Posted on 04/01/2017 10:32:33 AM PDT by blueunicorn6
"In the Spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love."
Young men spend a lot of time thinking of love. I sure did when I was a young man. Spring would come with Daffodils and Robins and me having thoughts of love. Of course, I was having thoughts of love in Summer, Fall and Winter, too, but Spring really seemed to bring out the thoughts of love in me. I grew up in the 70s and the girls wore Hot Pants. Hot Pants seemed to bring out the thoughts of love in me, too. I'd like to see Tennyson write a poem about Hot Pants. I did. I submitted it to our school's literary magazine. They sent it back and the Advisor wrote a note on it saying they didn't publish porn. How I have suffered for art.
In the Spring an old man's fancy turns to thoughts of garbage. It's time for that Spring lawn cleanup. My wife went from wearing Hot Pants in the Spring to wearing flannel shirts and boots and supervising my yard work. I think she could still get by wearing Hot Pants, but the branches would scratch her legs.
Don't get me wrong. I like things to be tidy. Lord knows the Drill Sergeant made me like tidiness.
"Your socks aren't folded the same length!"
He measured my socks with a ruler. This led to my footlocker being turned over and dumped into the middle of the barracks floor.
I tried explaining this concept to my wife after we were married. I measured her socks. She asked me for the ruler. She hit me with the ruler. The Sergeant probably hit me with the ruler, too. We didn't kiss and make up afterwards. Me and the Sergeant, that is. His loss.
I had to trim the Lilac bushes and the Apple tree for Spring cleanup. I know how to trim bushes and trees. I was a professional at that with The United States Forest Service. That and standing on a hill holding my hose. I was fighting a forest fire. They told me to get up the hill and grab the hose and spray the trees. The little water pump could only pump the water about thirty feet up the hill. I stood there with my limp hose watching a forest fire come roaring at me like college students going to the beach on Spring Break. I maintained my family tradition and ran like a chicken. But I digress.
I trimmed down the Lilac bush and the Apple tree. I probably should have just cut them both down, but my wife likes the Lilacs and the squirrels like the apple tree. I'm not a big fan of squirrels but they tease the dogs almost as much as I do, so I feel a kindred spirit with them.
The branches and limbs have to go somewhere, so I load them into the back of the pickup. I love pickups. Some of my best Spring thoughts of love were in pickups with my high school girlfriend. Her Dad was not a "thoughts of love" kind of guy. He was more of a "thoughts of shooting young Romeos" kind of guy. Those kinds of guys read Field And Stream and not poetry. His loss.
I drove the pickup to our small city's dump. They have rules at the dump. They have those rules posted in big letters on a sign right when you enter the dump. I was kind of surprised that there are so many rules at a dump. You would think you just go to the dump and throw out the branches and be gone. There have evidently been belligerent people who have come to this dump in the past.
Bad dump people.
I like to get along with my fellow man so I read the rules and attempted to live my life at the dump in such a way that the employees would consider me to be a Golden Dumper. You know, someone they are happy to see at the dump.
I drove the pickup over to the special spot in the dump for limbs. That's right. The dump has special spots for different garbage. There was a special spot for refrigerators. And God help you if you don't remove the door from a refrigerator before putting it in the dump. They will throw you in dump jail if you don't remove that refrigerator door. And there are Seagulls in dump jail. Mean Seagulls. Mean Seagulls carrying shanks and shivs. I had to put shanks and shivs because I got a lecture once on Free Republic about the technical differences between a shank and a shiv. FReepers sure do know a lot about some things in life that might surprise you.
I managed to find the right spot to dump my limbs and branches. I hadn't spent a lot of time thinking about the best way to load branches and limbs into the back of the pickup. Evidently, there is a science to this. Tim the dump guy gave me the benefit of his experience with loading limbs. He didn't give me the benefit of his help, he gave me the benefit of his words.
Limbs have some suppleness to them. By this I mean that they can bend. When they bend, they can snap back and hit you in the face. This is known as "The Limb Slap". At least that's what Tim told me. I told Tim a few things.
Turns out I hadn't read the dump rules close enough. They have a rule against swearing. Tim was a dump-narc and ran right to his boss to tattle on me.
The boss came over and proceeded to tell me the possible punishments for using filthy language at the filthy dump. I could get a timeout. I got one of those once at Free Republic for swearing. I swore at those ISIS rats. I swore A LOT at those ISIS rats. I deserved my timeout and contemplated my sins while sitting in the Free Republic penalty box.
They could ban me from the dump. Well, I'm already banned from Yemen and Peoria and I didn't really want to be excluded from more places, so I asked him not to ban me.
He made me apologize for swearing at Tim. I apologized most sincerely to Tim. I got back into my pickup, properly shamed and remorseful.
I flipped them the Double Chicken.
I only go to the dump once a year anyway.
I can have my wife go if we need to go sooner. She could wear her Hot Pants. They'd probably let her swear then. She can beat the snot out of seagulls anyway.
“... Hot Pants seemed to bring out the thoughts of love in me...”
________________________________________
Hot Pants and mini skirts seemed to bring out the thoughts of LUST in me.....
LOL!
“I told Tim a few things.. “
Lol
At the dump near my place, they make you pay $25 for the privilege of attempting to follow all the rules.
Bwahahahaha!
I respectfully bow to the master.
(No, I am NOT wearing Hot Pants.)
As a lifetime member of the Freeper Time-Out Club I can totally sympathize. Mostly for politically incorrectness in the old days when describing muslims in terms not accepted at your dump triggered the PC police in microseconds. But things have mellowed, fortunately.
Interesting and entertaining narrative.
Buy my main comment is I have saved myself a lot of grief in my life.
This confirms it; the root of much evil and grief.
Never owned a pickup.
Give Tim a break, he was just upset you didn’t bring anything he could decorate his house with after you left is all.
That was a nice find and much appreciated.
Kudos, very entertaining.
Your sense of humor and writing style reminds me of Lewis Grizzard. That’s a compliment.
I love this. Do more please
Ping
I push the limit at the dump by tossing cardboard into the “mixed paper” bin.
I wore hot pants in high school and had the legs for them.
Please be sure to “break down” your cardboard boxes.
I put my cardboard boxes in a dark room and shine a powerful light on them to try and break them down.
So far, they won’t say a word.
I’m not sure what a cardboard box would say, anyway.
“Yeah, I robbed that bank, copper. And you never would have caught me if I had legs!”
Those were gym shorts and you’re the only person I know who should shave the backs of their legs.
Wow you must have sat behind me in home room.
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