Raised Garden Beds — Part 1

 The dirt in my yard resembles concrete.  If we get enough rain over the winter, it almost softens enough to dig, but other than that, if I want to dig a hole, I have to get out my electric jack hammer.  I'm not kidding.  

But I like to grow stuff, and during the last year have channeled much of my home remodeling/renovation efforts to my front and back yards.  In the interest of growing stuff, I have created three raised garden beds and had trucked in a lot of nursery-grade amended topsoil—that is, dirt mixed with compost.  And by "a lot," I mean closing in on a hundred cubic yards of the stuff.  Some of it has been "premium gardening mix" (finely ground redwood bark, peat moss, perlite and compost).

You say that sounds like an awful lot of soil for three raised garden beds?  Well, okay, I'm also in the process of having a retaining wall built at the back of my steeply sloping back yard, and using the topsoil to backfill it level, creating in effect a giant new garden (trees, etc.).  A separate post will be forthcoming on that project after the contractor actually decides to start the work—maybe in a month.

This post is on the first of the official three raised garden beds, to wit, the official "garden."

The garden is located right outside of the back of my house, butting up against a small concrete patio, seven feet by about twenty feet, with rounded ends.  The garden wall is made from retaining wall block, but with the back lip knocked off, because I didn't want a setback.  A setback is good for a retaining wall because it helps support the load, and the lip keeps the block from sliding.  If there is a setback in a circular wall, however, each course is a slightly smaller diameter, and the blocks go out of alignment.  So I used mortar to secure each course to the blocks below it.  

But as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words.  Here's the start:

And this is it with the walls done, before any garden soil was added.  I dug out a good bit of the bad dirt to allow room for more good dirt.

Here it is with about half the soil shoveled in:

After a bit of time passed, things started to grow.  I also built a trellis for my grape vines (that had been in big pots), which did double duty as a frame to support a sun screen.  By the height of summer, the sun is so intense here that it literally scorches the leaves on tomato plants, etc.  Desert plants can take the heat, but not so much normal vegetables.

Here's a view from the end:

I mentioned that I was going to make my sloped back yard level, which means anything growing down slope will be buried in topsoil—not good for tree health.  I have a really nice flowering jacaranda tree I do not want to lose, so I built a retaining wall much like the raised garden, except in reverse.  Meaning the topsoil goes on the outside.  You'll see . . .

And then:

And as I continue to haul topsoil from my driveway to the backyard:

 Until the dirt reaches the top.

So this shows something about just how much new topsoil I'm bringing in—for the time being leaving room for the crew to build the retaining wall (6-7 feet at its tallest).

Guest Bathroom—Part 9 (Installing tub valve, spout, and shower supply lines)

 Last time I installed the tub and its drain lines—a big milestone.  This time I extended the hot and cold water supply lines from the attic down through the bathroom wall, and installed the valve and hardware for the shower and tub spout.  Another milestone.  Going forward, it's carpentry, wall and floor tile, etc. 

Building a new bathroom from scratch is much easier than starting with an old bathroom.  In my case, the bathroom was bounded on two sides by outside walls, and those walls had suffered significant water and insect damage, and had been poorly repaired, so the walls were in bad shape.  The studs were uneven in every respect, with many of them having been reinforced with partial doublers.  The first challenge was to shim out the wall where the plumbing would go, so it would be flat.

 This had to be done first because the hardware had to be positioned relative to the face of the finished wall tile.  Once I had calculated the various shim thicknesses, and installed those, the plumbing could go in. 

The valve body needed to be the first in.

 Then the pex tubing brought down from the lines previously run in the attic to a position above the bathroom ceiling.  I used 3/4" PEX tubing in the attic because the water flow would need to be maximized so as not to take forever to fill a 100-gallon tub.  Unfortunately, the valve body inlets were all sized at 1/2", so I used adapters down to 1/2" pex.

Since this is an outside 2x4 stud wall, I insulated with rigid foam as much as possible.

And then installed cement backer board over it all.  Next I will continue installing backer board and then tile. 

My Novels

 I've been taking a break from writing novels during the house remodel, but have five out as e-books (available from Amazon).  I would describe them generally as science-fiction political thrillers—all character driven.  Only $4.99 each.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004Q9TZLG 

A Wall Street Journal analysis concluded the last administration's "Moon, Mars, and Beyond" space exploration initiative was motivated not so much to send man to the planets as to send new business to the U.S. aerospace industry. In a bit of prescience, Dreams presents one harrowing answer to the question: What would be the reaction if U.S. dollars were supporting an international space program, and the consortium awarded the most lucrative contract to a foreign competitor?

Charles Xavier Fulton, the U.S. space program manager, is living a thankless existence under the thumb of Vice-President Savage (U.S. space policy czar). For Fulton, the question is: What if all your dreams came true, and then turned into the biggest nightmare of your life?

 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004TH08KC 

Night Frost is set in the recent past.

What if the U.S. unwittingly gave Iran title to the breakthrough technology of the century? What if the only man who can get it back is convinced the transfer was a legitimate business transaction?

Heavy-handed spy-chief Drago sets up brilliant CIA scientist Olcovich in Finland to tempt the Iranians with a bogus room-temperature superconductor, ostensibly to con them out of $billions for its "development." But Olcovich resents his treatment and pursues his own ambitions, leaving Drago in a two-truth clandestine fog. Is the technology real?

