Pallets for Occupy Tacoma

I had some unexpected free time yesterday so I did something out of the ordinary.  I helped some political homeless people have better beds to sleep on. 
About two weeks ago I dropped in on the Occupy Tacoma camp on 21st and Pacific.  I wanted to meet some of the people there and to see the place in person.  I saw that they have an info board with a list of wanted items.  On it was pallets to put under tents in order to lift them off of the cold wet ground. 
Yesterday while driving by Bellevue Healthcare, I noticed a couple neglected stacks of pallets in the corner of the parking lot.  I went in and asked if they would mind be taking some.  They were cool, so I loaded 6 in the truck and drove down to the camp.
I walked up and told the first person to make eye contact what I had brought.  They were quick to unload it and when I offered to get more if someone came with me, a guy named Chris hopped in.  Later I made a third trip with Toreone.  Everyone was cool, supportive, thankful, helpful.
In my conversations with 4 people over a couple visits, I've come to adjust my idea of what exactly the Occupy Tacoma camp is. 
Their level of discourse is low.  Their level of knowledge about politics, economics, and the big picture is low.  I had to argue hard against someone who insisted that the voting age is 21.  I had to argue that celebrities might be rich, but don't actually control that much money in the economy.  I had to make a similar argument that politicians don't actually make that much money, and firing them all or reducing their salaries will not solve any systemic problem.
Everyone I've talked to was homeless prior to moving to the camp.  They're frustrated, they want to work and have homes, and there is something wrong with a system that doesn't let them.  They plan to be there over the winter.  That sounds hard to me, but then again, they're already homeless so where are they going to go?  At least in the camp their homelessness is a visible symbol of the problems within our society.

Backyard Rototill

Two weekends ago I rototilled the back yard.  I rented the biggest machine Home Depot had and spent at least 12 hours criss-crossing what was left of our grass.  This is part of a larger project to convert the backyard into an urban garden oasis . 
First I used RoundUp on the entire yard.  This took about 3 hours one morning while Lisa was with the kids elsewhere.  It took about a week for the grass to turn yellow.  Then I spread 50lbs of lime over the space I'd be rototilling, which consists of the entire yard starting about 15 feet from the house and ending 10 feet from the alley.  I used a mixture of agricultural lime and dolomite as recommended by Steve Solomon in his book Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades.  I highly recommend this book if this is your thing.  I also spread about 20lbs of complete organic fertilizer which is made from:

• 4 parts seed meal (I used cotton seed meal)
• 1/2 part bone meal
• 1/2 part lime
• 1/2 part kelp meal (I didn't use this on the lawn since it would be so expensive, but I did make a batch with it to use in the future)

I got all of the ingredients from McLendons in Summit.

I was a little scared to see what I'd find when I tore up the ground.  Fortunately it wasn't all bad.  You can see from the photos, that someone had long ago laid down a lot of big chunks of concrete (sometimes referred to as urbanite) possibly as a foot path.  They turned out to be my bigest headache of the day.  Which in the grand scheme of things makes it a pretty good day.  I took an hour to dig them out, and Lisa helped me move them.
The gravel in the center of the yard went deeper than I had hoped.  Part of the problem was that the rototiller sort of fluffs up the soil, making it deeper, so I never did penetrate through the gravel and make it to the soil underneath.  No matter.  For the most part I anticipate that that space will be where we walk.  I won't be trying to grow veggies in it anyway. 

Prior to my final pass I sowed the crimson clover seed and then tilled it under.   I also included some leaf mulch my mom had given me.

It's been a couple of weeks now, and the clover is just starting to break through.  I've been stressing it.  Going out there, looking at the soil, searching for germinating seeds.  The weather has been frosty a couple mornings and we had a windstorm with some bitter cold rain.  Fortunately we've had a warmer spell this week which encourages plant growth. 
Interestingly, the seeds on the south side of the property are not as far along as those on the north.  My guess is that the south edge spends more of its day in the shadows of the neighboring apartment buildings.  Good information to have if you plan on growing plants. 

I'm hoping for a few more days of relative warmth and sunshine to keep the clover growing.  To get established and not be stunted by the low light or cold rain that will come.  But according to weather websites, we're in for 10 days of 49 degrees and rain. 

At any rate, the clover will be tilled under next spring anyway.  It's a green manure.  Its job is to produce organic matter to add to the soil, to break up the subsoil with its roots, and to fix nitrogen.  Next spring I'll plant some of the yard as ground cover, and some as garden. 

The next outside projects are to fix the lawnmower (it needs a tune-up), set up a composting system, and build a back fence.  I can do the lawnmower whenever I want to take the time.  I still need to figure out how I want to approach compost.  And as for the fence, I've just landed on an idea that I like, but need to run it by Lisa.  Basically I'd set some wooden posts, run wires between them, and use the wires to grow grapes, fruit trees, or other climbing or trellaced plants.  The benefits of this idea are that the materials are cheap, it would be within my skill set to build it, it'd look decent, and with plants growing on it it'd be very nice.  The drawback is that it wouldn't provide much privacy; even with plants, a passerby could easily look into the yard.  That's not such a big deal I think, because none of the yard is private.  There are windows and doorways of neighbors in every direction which can look into any corner of the yard.  Privacy can't be the veto since we don't have it anyway.

