Why Can’t We Have Anything Nice?

Every morning when I come back from walking the dogs, I water my plants and gardens.

One of my new efforts was to take the crappy area in my alley and plant a combination of sunflowers and wildflowers. I’ve been dilegently caring for them for weeks, even adding a watering system for them

So I go out today and see this:

The morons from the city came out and laid waste. Just to the right of what the pic shows is my gas meter. Ten feet more, and you hit the corner of the alley and street. Between the meter and the street is ten feet of dried up dirt moonscape.

These fools came twenty feet up my alley to do this.

Yet, there’s still a tree overhanging the alley, on their turf, that I got dinged for. I simply told them it was theirs and thus not my problem.

FWIW, yesterday it looked something like this:

That’s in the front where I cut down some nasty shrubs.

I believe that the land in the alleyway is my property. I’ll have to check the plot. But to the left of that carnage, past my gate, is a patch of grass that they do not maintain, and will fine me if I don’t. Screw ’em. I’mma complain. I’m old. I’m allowed.

Speaking of bitter dissappointment, behold:

Back in the day, hose fittings were brass. Near as I can tell from the rust inside and the patina outside, this here is galvanized steel. It was siezed up in my watering wand so bad I had to get pliers to get it off. Second time this has happened. The last time was on the other end of the very same hose. The female end.

Luckily, I’ve prepared for just such an occaision. I have brass fittings that I can simply replace this cruddy one. I was thinking of lubing it, but that’s a short term messy fix.

Isn’t that sad? Time was that a hose would crack, get punctured, dog chewed. Now, the hose part is fine. I’ve had it for years. But the ends have gone to shit. Whatever. I have a new ‘Flexilla’ hose to put out. Very high tech. But I’m guessing the fittings are actually chinesium.

We’ll see.

Meanwhile, I’ll remove my redneck watering system and modify it to use in my gardens.