A very long list of things to do suddenly materialized out of nowhere. Case in point is the recurring nightmare of the burst pipe. Last winter despite observing protocol to bleed the outdoor water lines as preventive maintenance, a leak sprung anyway, gushing forth a frozen pond. It seems to happen biannually without fail. Luckily this time no flood damage to speak of. The ice rink finally did thaw and eddied down the drainpipe harmlessly enough. Only the snapped-off spigot remains to bear witness. Galvanized steel is surely suseptible to something so innocuous as cold weather.
So this old house is under repair again.
First order of business then involves rerouting. Careful analysis of the problem reveals a flaw in Kansei engineering. Extraneous and highly vulnerable pipes extend extraneously from point of egress to an unimpeded corner in typical westernized design. To rectify poor interior architecture, simply realigning existing elbows to allow for direct access eliminates the need altogether of the exposed plumbing. Hopefully this ten-cent solution will solve future headaches.
Naturally all this work just for the sake of sprinkling the reseeded lawn because green matters. One day raking dead grass and leaves, pruning dead branches and aerating dead topsoil only reinforces this suburban fixation. Speaking of which, if the grass up front fails to grow, removing the hardened limestone-mixed dirt might soften the turf to permit the seed to take.
Then comes the garage, a bane hexing form following function. Completely gutterless with holes in the roof, this affront to backyard aesthetics is off-plumb by three inches. A temporary fix is to patch or reshingle the top and attach a front rail with flanking downspouts for proper drainage. Maybe even a new coat of paint. Inside requires additional shelving and hooks to increase the storage space and free up the floor which could also be repainted.
And that is only the outside.