Whacking by lightning, Immense

We had a dry night last night so I felt guilty not taking advantage of it. The task I selected is one of those pretty high on the shitty list, weed whacking the property fence line, both sides.  This is something that has not been done since probably the start of summer so it was beyond due.  Every time I do my backyard walks with Elsa I saw the weeds and high grass woven into the fencing taunting me, mercilessly.  I headed out to the shed about 6:15 making a quick mental estimate that the job should take me around an hour.  You would think after 21 years I would have a pretty good idea of how long certain tasks take.  I underestimated this chore by about half.

I started off by weed whacking under the solar panels which is it’s own unique version of suck.  Their angled mount requires me to bend over awkwardly while holding the weed whacker to reach down low, a perfect exercise for my now clearly chronic lower back issue.  I did this first following my normal do the worst, first game plan.  It was then onto the fence.  Weed whacking the fence line sucks for a couple of reasons. First it takes a very long time.  Because the way the weeds grow around the wire you have to go slow and sometimes hit areas repeatedly to knock it all down.  In some spots the field grass is so high that you have to chop down in layers, starting high and finishing low. The other annoying aspect is the field fence devours trimmer line like mad.  I had to refill the spool twice during the nearly two hour session.

Because the job took much longer than I estimated I wound up doing the last section of fence in near complete darkness with illumination being provided momentarily by the various strikes of lightning that were nearby.  I am pretty sure “fck my life” ran through my head more than once during this chore.  Every time I whack the fence I get a front and center view of how bad some of the fence posts are getting.  In the areas where water is a near constant companion during summers there are a number of posts that are completely rotted at the base.  This winter I may try to see how it goes doing as needed post replacements although that sounds miserable, trying to do so with the existing fence intact.

So after finally returning inside and throwing my grass covered clothing in the wash I am walking around preparing my supper.  As I am walking I stepped on the edge of one of my kitchen mats.  Somehow that was just enough to send a stabbing pain through my left knee.  It was bad, requiring a full on hopping limp to move around.  This has happened to me a number of times were seemingly innocent activities result in injury.  This sort of thing normally means probably some torn piece of meniscus moved inside the joint in just the right way to cause the pain.  Now I just have to wait for it to move somewhere else.  Life after 50, it’s no joke…. I’m supposed to play pickleball tonight, I haven’t given up yet….