More Gardening and Herding Cats

This was originally written last summer. I even have a picture of that poppy...on my friends computer.
So, despite going to bed around midnight, I woke up around five, watered the garden and checked my email. I think my cat, Ripley woke me up, wanting to go out.
We normally leave the window open for her to come and go as she pleases, but lately another cat has been coming in and eating her food. We thought that perhaps the cat was fighting with ours. This morning after letting Ripley out, I tried to go to bed, then heard mewing outside the bedroom window. I opened it up to let her in and there she is with the orange and white cat I chased off the other night. I called Ripley in--hoping to save her from a catfight--and she jumped to the window sill. Then the other cat just looked at me pitifully, hoping that I'd let it in too. Poor thing looked skinny and gave me the big eyes treatment (imagine Puss & Boots from Shrek), but I was unmoved by the kibble poacher (I hadn't had my coffee yet).
As I was up, I decided to get some more gardening done. I got dressed and drove out to the site that I've written about before. I started coffee at that location and placed some more screening on the ground, put more dirt in the tire wall, placed some railroad ties, and built a double compost bin. I moved some weeds, dirt, and organic (organically fed, no hormone/antibiotics for the horses on a holistic rescue shelter) manure into the bin. Then I moistened it up with the hose and moved it around with the hay fork.
All that took from about 6:45am to around 10:00am. That's when it started getting a bit too warm and bright to be out in the sun any longer. I chose to use that time to do some running around.
I paid some bills, posted a notice, picked up some items from storage, made some phone calls, and fueled the old 4runner.
I took siesta when I got home, then went to do some work in that vacant rental. It's mostly clean now. I need to vacuum again, then steam clean. I also like to wipe the kitchen and bathroom down with bleach, before showing a unit. Some people like pine scented cleaners, but the oils leave a film. Bleach just smells cleaner too me. I also need to wash the windows. I use soap and water. It doesn't harm any of the plexi-glass windows like an ammonia based cleaner would.
Even with the evaporative cooler it's just too hot. So I'm using time to write and do some reading rather than maintenance. So I'm cooling down with hefeweizen beer that I picked up at Big Lots (also a good place for cleaning and some gardening supplies). The beer is Carmel Wheat Beer, and is pretty good. It's better than Widmere (sp?)
Oh! And I was thinking of planting California poppies on the tire wall because they are so hardy and used to the soil up here. When I was out there I discovered a poppy had come up behind the wall. I'm taking this as a good sign.

Gardening Update

No pictures today.
I find myself apologizing for my lack of diligence to this blog.
Anyway. I drilled some holes in the bottom of the spa for drainage. I intend to put some block, brick and stone in the bottom to improve drainage, and then put in some soil and compost. I was motivated by a neighbor to one of my rentals. I've been over working on a vacant unit and he's been rototilling his front yard for a garden. He's made me feel like a slacker, as he is on disability.
So I went back to my place and started some small projects. I leveled out the spa using a demo bar and a railroad tie as a lever and fulcrum while I shoveled some dirt under one of the corners. Then I drilled some holes into the bottom or the spa and the low spots on the seats. I had to find my bit extension due to water being in the spa from the recent rain.
Once my battery ran out, I removed the wheel from my wheel barrow and then took the wire wheel to the axle.
I'm kind of glad there's no pictures. All the rain has sprouted tons of weeds. They'll go into the compost (and probably the spa) but I don't want anyone seeing how remiss I've been.
The long and short of things was that I had all my rentals full, then 3 vacancies happened abruptly. And I've been looking for something other than real estate.
Hope you're having a good day.

