Gardening 101

I've just spent the last 2 hours in the backyard trimming plants, pulling weeds and picking up poo. Oh how I love it when the wrinkly plastic grocery bag has a slight tear in the bottom and you end up with a fingernail full of poo. I gagged all the way to the kitchen sink. Nasty. And it's even nastier that I washed it off in the kitchen sink.

Anyway, I'm not much of a gardener, (btw, is it gardner or gardener?? both come up ok in spell check-however, "ok" does not. Go figure!) so, when it comes to maintaining a beautiful yard I'm somewhat of a moron. My first real attempt at gardening was back in Minnesota, during those 2 weeks of summer. I spent an entire weekend in the backyard pretending I was some Green Thumb expert pulling and planting all sorts of random green things. I was so excited to surprise Tom so when it was time for the big reveal, anxious with anticipation, I asked him what he thought. He told me, "You did a great job of trimming the weeds and pulling the plants." Kiss my ass. I'm done.

But since living here for the past 5 years, I've discovered that most of the stuff you stick in the ground actually grows so I'm giving it another shot.

Here are some of the things I've discovered about gardening (or associated with the "act of"), here in my own backyard:

-Some of the mushrooms that spring from the earth look like penises. I didn't want to pull them out just for that fact but I also don't want Wrigs to eat them. (And why, or how is it that these mushrooms literally appear overnight?? It's like one minute nothing, and then the next minute I've got Smurf freakin' village for a backyard.)

-These bastards, hurt like a son of a bitch, even when wearing thick garden gloves.

-It's hard to tell a piece of old dog poo from a piece of bark. Always wear your garden gloves.

-I am prejudice. (when it comes to grasshoppers)
I saw this guy sitting quietly in the middle of a plant and thought, "Oh he's cute." But whenever I see a guy like this, I scream bloody murder and hurl my body through the closest door/window.

-Butterflies have creepy crawly spider legs and when one is flying towards your face, it's f*cking scary.

-When cutting out stubborn weeds with that long nose chopper type tool, make sure all electrical cords from outdoor lighting systems are out of the way.

-Bees suck.

-I derive a freakish amount of satisfaction and pleasure when a weed that I've been struggling with finally uproots from compacted earth. I mean, I REALLY get so excited about this that I'm sure it's borderline cuckoo.

Ok gotta head back outside. I'm sure I'll have more to add to this list of backyard discoveries. Sounds like the next craze in reality tv...