Okay, the guy from Scott’s Lawn Service here in Hartford just called to schedule our grub control application. We went over the stuff and I told him that I had a few questions. I asked when I am supposed to plug aerate and apply an overseeding of grass seed. He told me that I should do the whole thing in early September. Then, I asked what type of grass seed I am supposed to put down. He told me to apply a grass seed with “Thermal Blue.” This is a Kentucky Bluegrass hybrid or something like that. It is really green grass, durable and survives hot and cold. Oh yeah, it also spreads to fill in bare spots, which is good.
I wanted to do a little more research on the grass seed, so I went over to YouTube and found a really neat video that had nothing to do with what I just wrote. I wanted to share it with you. It’s how they grow and roll up turf grass over in England (I think). If you are a grass guy like me, you’ll like this video.
Boy, it’s been a busy few days. My parents landed at the Bradley International Airport, North of Hartford at about 12:30AM, Thursday morning. Laura and I got there at around midnight, so we had a hang around for a few minutes. It wasn’t too bad. Strangely enough, you get to watch some very interesting people while waiting outside an airport.
A few months ago, when my mother and I agreed on this trip, I had a whole itinerary planned out. We were going to go here and we were going to go there. Then, Laura and I went on that little trip to Stonington. It was during that trip that I remembered that I really don’t enjoy driving as much as I used to. I mean, short trips here and there are okay, but the long ones I can do without. Remembering this, I started planning to visit places that were just a tad bit closer than the ones I had previously planned to visit.
On Thursday, we all hopped in the car and drove up to the Red Lion Inn, in Stockbridge, MA. You all know that Laura and I have been there a lot, but my parents never have. I thought I would spare you the photos, since you have seen a million of them already. We had a nice lunch and I even let my father beat me at a game of chess.
On Friday, we had a great time up at the Sharpe Hill Vineyard in Pomfret, CT. None of us had been there before, so we really didn’t know what to expect. Luckily, we were all very pleasantly surprised. I think I heard the phrase, “You know, we could be in Italy right now and you wouldn’t know the difference” more than once.
For those of you who don’t know, Pomfret is up in the “Quiet Corner” of Connecticut. It’s a really cool place that brings you back to the good ol’ days. It’s peaceful, beautiful and best of all, nobody from Hartford tailgates you all the way down the road. Wow.
The Sharpe Hill Vineyard offers two different tastings; they differ based on amount of wine consumed. The first tasting costs $5 and you get to taste five types of wines. Actually, you can taste five of the same wines. They don’t mind. The second tasting offers eleven types of wines for $10. We chose the $5 one because I didn’t want to get tipsy in the middle of the day. Neither did anyone else. We were all very happy with our five choices.
I took a whole bunch of photos, so you can see what the vineyard looks like. It’s really nice and they even had a restaurant. Unfortunately, we were unable to eat there because reservations are taken three weeks ahead of time. Maybe Laura and I will have to make reservations to check out the food.
This is just another one of my documentation posts. I thought it would be nice to show the status of flowers budding as well as the grass and how far the leaves on the trees have come.
One thing to note is that we primarily have Oak trees on this road. I have been doing a lot of driving around and have noticed that everywhere else seemingly has more leaves on their trees. It looks pretty much like Summer there. Then, I get back here and it looks like early Spring. Oak trees bloom late, that’s all there is to it.
The grass is coming along nicely. It’s very green and the bald patches are filling in. I already mowed it twice. There is one thing I would like to mention…I have been using the rear bagger when I mow the lawn. I have read all over the place that it’s good to spray the grass clippings back onto the lawn. It probably is, but with my experience, and especially when the existing grass (and crabgrass) is seeding, it’s better to catch the clippings. I don’t want to spread crabgrass seeds back on the lawn. That would pretty much defeat the purpose of what I am trying to do here. I told a friend the other day, “Just take a look at what the good lawn services do and copy that.” Seems logical enough.
Here are some photos from a cloudy, muggy Spring day.
