Note to city workers: If you've got a problem, just say so

What a mess of a day. Supposedly the lawn guy was scheduled to bring a helper and work on the plantings around my patio (lawn guy is older and doesn't do a lot of digging anymore - he has younger help for that). Some of the bushes are dying, some just look terrible, and one, the ivy on a trellis, is just a nuisance and needs to go. I had made two trips to the nursery to pick up plants this week to get ready for this. Two trips because you can't carry many bushes in a station wagon. At 8 o'clock I scurried out to move the outside furniture away from the azalea border around the patio, mark the dead/dying/pitiful plants that were to be dug up and replaced, measure and mark where the new azalea bushes were to be planted, lay out a tarp to gather up all the plant materials, moved the bags of compost and mulch around to the patio and generally get ready for the work. Then I waited. And waited. And waited.

All this time, my left eye had been aching. It was bothering me when I woke up and continued to be painful. Both eyes were raw and irritated, but the left one was what was concerning me, since I am using some prescribed eye drops and wondered if they weren't working or just weren't agreeing with me. So after 11 o'clock when the message I left for the lawn guy wasn't answered, I called my ophthalmologist and they said they would work me in after lunch. Thank goodness. I cleaned up and dressed, and walked over to my neighbor's house to ask if she had the lawn guy's cell phone number, since he mows her lawn too, because I wanted to try and inform him I would be gone.

On the way back to the house, I see a city public works truck pull up at the corner of the lot and a guy with a saw get out and proceed to hack on one of the dogwood trees planted at the corner. I scurried over and asked him what the heck he was doing.

To visualize this, I need to describe my lot. I am on the corner of a smaller side street, which the house faces, and a more busy street. There is a stop sign on my side street. At the corner is a cluster of short holly bushes about 5 feet from the curb, and set back from the street 20 feet or so are three dogwoods in a triangular configuration. These are large dogwoods that probably been there since the house was built over 40 years ago. The trunks have many branches which are high enough off the ground that you can ride the lawnmower under them, but not necessarily walk under them close to the trunk. They do not extend to the curb.

The city worker said that there was a complaint that the tree branches were blocking visibility of the stop sign. I can categorically say they were not. I stood in the street where a car would be approaching the corner and could see the stop sign completely unobstructed. I figure someone got a ticket for running the stop sign and used that as an excuse. When I told the worker so, it did not make any difference. I did however get him to stop hacking on my trees.

"Did you even ring the doorbell and try to tell someone that the trimming had to be done?" I asked. Of course they didn't. I told them that if anyone was going to trim my trees, my lawn guy would do it and do so in a way that would not harm them. The city worker evidently didn't know what he was doing, just chopping at the branches and creating a mess. Finally, he left.

When I got home from the doctor's office (thank goodness there wasn't a problem; my eyes don't seem to like those drops and she changed the prescription) the lawn guy was there mowing. I asked him about where his assistant was and found out that his helper couldn't do the work today and furthermore, he told the lawn guy LAST TUESDAY. Which information wasn't passed on to me.

Here's a tidbit you can use, lawn guy: Keep the lady with the checkbook in the loop. So now the work is scheduled for Monday.

Like I said. Heck of a day.