2011 MAR 23 : WEDNESDAY
Yet more house projects.

We hired a couple of people from the Millionair Club to clear the terraced eastern side of our property. They are a non-profit organization that places the homeless and working poor in day/temporary jobs (and perhaps permanent ones as well). Employers have to provide any necessary equipment, of course.

Tom and Paul (actual name “Si”… his full name seemed Korean to me but he did not look very Korean) worked hard and cleared practically the entire area except for the really stubborn blackberries roots. They were very happy we gave them lunch (one had brought a salmon sandwich just in case). I gave Paul some naproxen later, too. Apparently their job rate was only $9 an hour (is that even minimum wage?) but we gave them $80 each for maybe six hours of work. They protested that we were paying them too much, which was nice of them, but they definitely earned it.
Amanda finished clearing the steep slope above the large retaining wall in front of the house. She obtained various native plants and planted them. Sweet!

I started building the chicken run which will basically be a big rectangular frame with a door on one end and the doghouse/coop on the other. It is kinda slow going as I never have the exact tools to do anything nor is there a good space to make it, but I did get the big parts of the frame put together.

We and the two workers generated a lot of yard waste, but we had already filled our yard waste container up a few days ago. Since it will cost $4.15 for each extra bag we put out, we decided to slowly get rid of it over the coming weeks as we have 18 large compostable paper bags ($70+!!!!), and we are still generating more.

Grades came in for the winter quarter and I still have a 4.0! Crazy.

We went out to eat because we were tired and to celebrate a successful academic quarter. Although, since the Kai was with us, we ended up just going to Red Robin rather than, say, eating a lot of decadent sushi and sake. I ate a lot of fry instead and ignored Amanda’s disapproval. Hey, I was supposed to be celebrating.

I was taking a break, but now back to chicken coop-ing.