Pink / purple Lilac budding up close
Bloomed Red Dicentra – Bleeding Heart
Bloomed Crab Apple flowers
Blooming white Lilac
Status of Oak tree leaves in early May
Green grass in early May – Front lawn
Green grass in early May – Side lawn – Weeping Cherry in background
Yesterday, I received my notification call from Scotts Lawn service out of Hartford. They said they will be here within two business days. I gave a quick call back just to see what they will be doing. They told me that they will be spraying the lawn for weeds and putting down fertilizer / crabgrass pre-emergent. Sounds like just what we need.
I think the first thing you need to do is to recognize that your lawn has crabgrass growing in it.
Sometimes, crabgrass isn’t all that obvious. Actually, if your lawn looks great during the hot summer months but not in the spring or fall, you might have a crabgrass problem. This type of weed loves the heat. While many types of cooler grasses go dormant and turn brown during July and August, crabgrass is thriving. It makes the guy who takes care of the lawn proud…until October rolls around.
The first tell-tale sign that your lawn has crabgrass is the noticing of big brown areas come autumn. While the rest of the real grass is growing nicely, the crabgrass is dying off. The only problem is that crabgrass is an annual plant. Later on in the season, the weed produces seeds that we unknowingly mow into and spread around our regular grass. That lays the foundation for problems the next year, and the next year…you get the picture.
So, what do you do? Well, you can either get on your hands and knees and pluck out every single crabgrass weed you find all season long. That would probably do it. Or, you can apply what they call a “Pre-emergent grassy and broadleaf weed control.” This the probably the preferred route to travel down. You can buy the stuff yourself or call a service to come to your house and apply it for you.
The weed control is pretty nifty stuff. It rests on the soil of your lawn as small pellets and dissolves as it’s watered in. Somehow (and don’t ask me how), this weed control stops the weed seeds from germinating. Stopping the weeds from growing in the first place sounds a heck of a lot better than pulling them out after the fact.
It’s funny – while walking around, I like looking at the different levels of lawn care in different neighborhoods. You can actually see distinct property lines of those who take care of their lawns vs. those who don’t. One lawn is green, while the lawn right next to it is brown and full of weeds. By weeds, I mean big brown areas caused by crabgrass.
My friends at Scotts Lawn in Hartford stopped by today to give the grass its first application of “Early spring and spring fertilization” which adds nutrients to improve lawn color and strengthens the root system of the grass. They also put down some “Pre-emergent grassy and broadleaf weed control” which controls weed problems, such as crabgrass and other annual grasses later in the year. Okay, obviously I got those descriptions from the card they left with me.
I was really happy to see the guy stop by today, because I was getting nervous that the crabgrass seeds would start germinating. I always worry about things like this. Add that to my worry list.
The fella who stopped by today was very nice. We talked for a bit about none other than grass and its care. Believe it or not, it’s one of my favorite topics. Well, I’ll talk about anything that has to do with lawn care or landscaping. They are both interesting. We both agreed that there were some areas that had a little crabgrass problem, but nothing that couldn’t be taken care of.
I told the tech that I think the lawn is already showing nice signs of improvement from what they put down last autumn. Of what grass has already started growing, it’s really green and soft. I just hope we can keep this trend going and get the whole lawn nice and green by autumn.
I thought I would show you some pictures of the fertilizer/weed control they put down as well as some areas that have been affected by crabgrass. Enjoy, because you won’t see these problem areas for long.
We went on a little field trip up to West Hartford, CT yesterday.
Laura’s sister and her man are in the area for about a week, so we all thought it would be nice to meet up and have lunch at the Cheesecake Factory in West Hartford. We have never been to this particular restaurant location before, but we knew damn well that the Cheesecake Factory is an awesome place for lunch or dinner.
I didn’t know where I was going, but Laura put the restaurant address in the GPS and off we were. We took the same route we drove on when we visited this area a few years back. When we arrived, we were kind of shocked at all the construction that occurred since the last time we were there. Apparently, someone put up a new little mini-town in West Hartford when we weren’t looking. It’s called Blue Back Square.
