The front garden looks like this today.
As you can see the poppies are winding down and there are still irises. The alliums are blooming. I had a good look at this as I was walking back across the street after my stint of cleaning carpets. My mother loaned us her carpet cleaning machine, and it is getting about 95% of the dirt out of these filthy carpets. Below is a shot I took as I was finishing my “shift” and on the way over to get Jim.
The area directly in front of the machine had a similar pattern of soil to the part that is undone (just to the left). As you can see, most of the dirt is coming out, but this requires going over the section being cleaned about 20 times (REALLY!). This makes the carpet awfully wet, and you can still see a faint line where the dirt was. It would have been better, actually, if they had NOT put down area rugs in an attempt to “protect” the carpet, because then there would not be a distinct line where the dirt begins, which is quite noticeable even after you have cleaned and cleaned and cleaned.
The tenants used up all the propane in the tank (God knows how long they were living without heat or hot water), and we have ordered propane but the delivery will not come for another 5-7 days. So meanwhile, this makes our “shifts” of work with the rug cleaner fair. We have a three gallon container (which honey came in a few years ago and we use as an emergency water supply) which we fill with hot water and some Oxyclean, and haul across the street. When the container is empty, the shift is over and the next person goes to work with a new supply.
I thought I was in pretty good shape but my arms and shoulders are really feeling the repetitive “back and forth” motion with the machine. No matter whether the tank is full with cleaning solution or the dirty water collection tank is full, the machine weighs the same amount — a lot.
Meanwhile, I can stare out the window and watch the robins teaching their kids to catch their own worms. . . Right now there doesn’t seem to be a single adult robing that doesn’t have at least one (and sometimes two) chicks following it around watching it hunt and demanding food be deposited in its hungry maw.
Some of you may have noticed that I have signed up on Facebook. If you have gotten a friend request from a person whose profile page picture is a little girl in her daddy’s shoes with bandaids on her knees, that’s me.
It’s going to be my turn to clean carpet really soon, so I believe I shall post this.
the havens 