What a Weekend

I took Friday off from work and had a great day of accomplishment on tasks around the house. Mostly outdoor tasks. I took a couple of power tools to get tuned up. I put the snow blower away and I cleaned up my garage so I can park inside again. Just in time for a bunch more snow.

I didn't even bother to break out the snow blower because I knew it would all be melted before the end of the day...and it was. But then it snowed again. It's melting now.

So anyhoo...I had a load or two to haul to the dump. I borrowed a friends truck, donned my Ca-Boi Hat and went to work.

I had many tasks to perform involving the truck. I wanted to get the yard cleaned up a little and the garage cleaned out a LOT.

I really enjoyed driving the truck around. It made me miss my old truck. It's really handy to have an old beat up pick up. There's just so much you can haul with it. But, it's a total pig on gas.

I hauled some stuff to the Habitat for Humanity store and upon heading home, I came across this poor little car.

It was really smoking. The Fire Department showed up on scene just as I made it through the intersection. So I got to enjoy some excitment and not get bogged down in a major traffic jam.

My trip to the dump involved the removal of a lot of yard debris that had built up over the winter...including our $50.00 Christmas Tree. I trimmed a few branches off a tree next to the garage. This one branch layed right across the peak of the roof and wore a hole in it. It's not very big and right where a rafter is so it doesn't let much weather in. Still, it had to go. I'll patch the hole in days (months) to come.

I have been wanting to plant some vines around the deck so I could get them to grow up the posts and onto the arbors. I have found a place that sells Grapes vines and I am going to plant a clamatis as well. I also ordered some cutting of hops from Jim's Homebrew and they arrived Friday. It's still too chilly to plant them, but I picked them up and put them in a couple of pots in the basement. That will get the roots started and then they will be all set when it warms up...in August.

Well, that was my busy Friday. The rest of the weekend was full of accomplishments too. The main accomplishment I would like to discuss here is the Beer Chicken I barbequed for Sunday dining.

It's the first time I have tried this and it worked okay. I used Guiness and it didn't really add much flavor. I'm told that Sierra Nevada is a good beer to use cuz it's really hoppy. I'll try that next time.

The main problem I had was that it was too big to fit in my Bar B-Q. I had to take out the grill and set it down in the coals. It took about an hour to cook and the meat just fell off the bone. I'll be trying to perfect this technique over the Summer.