I gotta tell ya, it’s pretty cool. The area has been open for about a year and is full of restaurants, stores and even apartments. I took a few photos for you.
Blue Back Square in West Hartford, CT – Looking south
Blue Back Square in West Hartford, CT – Looking east towards the library
Blue Back Square in West Hartford, CT – Looking north
Blue Back Square in West Hartford, CT – Barnes and Noble
Blue Back Square in West Hartford, CT – Cheesecake Factory
Blue Back Square in West Hartford, CT – Whole Foods Market
This was an unexpected little scene that occurred on our way back from Costco this afternoon.
While driving down 91 south, towards Hartford (in the HOV lane – luckily) today, we saw some signs lit up warning us of an accident further south, near Interstate 84. I didn’t really think anything of it, because the signs actually said the accident was on 84 west, not 91. When we rounded a bend in the highway, I asked Laura if she saw smoke. She said yes and this is what we saw when we were forced to stop by a police officer.
Car fire on 91 south, near Hartford, CT – March 25, 2009 – Photo 1
Car fire on 91 south, near Hartford, CT – March 25, 2009 – Photo 2
Car fire on 91 south, near Hartford, CT – March 25, 2009 – Photo 3
Car fire on 91 south, near Hartford, CT – March 25, 2009 – Photo 4
Car fire on 91 south, near Hartford, CT – March 25, 2009 – Photo 5
Car fire on 91 south, near Hartford, CT – March 25, 2009 – Photo 6
It wasn’t bad until the fire department started spraying the car. When they did that, the smoke got all white and came near us. I turned off the car vent, but some smoke still got in to give me a headache. Burning rubber and plastic really smells.
While I was sitting there taking pictures, I noticed the guy in back of us doing the same thing. It was a race to get back to see who could post it on their blog faster.
If you weren’t aware, yesterday was the day of love. It was the day that souls join, people buy each other chocolate and roses and tell each other how much they love one another. If you are “with” someone, it was the day to remind yourself how much they mean to you. If you aren’t with anyone, it was the day to get up and remind yourself to find someone. My friends, yesterday was the day of action and whether we like it or not, it comes every year. Oh, one more very important thing…yesterday was my mom’s birthday. Hi mom.
As I mentioned in a previous post, I had made a reservation at Firebox Restaurant in Hartford, only to cancel it. We decided to go back to Shrine at MGM Grand instead.
I was really excited to go back to Shrine. The food is awesome and the atmosphere is even better. We had a really great time the last time we went.
On the way down to the restaurant, I kept thinking that we were going to have the place to ourselves. For some reason, I figured that everyone in the world was going to be sitting on the couch, cuddling under the blankets, watching a good movie. I thought we were the only ones who would really brave this St. Valentine’s day on the outside. Well, I was wrong.
We made a right off of the main road and turned into the entrance of MGM Grand at Foxwoods. I read the sign above us while driving into the parking garage. It said, “Levels 1-4 Full. Level 5 Open.” “That’s not good,” I thought. I told Laura that something must be going on, but in the back of my mind, I knew there must be some mistake.
We drove up to the first level of the parking garage. Full. We drove up to the second level. Full. We drove up to the third level. Full. We drove up to the fourth level and found about five open spots, but I wanted to see if there was anything better on the fifth level. There was nothing up there, so we went back down to the fourth level. The five open spots turned into three open spots and I took one of them. I guess something really was going on, but what?
We got out of the car and started walking into the casino. I took Laura’s hand in mine. After all, it was Valentine’s day. We walked quickly through the doors and into the elevator.
Upon exiting the elevator and entering the casino, we were greeted by crowds of…say…”interesting” looking people. We knew there had to be some sort of concert or show going on, but we had yet to figure out which one. Laura guessed it was Motley Crue, because there were so many people wearing black concert t-shirts. She remembered seeing something about that band somewhere along the lines.
