I hate weed eaters.  Excuse me, line trimmers is the official terminology.  Weed Eater is a brand name (it’s also a band name).  Anyway, I hate line trimmers.  They are loud, obnoxious and cover you in debris.  Without a doubt, trimming grass is one of the required activities in hell.  A couple of years ago I purchased a really good one made by Stihl.  It is the type used by “professionals”.   It cranks easy and the string advance works well, but it’s still a crappy job.  Nothing beats spending your weekend doing yard work.  Bleck!

    One time, when we lived at the lake, I was trimming the grass down by the water.  Our place was on a steep hillside, so steep, in fact, that if you fell down in the front yard you would probably roll all the way to the lake.  We also had a terrace about twenty or so feet from the waterline, making it impossible to get the mower down there.  I had to use the trimmer on an area bigger than most people’s yard.  It was hot and humid.  I was about ready to fall out anyway from the heat, when I trimmed over a ground bee nest, yellow jackets to be precise.  I didn’t see them at first but I certainly felt them.  The first one got me on the neck and a few more stung my ears.  I ran up the terrace, stopped and dropped the trimmer, the whole time I was beating myself in the head with my baseball cap.  The bees followed me and seemed to be concentrating on my head.  I don’t know which was worse; the bees or the little button on the top of my cap.  Everytime I would stop, the bees would catch me and start stinging my neck and ears.  I'm certain it would have been entertaining to the casual observer.

    I finally made it up to the house and ran inside.  I went into the bathroom and stood in front of the lavatory for a couple of seconds when I realized I was having difficulty breathing.  I was there by myself and knowing that I’m fairly allergic to wasps, I began to think I was going into anaphylactic shock.  I quickly shed my clothes, turned on the cold water in the shower and jumped in.  It was painfully cold, but as I leaned against the shower wall I realized that I definitely wasn’t going into shock.  I had just run all the way up the hill.  If you took your time and walked up our hill you’d be out of breath when you got to the top.

    I have a lot of memories from that house and all of them are about like the one I just told you.  In 1989 it got down to -13 degrees.  I had the water running to keep the pipes from freezing, but some smartass turned off the community well and all our pipes froze.  I went under the house and surveyed the damage.  Every copper pipe was split on six inch intervals.  It stayed incredibly cold for a week and there were plumbing disasters everywhere.  The plumbers bought up all the supplies from the hardware stores and the do-it-yourself homeowners got left out in the cold, so to speak.  My wife went on a scavenger hunt of sorts, scrounging up PVC pipe and fittings every place she could find it.  She had no idea what was required, but if it was PVC, she bought it.  I vividly remember it was about 4 degrees when I was under the house re-plumbing every inch of the water lines.  When I was finished it looked like a PVC display showing all the possible configurations using every size and type of component made.  Everything was mismatched and crooked.  Half inch pipes tying into three quarter inch pipes, three quarter inch elbows with bushings to make them work on half inch pipes...you name it.  But we had water!  Later on in the spring, I went back and cleaned it up.

    I will admit, though, that house taught me lessons that few people ever learn.  For instance, don’t use a backhoe when remodeling the porch because you can accidentally rip off the living room wall.  Also, when hiring someone to cut down trees next to the house, make sure they aren’t an alcoholic.