Irrigation

I’ve complained on this blog about the lack of an automatic sprinkler system in my big and beautiful yard. I’ve complained much more about it in my real life which I try not to do, because it’s whiney to complain about something as petty as dragging a hose around my beautiful yard, and I know I’m playing the world’s smallest violin for myself.

I do hate dragging the hose around, though, and I hate standing there, for hours, watering the garden and knowing it’s not really going to make much difference because if I really want my hose-watering to have an effect, it takes all day and is a giant pain in the neck, plus it wastes water.

A couple of people have recommended an alternative: the do-it-yourself sprinkler system.

My neighbor, who has a d-i-y sprinkler system, showed me how hers worked. My friend the rocket scientist who holds several advanced degrees, suggested that I just do the “redneck system,”  which I think that is engineer-speak for “figure out what works and do that; ” at any rate, when I asked him “how,” that is what he said. My plumber friend told me that plumbing is all about solving problems.

I said to myself, “hmmmmmmmm, it is already in the nineties and I don’t want to spend two hours every day dragging the hose around the yard.”

I went to the do-it-yourself store and bought an excessive amount of soaker hoses and valves and connector hoses and stick-in-the-ground sprinkler heads. I hooked them up. They worked! Perfectly! I went back to the store and bought enough to do the entire yard. I hooked them up! They worked! Perfectly! Then I adjusted all the valves so that I can turn on the whole thing just by turning on the hose.

It’s a complicated system, but not unnecessarily so, because I have a complicated yard (it’s on a creek). I’m just thrilled because as summer comes, my garden will thrive, and I won’t waste water because it all goes where it is needed. I’m even more thrilled that I could figure out how to do it, and that I had the capacity to see the project through.

“My complex problem-solving skills are back,” I said to Chris. “I can do stuff.”

“Great,” he said.  “Now go make me a sandwich.”

He did not really say that, but had he, I would have laughed. And he would have been right. I cannot imagine how hard it has been for him to have seen me go from problem-solving gal extraordinaire to “wife who can’t figure out how to put the laundry away.” I think he should be happier that I could do this, but I think he doesn’t want to jinx it, so he’s laying low. What is a huge deal for me is a pat on the head for him. Plus, he wants a sandwich. He’s been making his own, and mine too, for four years.

I also got a sumburn. On my neck.