Living Retired #192- April 24, 2017
DIGGING SPRING.
It is going to happen on a Saturday morning very soon. GUARANTEED.
Your wife will awaken…
Carefully, she will maneuver her way through the mountain range of Pier 1 decorator pillows– ‘For Display Only’ during the day– that are scattered all over the bedroom floor overnight so you can get into the bed!
She will open the ‘pleasing, complimentary neutral California shutters’ and see the lawn is beginning to turn green and the trees budding. It is spring. All is good.
Then she’ll spoil it all by uttering those 5 words: “Let’s go get our flowers.”
With those 5 words a perfectly good Saturday is shot to hell!
‘Let’s go get our flowers’ will kick off a series of events…
Husbands will grimace getting out of bed– and trip over pillows!! You think we’d learn– these are the same pillows we tripped over at 2 am, 4 am, and 6 am when we got up to pee!
Writhing in excruciating pain, guys roll around on the engineered hardwood flooring– European reclaimed white oak to compliment the California shutters– screaming four letter words that are usually associated with soccer moms!
‘Lets go get our flowers’ creates havoc on the roads. Everybody drives to the garden centre on Saturday morning– so they end up parking three Counties away!
With your vehicle parked on the side of a dusty gravel road you hike back to the garden store. Guys came prepared– wearing their L.L. Bean hiking boots. However, the footwear of choice for women is gardening-approximate ‘flip flops’ so they can complain about their toenail polish getting chipped!
Ahhh. Finally you reach the garden centre– sort of.
Before you can get to the shrubs and flowers you have to make your way past the kids face-painting tent, the kids kite-making class, the kids babysitting service, the kids change station, the kids lost and found, the food truck, and the water station… so you can line up to get a number… so you can get a rickety cart to carry your purchases… so you can line up at a cashier! Are we having fun yet?
The first plant your wife will select has very delicate flowers in one of those ‘thingy’s’– a horticultural Latin word meaning ‘Doesn’t translate into English’– that has a wire holder so you can hang the plant on a hook. A great idea– but first you have to get it home! No problem. Your wife hands it to you to carry for the rest of the garden centre visit.
“Dear, hold this plant at shoulder height and make sure you let the flowers trail down towards the belt of your relax-fit jeans. Don’t let them touch anything or they’ll break off”
Pushing a garden cart with three working wheels, on gravel, over hoses and uneven patio stones AND holding a hanging plant is a recipe for disaster…
“Dear, I told you to pay attention! By the time we get this plant home we will be lucky if you haven’t broken all the flowers off!”
“Me? Why am I the problem all of a sudden?”
The excruciating shoulder pain is causing your arm to shake so much that the flowers are falling to the ground faster than Trumps approval ratings. The plant looks like Charlie Browns Christmas tree!
OMG! We’re coming up to a display of, no don’t tell me: decorator candles for the outdoors! Too late…
“Dear, I’d like to pick up a few for the patio.”
Believe me. There is no such thing as picking up ‘a few’ decorator candles!
“Yes dear. I’ll go and get another cart.”
Next, it’s the ‘Imelda Marcos Collection of Gardening Clogs!’ How many pairs of shoes does a woman need to walk in dirt? And if that’s not enough– there are racks of ergonomic gardening flip flops!
Or how about a foam pad to kneel on– with memory foam technology! What’s next? An adjustable, dial-a-height, ergonomic watering can? What’s that? They already have them!
Garden centres don’t only sell plants and shrubs– oh no. They have become a destination with ‘ideas to turn your outdoors into a fabulous extension of your home.’ Just what a guy needs– another room with a granite countertop, cupboards with banker-style handles, and metal wall sculptures.
Customers can sign up for a session to learn how to build a garden pond. Or ‘make your own tropical oasis to attract monarch butterflies.’
Hey, just give me some cow poop in a bag to spread over my tomato plants!
And some Advil Extra Strength Muscle & Joint pain relief!
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Gary Chalk a retired Canadian baby boomer is a member of Humor Writers of America. Each week over 3,000 people across North America read Living Retired. To unsubscribe or to book Gary’s keynote presentation ‘I Don’t Have Wrinkles, I Have Laugh Lines’ visit https://livingretired.press
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