Hack and Slash- Gardening, not Editing.

September is almost at it's end...and I have been rather unproductive writing-wise. Made a start on a few things, edited some others, rewrote some, squinted, sighed and looked out the window. Spring has arrived, the sun was up and the jungle that is my garden waved back at me with its wild untamed tenticular...everything.
So I started a gardening blitz because ....

and every writer needs a break once in a while.


First thing to happen was the creation of a new fenced area for (all) my chickens. I have a lot of chickens and even though I love the cute wee things, I was quickly tiring of them leaving poopy presents on my doorstep. Sooooo, now they have their side of the yard and we have ours. They are very cute but their shit isn't, also my lawn was dying a slow hen-pecked death. They are very effective lawn mowers if you don't mind exchanging grass for...a hard poop-baked desert.

One of my Chinese Silkies- fluff for brains- seriously, they are the blonds of the poultry world.

My Georgie Girl- not sure if she can actually see under all those feathers- but she's oh so cute!

Job number two involved destroying an old garden shed. The only thing holding it up was an ancient ivy tree. The hardest part in the process was removing that cursed ivy. I ended up taking an axe to it, chop, chop, hack, miss...sometime later TIMBER! And the hybrid wall/ivy tree didn't fall on me! Yes, I was very proud of myself.

my triumphant, 'I-just-kicked-this-shed's-ass' pose. Wore my flashest gumboots for the occasion ;)

Actually that shed-pocalypse kicked my butt a little too, I ended up hobbling around for the next week. Not sure how I did it but I must have somehow strained something in my hip during that frenzy of wanton destruction.

Next thing to go was the two Douglas Firs at the back of our property. Our awesome, fantastic, amazing neighbors got hold of a cherry picker for the weekend, so they popped on over and asked us if we wanted the problematic trees gone. Problematic meaning they had a nasty habit of shedding branches during storms, narrowly missing fences, the neighbor's house, the chookhouse and even me (one evening when I was out putting the animals away, crash, Eek!). So naturally we were all happy to see the last of them- the trees... not the animals.

 

Our neighbors are especially pleased since they can now see the sun- oh blessed sunshine.

 

 Then there's the clean up. You know what? Woodchippers are great. Instead of a disheartening mountain of branches, I now have a manageable pile of mulch. 

Now the next thing is to put in is a vege garden. I will somehow figure out a way to bunny-proof it. Alaska is fond of eating anything I put in, or near the ground ( the two remaining stalks of the blackcurrant are a sad testimony to this fact.)

Here's the flemish giant fatty in question. She's cute yes, but she's bigger than a cat and has a greedy garden destroying glint in her eye.

After my September gardening binge I almost feel ready to sit down again and get back into that rewrite. That magical idea portal that seems to inhabit roughly the same space as my cruddy old shower has opened up and poured forth wonderful ideas. I may have just solved a troubling plot/continuity problem in The Rising. Can't wait to get back into it and see if this new direction works.
Or maybe I will just procrastinate and do more gardening... and also the house needs painting this summer...