Noise machines! No matter where I go, there’s always someone nearby operating some type of noise machine. It’s starting to drive me crazy. What’s worse is that a noise machine NEVER fails to materialize when I’m taking a break in some peaceful little spot. It happened twice today!
I came across a big apartment building overlooking the lake and assumed they would had some sort of walkway or benches at the waterfront. I was happy to discover I was right. No sooner had I sat down and started peeling a banana, than a guy with a weed whacker appeared out of nowhere (he was probably hiding in the weeds) and blithely went about making my resting place intolerable.
Later that afternoon, I stumbled on a cute park with a cool old-fashioned clock tower and some shade trees. I flopped onto the grass and commenced resting like the professional that I am. Two minutes later, a truck pulls up to the house across the street. Three guys jump out and within seconds they’ve got two giant mowers going, and the third guy is grinding an edger along the sidewalk. So much for relaxing in the middle of that cacophony!
As I rode away grumbling, I began to piece together that these weren’t isolated incidents. At the KOA campground: old guy on a mower circling my site for almost two hours. Bench outside the store in Amsterdam: guy with a gas-powered weed whacker. Camping at the lock in Macedon: old guy on a mowing tractor who started cutting the municipal grass at 7:00 in the evening (who does that??). Taking a break in a gazebo next to a church: guy walking around the grounds with a leaf blower going full-bore - even though there were no leaves to blow! The list goes on. And that’s when it hit me.
The noise machines aren’t the problem – grass is the true enemy. In every case, people were cutting, trimming, or somehow prettifying grass. I began noticing how many people are out mowing their lawns as I pass. I begin adding up all the yards, and all the acreage, and all that must be done to maintain it. Forget the strain on our fresh water resources, the time and money that goes into grass alone has to be staggering in the aggregate. How can people devote (i.e. waste) so much of their lives taking care of stupid grass? The one thing that would make it worthwhile is the one thing I never see.
The only time I see anyone out in their yard is when they are tending to the grass. I’ve passed thousands of homes on this trip so far, and I have yet to see anyone, and I literally mean anyone, using their lawn for any purpose whatsoever. No kids are playing in it, no one is sitting out in lawn chairs, no family badminton games on the neatly coiffed turf. The closest I’ve come are dogs standing at the edge of their territory barking at me to keep off the grass (or, as they see it, their painstakingly manicured toilet). If I actually witnessed people using their yards, it might make at least some sense, but everyone is locked up inside, occasionally glimpsing out the window to see if it’s time to mow the grass again.
If you have a lawn, replace it with green gravel tomorrow – the world will be a better place for it, and you’ll have a whole lot of extra free time and money to do something fun!
This concludes our test of the emergency rant system. We now return you to your originally scheduled blog already in progress…
What I Learned: Aside from discovering that lawn care is the new bane of my life, I learned that no matter how careful I am, whenever I do any maintenance on my bike I WILL get grease on my clothes. I decided to turn my shirt and shorts inside-out from now on when I work on my bike – genius!
Distance Today: 47 miles
Total Distance: 868 miles
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