Better Living Through Chemicals

One of the things that I never anticipated about suburban living was the chemicals in which I would find myself awash on a nearly weekly basis. See, I'm now a bit more than a recreational chemical user despite the fact that I primarily use only on the weekends.

Just this pass weekend, on the stretch of lawn between the sidewalk and the street,I sprayed copious amounts of crab grass killer. Earlier in the spring I bathed in Malthion while killing bugs on my roses. I used some other horrible sounding chemical to kill Winter Moths. I have spread in excess of 30 pounds of fertilizer and an additional 10 pounds of grub killer and 6 pounds of high test antifungal powder from my spreader. This is certainly not organic lawn care, that's to be sure, but the lawn looks lovely, I get plenty of positive comments about the health of the lawn, and I'm proud of the results. On the flipside though, if you add to this the copious quantities of H2O (read, money) that I've poured on the lawn in addition to the chemicals, it should look good.

See, when living in Brooklyn domestic, legal chemical use was limited to a can of roach spray, toilet bowl cleaner and bleach. Now I own a veritable garden supply store of chemicals. The suburban-moving-homesteader must become very comfortable, very quickly, with the handling, use, and even sometimes, disposal of serious chemicals. One must also tell the children to stay off the lawn for a few watering cycles. It's worth it though when you look out the windows of your home and see green lawn all the way to the sidewalk.