Ok. Actually I'm waiting for some non-paying renters to remove the last of their belongings and give me back the keys. But, If they show up, that will save me (and them in the long run) the legal fees.
Today, I've been working on updating rental agreements to include fees for serving notices on tenants. This is because I had to serve the above mentioned people in a city 50 miles away. I had to make 3 trips. So I'm not going to take that one in the shorts again.
I've also been working on a new "Disposition of Security Deposit" form, so that I can comply with the law. Remember, you have 21 days in CA to mail one of these out.
Happy 4th of July to you all. Remember all of the Patriots who have sacrificed fortune, wellness, and life in order to give us this great country.
If you wish to read my political ramblings, check out www.radicalforfreedom.blogspot.com

Still Working on the Garden

As you can see, I got that spa back to my house. I was also given 7 more tires for the wall.
Unfortunately, I didn't get the pump for the spa, but did get the heater unit. I don't know what I'm going to do with the heater, but the spa is getting turned into a raised garden area.
It's big enough for a fruit tree, so I may do that. It has eye bolts on the base for moving the spa and these may prove useful if I ever have to net or put plastic over the tree. That will still give me room for flowers or food crops around the base of the tree.
Now I just need to set it down and make sure the drain hole is unplugged so that excess water doesn't accumulate.

I also got some dirt into the bottom row of tires. They are mostly truck tires--16's and 30's.
After I put the dirt in I ran a hose out and started compacting the dirt and filling the voids in the tires.
The soil out here has a lot of powdery clay. It's going to make quite a formidable wall.
 On the left, I have the hose trickling water into the tires. I'm using rebar and and a hoe to move the slurry of mud into the voids. I don't know if you can tell but the voids use about half the dirt, so I'm going to be bringing more in on a continuous basis.

It's been hot today, so I was out with the large straw hat, and gloves because the rebar gets hot in the sun.
 I'm hoping the amount of clay in the soil will make for a good semi-finished surface at the form boards.

As you can see, I still have more tires. That is probably not enough to complete the wall, but it will be enough to get the wall of tires done a few feet out from the block wall in the background.
I did notice a low flow in the garden hose out this far. This will be OK for drip irrigation, but I may need to put a booster on my well.

Gardening Part Deux

On this first day of summer, I spent the majority of the day doing more gardening prep work. I will be using a lot of materials that I have on hand. Most were picked up second hand--much of it free or at little cost. For example, I arranged to remove a spa out of someone's backyard. It has no heater, so few people want it. I want to use the spa as a raised garden bed, and can use the pump for the fish pond I want to grow.

In the picture above you can see the remnants of a couple of Chinese Elm trees that I removed. I'll have to keep an eye out for shoots popping up around the yard again. It's about 95' from the block wall to the back of that garage. I plan to make the garden about 60' off the back wall, which will allow me access to the septic system and should give me enough room to eventually put a gray water tank in.

Here you can see a smaller amount of tires. I took this picture toward the end of the day. In the lower left corner is the manual tire changing machine. I've had that for years and it's bolted down to the slab. The machine on the right, is a pneumatic tire changer that I picked up at the swap meet, and it's good for breaking the tires loose from the rim, but doesn't remove the tire very well. It's also not bolted down to the slab, yet. We ran an air hose from the garage to the wall, then behind the other stuff. You can see the air hose dropping off the back of the 1965 Ford Flatbed. In the lower right hand corner is a solar water heating panel.
My buddy, Steve, and I set up to removing tires. I would work the pneumatic changer, because I've worked in garages before, and I didn't want to take chances with him getting hurt/losing a finger. He provided the brute force for pulling the tires off. On a few of the larger tires we used my Bobcat to loosen the tire from the rim. Then we took the tires over by the wall and unit and sorted them by size.

Here is most of the tires we got done today. Not very many, but we moved quite a bit of stuff around, as well. So I don't feel to bad. If you look to the right of the line of tires you can see the air hose. I climbed from the cinder block to the top of the block wall and walked the hose back behind everything so that I can still maneuver the Bobcat and other vehicles back here.
The plan is to stack tires until they are about the same height as the block wall, filling each layer with soil to keep them in place. Then I can plant stuff in the terraced tires. I'm thinking herbs or some sort of ground cover or flower that keeps bugs away. A wall of color would be nice there. I'm also contemplating painting them white to keep the temperature of the soil down. I've read that a problem with raised beds, especially with all that black to absorb heat.
Just to the left of the lined up tires you can barely make out some grating.

Here is the grating. I have a bad problem with gophers on this property so I'm laying down the grating to help protect the crops. They aren't tight to the wall, because there's a cement footing there. I've slid the one under the tire. I picked up the grating from a walk-in refrigerator I was asked to remove. I plan on using the glass doors from the walk-in as part of my green house.
Happy Summer!

