Garden of Death

It started out like any other Sunday. MaxieC getting up way too early, and The Mrs. and I both pretending not to notice him jumping on our heads. Eventually, The Mrs. realizes that I got up first yesterday (probably she remembered it from reading it here, as she seems to have a very selective memory about who got up first when it's her turn), and she gets up and takes MaxieC downstairs.

When you're single, you think it'll be great having someone to wake up next to. When you're married, you know much better.

Young Miss HannieC kept coming up every 20 minutes or so to remind me that I was still sleeping even though, "it's not your birthday!" Sheesh. At 8:25, I eventually gave up and got up. Took a shower, put on my tan pants for church, and began ironing a shirt to go with it.

No, in case you're wondering, The Mrs. doesn't iron. I like to think she would iron if she didn't have two screaming kids. But we were married for a number of years prior to having kids, and I can't recall her doing much ironing during that time. But back then, I wore something that needed ironing probably less than once a year. The pressures of having to go to church every week have really been hitting the laundry hard.

So, I'm ironing the shirt, and Miss HannieC appears once again. "Daddy, Mommy says we're not going to church today. We're going to stay home and do some gardening."

Being a good Christian Father, I replied, "First off, Honey, your mother is not in charge. Secondly, imagine if Jesus had just stayed in the garden. Do you think He wanted to die on the cross? No. He liked the garden. It was quiet. It was filled with beautiful flowers. And it was not filled with people yelling 'Crucify Him!' Yet He went and died on the cross so that all your sins could be forgiven and you could someday join with Him in paradise. The least you could do is go to church on Sunday."

Well, alright. What I really said was, "OK." And then I put on my junky clothes.

When The Mrs. is moved to "garden", it's usually a bad thing. It generally involves a large number of bizarre operations that will require multiple trips to multiple stores and for some reason just always has to get done today. This was no exception.

It started out innocently enough. I asked what she had in mind for "gardening." This is what she said. Exactly. I'm not making this up. You can't make up stuff this good.

"I figured you wanted to mow the lawn today."

Now I'm really starting to worry, but I play cool. I'm not cool, but I can play cool on occasion. "I mow the lawn just about every week. I don't think we've ever called that 'gardening', and we've never skipped church for it."

"Well, I kind of have some ideas of things we need to do."

Yup. Here comes.

"Like, I'd like to build some boxes for the garden that we can plant stuff in. Like carrots."

So, here's what that means. See, we have a garden patch over by the fence on the right of the yard. Like most garden patches, it is dirt. If you start to dig in it, you hit dirt. If you dig some more, more dirt. If you dig even more, then you need to get yourself a beers to cool off with. But then it'll just be more dirt. The kids love the dirt. The tomato plants love the dirt. The Mrs. hates the dirt. She wants better dirt. She wants to build above-ground dirt holding containers that we can fill with dirt. Only not the dirt from the garden. New, fancy, expensive dirt. Not the dirt we already have, only mixed with that great compost we've been brewing for a year, and maybe a couple bags of steer poop. Nope, all new dirt.

Whatever.

"Oh, and I want to move the butterfly bush. To over there where the melon patch is."

What I should have said, "Move the butterfly bush? This thing is like 10 feet high! And where are we going to plant our melons? That's just crazy."

"Uhh...OK."

"And I want to get some new flowers for the hanging baskets."

Ah, at last something that makes sense. So, we discuss the box thing a bit and the location of the butterfly bush a bit, and I'm thinking this may be a great opportunity to buy a new tool. I've always wanted a power miter saw, and building garden boxes is the perfect (exc)use for one. So we pile into the truck and head for Home Depot. Now, I know what you're thinking. Home Depot - everything there is crap. Well, maybe. But I happen to be in the market for crap. Steer crap, which Home Depot has for $0.99/cu ft.

We hit the garden section, and spend an hour looking at every single plant, and finally get just the perfect ones. The don't have any cherry tomatoes, so I guess we're not planting the garden today. We load up on steer crap and some other stuff, and then make our first pass through the checkout.

Next, back in to the tool section and the lumber. Unimpressed with the miter saw selection. It's mostly $99 Ryobis and Rigids. Why do both Ryobi and Rigid make multiple models at the same price? I couldn't figure it out. Then, from there it went to a couple of $199 things that they were out of stock on, and up to $600. I'm not spending any $600 for a tool to make boxes for my garden. Then, I wouldn't have enough money for the pneumatic nailer and compressor I'll need.

So, forget the saw. I'll stop by at OSH and pick one up. Or maybe Sears. I still have a Sears gift card from Christmas. Head to the lumber. Naturally, since this is Saturday, they've got lumber fenced off while some idiot with a forklift tries to bring a palette of wood down from up above. We wait. And wait. And wait. The palette is stuck. He's hammering on the adjacent wood with a 2x4 trying to make room for it. Some guy runs off to get him a sledge. F- this. I'll go to Southern Lumber. I'll pay a little more, but the lumber will be higher quality, and I won't have to stand around all day trying to buy it.

It's lunchtime anyways. We go home, eat, and start planting. The Mrs., crafty devil that she is, has bought all kinds of plants that are not for the hanging baskets of Babylon. She starts right in by pulling out a clump of fountain grass that is just starting to come out of its winter dormancy. I yell. Why do you have to kill everything? I'm tired of having you pull up everything we planted last year just because you're tired of it.

"It's dead."

No. It's got all kinds of green blades coming up from the bottom. Look at it. Oye.

She puts it back into the hole. Angrily, because the plant contains some brown given that it has been spring for like 7 days, and The Mrs. does not appreciate brown in plants. Brown is death.

We plant. Then, eventually, The Mrs. declares we must head to OSH to get basket liner moss for the hanging baskets. Great. I can check out saws.

OSH's selection of saws also sucked. They had a lot more DeWalts, but they were also out of stock on just about anything mid-range. Oh well.

Back at the homefront, we managed to move the butterfly bush. I think it will die. Most of the roots did not make the transplant. But, I poured Miracle grow transplant fertilizer on it, which is a root stimulant. So, I'm hoping for the best.

Then, since there was a hole where the butterfly bush was, The Mrs. Needs me to move the tangello tree into that hole. It's always something. The tangello tree is only about 2 ft. high, though, being a dwarf variety. No big deal. I think it may even live after the transplant.

In the end, though, it all worked out well. I got me one of these. Great deal, and an additional 10% off with the promo code on certain drills and saws.