Pornstar (hiatus)

Chapter 25

"Alright, where do we head first?" Tristan asked once they pulled into the parking lot of the Home Depot.
"Should we start with the barrel?"

"Yes!" Warren said excitedly, jumping out of the car the moment Tristan parked. "I think Home Depot also has a garden center, so we could check if they have strawberries. They are planted in summer and autumn here in California, so sometime around now."

Tristan followed him to the shopping carts, where Warren grabbed one for them. "What about blueberries? Do those grow around here?" Tristan wondered. Back in Germany, blueberries were planted in late fall, or early spring; strawberries usually in early spring.

"Yes, they do. But they are planted later, usually right before the winter, so they probably don't have any yet," Warren explained. "And they need more acidic soil, whatever that means..."

"It means the PH level needs to be lower, somewhere between 4 and 5. We can achieve that by adding sulfur, though I doubt it will be necessary. Manure is already a bit acidic, so if we add some needle bark mulch, it should be fine." That was the same way Tristan had done it back in Germany, where it had been very successful for his blueberries.

"What all did you plant in Germany?" Warren asked curiously while they began heading down the endless lanes of Home Depot. Tristan had only seen this store in movies so far.

"What didn't I plant," Tristan laughed. "I planted everything that was common in Germany, and many other things that were less common. As far as berries were concerned, I had strawberries, blueberries, raspberries-"

"Raspberries!" Warren gasped with wide eyes. "We need to plant those! I love raspberries! Is it very difficult?"

Tristan laughed again. "Not at all, but you need a lot of space because they grow very fast and large. I'm not sure how well they will do with the heat here, but... We can try."

"I guess they won't work in a barrel then, right?" Warren asked doubtfully.

"No, I don't think so, but we have five empty beds, and one half empty one, so I really don't think that space will be our problem." Tristan grinned.

Warren chuckled. "Seriously, why did you get so many raised beds? What are you going to put in all that?"

Tristan shrugged. "I don't know yet, but back in Germany I had to enlarge my garden 4 times because it was always too small, and that's so much work every time, so I thought I might as well just get 10 large beds to begin with."

Warren laughed, shaking his head before pointing in excitement. "There's the barrels!" he announced happily. "According to the tutorial, we need a 55-gallon barrel."

Tristan nodded slowly as they approached the barrels. "I think it's those ones over there." He pointed at the large, blue barrels.

"Yes! They look just like the ones in the video we watched," Warren agreed enthusiastically before shrieking loudly in shock. "They cost $189?! What da ffff-?!"

Tristan chuckled. "Yeah. We need three."

"No we don't!" Warren objected outraged. "That's insane. I bet we can find a used one on craigslist. Let's do that."

"What? Craigslist? We're not doing that. We're not getting a used barrel," Tristan argued immediately.

"Why not?" Warren demanded pointedly, placing his hands on his hips. "What have you got against secondhand stuff?"

"Uh... Nothing, but..." Tristan had often bought secondhand things back in Germany where there had been a very large platform for it, similar to Craigslist, but it involved a lot of time because it meant searching for something and then driving there to pick it up. Back in the day he had had more time than money, but meanwhile that was the other way around and he would much rather spend $200 than 2 hours.