More Gardening Stuff

So I've decided to post the pics I was talking about earlier.

This is the view from near the detached garage. There, behind the cars, is a block wall. I want to put a raised bed against the wall to grow tomatoes and (something). The boarded up building to the right (west) is a 6 unit apartment complex that I've run out of money to finish at the  moment.

Obviously I'll have to move the cars. I'm thinking about taking the tires off the rims and building a wall 20' out from the apartments. I am thinking about 5' tall and terraces toward the east in order to plant an herb garden on the east and maybe something decorative on top. I think I'll either paint the side that faces the apartments or cover them with mesh and stucco that side. I happen to have a lot of paint given to my partner by his cousin who was a superintendent for a housing tract.

I've also gotten in touch with a local horse rescue shelter. So I'm able to get horse manure. It has a real high pH (8.5) but can be composted. It could also be mixed with the caliche on my property and made into adobe. How cool would that be?

For those of you who are vehicle buffs, from left to right: 65 Ford 1T flatbed, 70 GMC 3/4T with a working factory tachometer and 402 cid engine (needs rebuild), 1978 Propane power Toyota, 1967 Daimler Saloon.

This is the back of my garage and workshop. The evaporative cooler is up and working, which is good, because it's been over 100 for the last 3 days. I've replace a lot of toilets over the years. The wife insists that I don't use them as pottery. I may rebuild them with the cost of ceramics going up. It mostly involves removing calcium deposits. I also knocked down the weeds with a string trimmer today.
I plan to stucco the garage at some point, but materials alone are close to $2000.
You can't see it, but there is a water line by the evaporative cooler that I'll tap off of for my water line.

Here is a closer view of my southern bounds for the garden. I'm standing near a 10' wide chain link gate. It's six feet high.
In the foreground are a couple of solar water heaters and a heat exchanging tank. I left a helper unsupervised and he rolled it to the recycling trailer. I don't know if it's any good anymore.
Yes, more tires.
Under the tires and solar water heaters is a cement slab. I may use this area for a chicken coop or ????

In the foto to the left, I'm standing behind the orange Toyota truck. This is the back wall. As I said earlier, I later knocked down some of the weeds.
This picture reminds me that I need to install a back panel for the shell on the GMC and a carpet kit.

I turned to the left 90 degrees (now facing north). You can see the boarded up windows on the apartments and the garage, and a Chinese elm tree. The elm has been very stubborn, as has the acacia about 30' behind it that you can't see.
I'd like to start more acacias as they have horrific thorns every 3-5". I think they and the cactus will make great security.
You can also see the propane tank in the back of the Toyota.
If you look to the right of the door stoops you can see a depression that is the trench for the water and gas piping. At the back you can see the wooden fence. It was also recycled from a job where the contractor was happy to drop it off at my house rather than pay the dump fees. He was putting up a block wall.

Now I'm standing to the west of my garage. The utility trench is more clearly visible. You can also see the acacia.
The acacia was over 30' tall, but seemed half dead. After cutting it down, suckers started popping up all over. We removed several from the trench on the right. Some of them were covering a beehive in the block apartments. I couldn't find anyone to remove them so, sadly, I had them exterminated. I feel horrible about that, as my great grandfather was a beekeeper.

I'm hoping to lay out a few raised beds and 6 to 10 fruit trees in this space. I have to contend with gophers. I'm going to get 1/2" hardware cloth for the trees and have some used shelf racking from a walk-in refrigerator to put at the bottom of the raised beds. I've been told I should by a couple king snakes for hunting gophers, but I think that would interfere with chickens and rabbits in the future.

Feel free to comment, just don't tell me how bad the building looks. I know, trust me, I know.

Gardening and stuff.

