I've been teaching Brutus how to retrieve the newspaper and bring it to the house. On Friday afternoon, he carried the paper to the house... HIS HOUSE. He went inside, dropped it, and came back out. We still have a bit of work to do.

April 18, 2015 - Saturday morning
34 degrees/ partly cloudy/calm
Pentoga Road

It appears as though today will be the last nice one in this string of near perfect days. The thermometer is to fall and there's even an inch or two of snow forecast for the middle of this coming week. 

Friday began by riding with Sargie to Iron Mountain, retrieving the Blazer, then go onto Home Depot. One person waited on me and I asked where I might find 1x8 by 8 foot long boards. He said they didn't have any, but he'd check to be sure, told me wait, and disappeared, never to be seen again. After waiting for over twenty minutes, a young man finally came along and asked if he might assist. I wish Home Depot would find a few more workers just like him; polite, hard working, knowledgeable. The manager of the lumber section came to the cash register when I was checking out and told the cashier to take off 10% as I'd had to wait so long. I thanked her and we had frank discussion on manners, or lack of them. 

I must be getting old and crusty to think those who work where I spend my money might actually be helpful. To make a long story short, the manager gave me her name, her hours, and told me if I ever needed help again while at the store, to look her up and she would personally give me assistance. We'll see.



After getting everything loaded, the poor Blazer was really squatting; so much so that I stopped halfway home, in Florence, Wisconsin, to add more air in the back tires. I drove slow and and avoided as many bumps and potholes as possible, no doubt making me very popular with those behind me. 

Once home, it took me an hour to unload the Blazer. There were ten heavy bags of concrete mix, fifteen treated landscape timbers, fifteen boards of dog ear fence, and twelve treated 1x8 by 8 ft long boards. (Yes, they did have them.) 



Digging another 150 strawberry plants was next on my agenda. It was a beautiful day and once again, after a long and cold winter, it felt great to dig in the dirt. The plants are ready for the pyramids once that area is made ready.

Brutus had been following me around carrying his tennis ball. The pup had more energy than good sense, so I took a break in the day's activities so he might go swimming. Throw a ball into the lake and he thinks he's a retriever.



I used the Ford tractor to tow the backhoe towards the rear of the property. There were two rocks in the trail that I've hit time and time again while mowing. They only stuck up about three inches, just enough to catch the blade, and I decided as long as I had the backhoe in the area, it was time they came out of the ground.



The rocks might have been only three inches above the ground, but one went DOWN about four feet. 



IT took well over an hour, but in the end, the boulders were removed, the holes filled in, and the area raked over.

Those two boulders on the left are what came out of the ground.

Yooper Brother Mark stopped for visit. As always, we had answers to all the maladies of the world... if only others would listen. Mark's been so busy at the plant that we don't get to talk as much as usual so it was good to sit on the patio and get caught up.

The place I hoped would provide good fill with few rocks has turned out to be just that. It's alongside the back meadow in a rough area and so far, after digging one test hole four feet deep, I've not seen one rock. The soil contains quite a bit of clay, but that's okay. It's just being used for fill. I'll keep digging and who knows, before I'm finished, I might have quite a pond back there.

I resurrected an old two wheel wagon in which to haul dirt behind the four-wheeler. So far, it's working well as it has a dump bed which saves me quite a bit of shoveling. After one load, I'm happy how far the fill is going and hope to have a majority of the new landscaping finished by this afternoon.



Sargie works early today. As I said, I'll be moving dirt. Mississippi Brother Garry has a big ol' bucket on his tractor that would make short work of that. He's offered to loan his rig to me before, just as I've told him to come up and get the backhoe when he needed one last fall. 

Let's see, if I flew down to southern Mississippi and drove his tractor back... hmm, averaging 12 mph or so. Naw, doesn't seem like it would be practical. 

So that being said, it's time to get busy.

After all, a man's work is never done.

Both sets of four-wheeler tires finally arrived. I talked to Larry the Mechanic and he'll mount them on the rims this coming week.

So are the tales from Pentoga Road...

A bit of dry rot in the old ATV tires... and NO tread.