Can you say, Nematodes?

Up until not that long ago,  I had no idea what the heck a Nematode was, but apparently they’re kind of important.

And,  you can put them on your lawn.

And,  you can do that by putting them in a bucket of water. 

And, it’s best done when the lawn is wet.

Well,  it was raining today, and I’m sure I was an interesting sight out there with my watering can and umbrella.  “We can do up to 3000 square feet”.

Really?

Fun times.

Of course,  we have no idea as to just how effective they’ll be against grubs, or whether or not the whole thing is just one big ruse.  I mean, you can’t exactly see them,  although my flip-flops were starting to get a bit slimy at one point, so I guess there must have been something going on.

No worries,  I rinsed off my tootsies before coming into the house.

It wasn’t like,  slimy having walked in cow dung, (not that I would have ever walked in cow dung in flip-flops, mind you)  but it was definitely not just water I was spraying on the grass.

We’ll see.

Actually, *thinks*,  we won’t.

 

Anyhoodle,  I figured I’d mention one little project that has finally started to get down to the bitter end,  and that’s the gas insert that is now hooked up and basically ready to go.

 

And yes,  I have the slate at the ready to cover the bare concrete hearth.  That’s next.

 

Had a “gas Dude” in yesterday to get it hooked up,  and most everything went as planned with only a slight snag.  The opening for the vent pipes that I had put in was just a little bit too far towards the back of the previous firebox,  so I had to get in there with an air chisel and do some surgery.  Now that was fun!  Not.  Had to work at that from a prone position,  which of course meant having concrete raining down on my face.  I’m pretty sure I’ve washed most of it out of my hair. 

This is what we’ve been looking at for a quite while now.  Glad that’s over.

Oh,  and did I mention that I had to build up the firebox so the thing would fit properly?

Just so happened that I had some random bricks hanging around.

Probably not something I should readily admit. 

Here I’ve been snapping pictures all along,  and not sharing.  I’m sure you were just dying to know what had been going on here all along.

 

I’m still in a bit of a quandary as to the placement of the “fire logs”,  but Gas Dude and I lit the thing up using the arrangement that we came up with,  and it works fine.  The only slight wrinkle is,  there’s one piece that just doesn’t seem to have an obvious spot.

 

This is what I got:

This is what’s left over:

I sat there in front of that arrangement studying it for way too long today.  Nothing happened.

Naturally,  the diagram in the instruction manual is for a completely different set,  so that was zero help.   I’m going to stop by a local retail outfit and pick someone’s brain tomorrow some time. 

I took pictures.

Managed to transfer them to my tablet.  That’s a whole other story.

It hasn’t been quite cool enough to have the fireplace on,  and I’m in no hurry to get to that point when we’ll be so inclined.

Sadly,  the forecast looks as though we’ll get to test it out in the next week or so. 

Bah.

 

Thanks for stopping by.

Keep it between the ditches.

Rode hard and put up wet.

Or at least that’s the way my shoulder has been feeling for the last week,  and I know it’s from getting slightly carried away on the boat a week ago.  Some sort of switch went off in my pea brain,  and I thought I had the upper body strength of a much younger and stronger guy. 

Turns out I didn’t.

I see I haven’t had too darned much to say for a bit.  Well, in trying to avoid that “one cactus looks like another” syndrome, I haven’t had much to say so as not to bore you. 

There, hope that makes it all better.

 

The sailing thing has switched to the “Fall Series”,  which means we go out on Sundays,  today being one of the exceptions,  for me at least.

This Sunday morning I spent with a host of other volunteers registering folks and taking their donations to the Terry Fox Marathon of Hope. 

It was a good morning.  Not overly cool, but pleasant.  I could still feel my fingers by mid-morning,  so that’s always a good sign.  Last year it was just that much colder,  with a constant breeze off the lake.  I don’t remember much,  but I remember that.

More and more contributors are donating “on-line” these days,  which makes the job of sorting out their registration “stuff” all that much easier. 

That was especially appreciated,  as I was plunked in between two “newbies” since I was now “experienced”.    Note quotation marks. 

I have difficulty remembering what I did yesterday,  let alone the refresher we had a week ago.  But I managed.

The “newbies” were both very sharp young-uns who had total recall of all the tiny little nuances,  and I’m sure made far fewer little slip-ups than I.

Thankfully,  the “slip-ups”  don’t get past the rear guard,  and usually consist of forgetting to fill in one box or other.  I’m pretty sharp when it comes to counting the actual dough however, and making sure it all gets put into the bag.  No worries there.

I think that goes back my days of handling cash in the restaurant business.  Some things never seem to completely fade away.  Long term memory and all.

 

So,  I don’t really have any pictures,  since my picture taking has kinda sucked lately.  They’re pretty cringe worthy.  Trust me.

I’ve done something goofy to the settings on the camera,  and I don’t seem to see it until I put the pic up on the big screen.  May be time for a “re-boot”.

 

That’s about it.  Thanks for moving your eyes back and forth.

 

Keep that stick on the ice.

Haven’t had much to say.

We’re having another hot spell,  and I’m not referring to “raging hormones” or any such thing.  We’re past that. Thankfully.

We did manage to unpack the very last thing from the move home,  which was the outside table that we had on the patio in Vienna. 

I have to say,  the movers did a really good job of packing it up, which meant it wasn’t all that easy to unpack.   Not quite like the movers we had in Puerto Rico.  There were a few items that ended up getting scratched, mostly since they didn’t really have it all figured out. 

Water under the bridge at this point.

 

We’ve done without an outside table this summer,  mostly since the one that we had out there has been moved up into the “Veranda”.  It’s still basically a three season space,   and too hot to sit in today, that’s for sure.  Too hot to be anywhere outside, as far as I’m concerned.

 

Sailing has been a bit of a bust on the last two outings.  Hot humid air just hanging around makes for no wind.

So we drank beer instead.  Among other things.

 

There’s always a way to make the best of it.  I’ll be out again tomorrow night.  Here’s hoping for some wind.

 

Oh,  and I have to show this next picture to Travelling Companion.

I had her sew me up a pouch thingy for our reading glasses while on board.

 

As there are (at last count) three of us at any given time who need glasses at the nav station,  I got tired of trying to either fish my “cheaters” out of my sail bag,  or out of a pocket.  Keeping things in a pocket when  on the foredeck is never a good idea,  by the way.  Too easy to lose yer stuff.

So this works.  Get aboard.  Get squared away.  Put your particular version of “cheater” in a pouch.  And you’re ready.  It’s held in place with peal and stick Velcro,  so it could be removed over the winter if need be. 

Now I just have to figure out some sort of pouch arrangement for the camera.  That one is more of a challenge.   Might not happen until spring.  We’ll see.

I have the material from an old blue camp chair that I’m eyeing,  but T.C. says it’s too thick for her machine.  I might end up just hand sewing something. 

I’d have to figure it out first of course. 

That’s pretty much all I have in my pea brain.  Just thought I’d pipe up and say something.

 

Keep your oars in the water.

 

Thanks for stopping by.