I haven't posted in a while. I had the flooring to redo in the mobile home and have that listed up for sale. Right after I got the flooring in, someone threw a rock and broke a window, so I had some really nice infrared cameras installed along with a multiplexer. So now the mobile home has a professional security system, as well. The work was done by Sam Moose at New Age Systems.
In the mean time I've been developing my skills gardening. I'm looking at plant types, pH levels, composting, gopher guard for trees, and putting in some raised garden beds. I'm even thinking of doing a terrace with some of the used tires I've acquired. You might be surprised how many with rentals, or maybe not. With small growing areas, I thought I'd use them for a wall on one side, and small herb gardens in the exposed soil.
So I need to get an empty 5 gallon bucket for my local coffee shop so they can save me coffee grounds. Then I'll measure the pH of the grounds and see how I need to modify the soil.
I have to move some trucks I have parked against the old back wall. I want to use the wall to shelter tomato plants from the wind.
I need to learn to plant more densely. So I'm looking at planting shallow and deep rooting plants next to each other, but I have a lot of work to do prepping the beds.
I just wanted to write a little something for now. I'll try to keep things updated with some pictures in the near future.

More rearranging the home office and submitting a commercial offer

So today consisted of running over to a clients place of business and having him sign an offer on a restaurant going into foreclosure across town.

The lender plans on foreclosing on Thursday, so my client made what he thinks is a high offer, though I doubt the lender will be happy with it. I've been saying we're heading for a commercial crash, and mentioned the stagnant commercial market, so I'm hoping for a counter offer, at best. If we don't get anything, we'll just wait and see if it comes up again at a better price. I'd like to be more hopeful, but I think a lot of lenders are too optimistic about the commercial market, or too stubborn to take a small loss now, in order to take a bigger loss later. Maybe the lender is hoping to make another loan on the property in order to foreclose a second time.
The location is on outer Hwy 18, so a little hard to get to for travellers, but it is close to the post office. We could use a place for a good cup of drive-thru coffee over there.

I also spoke with a businessman and his wife (businesscouple ?) about the value of the building they were leasing with an option to buy. Hopefully I'm making friends. Their building is old and needs a lot of work to bring it up to current codes, as is the attached SFR, but their credit isn't the best, so maybe they can work something out with the owner. IMO, the owner wants way too much.

Still working on the home office. Had to get some round cable staples for the power cords. Just about have things set up in an acceptable manner. Older places never have enough electrical receptacles. When I get my dream house built, it's going to have lots of places to plug the stuff in...if I don't go all mad scientist and power the place with a Tesla coil.

Tomorrow is time to meet an inspector and potential renters.

New Computers and technology stuff

So, I'm still getting settled in after the move in February. There's much arranging and rearranging of the home office space. My boss, is even talking of expanding, and possibly opening an office in the High Desert.

In the midst of all this, I've gotten a new computer. I'm setting it up to run Linux Mint. My subscription to WinForms is about to expire, so I'm moving over to a membership with Firsttuesday.us which has great articles and real estate forms for about one quarter the WinForms price.

So there have been quite a few late nights messing with technology. My PDA wouldn't sync, so I reset it and lost some contact info. Everything seemed fine, but now it's temperamental again. I set up a digital picture frame for my grandma. Now I'll need to use my old computer parts to build something for her to scan in the old family photos, and type up some memoirs.

So, I still need to get the network printer to work with Linux, though I have a friend who'll help me "when he gets the time". LOL, we're all so busy these days.

Meanwhile, I'm helping a couple friends with their rentals, and have gotten all my California rentals filled. It's now time to get some of the back rent owed with the help of income tax returns. When I had empty rentals and no qualified applicants, half rent was better than no rent. Now it's time to get people caught up, catching up, or packing up.

Basically the last half of March, was a lot of property preparation, and some pre-summer maintenance.

There have been several articles out there on more price drops in the future, and I'm submitting an offer on a commercial property tomorrow.

I went to the International Code Council meeting in Victorville last Wednesday. The discussion hinged on home health care facilities. I was torn between it and the Mojave Water Agency meeting on gray water use, but a friend attended that. Unfortunately, she hasn't been feeling well, and left early.

I'll be going to Las Vegas this weekend for a professional leadership seminar. I'll also get to see some friends. After that, I'll come home for a few days, then I'm off to Colorado Springs to tidy up a house up there for sale.