Cooking Space

I've finished building the counters and table around the stove, giving us a decent workspace.  With the pot rack overhead, I spend less time in the cupboards.  The microwave works well behind the oven, and building the counter-top there freed up counter space elsewhere. 

The set-up works.  The big table to the right serves as our food prep area.  You can see the measuring cups and spoons on hooks below the spice rack.  Everything is within easy reach and there is enough space overall.  I have a couple of ideas for small improvements like a place to hang oven mitts.  There are two openings on either side of the stove where I could put a box to create another storage space.

The space looks nice too.  It's visually pleasing, colorful.  There is a large vine plant on top of the cupboards by the sink which is able to reach across the top of the doorway. 

All in all, I'm pleased with how this project turned out.  It's done for now.  I have an idea to take out the free-standing cupboard you can see on the right side of the picture.  I'd replace it with the curved shelves I've already made.  The big cupboard is ugly and it doesn't fit properly into that space and it blocks the sightline to the door.  I can fix that and get more storage space in the process.  The only problems are that I don't know what's behind it, and the project will involve putting a patch of linoleum down on the cupboards footprint; something I've never done before.  For the time being, this'll remain a project for the future. 

Moving In

My last post was prior to moving in to the newly acquired house, which makes it about a month ago.  I got swept up in the process and the projects that I didn't even think about this little blog until a week ago.  If this blog is a reflection of my daily thoughts, then there are going to be a ton of home improvement project articles forthcoming.  So what the hell, let's dive in, eh?

The first thing we had to do was paint.  We tried to do this as much as possible in the week between closing on the house and vacating the apartment.  My life became a bootcamp of going to work at the gym and working on the house.  This lasted for a week.  12-14 hour days, but it felt good.

Then we moved in.  Lisa did the lionshare of distributing boxes and unpacking.  She basically moved us in while I doubled down on painting and home improvement.  My fear was that we'd get lost in the process of settling into the new place, and lose all progress on projects.  This, I discover, is my driving fear; that I disliked the perpetually unfinished projects of my parents (sorry mom and dad), and I didn't want to have them here. 

So I painted, which is a never-ending process (I still have touch-up work that needs doing), but is at a point where the popular spaces are finished, and only smallest patches need touch-up.  The transformation of the feeling of the space has been awesome.  Lisa remarked at how amazing it is to so completely change a house so cheaply.  So we're feeling good about that, although if I met the man who painted the original trim a dark green-brown, I'd probably bitch slap him to the ground.

One of the unexpectedly fun aspects of painting was organizing work parties.  Many friends and family came to pitch in, which probably saved me from death.  But the challenge of it is making sure everybody works to a quality standard, and that they are used to accomplish the most amount of work in the time they've given.  So I wrote a couple flow charts, detailed directions, and priority lists, and put them up on the fridge.  Knowing what had to come next, I could always keep people doing the  work that most needed doing. 

The first challenge of using the space was the lack of counters or storage in the kitchen.  We'd pull food out of the fridge and have no place to set it to prep it.  This is compounded by having no dishwasher, so precious space is taken up by a dishwashing station.  My next task then, was to create more counter and storage space.

So I built a couple of tables, which I cut to fit the spaces around the stove.  I have to admit I was proud of how they turned out, and now Lisa likes to show them off when people come to visit.


That finished, I decided to make myself a magnetic spice rack.  I had seen magnetic spice containers at World Market by the mall which would save me the hassle of gluing magnets onto spice jars.  I got a thin sheet of steel (I took one of the spice containers into Home Depot to make sure I got a magnetic one) and a piece of an aluminum cut-out design which I put over the metal to give it a more interesting look.  I used my label maker from work and took Finley on a spice-shopping trip.
{Insert spice rack pic)

Then the office needed attention.  Lisa requested shelves in the closet.  So I built those.  While doing so I made and painted a much larger set which I will use in the kitchen in the future.  For now, I set those aside and kept going.  I installed the tv onto a wall post and made some shelves out of scrap to go next to it and hold dvd, cable, modem, and router.  Somewhere in there I built and hung a pot rack.

Along the way I pruned the trees and roses, weeded the beds, and cut back the neighbor's encroaching laurel.  There were 200 bricks in the basement which I carried outside, then dug out the ground, and laid out some of the bricks on the pathway to the door so we don't track in mud.  This wasn't actually that difficult, the ground was soft and didn't have any plants on it.  I also sprayed Roundup on nearly the entire back yard.  Yesterday I spread lime and complete organic fertilizer.  This weekend I'll rototill it.

I just received 5lbs of Crimson Clover seed from Terrestrial Seed Company.  I'll sow that this weekend as well.  Crimson Clover is a green manure, a Nitrogen-fixing plant which will be tilled into the soil next spring when I make garden beds.  I'm nervous about what I'm going to find in the yard.  I've already dug up several chunks of concrete, and the center of the yard is hardpacked gravel.  My only real hope is that the majority of the yard isn't totally f-ed up due to neglect by the previous owners

Which brings me up to the moment.  I have one more counter top/table to finish in the kitchen, but that's it for woodworking at the moment.  I still want to install shelves in the kitchen as well as some in the basement, but those can wait.  Along with the yard, the task at hand is to set up the office, which I'll start by visiting the file cabinet.