The Annika Enclosure

       By far the largest undertaking for the 2018 Backyard Renovation was the creation of the Annika Enclosure. The Northeast quadrant of the backyard had historically been occupied by a messy and overly productive grapefruit tree. It required alot of water, was slowly becoming infested with termites, and made more shitty grapefruits than I could eat in a lifetime. Additionally, you really couldnt do anything else over there. It was just a tree, it took up space, that was it. It was too low to walk under comfortably and wasnt well positioned to provide any appreciable shade. It had kinda become a collecting ground for stuff I didnt know what to do with. Grass didnt grow well there, and it was alot of yard that was just dead space.

So the operation began, I could have had Jose yoink the whole thing out, Probably in 30 minutes, for $20, without breaking a sweat. But i was having fun and id just canceled my gym membership, so I kept at it. Worked on it about 45 minutes per night after work, for acouple weeks. eventually i got it widdled down to a nice little stump which I was then able to dig out of the ground. Ended up burning up anything worth burning. But ive still got most of that stump sitting in front of the house, waiting for the next bulk pickup. Anyway, once that fucker was out, I had a clean slate. 

So, we werent going to just keep truckin with a dirt lot. I could have found a way to have fun with that, but Christi and Annika were not going to be big fans. We decided artificial turf was gonna be the way to go. We shopped around ALOT. Quotes were mostly over 5k and most places werent going to touch our brick border unless we paid extra. It was starting to look pretty glum. As usual Jose saved our ass, he asked if we had found anyone to install the turf yet and volunteered his services. He also mortared in all the brick and relocated some irrigation lines. All for several thousand dollars less than the next nearest quote and all in a single day. Jose is a badass. Seriously. My real live hero. They should make a movie about him. 

Fence came next, to separate doggles from clean, expensive grass. That came from Home Depot in pre-made sections. Trump Enterprises installed the fence. They make the best fences. Tremendous, amazing fences. You have never seen such a great fence. Really great fences. With big hands. ( I actually installed the fence, it went pretty smoothly and took a morning.)

       So that was that. Annika loves it, its way better looking, and its great to chill by the fire or grill or garden while the wee child frolics in the emerald glade. And no dog poop. Love not having dog poop there. like a whole section of yard that is relatively clean. you can roll around in it. Its just great. Doesnt feel exactly like real grass, but lets not kid ourselves here, real grass isnt exactly without its own faults.  

THE GARDENS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

       As part of the 2018 Spring backyard renovation, we have put in some pretty dope raised gardens. Four at present, though only two are planted presently. Obviously they are galvanized cattle troughs so they should last pretty much forever. Hundred bucks apiece at the ole Tractor Supply. Also got some bitchen flannel shirts while I was there. Filled the bottom half with palm fronds. Those should decompose rather slowly, occupying space i would otherwise have to fill with valuable soil, and eventually add to the organic content of the soil. Palm Fronds are actually kind of a minor ecological issue in Phoenix, so finding a semi adequate use for them is kind of a plus as well. 

       Planted some junk in there on a whim around xmas, results are not worth pictures. But we are pretty dialed in now and should have some Tomatoes and Peppers in pretty short order. Each plants gets its own drip line. Watered twice per day for 10 minutes at some absurdly low setting. So we are wasting little to no water, unless you consider gardening in general kind of a waste of water, which is open for negotiation. To that end, an additional trough has been purchased which will soon be utilized for rainwater collection and storage, more on that later. 

I hate my pool

          Ok, I hate my pool. I never swim in it. Its just a an ongoing project that costs me money. As i write that, i realize that describes about half the shit in my garage but this item adds considerable value to my house and the dogs and wife and child all like it, so I guess I wont fill it with concrete. 
           Anyway, when we moved in the Hayward pump that ran the filter was god only knows how old and made horrific noises. It boosted our electric bill by about about $200/month every summer and it was a constant pain in my ass. The only reason we kept it around is because new pool pumps are very expensive, its not a decision that is made lightly. 
           About 3 months ago the Ole Hayward took a pretty serious shit. What had been an inconveniently loud noise became a pretty serious scream. Like, this was loud, i piled old pallets around it so it wouldnt piss the neighbors off too bad. Luckily it was the cold season so it only had to run an hour or two per day. Regardless, once the shit hit the fan, things went south pretty quick ........

Not super ideal. So I rebuilt the pump. The rebuild kit cost 20 bucks, took about 4 hours to complete, and extended the pumps lifetime by about one week. And once it took a shit this time it REALLY took a shit. Smoke, and full god damn stop. Warm weather (algae growing season) was quickly approaching so it was either live with a swamp or get this pump rockin. I briefly considered turning the whole thing into a tilapia farm, but Christi was not enthusiastic about that. Which is absurd. 

So the extant PVC piping and valves were pretty ate up. So it quickly went from a simple pump exchange, to a replacement of pretty much everything that came out of the ground. I didnt get to straighten things out quite as much as I wanted due to the limitations of the existing pipe. Several repair joints were already installed and I didnt want to dig down any more than I already had to for this operation. Also, I quickly realized that the new pump wasnt going to fit in the old pumps footprint, it was considerably taller and had to be moved out from the filter afew inches. So i had to pour some concrete, so that was fun. 

 Anyway, The new pump is amazing. The whole project probably cost 1k, the pump was not cheap (though, as with all things, it was cheaper on Amazon Prime than anywhere and came free to the door). It is quiet, like I can barely hear it running most of the time. And it has a variable speed transmission thingy so it should save us a tremendous amount of cash and pay for itself within a year or two. I think the fresh gravel around the filter and freshly painted pipes really make the whole thing look alot better. The project also took care of alot of leaking issues, so that is nice for a number of reasons.