The Garden

I went out shopping again yesterday for housewares. The local hardware box store, Bunnings Warehouse, is roughly equivalent to The Home Depot in the States. I've finally found the big box stores near where I live. For me, they are in Carindale and Cannon Hill. And I've only scratched the surface of them....lots more stores to explore. Bunnings has a parking lot the size of Nebraska, which made life much easier. I spent a couple of hours wandering about, looking for garden tools, cleaning supplies, push brooms, and eventually settling on a barbeque grill.

The grill I chose has a timber frame, so I spent a bit of time assembling the frame when I got home. I had a great time putting it together in the the late afternoon. It gave me some time to spend on the deck. I got a great deal on the thing, and it was cheaper than the black or chrome all-metal grills, so I think I did well. It's very satisfying to assemble kits. And this grill will be a beauty and the source of so much enjoyment, I can't wait to get it all together and fire it up the first time. Flame grilled food...yum!

I also spent some time with the garden tools hacking away at the hedges and the palm trees. The picket fence in front of the house is backed by a hedge that had gone to flower and seed. It is too tall, too wild, and had grown through the fence. Quite messy. There's something very calming about pruning and shaping plants. It can be hard work, but hedges are really easy...I had a small hedge back in San Francisco, so I've had a bit of practice with them. Since the hedge at my new place is overgrown, my biggest challenge is being patient enough to not over-prune. So, I pruned it back just enough to leave some spaces between the leaves. In a few weeks, they'll grow back, and the interior spaces will come alive, and I'll be able to prune it back some more. It's too bad the owners let it go, but it's understandable. I think they spent most of their time on home improvements in the interior, which I'm grateful for.

Cutting back the palm trees was simple, and I really only wanted to get them out of the way of the walkways and stairs and deck. There are a couple of trees that look ill. It's hard to tell if it's because they over-grew with all the rain this year and are now dying back to a more sustainable level, or if they are really sick. I'll have to keep an eye on them.

It's nice to have a garden and green, growing things to look after again. I hadn't realized how much I did miss gardening. I'm not a master at it, but I did somehow manage to coax my backyard in the States into some semblance of order. More importantly, I learned how to keep plants alive, and how to prune and weed. Gardening is a skill that is undervalued in urban society, I think. I'm glad I had a chance to learn it in San Francisco. What little I've done so far here in Queensland has been wonderful, and I'm really looking forward to looking after the backyard.

I met my neighbors yesterday. They have the cutest little boy. He was running around in a Spiderman costume all afternoon. He and his Dad ran around their backyard. The whole family seemed happy. They seem like good people. I saw the neighbors on the other side; didn't get to speak with them, but they do seem to keep a tidy house.

Overall, I seem to have landed in a nice neighborhood. I still have lots of exploring to do. There are several restaurants I have to check out, including Mexican, seafood, and Indian. There's even a pub up the road a bit, a tackle shop, and cake shop. I had a pizza from the local Pizza Hut, which is just steps away from home...uninspired pizza, but I was really, really hungry. Way better than the last Domino's pizza I had, so it'll do in a pinch. I have to find a real pizza place, though. Sadly, the local video store is a Blockbuster, so I need to find the real video store.

Anyway, I'm starting to settle in to the new place. I'm getting a lot of things delivered in the middle of the week, so at least I'll be able to start making my meals, cleaning up after myself, and eating on a table. It'll be another few days after that before I get my bed, so I'll be sleeping on the floor for a little while. I don't mind, but it does make for late nights and early mornings. There's lots more to do to move in completely, but I'm making some real progress now. I hope I can be out of the high rise by the end of the month.

Oh, yes. I've seen the bats go hunting every evening I've been at the house. I saw the flight last night. I also saw three species of birds in my backyard, and saw the lizards climb down from my roof back to garden level. Yay! Another benefit of the garden and the park are all the living things. I missed the natural world, and I'm glad to be in a small slice of it in my new home.