Pam Was Right … As Usual

One of the things that Terrell No TV month means is that we take up household projects that we have been trying to avoid. For me that involves work in the backyard. I enjoy cutting grass, but for some reason I don’t enjoy landscaping and other yard work. Our backyard is connected to a local school forest and therefore we thought it was too shady for grass to grow. So all I thought I would have to do in it was build a fence for the basset hounds to be able to roam around within. 4 years ago I built a “temporary” fence out of snow fence and said I would build a nice wooden picket fence to replace it soon. “Temporary” has a wide meaning for me when it comes to some things. For building a fence “temporary” incrementally equaled a gate and a few 8′ panels of pickets three years ago and then the majority of the remaining panels 2 years ago. Unfortunately I stopped with the two hardest sections and let them stay that way. I just left the snow fencing there because no one really saw those sections unless they were looking for it. Or at least that is what I told myself. That changed when Pam came up with the great idea of talking to our county agent and discovered that we can actually grow grass in our backyard.

So last weekend we started the great backyard project. We picked tons of stuff out of our backyard, sprayed the rest with Round Up, tilled the space, fertilized everything, and finally spread seed everywhere (which has visible sprouts as of today). Working that much in the backyard and trying to grow a lawn made me think that it might be nice to have a convenient way to get my lawnmower into the backyard. I realized I should finish the picket fence. It was finished today. Two gates installed and lots of pickets hand installed in place (these sections were too abnormal for 8′ picket panels).

This left me with two things I needed to get take care of to finish the job.

Get rid of the 150ish feet of snow fence that I originally bought last year.
Clean up, which included removing 35ish one foot sections of what I thought was treated (I later discovered they were cedar rather than treated) picket ends.

I thought it would be pretty easy to get rid of the snow fence on Craigslist. Here is the ad for it.

I bought 150ish feet of snow fence to create a temporary fence for my dogs in our bakyard. “Temporary” is a relative term being as I took my sweet time building the wooden picket pence that now keeps my basset hounds in the back yard barking at deer that run through the forest behind our home.

The good news is that the snow fence has now finished its “temporary” job and is ready for another use. Perhaps you need some “temporary” fence to hold a creature, such as your husband, who isn’t house trained and you need a way to release him into the backyard to relieve himself without fear that he will see a squirrel and run away forever. I’m not here to judge. I’m here to provide you with 150ish feet of snow fencing for you and your spouse to use as you please. As long you are using it for something legal you are welcome to it. If you want to use it for something illegal … well just don’t tell me about it.

This “temporary” snow fence is yours for free … REALLY IT IS FREE … okay if you want to buy me a cup of coffee that would be fine. I prefer the house blend at Emy J’s in Stevens Point.

I was sure the snow fence would go fast, which it did. I wasn’t as sure what to do with the 35ish one foot sections of what I thought was treated wood. You aren’t supposed to burn treated wood and these pieces were too small for anything that I would do with them. So I piled them up and went to throw them in the trash, walking right past Pam. Which is why she asked “what are you doing?” I told her and see said I shouldn’t throw them away, but instead post them on Craigslist. I was dumbfounded. Nobody would use these things and definitely no one would look for them on Craigslist. So I told her that. She said Pinterest had changed everything and people looked for junk like this on Craigslist now.

I hate Pinterest.

Actually I don’t hate Pinterest, but I do definitely have some strong, and mixed, feelings about the stupid website. Anyhow I thought I would prove to her that she was wrong and I posted the following Craigslist post.

I have around 35 one foot long end remnants from treated fence pickets. Since they are treated they aren’t supposed to be burned, yet I feel stupid just throwing them in the trash for them to end up in a landfill. My wife is convinced that Pinterest has changed the world and therefore some creative person might want these things and be able to turn them into something beautiful. Like a plank sided house for injured squirrels or crazed turkeys. I, on the other hand, think they are just scrap. I kind of sound like a grumpy old man right now, but that isn’t usually the case on Saturday evenings (just Monday mornings – HEY! KID GET OFF MY LAWN).

So how about one of you creative types prove my wife right and me wrong and message me about getting these scraps before our trash pick up happens Tuesday. All I ask is that you send me a photo of what you have made with this stuff.