Mud Pile

In mid-May R.J. dropped off a load of fill dirt in preparation for doing the finish grade for the house.  Because we'd had so much rain for several weeks, this load was really fill mud.  J.R.'s pile of mud has been sitting at the corner of my house for five weeks, blocking access to the rear of the house and to the propane tank.

My mud pile on May 16.

Because the weather has continued wet, my mud pile never really dried out.  When we did have a few days of dry weather, R.J. was busy taking care of excavation clients who understandably wanted their basement holes dug and septic systems installed.  My grade work was well down on R.J.'s priority list.

Then yesterday, with no warning, R.J. showed up at my house, unloaded his dozer, and started spreading the fill dirt... which is still fill mud.  I'm glad R.J. was doing the work.  He has years of experience running heavy equipment and managed to push the fill around without taking out my propane tank, the corners of the house, or even my on-the-ground telephone wire.  Had I been running the machine, the results would have been disastrous.

R.J. pushes the mud pile around the southeast corner...

...along the south side of the house...

...and into the back (or front) yard.

Now I have a layer of rich, black mud around the side and back (or front, since I'm on the water) of the house.  R.J. will bring out a couple loads of topsoil as soon as it dries up enough to haul.  At the moment, he says, his topsoil source has standing water over it.

In the meantime, I'll ask the propane supplier to move the "pig" to its new locale down the driveway, and I'll see if Frontier can bury my phone line. •••