Wednesday, June 04, 2008

Body Shakin', Earth Movin'

After all the consternation, pain, and embarrassment it's caused me, I bet you guys would never guess what I rented last weekend...

A skid loader! Well, kinda. It was a mini skid loader. It's called the Dingo, by Toro. We're ramping up to put down a patio of pavers and we needed to remove a foot of dirt over a 20'x12' area. Turns out that much dirt weighs a lot!

I knew it was a lot of dirt and I also knew that this soil hadn't been worked in over 4 years, so it was pretty tough. I had no grand illusions that my weak back could do that work, so I forked out the money to rent this puppy.

It was fun, but I was still tired at the end of the day. Now I've got to compact the dirt, get a load of sand, and level the stuff out. I've already purchased the pavers from Lowes and am awaiting delivery of those fellas. After the patio, we're moving on to the deck.

We're doing our part to stimulate the economy. Thanks, President Bush.

4 comments:

Papa Doc said...

Hey, that looks fun! Looks like the project is moving along nicely. Sorry things like this are so hard on your back.
Mom

Jess and Jen said...

That would have been tough on anyone's back. I just don't happen to have much of my L5-S1 left.

Jason said...

Wish I was there to give you a hand. I really enjoy doing landscaping - especially the cool stuff you get to use like the dingo.

Jess and Jen said...

Jason, I wish you were here to help us landscape too! I must admit that when you wrote once about planting one of your favorite hostas, I had no idea what a hosta was. Last week I was at my mom's house and I asked her what the nice green plant in her front yard was...of course it was a hosta. I totally want to put one in our yard now. I don't know nearly enough about plants and gardening, etc, but I guess it's not too late to learn. (Now if only I can manage to keep the flowers I planted alive...)

Jen