Almost lost a tomato plant from lack of water, but I have the drip set up over my tomatoes now, so I hope it comes back to life! I have a soaker hose weaving through the fence by the tomatoes, so it is dripping down over my tomato row!
Spent several hours in the garden today hoeing weeds and running the tiller. My brother was there as well, so at one time we had two tillers going at the same time. Now.....the garden looks beautiful again. Dad would be so proud.
Even though I was exhausted, I came home, took a shower and went to Shreveport to run some errands. Got the car washed, bought Laura Bush's new book for Mom as a part of her Mother's Day haul, bought a beautiful plant for her as well, went to Sam's and also did my part to support illegal aliens for Sinco de Mayo at Taco Mania. Just kidding.....I don't know if they are illegal....I just know they can cook some Mexican food!
Started trimming back sharply her azaleas because the plant gurus said now is the time to do it and fertilize them. I didn't get far. She has a LOT of azaleas!!! I got tired!
Since neither my brother nor I checked the oil in Dad's lawn tractor (Dad always did that, so we didn't have to think about it), tomorrow we will be purchasing this little number! Who knew lawn mowers run out of oil???? Not me! It spit the bits out and seems to be unrepairable. Oh, well.....that won't happen again. I'm sure we will both be checking the oil way too often. I asked him if the new lawn mower was going to have a red light that says, "Check oil" like my car does!!!! What can I say....we screwed up! I just happened to be the one on the lawn mower when it crashed and burned!!! CRAP!
My snake phobia materialized while I was at Mom's today working in the garden. As I walked a path I had already walked a dozen times today, I was suddenly confronted with a snake. It wasn't a big snake, but it doesn't take BIG to traumatize me. Thank goodness for the cell phone in my pocket. I stood right there watching it so I wouldn't lose it and called my brother to come kill it. I thought it was a copperhead, but he said it was a spreading adder. Enough to scare the crap out of me. Of course, he just laughed!!! I was too traumatized to take a picture!!!Time to break open the wine!
The storm predictions did not materialize here in our part of Louisiana, but the garden only got 1/2 inch of rain. We have a 5 inch deficit, but the garden really looks good today. My potatoes have some blooms, so that means potatoes are forming beneath the ground, I think! What do I know! It must mean something!
Mom has yet another infection in her foot...yes, the same one that was operated on in January. It's all healed, but is swollen and red and some lymph nodes are involved as well. This was all noticed by the lady from home health who comes to help her take a bath. She notified the nurses and they sent someone out to see about Mom. They got her in to see a doctor and get some antibiotics. Does it ever end? I thought we were finished with foot issues!!!
I planted some replacement tomatoes and protected them from the cutworms. Also, planted a few marigolds in the tomatoes and potatoes because I've been told insects don't like marigolds.
Brother has been having major heart palpitations for a couple of days now and just generally doesn't feel well, but he won't go to the doctor!! Go figure! His heartbeat is very irregular!
Since my tomato dilemma, more than a few people have told me that I must protect the stems of the young plants from cut worms by wrapping the stems with foil or putting matches or toothpicks next to the stem so the worm cannot wrap around the plant. I will be doing that tomorrow to the ones that I have left and most certainly will do it to the replacement plants I have to buy now!! Who knew? Apparently, everyone but me! Dad never did that to his plants, so I didn't know. They never cut his tomatoes down.
Yet another tomato plant lying dead on the ground this morning. Looks like something is just cutting it off......and not even eating it! Damn, bugs, if you are going to cut down my plant, at least eat it! 5 of the eight Better Boy plants are gone. I guess I will replace them tomorrow with some bigger plants. Today I got another sprinkler system hooked up and have one going on the corn rows. Also, got Dad's drip system he set up on a fence above his berries going again. It's a rather unique system consisting of a soaker hose snaked through a fence so that it drips from the top on the berry plants. It's way cool! It stayed just like he had it all during the harsh winter, but was unhooked from the water source. I was doubtful that it would still work since those soaker hoses are rather fragile, but it did. Dad was very proud of his row of different kinds of berries....blackberries, boysen berries and some others that I don't recall. What didn't survive were his little markers where he had labeled his plants, so we are clueless as to what they are. The very last place Dad ever worked was from a little stool he sat on to clean weeds out of his berries. It was very hard for me to move that stool, but I finally did move it because I had to clean out from under his berries and put new pine straw around them.
I spent 5 hours working in the garden today. All I can say is it better produce some groceries. Part of the time I was trying to rig up some sprinkler systems in the garden because it is getting really dry. I planted some bell peppers, eggplants and more tomatoes. Something has destroyed two of my original tomato plants. I put pine straw around the new plants that I planted today to help with moisture and weeds. My mom even came out looking for me because I had not come inside at all and she was afraid I was passed out somewhere in the garden. Not out of the realm of possibility....I was very tired when I left. I called my brother and asked him to go over at some point tonight and turn off the sprinkler. Our garden water comes from a well and not from the village water system, so we don't have to be as frugal.