We started walking towards the restaurant. I kept looking at people’s t-shirts to see if I could find some sort of clue as to what was going on. Finally, I saw two t-shirts that said, “Kid Rock.” “Oh, it’s Kid Rock tonight, sweet doll,” I said. Laura agreed because she had just seen one of those shirts too.
Have you ever seen Star Trek: Deep Space Nine? If so, have you ever noticed the area where everyone meets and drinks? It’s like a big mixture of all types of beings from all over the universe. That’s kind of what it was like last night at this casino. There were all types of people from all over the place. I mean, some of these people aren’t out in normal daylight. The only place you would find them is in a casino, tucked deep into the night. We saw truckers and bikers to ballerinas and trapeze artists. There were people with one head, two heads and three heads. People who couldn’t walk, people who walk too much and everyone in between. It was an interesting experience. One thing is for sure, Foxwoods really needs to update their anti-smoking rules…or make one altogether. The amount of smoke you inhale just by being in that place is terrifying.
We made it to the restaurant just in time for our 8:30PM reservation. We were promptly shown to our seats. We noticed that the restaurant was chock full of people. I mean, this place was jammed. We didn’t mind because with the frame of mind we were in, the more the merrier. The restaurant was really loud because there was a DJ doing his thing downstairs at the nightclub. People were talking, yelling and laughing while drinking their scorpion bowls…those big, huge scorpion bowls.
Our waitress came over to say hello after about five minutes of us being seated. Not bad, considering all the people she was taking care of. She said hello the first time and by the second time, we ordered every last thing, just to make things easier on her. We even ordered two glasses of plum wine because that is one of our favorites.
As our drinks and food arrived, I held my glass up and in the spirit of St. Valentine himself, I made a toast. I said…well that’s private, but it was well worth saying because we both smiled when I was through. We took a drink and began to eat some of the best food we had in some time.
When we were finished eating and fully satisfied, we left the restaurant. We thought it would be fun to take a walk over to Foxwoods to see what was going on over there. I mentioned earlier that I had never been to Foxwoods, so I was really curious as to what it looked like.
There is a long hallway that connects MGM Grand and Foxwoods, so you don’t need to walk outside. In this long hallway, there are two of those long, flat, moving floor things that you would normally find in an airport. You know, they are like flattened escalators that you stand on and they carry you along. When we arrived at the flat escalators, we instinctually stepped onto one of them. Now, the trick is to walk on these escalators, so you can really get some speed while heading down a long hallway, like the one we were in. You can maintain probably twice the speed you would if you were simply walking on regular ground. Well, last night, no one knew that you were supposed to walk on these things. Everyone in front of us just got on and stood there.
About half way down the hallway, Laura turned to me and said, “This is like a bad dream.” I said, “What do you mean?” She said, “Take a look at the carpet over there. Look how slow we are moving.” I didn’t know what she was talking about because I thought we were moving along at a nice speed. I was looking at the flat escalator that was moving in the opposite direction of the one we were moving in, so it looked like we were moving twice as fast as we really were. I looked up and past that escalator to the carpet and started laughing. We were going sooooo slow. It was like we were drunk or something. People were casually walking right past us on the carpet as we were stuck on this thing. There were people on crutches, babies crawling, old men staggering along…all moving much faster than we were. It was hysterical.
When we finally got off that thing, we buzzed right along. I forgot my camera in the car, so I wasn’t able to take any photos, but I will tell you that Foxwoods is much more interesting than I thought. I was like Disney World in the inside. There were all sorts of little shops with storefronts designed and painted with different styles of architecture and color. It was really cool…and big. Foxwoods is big and long. There is a shuttle, if that gives you any indication of how big it is. Much bigger than I was prepared for.
