Our neighbour D. is here with his mini-backhoe about to start finishing the back walkout drainage work.

However, Jeff just came in for the phone and said D. thinks our septic bed is full.

Our what?

I thought the last septic guy who was here said we only had a tank. Which we just had emptied. How can the bed be full? Is that why it tries to backup into our basement sink during rainy season? Am I going to need a third job to pay for this one?

Weekly Update

I got in my car for the first time in 6 weeks. And then I actually drove it! Jeff was away for work for a few days so I had to fend for myself. I took a brief trip into town to get a couple things.

Driving went okay, but I definitely should only do it after good sleep. I find I’m still foggy brained at times.  In fact I dialed the wrong phone number twice this week! Embarrassing…

Speaking of sleep, I don’t let myself sleep enough. I keep getting caught in the “OMG I have to go back to work soon” trap and “I don’t want to waste a second of this time” then I realize I’m home recuperating from a major surgery and I should be sleeping!!

I can weed some of the easy weeds in the garden for very short periods of time. This gets me moving a bit so I think I’m easing back into normal activity.

I still get a very sore abdomen at times. Usually when I’m tired. And at night. And if I’ve been coughing and/or sneezing. Good news Julie – my sneezer is back! Loud enough to hear ’em across the lake, I’m sure.

Monty’s fence has been dismantled for a week too because of the backhoe work, so Monty has to go out on a leash each time.  That gives me more walking exercise too which is good.  Luckily he is getting older and didn’t try to rip my arm out of the socket much this week as we walked around and around the yard and house and upper driveway.

Update from the digging

We are realizing more with every new project in the ground here that we are on rock solid clay.

We rented a post hole auger a few years back when we were building the wood shed, but we didn’t get to finish the job. We got a few inches into the ground before the ground said no more and started to smoke – the ground – not the auger!

The only reason D. think our septic bed is full is because Jeff mentioned that it seems to back up into the basement sink during really rainy times – there are no symptoms from outside.  Whew!  D. thinks either our septic bed doesn’t drain because we are sitting on harder than rock clay – or maybe the outlet is blocked up. He seems to think the outlet is in the trees and he made a couple calls to confirm, including to M. the contractor next door who agreed with him. D. is going to try to find the outlet because the drain he’s putting in for the walkout is going to end up in a similar place. He said maybe it just needs a new gravel bed at the outlet.

And speaking of gravel, D. is saving Jeff’s back and he’s moving the gravel over by backhoe bucket from the pile that was delivered in the driveway rather than Jeff moving it by wagon or wheelbarrow. Whew!

Deck Construction

Deck construction resumes tomorrow.  Jeff got a couple more of those really thick and heavy duty L brackets made by an iron works guy so we’ll have 6 attaching the deck to the house, rather than just the 4 we had originally.

It will probably be a little frustrating that I can’t lift the lumber and help out.  Jeff has already decided that I can be in charge of painting the cut ends with that green pressure treated sealer.

Weather

It is still quite dry here and we have a ban on open fires. The weather has been gorgeous though. Warm, sunny, not too humid lately.  And at night it gets cool and really dewey.  We have to close up all the windows at night on the main floor because everything in here, especially paper, gets so damp.  I remember in the Sault I used to open my windows in spring and close them months later, but here we open and close the main floor ones every day.