Could Phil and I be the next stars of HGTV?

I don't really use a cane, but I thought it was a nice touch.
Granny glasses and elbow brace?  Necessity.

I have no clue where I get my crazy ideas. They just come to me like POP! - a moment of brilliance that lights up all the neurons in my brain and away I go. Wait till you hear this one...

I have been talking to Phil about flipping a house in Thomasville, Georgia. What??? you say??? I got the idea after watching a show on HGTV where a young couple helped another young couple renovate their historic home in this small town. 

The houses in Thomasville are fairly cheap and there is probably a reason for that - who wants to live in Thomasville, right? But it is a cute little town with lots of old houses that are in desperate need of repair. You may say, "Patti, restoring or flipping a home is not an original idea." But wait - this idea has another dimension...

Downtown Thomasville

As with most shows on HGTV or DIY, the renovators, clients, workers are all YOUNG. Ever watch House, Yard, Bath or Kitchen Crashers? You know the show I mean - the one where they go into a Lowes or Home Depot and choose a couple to "crash" their house or yard? They tease the audience by speaking to customers of all ages, but they NEVER choose anyone over the age of 35. What the hell? Do TV producers not realize that the baby boomers are the largest demographic? Where are the old people on these networks? I stopped watching the "crash" shows specifically because of that. The purposeful neglecting of senior citizens (gosh I hate that term - let's just say "the older and wiser population") on reality home improvement shows stimulated the birth of my idea.

Who wants to watch young, sexy renovators?
On second thought,  don't answer that question.

I think that I should pitch a TV show where Phil and I are the "Flippin' Seniors". Our renovations are laughable as it is, but I think we could really bring home the difficulty of completing work with aching joints, bad backs, poor eyesight, the frequent need to pee, and going to bed by nine. We could focus on one room at a time and, as another layer of the show, invite a different senior family or friend to assist in each episode, which would undoubtedly lead to more chuckles and chaos. As each show comes to an end, we would hopefully have a new room and gather around the grill with our wine and beer nursing our aches and pains, reminiscing about the past and toasting the future. I think it's brilliant. I would watch that.

Yep. Perfect ad for our new show!

And think how easy it would be to sell advertising. Viagra, Depends, Milk of Magnesia, Lipitor - the list is endless! 

Now, I have to tell you, when I explained all this to Phil he looked at me like I lost my marbles. But, that's OK. First of all - after 30 years he's used to my hare-brained schemes. Secondly, his doubting my sanity doesn't frighten me. I've been in the trenches in middle school. I can handle anything. Or maybe that's where I lost my mind. Hmmm...

Anyone out there know a TV producer? I'm ready for my close-up.

Is a "hair" transplant the answer?

Ladies and gents- as you age you will find that your hair is not what it once was. Just another fabulous aspect of getting older. It's not enough for nature to throw wrinkles, sagging skin, and sore joints at you - the "mutha" nature has to include thinning hair as well. However, this post is not actually about me considering a human hair transplant (OUCH!). It's about using the same concept only using grass instead of hair. Not on my head of course, on our yard. Or what once was a yard, which is now sickly and balding and resembles a battlefield where dirt was the victor and grass the defeated.

At one time our yard was the envy of the neighborhood, thick and luscious - Phil's pride and joy.

THEN -  I could not find a picture (out of the thousands I have) of our yard way back when. You have to look between Anthony and Annamarie to see how nice the yard was. Or just take my word for it. It was gorgeous. A great place for Easter Egg Hunts!

Enter financial woes that would not allow a $250 monthly water bill to nourish the grass (we have almost an acre), a scalping of the land and then erosion that followed from removing all the pines, and years of incredible heat and drought in the summer. And there you have it - a yard in deep despair. It's pitiful and screaming for what once was. 

We have tried reseeding and hiring company after company to try and bring this disaster called our yard back to life and pretty much wasted thousands of dollars. Nothing has worked. I told Phil - I'm done with seed, straw and those machines that supposedly punch holes in the soil for seed that will never amount to much. It's time for the big guns - it's time for sod.

NOW - Seriously ugly.  This yard is pleading I NEED SOD!!!

We will never be able to afford to sod the whole yard. All I'm asking for is the front yard and possibly the side to prevent any further erosion. I want Zoysia in the front and Fescue on the side.

This desire for sod led me to create a special bank account that I call our "Saving for Sod" account. All the money from the yard sale, consignment shops, Craig's list and eBay sales has been carefully tucked away in hopes of rescuing our poor, poor landscape. I have enough saved for a backhoe to remove some 30 year old ugly bushes and shrubs and maybe enough for a pallet or two of Zoysia. But we will need much more.

As we wait for the "Saving for Sod" account to grow, we are trying grass (hair) plugs in some of the bare spots. My dad did this over 28 years ago while he and my mom were visiting and the area he plugged is fantastic. The Zoysia is thick and pretty much impossible to kill. 

This was started with sod plugs. Thanks Dad!

We still had the original tool in the shed (remember Phil throws nothing out!) and to speed things up he went out and bought another one (remember - can't have just one!) and I'm glad he did. Working together we were able to pull over 100 plugs and transplant them around our newly renovated patio. 

Tools of the trade - the green one is the original. We used
these to pull from...

here - to transplant....

over here. (Sorry about the thumb) See - it looks like a hair transplant!

I'll let you know if this crazy experiment works.

In the meantime I'm searching the house for anything that is not nailed down as a potential article to be sold on Craig's List or eBay for our "sod" account. Hmmm. Maybe I should wander out to the garage... (shhh don't tell Phil!)