What House and Garden Won't Show You
It's spring, and magazines are full of fashion do's and don'ts. Here are a few don'ts you won't see in the gardening mags.
The Bordello. A brightly colored paint chip may not look so good when it’s the size of, well, a house.
The barnyard. A terra cotta bunny is cute. A copper flamingo is quirky. A yard full of store-bought critters, to quote Dorothy Parker, “makes me want to frow up.”
The floating arch. An arch that is flanked by a fence has vintage appeal. An arch without a fence is like the tollgate in the farcical movie Blazing Saddles: dozens of bandits in the desert lined up to pay a toll at a gate instead of riding around it. Unless your friends like to be funny, why will they go under the arch if there’s no fence around it—especially if the arch is a support for thorny roses?
The Sanford Son. If you think all that trash in your yard is treasure, then sell it. It isn’t going to appreciate sitting out there in the weather. If it doesn’t sell, then store it. If it isn’t worth it to store it, then order a lugger. Your neighbors will thank you.
The jungle. Trees, vines, bushes, and flowers growing unchecked is the garden equivalent of dreadlocks.
The quarry. This isn’t xeriscape, this is zero-scape, where the lot is full of heat-retaining rocks. Your yard shouldn’t have its own weather system.
The haunted house. The only sign that someone lives there is lights in the window. For goodness sake, at least keep the weeds mowed. If you need to, ask your neighbors for help with your yard—they’re tired of looking at your dump. Really, they are.
The Bordello. A brightly colored paint chip may not look so good when it’s the size of, well, a house.
The barnyard. A terra cotta bunny is cute. A copper flamingo is quirky. A yard full of store-bought critters, to quote Dorothy Parker, “makes me want to frow up.”
The floating arch. An arch that is flanked by a fence has vintage appeal. An arch without a fence is like the tollgate in the farcical movie Blazing Saddles: dozens of bandits in the desert lined up to pay a toll at a gate instead of riding around it. Unless your friends like to be funny, why will they go under the arch if there’s no fence around it—especially if the arch is a support for thorny roses?
The Sanford Son. If you think all that trash in your yard is treasure, then sell it. It isn’t going to appreciate sitting out there in the weather. If it doesn’t sell, then store it. If it isn’t worth it to store it, then order a lugger. Your neighbors will thank you.
The jungle. Trees, vines, bushes, and flowers growing unchecked is the garden equivalent of dreadlocks.
The quarry. This isn’t xeriscape, this is zero-scape, where the lot is full of heat-retaining rocks. Your yard shouldn’t have its own weather system.
The haunted house. The only sign that someone lives there is lights in the window. For goodness sake, at least keep the weeds mowed. If you need to, ask your neighbors for help with your yard—they’re tired of looking at your dump. Really, they are.
posted by Lori Miller at 4:17 PM
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