no more Langolier holes

Today was a busy day. First of all, it started at 3:30 am. I tried really hard to get back to sleep but at 4:30 I gave up and got out of bed and went to the living room to play some Guitar Hero. I played until I was tired and making mistakes, so Ozzy and I went to McDonald's and got some Sunday breakfast. 

I thought I would read the Sunday paper. I had given in to one of those teenage solicitors trying to win a contest, in this case a savings bond. I thought that was a worthy goal, and it was only $10 for two months of Sunday papers, so since I had that in my wallet, I did it. Today's was the first paper I have opened, and they have been delivering it daily ever since I gave that kid the ten bucks. 

I can tell the recession is hitting the Daily Oklahoman cause, since I took the paper the last time, the paper is thinner. Not the number of pages, the width. It is now proportionately much more tall than wide than it used to be, enough to be obvious and I think a bit odd looking. Maybe it's just me and twenty years in the newspaper business.

Anyway, the day progressed in an interesting way, considering the way it started. I kept thinking that I would just lie down and take a nap at some point, but I kept finding things to do. I took out the trash after finishing the paper cause with the paper it was just too full not to take out and tomorrow is trash day. I did the dishes and got the counters clean and, in fact, am in the process of cleaning the stove. I straightened the spare room and made the bed again, picked up Ozzy's toys (he pulled his favorites back out), all the while staying in the living room, thereby making Ozzy's day. 

I check my iPod frequently during the day and when I checked the weather I noticed a severe weather alert for tomorrow. The alert is for wind during the daytime but there will be storms moving in tonight. I started thinking about the Langolier holes at the edge of the foundation of the house filling with rainwater. Not really a good idea. I had planned to fill them up a long time before now, as Josh as some Top Soil left over from filling his gopher holes in his back yard and told me I could have it. I tried to call him but he never called back, so Oz and I went for a ride to get some.

We went to Lowe's and I picked up a couple of bags of Top Soil and a couple of other things I need. Last year the water main at the sidewalk between my neighbor's house and mine broke and the City did a terrible job fixing it. It took them a year to flatten down the mounds of dirt. Now it just looks... unloved. So I bought the other bag of dirt to make that look better. It doesn't matter to me that the main is mostly on Dusty's side. It will look better when it's leveled out. I bought a little metal rake that I can use in the gardens but will still level out the dirt. I bought this industrial weed remover with an ergo handle. When I was in the Valley for so long last summer some weeds took root that I can't get out with anything so far. Even if they die the stalk is shrub size and painful to step on. 

Anyway, I came home with those things, and dinner from Sonic, and decided that I had better get the holes filled before I did anything else because if I sat down I would probably just want to stay down and the storm would probably hit and it would all be for nothing. So I trudged that heavy bag of soil to the back (man, that bad was heavy, or I was really tired - the other one is still in the trunk) and opened the bag and just started pouring dirt into every hole I could see. It took the whole bag. 

A couple of things struck me, though. First of all, I'm so used to hard packed Arizona soil that I was shocked when I used the weeder to help put the dirt in place and the weeder went right in and the dirt moved around. What was wrong with this stuff?! There hasn't been any water on it in ages - it should be rock hard!! Oh, wait a minute, there's actually moisture in the air and stuff. 

The other thing is that it's starting to look like spring. What looked like a dead garden in the Langolier pictures now has greenery in it. Granted, some of the green stuff is weeds, but not most of it. The perennials are coming back and the rose bushes are almost all filled in. The weird black leafed shrub is back again and that other shrub next to the door is about five feet tall. I think it's time for some pruning. I'm getting excited about gardening. 

The grass along the freeway is starting to green up. It's interesting that the patches where the fires were are the greenest. I remember Randy's dad burning his yard in the early spring. I thought that was the coolest thing ever. He let me light it once. This was legal!! Really shows the need and benefits of regulated forest burns. My yard isn't all that green yet. I was going to start watering, but it's going to rain, so I didn't. I had a treatment put on it that was a weed and feed. Most people around here do it. It looks like they paint their yards green. But it seems to work well cause there are some really beautiful yards. But what sold me was that the highway department does it and the grass along the highway is beautiful. I just didn't know what else to do to take care of those weeds. I want to walk barefoot in my back yard and not have to fear a half inch thick stalk in the sole of my foot. Plus I want it to look nice for the wedding.

So, where was I? Oh yeah, filling holes. Finished that, came back in and had dinner and called it good. That was it. That was the last thing I did, other than watching OU in the NCAA women's championship. They were the secondary game (ESPN switched back and forth between playoff games) so I didn't get to watch all of the game, but they won, so that was the important part. The only reason I watched was an article in the paper I read today about Courtney Paris, the senior sensation from OU who vowed to pay back her scholarship if she didn't lead her team to a national championship. This has caused varying reactions from commentators, especially considering UCONN is evidently considered to be the powerhouse team this year, giving OU an outside chance at the win. This makes watching much more interesting for me.

So I've managed to stay awake all day which means I'll have a better chance of sleeping all night and normalizing my schedule on a long term basis. I'm gunna be tired tomorrow, but it's going to be a good tired.