butter with a crack. It explains why Annie found oil on the floor of the pantry. She couldn't figure out where the oil had come from. I transferred the peanut butter to another jar.