Oh the Misery!

There are things that come with age.  Wisdom, knowledge, and maturity. Poor eyesight, decrease in flexibility and range of motion, and weaker immune system. I don't consider myself young nor am I old.  I'm kinda stuck in the middle. Sometimes, no matter the age, it takes an experience for one to learn and appreciate wise old sayings. Take for example "Leaves of three".  This statement has been repeated and repeated, year after year by parents, grandparents, outdoor enthusiasts, and other knowledgeable beings.  Hell, I even repeated to those younger than I.  A lot of fat good all that repeating did.  For the first time in my life I got to experience, in all its glory, poison ivy!

Poison ivy is a beautiful plant with bright, shiny green leaves.  There was no red angry colors, no orange streaks, no flashing neon sign chanting STAY AWAY, STAY AWAY, STAY AWAY.  I have seen, pointed too, hiked alongside, camped under, and cleared trees containing poison oak, poison ivy, and poison sumac.  Never once did I have a reaction to its evilness.   Never say never cause three to five days after cleaning brush, I discovered that I was covered.  My face and neck were spared, but all extremities and torso were are a red, blotchy, angry, bumpy, itchy mess.

Oh, the pain.  Heat is not welcomed when covered with such evilness. What's worse is that there was no cure for this misery except time and a cool room. Don't get me wrong, if there was a home remedy, cure, or snake oil, it was tried. Benadryl liquid gel, Calamine lotion, and generic creams are still in the medicine box at full capacity. Baking soda rubs are messy.  Hot showers are great only while in them.  Rubbing alcohol worked the best for me because it is cold and dries the itchy out.  However, rubbing alcohol burns like the fires of hell on open wounds caused by excessive scratching.

This mess lasted intensely for three weeks.  Just about the time I was healing, the husband decided that he needed to experience this in his life too. Luckily for him, we knew what to expect.  While his were more confined, he did experience a much more intensive patch on his leg. I guess reactions to poison ivy are one of those things that come with age. 

The Second Clearing

After all that work clearing, it became evident moving the Airstream under the trees would not work well. Yes, trees provide shade, buffer street lights and road traffic, and hinder the breeze. Hindering the breeze is not an option.  Just because we are moving from the RV park to the property does not mean we are gonna change our living styles.  Natural light and fresh air are important to maintain a healthy RV.  Too many people in a small space increases interior heat, dirt, and claustrophobia.  Being able to open windows and doors is a must.  And besides, a stiff breeze helps control these nasty buggers.

Mosquitoes! Everyone has some type of experience with them.  The buzzing, the biting, the slapping, and the itching.  ARGH!!! Just saying the word mosquito makes strong men weak. While I don't promote idioms, there is one about Texas that is true.  "Welcome to Texas, where everything is bigger".  Bigger here being referenced to mosquitoes sizes.  The example above is what the kid refers to as the "eagle".  Kinda have to agree, don't you think? The "eagle" is placed next to an Altoids mint for reference. How much bigger do they come?  However, these eagle sized mosquitoes are bearable compared to their tiny cousins.  The small ones, the ones you don't hear, are the buggers the bite you because they are so small you don't feel them when they land.

So this is what the husband did during his family free days with his borrowed tractor, he cleared a new home location where the summer breeze will help keeps the mosquitoes at bay.  This space was filled with brushy growth making removal easy peasy.  The only drawback to the new location is the lack of protection from the intensive summer sun.  Direct sun will bake the Airstream but the plan is to be in a home with a nice porch before next summer.  Well, that's the plan anyways....

Just a Little Trim

A family divided.  The kid has camp again this week, one in the morning and one in the afternoon.  Since he is occupied and I am at work, the husband borrowed the tractor again. He figured he'd use his family free time to piddle at the property.  Not me, I'd spend my family free time at home in the AC drawing on the house plans.  It may not be the dog days of summer but temperatures will still be in the upper 90's with a heat index in the low 100's.  To each their own.

