The summer after my husband died I was trying to revive my "superwoman" title by building a raised bed along my driveway. The garage was being torn down and new one rebuilt during the same time I was doing this.

I ordered the railroad ties to make the bed: 4x24 feet, three rails high, three rails long and half a rail deep. A neighbor helped me hand saw the end rails & then I went about drilling holes for the anchoring steel rods.

Day 1 -Burned out one drill with a long handled spade bit drilling about 3 holes.
Day 2 -Went to a tool rental and rented a jackhammer - like industrial drill
Burned that out with the spade bit too- after another 8 or 9 holes.
Day 3 - Went to rent another industrial drill.

Construction workers watched all this with amusement & when I came back with the second rental drill, they presented me with the loan of a HUGE drill bit that was big enough 'round and long enough for all three layers. It took me about 3 hours with that drill bit to do more holes than it had taken me three days to do with the other drills & spade bit.

So, then came the dirt delivery.
Dump truck backs up in the drive way and out comes the lovely dark topsoil.
HUGE pile - but, WAY bigger than I thought it would be. Neighbors are watching from the back porch next door. Builders are watching from the roof frame of the new garage. As I'm puzzling out why this looks like so much, the truck cranks up the REST of the way and dumps the REST of the load! There is now a pile that tapers to a tiny point that is on a level with my eyes. Neighbors are laughing so hard they're holding their sides, the carpenters are trying not to fall off the garage roof.

Math has never been my strong suit. I ordered square YARDS of dirt instead of square FEET. Neighbors, bless their soul, came over chuckling, but also bringing a roller & helped me build a ramp to get the roller in the bed & rolled the dirt down as I filled the bed.

There was STILL alot left over.
So, I invited neighbors to come and help themselves. I had a party planned in my back yard as part of my 10 year High School Reunion in a matter of 5 days and needed the dirt OUT of there. A fellow from a few houses down came and hauled away quite a bit. Being a new gardener, I missed the import of him putting the dirt through a grate/sieve before hauling it away - leaving me all the rocks.

Never got a thing from him in return - not even one overgrown zucchini.

Joanne in Cleveland (who still is more literate than numerate)