The ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM or ---------Shed ready

My Queen Bee and I live in a condominium in Charlotte, NC most of the time.  Our little slice of heaven does not have lots of room but is a very efficient place to live.  With the kids gone and the dog dead, we are reorganizing.  My old office is being converted into a guest room and our upstairs bedroom is now our office.  My old office used to house lots of bee equipment but with the reorganization, we moved the beekeeping equipment to our living room.  What a mess.  It is the elephant in the room.  We discussed what to do with all of the gear until we had an "ah ha" moment.

Living room mess.

Shed Ready - On Plan Bee we have about 23 1/2 acres.  One bright sunny day I asked myself why not take advantage of that space.  After all we use our beekeeping equipment almost exclusively on Plan Bee so wouldn't that make more sense??  So I have begun clearing out an area behind our Plan Bee Picnic Shelter.  Plan A for Plan Bee is to clear the area, level it up with dirt, pour a concrete slab, lay down some 6x6 beams and then put up a shed.

 

Area being cleared behind the picnic shelter.

 

The big tree in the back is about 3 feet in diameter but it was rotted away in the middle.  Interesting enough without proper felling, it would have fallen exactly where we wanted to put our new shed.  So we beat it to the punch.  So far I have spent 2 days of chainsawing and dragging away trees and brush to get this area ready for more dirt and a concrete pad.  Good news is there are few bugs this time of year and it is a great area to work on.

 

Fixed error with well head dusk to dawn light.  We have a regular 60 watt light bulb under our well cover.  During the winter it keeps it just warm enough so that the well head won't freeze.  I noticed the electric bill did not reflect electric useage but instead showed the same value on the meter.  Upon inspection, after removing the black widow spiders, I noted the light bulb needed a few more turns in to work.  Tested it again with the on setting and then the dusk to dawn timer setting and that seems to have fixed the problem.

 

 

 Chopped an irrigation pipe in two which is not good for water pressure in the line.  At first I was going to wait until next trip to repair the line as I didn't have my drip irrigation repair kit with me.  Then I remembered there was an end piece/ end cap to the line.  Used my machete to make a clean straight cut and repaired the line. Yea!!  Problem solved.

 

Bee Grim -- regarding my name.  I wanted to use my nom de plum (Pen Name) or "Bee Boy".  Alas, Google said the name did not comply with their naming standards.  I then thought, how about "Bee Happy", guess what, same deal.  Mr. Google has allowed me to use my desired first name, "Bee" but requires I use my real last name, "Grim".  Yea, I know.  So anyhow as I tell my friends and others I try not to bee Grim but alas, it is my name.  So Bee Grim I am as far as Google is concerned but I hope to either Bee Happy or bee a Bee Boy one day soon.