How to Annoy Your Neighbors Through Yard Use

As the weather gets nicer, the weekends get better and better.

Kale egg bake

The cats get full use out of all the windows (though Titania is still getting a bit too much use out of the basement ceiling, which leads to her getting stuck above the furnace and in the walls). Oberon gets terribly jealous that we're allowed outside and he isn't - he meows plaintively at the windows and follows us as we roam. I think he's loud enough for the neighbors to hear.

So much bloomed this weekend. I now have tulips and poppies to go with my daffodils, hyacinths, and bleeding hearts.

We mowed the lawn for the first time this weekend with our new electric mower - I'm quite fond of it, despite the cord. It's just like vacuuming, but more detrimental if you run over it.

I mowed a lopsided half of the yard on Saturday, as we discovered that the 50-foot extension cord wasn't long enough. Rather than run back out immediately, we decided to finish the rest on Sunday. I mowed as far as the cord would let me, resulting in a haphazard semicircle where mown lawn met unmown in the front yard. If it's possible to look sketch due to poor grass grooming, we did. Though I felt more normal when I saw the neighbor down the street using a rider mower to hack down foot-long grass in his average-sized suburban yard.

While I mowed, Spousal Unit cleaned the gutters. We were quite pleased with our skills, and it was even fun to do some yard work. I'm sure that won't last terribly long, but it was enjoyable in the meantime.

On Sunday, I read, played mandolin, and did yoga in the backyard while bees buzzed over the sweet spring grass. The mandolin thing was kind of a BFD, as I'm not terribly good yet but felt sequestered enough by the fence and trees not to be shy. (I hope the neighbors were at least amused by my terrible strumming.) I like not being in an apartment anymore.

Below is my latest outdoor dilemma, however. This overgrown corner is full of so many strange things (strange to me, at least) and I don't know what they are or how to organize it a bit more. (Click to enlarge and please share your findings with me!)

Close-up of one of the above plants