Cal Jorgensen

I think it's time to admit that if I've held on to these shirts without mending them for this long, I'm probably not going to, and I could use a few cleaning rags, so I picked one to cut up.

John C Daley wrote:Well done!
Some photos will be nice.
Earthen floors in 'basements' can be good. How high is the ceiling?
I shared homes I owned with a boarder for 20 years when I was 25 or so, it helps with the cash flow and socially is nice also.
I was careful how I selected house mates, had rules;
- shared food
- no loud music
- shared cooking and cleaning
- had to have a job
- had to invite somebody over for dinner from time to time.
It was good fun and I developed good friends to this day.

The basement ceiling is tall enough to stand in, but I have to duck to walk under the... ducts. Access to it is the real challenge; I believe it had an actual door to the outside at some point (maybe used as a root cellar?) but a newer room built on to that side means getting in now requires climbing down through a trapdoor and walking through the addition's shallower crawlspace (about 3'). Maybe usable for storage, assuming the flooding was a one-off event as all my neighbors tell me it was, but I wouldn't trust anything valuable or delicate down there and it's never going to be a living space. (I actually kept my quail in the basement for the first few months, since I moved in December and didn't have their outdoor housing up yet. Having to emergency relocate them was unpleasant, but I may not have noticed my basement was flooding as soon as I did otherwise!)

The economy around here is mainly seasonal/tourism. I was incredibly lucky to have found a job I actually love doing in one of the few shops that stays open year-round, really perfect timing. I'd been prepared to take another factory job despite how much I've hated it for the last five years, or possibly a summer job here and then have a longer commute to work in a ski resort in winter. But there's a major housing shortage for summer workers, so I can easily offer a room to someone for just a few months out of the year and know that it's a huge upgrade from the tiny apartment, if that (two of the people I work with have been camping all summer!) they'd be sharing otherwise. If I do happen to end up with a terrible roommate, at least I know they'd be gone soon enough.

My yard is one long narrow strip of dense packed clay with an 80' sickly elm in the middle. I did finally confirm last week that it's not Dutch Elm Disease, it's slime flux! Gross, but nowhere near as deadly. It rained last night so I'm about to head out to work on digging up a few clusters of knotweed while the ground is still as soft as it gets.

Bathroom was due for some scrubbing. The hardest part was the bathtub; the hard water and rust leaves some nasty stains. Everything was done with either water alone (mirror, floor), water with vinegar (sink, toilet), or water with vinegar and baking soda (the bathtub).

Cleaned all my floors last night, so this morning I started cleaning the rugs. I did the biggest one first, draped over the porch railing to shake and beat it until it stopped releasing dust clouds, and then turned it around to repeat the process.

It's been a bit since I've done a thorough, underneath-all-the-rugs floor cleaning (I raised chicks in the living room a couple weeks ago so it's definitely time!) so I rolled them all up last night and swept everything.

I don't have a dishwasher, so I did two large loads of dishes for this BB.

I used a small squirt of Mrs Meyers Clean Day Lemon Verbena for each load of dishes.

The first time, I scrubbed with soap and then rinsed with fresh running water into the sink basin, using the rinse water to scrub the next items. I saved the largest and dirtiest items, my pot and pan and casserole dish, for last. That helped to keep the water clean longer, but for the second load I switched it around and used the pot and a big bowl to hold soapy and rinse water, replacing the rinse water as needed. Other than the pot I still waited until the end to wash anything with food stuck on.

Total water used looks like roughly two gallons? A bit more for the first load, less for the second one since I didn't turn the sink on as many times.

All the best planting areas of my yard (in other words, anything that isn't solid clay) are full of Japanese knotweed. Looking into potential uses for it as I try to fight it back; it's almost time to chop everything before it seeds. I know it's edible, but I have far more than I can eat on my own and it's all very large and tough now. Poles for trellises/temporary fencing? Fibers for twine? I could make an insect house. I know I need to heavily mulch over the clay if I hope to ever plant on it without raised beds, but I'm more than a little wary of using the knotweed for that given its tendency to reroot. It clearly doesn't love the clay either, but I don't want to take that chance!

I picked 2 cups (stuffed them in a 1-quart mason jar, it was about half full after packing it down) of dandelion greens. Since it's August and I couldn't find many that weren't too bitter to eat raw, I boiled them and used them as a spinach substitute in a ham and spinach frittata.

I picked up a whole reel of old garden hose someone was getting rid of. It would be a perfect extension to help me reach the far end of my yard, and was amazingly leak-free... except the end was smashed, so I couldn't use a sprayer attachment with it.

I got a new brass male end repair piece and steel clamp, chopped off the old end, and installed the new one, only to find it leaked under pressure — without a sprayer attached, it worked fine, but with it I was getting far wetter than I'd like. No point in having replaced the old end if I still couldn't use the sprayer! Another, cleaner cut and a few adjustments of the clamp fixed that, too.

I actually managed it: I purchased my own home, by myself, something I'd almost thought was impossible these days. Of course, I couldn't afford anything in or near the city I grew up in, I had to move to a far cheaper area across the state, where jobs pay less, but I budgeted for multiple scenarios and my house does have a spare room so taking a roommate is an option if things get tight. I couldn't move in until I had a job, so for the first few months I continued living with my parents and took my time moving furniture.

So now I have a new (very old, actually) house, new job, new community. And a lot of work to do with it alone.

The roof is old, but will probably last a few more years. Storage space is... tight. It was the smallest frame house on the market (nothing wrong with trailers, but the idea of having both a mortgage and rent, and not having space for even a garden, didn't sound like an improvement to me) with no garage. There's an 80ft tree in the backyard that may be dying, but my more immediate plant concern is the knotweed that is alarmingly close to my foundation. Anyone have any ideas on controlling knotweed without poison, by the way? Everything I read says it's impossible.

My basement has a dirt floor — it's essentially an extra-deep crawlspace, what we call a Michigan basement, and so not very useful for storage. I was a little annoyed by that at first, but it turned out to save me this spring when so much of the region flooded. Almost everyone I know around here had their basement fill with water, with the sole exception of someone who had just had it sealed last year, so having nothing down there to be damaged meant I was probably the best off out of everyone.

I have just under half an acre total, which is large for being (just barely) within city limits. I won't be keeping any large livestock, but for just myself I don't really need to. I still have quail, which is technically questionable under city zoning, but my next door neighbors with their 12 dogs aren't going to complain, and someone down the street has a definitely illegal chicken rooster. I've considered possibly keeping rabbits as well? Meat rabbits? Not sure yet. Again, high production is not necessary, and I probably need another freezer first anyway. I'm starting to plan out my garden and mini orchard now; I want a row or two of fruit trees and  some perennials, and the soil will need much work, and I may have to consider how the water and sunlight will change if the old tree has to come down...

Over all, I don't regret it. I have a lot of maintenance and repair work to do, and some organizational challenges (putting up shelves will help! Maybe eventually I'll even have a garage), but I can make all those decisions myself.