When we were finished with our Foxwoods tour, we decided to head back over to MGM Grand for a little midnight gambling. We walked and walked and walked. We walked right past that moving floor thing and made it back to the other casino. When we got there, we broke a $20 bill and walked over to a slot machine. I said, “Pumpkin, go ahead and make your bet.” Laura sat down and put a $5 bill in the machine. On the first pull, she didn’t win anything. On the second pull, she won $1.30. She instantly looked up at me and said, “You want to go?” I started laughing when I realized she was serious. She wanted to walk out a winner, so I said, “Heck yeah. Let’s get out of here while we are on top.” We walked over to the payment machine and cashed out. You should have seen us running through the casino floor like we had just won the lottery. It was great.
We left the casino and walked back to the car. We hopped in, I started it up and took Laura back on the open road. But before we left the casino property, I did manage to get a few pictures of the outside. I know it’s disappointing, but this is the best I could do because of my forgetfulness. For that, I am sorry.
Top of MGM Grand at Foxwoods hotel at night
Top of Foxwoods hotel at night
Foxwoods casino main entrance at night
Well folks, there you have it. Our Valentine’s day 2009. See ya next year.
Earlier this week, I made a reservation for a nice Valentine’s dinner up at Firebox Restaurant in Hartford. It’s supposed to be pretty good and was recommended by a friend. We had a reservation for 9PM. Since I had never been to this restaurant, I didn’t really know what to expect. I heard there was valet parking, side-of-the-street parking or a parking lot close by. For some reason, the whole thing made me a little nervous, and I was kind of looking for an out. I didn’t want to park on the side of the street up in Hartford in some area I had never visited. Perhaps during the day sometime on a weekend, but not at 9PM.
We were sitting at the kitchen table this afternoon, when all of the sudden a great idea popped in my head. I said, “Hey petunia pumpkin girl, why don’t we just go back to Shrine (down at MGM Grand at Foxwoods) for Valentine’s day? We had an awesome time there.” She replied, “This is why I love you, Grand Master Jay.”
So, we are going to Shrine for dinner. There is a little skip in my step because we get to walk around again and this time, we are going to walk next door to Foxwoods to check it out. I have never been to Foxwoods, so you can be sure I will bring my camera. I think I might just share the whole experience with you.
Is anyone else going out for St. Valentine’s day? If so, where are you headed?
If you have gone outside over the past couple of days, you may have noticed that it’s fairly cold out there. It doesn’t really feel much colder than it normally does for this time of year, but the time-to-being-frozen is a heck of a lot shorter.
Being this cold really isn’t my cup of tea. The house is a little colder than it normally is, which makes my arms numb when I type on the computer. It’s not thatcold in here…I’m just sensitive. Also, we can’t really go outside walking, which gets on my nerves. Anything under 20 degrees is usually our cutoff.
Since this is such a drop from our regular average temperature, I was wondering what the average temperature usually is around here for this time of year. I did a quick search for “hartford, ct average temperatures” and came across this website. Basically, this is what I was looking for.
The website tells me that January’s average temperature in Hartford, CT is usually 25.7F. That’s not too bad. I was telling my brother last night that when it hits 20 degrees again at night, it’s going to be like a heat wave.
If you want to check your town’s average temperature, just visit the website I linked to above and click the logo in the upper left corner. From there, you will be able to locate your state and city to see what you are up against.
If you have read any of my tennis posts, you would have seen me writing about this guy I play tennis with. You know the guy…if I tell him my leg is hurting, he hits me in the leg with the tennis ball. He is vicious on the court, a true competitor.
Well, as it turns out, he is also famous. I’m not sure if I ever told you this, but this fella (Mike) is in the golf business. He manufactures and sells all type of golf equipment out of his Hartford warehouse. He primarily sells online through Ebay and his online store called Linksman Golf.
Recently, Mike was on TV. How he gets all over the place and ends up on TV, I’ll never know. Some people just have it, I suppose. You gotta check him out by clicking here.
Michael Blair and Fox News reporter
Golf equipment at Linksman Golf
Linksman Golf online
Now, I wonder if I should post those videos I took of Mike’s tennis serve on YouTube. Hmmm…
