Waiting for the rain

[altivo]

Actually, there's none forecast until probably tomorrow afternoon, but right now it feels like the sky will burst at any moment. Cloudy, humid, still air. You expect to hear thunder at any second.

What could have been a peaceful afternoon was anything but. Continuous lawnmowers. I swear, in summer one never gets to hear the birds for the lawnmowers. I'll bet they are producing more greenhouse gas than all the cars and trucks in the county. And all for silly appearances, because everyone thinks they should or that they have to.

I'm so tempted to take a bunch of sheep down the road, tie one on each lawn, and leave a note saying "Give your lawnmower and my ears a break, please."

Comments

[pioneer11.livejournal.com]

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

*turns off the lawnmower*

What?

*ducks*

^_^

[altivo.livejournal.com]

See, it's given you hearing damage even. We wear earmuffs when using mowers or other small engines, and even then I absolutely hate the things.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

You'd like Brisbane at the moment, all the grass is dead.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

That wouldn't stop them here. Last summer we had nearly five months without rain, but our neighbors continued to mow. Some of them do it three times a week.

[songdogmi.livejournal.com]

Here it's Saturday mornings. And of course not all at once, but staggered throughout the morning. It becomes real difficult to sleep all morning with the window open here. The only thing worse than lawnmowers are the leafblowers that follow in some yards. Gawd, I hate that noise.

Makes me almost sad that I own a lawnmower, myself. But I'm in a suburb, and you know the rules in suburbs. <sigh>

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Oh, well, there's another message in that. Sleeping on Saturday morning is a waste of your time. ;p

One reason I get up so early is to avoid that stuff. But here it doesn't matter whether it's Saturday, Sunday, or Tuesday. It seems like there's always a mower running.

[songdogmi.livejournal.com]

Sleeping on Saturday morning is a waste of your time. ;p

But they don't like it when I sleep on Monday morning. Something about me needing to get work done. Either that, or my snoring keeps the office awake.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Well, yeah. I forget how nocturnal musicians are supposed to be. I'm the one who always has to avoid making noise (like by playing music to welcome the dawn) in the morning because everyone else is asleep.

[avon-deer.livejournal.com]

I don't own a lawnmower. MY garden currently looks like a South American drug lord's plantation. I did have the idea of putting a sheep on it, but my house's deeds clearly state "NO LIVESTOCK".

I don't like the polen that lawnmowers throw up.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Well, if you were in the US, you'd likely be visited by either the sheriff or the neighborhood association bearing demands that you mow. Probably one of the reasons I liked Over the Hedge so much was that the aggressive conformist lawn nazi got her just rewards.

Where I live, everyone has at least five acres of land, often more. That's a ridiculous amount to try to keep pruned so it looks like a deer park, but they insist on trying it. The whole thing is about status symbols and trying to look like English country homes of the 18th century, but they don't even know the background. They just do it, like ants or lemmings under the compulsion of instinct.

[avon-deer.livejournal.com]

Well, if you were in the US, you'd likely be visited by either the sheriff

Its illegal to neglect to mow your lawn?!

[altivo.livejournal.com]

In many places, yes. There are actual city ordinances that specify the maximum height to which grass or weeds may be allowed to grow, and failure to comply results in fines. Isn't that absurd? And mowing, of course, generates greenhouse gases that add to global warming, and wastes expensive fuel.

In many additional places, though no local laws regulate lawn heights, there are deed covenants and restrictions (like your "no livestock") that apply directly. That was the joke in Over the Hedge where the lawn nazi calls someone to complain that she measured their grass and it was 2.5 inches tall.

Where I live, though, the zoning is agricultural. No one can threaten me for not mowing, and I only do it for practical reasons and far fewer times a year than most of my neighbors.

The American obsession with trimmed lawns really does go back to 18th century England where they were a status symbol. In brief, having an evenly cropped sward with no cows in evidence meant that you were wealthy enough to waste land on grazing deer instead of cattle. So it was a sign of wealth. When country landlords were no longer quite as wealthy in the 19th century, they invented lawn mowing in order to keep up the appearances. Before that time, grass was only mowed in order to make hay of it.

Riding Lawnmower

[goldenstallion.livejournal.com]

Dear Rider,

Hey, I'll come mow yer lawn free of charge and give ya a ride at the same time. Like any good equine. :)

Imperator

Re: Riding Lawnmower

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Talk about a deal I can't refuse. And without any lawnmower noise either.

Tess has been our primary lawn trimmer the last few years, but she's still not allowed free grazing. July, the vet says. That means we're going to have to run the mower ourselves soon. Usually we do it once every two weeks or so this time of year, and by July we can pretty much stop.

[captpackrat.livejournal.com]

It's funny, as I was reading this, someone started mowing outside (I'm at work).

Lawnmowers don't generally bother me much, as it's a fairly constant drone. I'm surrounded by computers all the time, which produce a not dissimilar sound (though quieter and a higher frequency). Loud parties and the neighbor's stupid insomniac dog yapping all night are much bigger annoyances.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Oh, those bother me too. But lawnmowers are much more persistent and pervasive. And everyone but me seems to think they are just essential and you have to put up with them. I disagree. We do far too much mowing in our culture, and it is all conspicuous consumption that serves no other purpose.

Lawn mowing fetish

[goldenstallion.livejournal.com]

Dear Rider,

Years ago, when I left Southern California, I thought that would be the last I had seen of lawn mowing. Uh... no.

Since then I have lived all over the US of A and all over the world and it the same world-over. Lawn mowing.

It is a major industry with very expensive ride-on mowers that can turn on a dime and have lots of horsepower and huge baggers with trailers to catch the clippings and leaves. Every where I look there are lawns being mowed, often of many-acre size.

I agree and understand about feeling it makes one seem to appear wealthy... the same thing with buying white or silver cars. That used to be something only the rich had.. white or silver Rolls Royces or Lincolns or Cadillacs but now it is apparent the fakery has taken over the minds of the commoner.

The part about lawn mowing that amazes me the most is that so many people around here mow it much too often and waay too short. I mean I can drive along and see what appear to be beautiful green lawns in perfect order and the next day it is being mowed almost to the dirt and now looks brown and ugly. That is the part I do not get.

We mow when it gets to the point it will soon become a much bigger project/job due to the sheer height and if it rains, forget it. If you simply let it go, very shortly you will be living back in the woods since it is not only the grass but trees and shrubs and weeds and a myriad of plants getting too tall to mow any more with a conventional mower.

Still, there is much too much lawn mowing around here in Michigan and I know it is going on all over the world. Of course we know that grasses of all kinds comprise like eighty something percent of all plant life on Earth so maybe if we just keep on cutting it there will be no more animal life... er... oh, another thread entirely I suppose.

I remember folks in Southern California who would asphault pave their front yards or have their new carpeting installed on the ceiling to keep it from getting dirty, etc. etc. etc. so...

I often wonder who IS the most intellegent life form on this planet.

Imperator

Re: Lawn mowing fetish

[altivo.livejournal.com]

That last question is easy to answer in the negative. Whoever it is, humans are not it. I'm sure of that.

Yes, that's the really weird thing about mowing. People cut all that grass off, and throw it away. Often pay to have it carried away. Then they pay out more money for "mulch" to put down in their flower beds and gardens. Same with the fallen leaves in autumn.