Let's do this

Awesome!  It's my day off, the weather is gorgeous and I am in the mood to pull some weeds.  I woke up early and headed to the Fred G garden center for some basic gardening necessities: gloves are number one on my list.  I saw all the slugs, spiders, worms and other bugs when I made my first visit and NO way am I touching those things!  Oh, did I mention the dirt and my complete aversion to being dirty, most specifically having dirty hands?  Straight to the gloves and step on it!  I was torn between the rubberized gloves or the good, old fashioned, leather, gardening gloves but when I saw the leather gloves with the super cute vintage inspired fabric trim I knew those were the ones.  (I may be regretting that decision now.)  Other items of immediate importance?  A hand trowel and yard debris bags.  30 gallon yard debris bags.  I think this may be a good start for today.  I've also heard there may be other tools available for use at the garden - I hope, I hope...

Off to the garden!

          ... Oh.  Hello weeds, I forgot how overwhelming you are.  And, my, how you've grown!  You're toast.

So, I've discovered in my adult years that I am allergic to bees.  There are several varieties of the black and yellow devils buzzing around when I show up - bumbles, yellow jackets, etc. - and I find myself more fearful than I ever thought I would be.  I'm starting to have a real panic attack - heart pounding, shortness of breath, shaking, the works.  After several moments of panic and second guessing whether or not this is going to work I have decided that I need to calm down; I can keep my plot.  I only live across the schoolyard so if I get stung I will simply scream like a baby then run home and take some Benedryl.  A lot of it.  Now get to work!

The sun is beating on me, and after a long Portland winter I'm not quite used to that feeling.  It's hot and I'm tired.  It's been an hour or so and I've filled 2 of my 30 gallon bags (I only brought 2 thinking I'd never need more than that...) with nothing but the foliage from those nasty old weeds, maybe a few of their root systems and a couple of tall cans that a hobo or some punk kids threw over the fence.  I'm pretty sure that unless you actually witnessed me working out there, you'd never know I was there.  Seriously?!  This is hard work!  I'm in way over my head, but I'm feeling pretty satisfied from all of my efforts.  At this point I figure I've done half of the work that was needed on 1/3 of my allotted space.  But I'm not here to do math, remember?