Gardening Hack #9: Details, Details

Gardening Hack #9: Never leave an assistant without clear instructions.
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As we prepared to clear away the last remnants of fresh garden soil delivered earlier in the week, Mr. Bitterman suggested that he finish up while I go spend more money on garden fripperies, such as another Garden Godzilla Eating Garden Gnomes.

After I left, Mr. Bitterman tired of the shovel and decided to take a snow thrower, run it back and forth over the dirt pile and clean it down to the grass.

Sadly, he didn’t think to change the direction of the throw chute on each pass, so dirt is in the garden, the neighbor’s yard, on the bike path, burying the pine tree in our back yard and decorating one sleeping dog. He also failed to consider what soil, compost and rocks might do to the internal workings of said machine. When I returned from Home Depot, Mr. Bitterman had departed for the day, leaving me with one thoroughly trashed piece of expensive machinery.

Luckily …

The snow thrower belonged to my neighbor (Mr. Bitterman borrows what he likes – with or without permission). I was able to get it relatively cleaned up, reattach most pieces that had traveled a goodly distance across the yard and moved it back into the neighbor’s shed without anyone the wiser -- except, of course, for Mr. Bitterman, with whom, it seems, I am now firmly in cahoots.

We'll see what happens in the next snow storm, which promises to hit Colorado anytime it damned well pleases.
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