Another weekend, another mow

I can't complain too much, I had a 3 day weekend with fun activities filling Friday and Saturday.

But by Sunday it was time to face the mower again, and tackle the back yard, which featured grass ranging from 6 inches to 4 feet high.  The worst was in the far west where I had to mow enough 4 foot high crabgrass simply to remove the solar lights before I could finish the job.  And the grass had wound itself around the solar light wires.

I only returned two solar lights this time, I will add more from my collection of 12 solar lights over time.  It occurs to me that after about mid November the grass will likely go dormant, so I won't have to be removing and re-adding the solar lights so much until grass growing re-starts in late February.  Whew!  I also intend to get the removal and replacement of the lights more easier, or find ways they don't always need to be removed.  But for now, I need to remove the lights before each mowing, and I am barely keeping up with mowing, which is why I haven't replaced most of them.

Hopefully, too, the crabgrass will eventually be overrun by St Augustine and other grass.  While the crabgrass grows 4 feet, the best part of the St Augustine grows about 3 inches.

I didn't trim around the fence or around Lyndhurst.  I also intend to do that over the next few weeks.  If I pull the crabgrass out, which is better than merely trimming it, but it is exhausting work.  Both are exhausting work, but pulling the stuff out is far worse.  This coming weekend I may do some touch up in the front yard instead.

I had an excuse for that.  I couldn't find my regular leather gloves, only my welding gloves.  The welding gloves are great for pushing the lawn mower, but not so great for doing work like pulling weeds.  I bought some new leather gloves on Monday night.

The same excuse also allowed me to avoid putting the Xeripave pavers in front of Lyndhurst, replacing the motley collection of pavers there now.  But moving any pavers definitely requires good fitting gloves.  It's easy to cut skin on fingers, which is terribly inconvenient when you are doing yard work.

Instead I hauled the trash can which has been sitting in the garden tool shed (Oakhurst) to the front, and also finally trashed the #3 rebar which has been sitting on the patio for two months.  The rebar needed to be bent enough to fit in a trash bag, and there's nothing better for that job than welding gloves.

On Monday afternoon I put ant poison on one new mondo ant mound in the back yard and around the tree in the front yard.

Last week I did notice some of the old chemical smell in Lyndhurst after the doors and window had been closed. I opened the window a crack, and after that it didn't seem as bad after that during the next few days, but that may be coincidence.  The smell is far attenuated from what it was in March, and doesn't even always come back when the doors are closed (which may be helped by the lack of door seals).  I think when I noticed the smell the strongest last week was when the wind was blowing from the north at about 10mph.  Perhaps that forces chemical smell out of the north building wall.  Still it's a bit disappointing when just a few weeks ago I had convinced myself the smell was completely gone.

Lyndhurst now needs a good floor and wall cleaning.  Even the shelves, which I have focussed my attention on, should probably be re-cleaned.  Now it's pretty clear I will not be getting to that by November 1.  But I want to get the building cleaned by December 1 and have the contents of my 3rd bedroom moved out there by January 1.

During October I've had the Lyndhurst doors closed mostly.  But re-smelling the smell leads me to want to open them.

Another concern is the bottom door seal.  Grass pokes through and it may be a good entryway for bugs also.  I noticed a walking stick bug inside last week, but it could have gotten in when the doors were open.  Next time I saw it, a few days later, it looked dead.  But there is some funny fuzz around the doors that looks like the evidence of some kind of bug.

Replacing the bottom door seal may require removing the doors from their hinges.  I intend to see if I can find out online.