Before he could even get started trees had to be trimmed to clear the trailer and tractor.  These trees were cleaned up two weeks ago during our staycation and now have adjusted to their new positions.  It was debated in removing the entire tree but decided one limb at a time was better.  Once the tree is gone, it's gone and replacements take years.  Oh, and pay no attention to the fact the husband is standing on the gooseneck trailer to trim the tree.  Details like that could drive a safe person crazy.

Limbs were not the only evidence that two weeks have gone by since the staycation.  Several plants are rearing their heads in the newly cleared areas.  Some are good like this palmetto the size of an adult's palm. Palmettos are a native plant and come in various varieties. It is too early to determine types.  At this point, every effort is being made to preserve any palmettos.

Some plants are bad like these briars.  Briar comes in several forms: the good, the bad, and the ugly.  Briar grows very rapidly and takes time to eradicate.  In two weeks this plant grew almost two feet.

The briar has curly tendrils, thorns and is bright green in color.  As the briar gets larger and older, the thorns become thicker and harder. The briar of them has root balls that spread under the sand like a frayed ribbon. Each of the frays is covered in little, tiny, sharp, sticky thorns.  Evil, Evil, Evil. Briar of this nature means the ground has been robbed of native grasses and vegetation due to lack of adequate sun light.  Once we start brush clearing, allowing more natural light, the native coastal will come back and it will naturally choke out nasty briar bushes. Constant diligence and time. Lots and lots of time.

Yucca, Yucca, Yucca

 

Scratch my back and I'll scratch yours.  The neighbor is letting us use her driveway until ours is built. There is legal access but it is two blocks down a paper street, a never improved road owned by the county.  A road that was laid out when the subdivision was established in the 50's. This paper road runs where our grass patch grows into the neighbor's beautiful coastal field. As a way to say thank you for such neighborly pleasantries, we cut the neighbors field, the first time in two years.  I mean we had the borrowed tractor again anyways to cut ours. How long could it take?

Yowzers, what an ordeal. Do you know what can grow into a field in that time frame? Concrete blocks, plastic bottles, rebar, Johnson Grass 8' tall, coastal grass so thick that it had to be cut on the slowest setting and at the highest heights, and these plants. Hot dog!

When asked what they were the reply was "they weren't there before, cut them down".  Hmm, four plants three feet wide, two feet tall grew in the less than two years.  Seems shifty, but what do I know.  Wait, what? Cut them down! I don't think so. These are beautiful specimens of some undetermined plant.  I want them.  "Fine", I was told, "move them to your property".  Yeah, my first plant!  Well, it will be when we figure out what it is, when it can be transferred, and how to move to it without killing it.  Sooo, my first official plant come winter.  Isn't it wonderful?

Staycation

Bye kid of mine, have fun at grandma's and at camp.  I will see you in 12 days!!! Woo-hoo, what to do with my free time? Oh that's right, work.  The first week he was gone was the normal 9-5.  The second week was when the fun started.  I took a week of vacation from work to work. Yup, sort of like a staycation. Only not as relaxing.

Up at daylight, work until it was too hot to think. When the temperature is already in the upper 80's at 6:30am, it doesn't take too long to get so damn hot I saw a little man in an orange suit burst into flames.  After lunch and a nap, it is off again at 6pm-ish until dark.

We had borrowed the tractor again, but most of this work was done by hand.  Well by hand tools.  Oh, how I love my chainsaw.  The power, the two-cycle smell, the endless potential.  Unfortunately, this time, there was a lot more limb clipping and vine pulling. No power, no oil, no noise, just a plain old limb lopper.  Don't worry, I found reasons to run the saw. Branches small enough to be cut with limb loppers but big enough to use a chainsaw.  You know, branches the size of an infant's arm.  Don't blame me, the chainsaw told me to do it.  

This section is being cleared first because this is where the house will ultimately go.  Shade all day until late afternoon, close to the work space, and plenty of space to expand later for any future endeavors like space for the kid to move into.

Five days of manual labor and this is all we accomplished.  Huff.  Oh well, any further manual labor will have to wait until it is not so hot.  You know, around October or so.  Fair warning, compressing a week's worth of video is time-consuming.  The video could use more editing but at this point, I lack the time.  So if you're in the need for a nap, enjoy!