Diggin Ditches

Three Hundred Twenty Fifth Post: Diggin Ditches

Well today I took on the task of digging a French drain behind the house. A simple task, or is it? It was only 70 ft long and ½ foot deep. I calculated the depth for a slope of 2 degrees and a length of 50 ft (the rest would be level). I strung a line to dig straight and made the string the same height of what the depth would be from the ground. I did this by beginning at ½ a foot on the start pole and 2ft + ½ ft on the end.

Well it seems I made it more complicated than it actually is. We ended up just judging the slope by digging. But we went to the home store and got some cheap, interlocking pipe. We covered the pipe with a sock and put gravel on top. That was it, but it took 8 hours including the trip to the store and get gravel. Not bad for digging the ditch by hand.

This is just one of those projects similar to what you find in Popular Mechanics which shows for a little bit of work, you can really improve your home and yard. Some might even call this project relaxing. (Maybe not the digging hard ground part.) But there are some handy men and handy women that take pride in their work. Fixing the car, painting the house, or woodworking are their past times.

There is sort of a science to it: Little children play. It is very serious stuff, because they are learning about the world and have fun doing it. Meanwhile while at an adult age we call it work. (I mean the things that are work that you like to do.) And this work is very important it betters our homes and lives. So in that time period change when play turns into work, both have deeper meanings in our lives.

Until I dig a trench for the electric... May the Creative Force be with You