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Exercise

I had a difficult bicycle ride yesterday.
It was an off-day for racquetball. My ankle is a little sore, so I can’t run any distance right now. So I decided to take a bicycle ride for my exercise.

I headed out to ride around Harper lake, up on Davidson Mesa, in the northwest part of town. (Yes, all the way to another part of Louisville). But on the way I decided to go down the street that has the house with the yard train in the back yard. I haven’t been by there in a couple years and thought I should see how he’s doing. He’s doing very well! The layout is complete now. It includes mountains and tunnels and trestles and towns. It covers the entire back yard. It required lots of observation and admiration.

After about twenty minutes I managed to pull myself away and continue on to the bike path around Harper Lake. But just as I got to the other side, I encountered the sailboat regatta! Nine boats in all. Each one about two feet long. A radio-control regatta.

After the additional observation and admiration, I got back on track for the bicycle ride, but from here it was all downhill back to the house.

Sometimes it’s just really hard to get in a good exercise.

S

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Potatoes

Have I mentioned the potato bin?
In theory, you plant the potatoes in the bottom of the bin, fill it with straw and compost and leaves and stuff as the potatoes grow, and you end up with a bin full of potatoes when all is done.

The product literature described the delight of “opening the bin and watching all the potatoes tumble out.”

Last year, I used the potato bin. Some of the plants died, but some survived. When I opened the bin, nothing tumbled out. It was a giant solid heavy block. I had to pick it apart to see what was inside. It made great compost. It made great earthworms. It did not make potatoes.

When I called the manufacturer of the potato bin for advice, they asked me what I did and what I got. After I told them, they said, “That’s a lot better than we did in our test garden. We don’t sell this as a potato bin anymore. Now we sell it as a strawberry garden.”

Well, they may concede defeat easily, but I think I can do better. This year I planted a row of potatoes. One end of the row is enclosed in the potato bin, the remainder is out in the open. The potatoes are doing great. Much more growth than last year.

In the attached picture, you can’t really see the potato bin. That’s zucchini (and a dog) in the foreground (and yellow sunflowers in the middle). I’m standing directly behind the potato bin. I’ve never had armpit-high potato plants before. You can’t even see the rest of the row of potatoes outside the bin. They’re hidden behind the zucchini between the bin and the corn.

So there you have it. The best potato plants ever. And a bin full of potatoes to boot, just waiting for me to open the bin and delight as the potatoes fall out at my feet.

Just wait till the quitters at the potato bin factory hear about this.

S
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Vegetable gardens

The corn is growing well. The first block planted is now a lot taller than I am. It is a lot taller than I can reach. We are not growing it for ourselves, however. We are having a banner raccoon year, and they are having a record best time in the corn. There aren’t even ears of corn yet, and they come marauding every night and tear down stalks and rip it up.
There doesn’t seem to be any legal way to protect the corn from the raccoons without trapping and relocating them. That is an expensive and temporary solution.

The good news is that they don’t seem to fancy any of the other vegetables growing. They get the corn, we get everything else.

S