Washington lawyer Roger Piersig thinks it is. Recruited by Olcovich to promote the technology, he soon finds himself in the middle of a deadly conflict, pressured by the CIA to betray his new boss. Complicating Piersig's dilemma is the beautiful but headstrong Finnish intelligence agent Lotta Svärd, with her incendiary personal agenda.

Anti-hero Piersig struggles to remain his own man, even as the operatives around him play out their inevitable fates. But when Olcovich finally prepares to move the priceless technology to Iran, even Piersig is compelled to choose sides.

---

"turned out to be as good as the some of the best-sellers I've read . . . well worthwhile! I look forward to reading more by this author."

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004KAAYWK 

The Samsara series is based on the dreams subplot in Dreams of the Iklax, a sci-fi/political thriller set in an alternative near-future.

Two-hundred years in the future, a partially deciphered message from an alien race is revealed by Earth's ruling Committee, then ignored. Maverick war hero Fulton, shocked and suspicious, demands a first-contact mission.

Shift five years later: Fulton and three others set out in a small, untested spacecraft, miraculously capable of traversing space-time. Fulton soon discovers they're heading into a galactic war, and realizes they've all been betrayed. They are lost, and the vagaries of space-time have moved them far into the future. There's no going home.

His secretive Diplomatic Corps second-in-command--Rachael, appearing mere minutes before their departure, then reveals the device found planted aboard is some kind of weapon, built to the aliens' specifications. They would know how to use it to save the galaxy from a powerful adversary.

Pressing ahead with their mission amid distrust and shocking revelations, the crew barely survives baffling attacks, then starts to wonder--just who is the real enemy? 

---

"The surprise was the haunting, parallel plot . . . that left me wanting more. . . . sprinkled with bits of humor . . . made me smile every time. Highly recommended!"

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004KSQWX2 

Two hundred years in the future, multi-national corporations have grown enough in power and reach to see national governments as obsolete, creating political instability, burdensome rules and uneven tariffs, without any apparent benefit. Even most public services have been contracted out to global monopolies. This includes the World Vids, the source for all news and information. With technology now able to easily generate any virtual reality for the screen, the acceptance of "created" content has become universal. But recently, some of the more perceptive politicians have noticed a disturbing trend in incidents undermining their authority, and it's making them nervous.

Privileged political apprentice Toby Fitzgerald -"Kenshi"- is largely oblivious to all of this. But when he survives a dramatic terrorist attack on the Senate leadership, his investigation to find those responsible makes him a persona non grata with the corporate power elite, and soon plunges him into a world of nightmarish political upheaval.

Kenshi's World is the second novel in the Samsara sci-fi series, taking place almost three decades before Samsara. It spans the eighteen months of escalating terror preceding the global War that took the lives of six billion people.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GFEZ6Z4 

Two-hundred years in the future, with their War to bring all governments into the World Union well underway, a confederation of global monopolies begins to suspect the rumored Resistance might in fact be real.

Fearing their leadership may be threatened, the Committee targets a suspected Resistance expert on sentient artificial-intelligence, Havana-based Margaret Ripley. If she steals the dangled bait--an A.I. uniquely able to exploit her revolutionary software--the Committee thinks it can expose the whole Resistance. Ripley seems willing to risk almost anything to realize her dream of creating a synthetic human. The Committee's operatives are counting on that, having imbued the A.I. trojan horse with insidious spyware and stubborn loyalty.

But when she discovers the ruse, Ripley is determined to turn the A.I. against the Committee by giving her a human physical and emotional consciousness, if only she can keep Johnnie isolated long enough for her humanizing modifications to take hold. That turns out to be easier said than done, even with the help of familiar Resistance veterans.

Ripley's World is the third novel in the Samsara series, picking up a year after Kenshi's World ends, and predating Samsara by about 27 years. 

 

In the pipeline:

A sci-fi murder mystery, Daughtry's World will be the fourth novel in the Samsara series. Its protagonist is Kevin Daughtry, a detective introduced in Kenshi's World, and a character just too interesting to let go. I'm excited about this one, and am now putting together the scene outline (after filling 100 single-spaced pages with plot elements and character development).

Two hundred years in the future, in the unsettled aftermath of a brutal, global political upheaval, commoner Kevin Daughtry is mysteriously pulled from his Criminal Investigative Service unit to find out who is behind the murders of three apparently ordinary people. It soon becomes clear to Daughtry that someone at the very top of the ruling elite knows secrets about the victims, and does not want that knowledge revealed, even to the corporate bluebloods.

Daughtry soon finds and deciphers a hidden "hit list" that had been in the possession of one of the assassins. Five names. The three who had been murdered, and the fourth: Alfred Donnerly, the head of Burning Rock Interplanetary Development, headquartered in the Helios colony, on Mars. The fifth name was Donnerly's daughter Melissa. She was 41, three years younger than Daughtry, and living in Shanghai.

It isn't clear why either of the two are being targeted, but Daughtry and Melissa very quickly develop a relationship, both emotional and professional. The bond grows after they barely survive an assassination attempt; she becomes his de facto partner in the investigation. What is clear to Daughtry, however, is that if he does not identify those behind the murders, both he and Melissa will be the next victims.

When he decides the answers to the mystery can only be found on Mars, Daughtry reluctantly heads for that planet. It is there that his greatest challenges are waiting for him.