Fly Away.

Last year Kevin spontaneously planned to go to New Zealand this winter, instead of flying to a Mountain state for skiing. This means that I am completely alone for the next two weeks.

Yay!

When Kevin told me that he was flying to the southern hemisphere last year, I thought he would be going during Spring Break. That would have been pretty damn good because I was also planning on surprising him with various tasks that needed to be done in the back yard. Specifically, I was planning on re-seeding the yard because of the invasive nimble weed that has displaced the regular grass. However, the nimble weed has covered approximately 80% of the back yard. My original plan was to completely rototill the soil, and then re-seed everything everywhere. Of course, that project would have been huge and expensive. It is a good thing that one of Kevin's neighbors happened to come by during the winter and tell me that would have been a monumental waste of time. Grass, if left to its own devices, will repopulate bare areas. Help doesn't hurt the grass; that was why he also suggested that I aerate the entire back lawn, throw down some fertilizer in the really bad spots, and then throw down some good grass seed. That way, I wouldn't have to break my back, and my budget, completely reworking the back yard.

When I showed him the back yard, in the middle of the winter, he showed me how the grass was infiltrating the bald spots where the nimble weed was eradicated. That made me happy.

However, I didn't stop there. Since Kevin has such a green thumb, I've been catching it through the years. During his trip to the mountains, I was also thinking of caring for the gardens in the back yard, too. I was thinking of completely roto-tilling the soil, fertilizing the gardens, and then throwing down a very mild, broad-spectrum fungicide-herbicide mix. For the past three years, we've been having trouble with mold spores on our tomato plants, and other pests, and I have been getting so sick and tired of constantly removing invasive bugs and plants. I am really hoping that the one-two punch of roto-tilling, fertilizer, and herbicide will significantly reduce the amount of bullshit we have to deal with this year.

But alas...Kevin's plans were not what I was expecting. Instead of him leaving for two weeks starting at the end of March, he instead is leaving for two weeks starting today. I'm still planning on executing my "Big Back-yard Plans," but I'll have to do them on my days off from school. I'm pretty sure I can execute 100% of everything I'm planning.

Since this is a big project, I also couldn't "surprise" him with a completely new back yard. So I told him what I was planning, and he is totally OK with it...for the most part. I know he gets paranoid whenever he repeatedly tells me things he does and does not want done in the name of lawn maintenance. I told him to relax because I'm not planning on...I don't know...renting a back-hoe and uprooting everything in the back yard. I'm just doing the same amount of maintenance he would do if he was here. Besides, when he has done his regular yard work in the past, he has usually done most of it. I wanted to surprise him with a yard he could actually enjoy...without the back-breaking labor. Besides, since the back-yard is totally "his," I wanted to make part of it "mine" by doing my own things and experimenting with regional plants.

Since yesterday I've already started a list of tasks that need to be done during the next two weeks. Perhaps I should also make a short shopping list of gardening things I need, too.

I think I'll have fun.

⊗