I spent more time today in the garden. I went and bought a bunch of tomato plants and a strawberry plant and spent most of the morning getting the planting areas ready. Actually, most of the work was in the strawberry patch. When Heather was the keeper of the garden she planted strawberries alongside the house. She left the thick weed barrier under the tree bark intact. So since strawberries are perennial, and spread through vine shoots, they started growing into this porous weed barrier. So I removed all the wood chips and then tried to carefully pry each of the strawberry plant offshoots out of it, trying not to tear up the roots. Then I removed all of the weed barrier and tilled up the underlying soil and added some rich mulch to it. Then I replanted the strawberry plants. Hopefully, they’ll take, but a few of them look pretty scraggly. Fortunately the main plant Heather originally planted is doing well and the one I bought (front in the picture) is also doing well. If you look closely, you can already see a strawberry developing!

At noon, I did VO2 intervals on Bogus. They were hard as usual, but my legs felt worse than my lungs. Since I’ve been slowly trying to get my weight down, I think I haven’t been fully replenishing my glycogen stores. But I stuck with it and was able to complete three 4-minute intervals and one 3-minute interval without my wattage dropping off too much. I also realized that it’s much easier to keep the wattage up when the road is steepest. I had been doing them on my progression up Bogus Basin Road, but I think next time I’ll just do them over the first section of switchbacks and then turn around and repeat them on that section.

When Heather got home I showed her my handy work in the garden. She then told me she wanted zucchini and butternut squash. Personally, I was hoping I could just get away with tomatoes and strawberries. Plus, we still have tons of zucchini in the freezer from last year! But, I reluctantly went back to Home Depot and got two of each zucchini and butternut squash plants and planted them when I got home.