The thermometer outside the atrium window reads 92° this morning, probably because it’s older than I am and in the direct sunlight. Officially, the temperature is 68°, which means I’m going to put on some shorts and spend at least half the day outside in the yard. Our good friend Dave, who has been doing triple-good-friend duty, lent me his chainsaw, late of Louisiana, for some down-home woodcutting fun this afternoon. I found an owner’s manual online with instructions on gas mixture and chain tension, and I’ll probably pick up a new chain for the heck of it.

Part of the Great 2006 Garden Experiment is to plant several species of tomato, bean, and vegetable in a 25’x10 plot towards the back of the lawn. Instead of buying expensive wood to edge the plot, I’m going to cut thin slices of the remaining felled tree out back and use this to keep the soil in place.

We seem to be having problems keeping our seedlings alive downstairs, which is troubling both of us. The cucumbers started almost immediately, got huge and started pressing up against the plastic of the container, so we opened the container and most of them died off. The tomatoes have proved to be heartier, but we’re at a loss for how we should deal with the loss of our entire crop. There’s a house in our neighborhood owned by a man who runs a window installation business, and he often puts old casement windows out on his lawn for people to take. I’m going to grab a couple that I saw today and build a larger coldframe out of scrap wood to see if that helps our crops.