Look fake, poisonous and manufactured by Chem-Lawn. Gimme clovers,
dandelions, mole trails, grub damage and moss any day.

bizbee wrote:

On 13 Aug 2006 14:50:01 -0700 in
. com, "Mean Mr
Mustard" graced the world with this thought:

Look fake, poisonous and manufactured by Chem-Lawn. Gimme clovers,
dandelions, mole trails, grub damage and moss any day.

His house is probably the same too!
Ah, listen! The call of the guy that's too lazy to take care of his
lawn..!

Some people believe that our society's fixation with lawns causes
considerable environmental problems including water depletion,
pesticide and herbicide pollution, habitat degradation, and threats to
biodiversity. The National Lawn Conversiion Program
http://www.conservationinstitute.org/lawnconversion.htm advocates
pulling out your grass and replacing it with native plants. Once it's
done, you save time in maintaining your garden (for us lazy folks),
save on chemicals, water and machines (plus gas) to keep on mowing
lawns.

For more info on lawn conversions and examples of converted lawns,
visit the Ergonica World of Weeds website weeding tips page.

What does having an expensive lawn really mean?


wrote:
bizbee wrote:

On 13 Aug 2006 14:50:01 -0700 in
. com, "Mean Mr
Mustard" graced the world with this thought:

Look fake, poisonous and manufactured by Chem-Lawn. Gimme clovers,
dandelions, mole trails, grub damage and moss any day.

His house is probably the same too!
Ah, listen! The call of the guy that's too lazy to take care of his
lawn..!

On 13 Aug 2006 14:50:01 -0700, "Mean Mr Mustard"
wrote:

Look fake, poisonous and manufactured by Chem-Lawn. Gimme clovers,
dandelions, mole trails, grub damage and moss any day.

I agree and that is what I have. However, I also respect those who
want all that hard work to maintain a lawn. In my neighborhood the
men are such assholes they compete who can do a better job, and who
can make the most obnoxious noise doing it.

The only thing my husband does is mow the tiny lawn. Everything else
is cultivated beds...which need weeding!!!!!!!!

Thank you, raycruzer. The truly lazy are those who resort to chemical
quick fixes and wasteful practices that are environmentally devastating
combined with the requisite arrogance of ignorance.
There was a recent article of a woman who pours more water on her lawn per
month than I use in three years, and she wasn't the most egregious example.

"raycruzer" wrote in message
ups.com...
Some people believe that our society's fixation with lawns causes
considerable environmental problems including water depletion,
pesticide and herbicide pollution, habitat degradation, and threats to
biodiversity. The National Lawn Conversiion Program
http://www.conservationinstitute.org/lawnconversion.htm advocates
pulling out your grass and replacing it with native plants. Once it's
done, you save time in maintaining your garden (for us lazy folks),
save on chemicals, water and machines (plus gas) to keep on mowing
lawns.

For more info on lawn conversions and examples of converted lawns,
visit the Ergonica World of Weeds website weeding tips page.

What does having an expensive lawn really mean?


wrote:
bizbee wrote:

On 13 Aug 2006 14:50:01 -0700 in
. com, "Mean Mr
Mustard" graced the world with this thought:

Look fake, poisonous and manufactured by Chem-Lawn. Gimme clovers,
dandelions, mole trails, grub damage and moss any day.

His house is probably the same too!
Ah, listen! The call of the guy that's too lazy to take care of his
lawn..!

In article . com,
"raycruzer" wrote:

Some people believe that our society's fixation with lawns causes
considerable environmental problems including water depletion,
pesticide and herbicide pollution, habitat degradation, and threats to
biodiversity. The National Lawn Conversiion Program
http://www.conservationinstitute.org/lawnconversion.htm advocates
pulling out your grass and replacing it with native plants. Once it's
done, you save time in maintaining your garden (for us lazy folks),
save on chemicals, water and machines (plus gas) to keep on mowing
lawns.

For more info on lawn conversions and examples of converted lawns,
visit the Ergonica World of Weeds website weeding tips page.

What does having an expensive lawn really mean?

Here's my article on the subject, "Lawn Loonies and Envirophobia":
http://www.paghat.com/lawnloony.html
One horrible thing is that in many places, healthy meadows are illegal as
the lawn nazis have passed laws against not destroying the environment.
Municiple codes with possibility of frequently make the natural habitate
recommended by the Lawn Conversion Program fineable offenses. A healthy
environment is viewed as an eyesore &amp all wildlife therein as vermine.

-paghat the ratgirl
--
Get your Paghat the Ratgirl T-Shirt he
http://www.paghat.com/giftshop.html
"In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to
liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot." -Thomas Jefferson

Jangchub wrote:

On 13 Aug 2006 14:50:01 -0700, "Mean Mr Mustard"
wrote:


Look fake, poisonous and manufactured by Chem-Lawn. Gimme clovers,
dandelions, mole trails, grub damage and moss any day.


I agree and that is what I have. However, I also respect those who
want all that hard work to maintain a lawn. In my neighborhood the
men are such assholes they compete who can do a better job, and who
can make the most obnoxious noise doing it.

The only thing my husband does is mow the tiny lawn. Everything else
is cultivated beds...which need weeding!!!!!!!!
I like to tell my wife my goal is to have the second worst lawn on the
block. Just so someone driving down the street can't point to mine being
the worst. If I spend more time than that, I consider it a waste since
I'd prefer to tend to my specimens, tropicals, ornamental/whatever or go
inside and surf the net or watch a movie! hah!

Carl


--
to reply, change ( .not) to ( .net)

Paghat, your article is right on! Here I quote the last paragraph:

"I call for an Urban & Suburban Meadow Movement to villainize lawn
loonies, get rid of envirophobic laws that prohibit meadows, & uphold a
greater standard that values native flora in every empty lot & along
every greenmargin, & which views a single-species flat mowed lawn as
the unsightly destructive force that it seriously & actually is."

Lawns are promoted by those who profit from their existence. A few
years ago, I had a little landscaping work done and the contractor
strongly suggested I put a lawn in a narrow strip in front of my house.
I'm sure he would have been glad to help me mow the lawn every week
for a small fee. Instead, I planted some cacti that my neighbors gave
me as cuttings and now that they have grown large and bountiful my
neighbors compliment the appearance of my house and landscaping. I
live in Northeast Los Angeles.

If you need help in creating a native plant garden, there are a few
landscape architects here and there that can help you put it together
in your area. Or just look up native plant nurseries in your area
using your favorite search engine, and use a non-structured,
plant-centric approach to place your new plants wherever you like! If
you're really brave, you may plant things in a way that no geometric
pattern could ever define!

Thanks, Paghat, for your inspiring article.



paghat wrote:
In article . com,
"raycruzer" wrote:

Some people believe that our society's fixation with lawns causes
considerable environmental problems including water depletion,
pesticide and herbicide pollution, habitat degradation, and threats to
biodiversity. The National Lawn Conversiion Program
http://www.conservationinstitute.org/lawnconversion.htm advocates
pulling out your grass and replacing it with native plants. Once it's
done, you save time in maintaining your garden (for us lazy folks),
save on chemicals, water and machines (plus gas) to keep on mowing
lawns.

For more info on lawn conversions and examples of converted lawns,
visit the Ergonica World of Weeds website weeding tips page.

What does having an expensive lawn really mean?

Here's my article on the subject, "Lawn Loonies and Envirophobia":
http://www.paghat.com/lawnloony.html
One horrible thing is that in many places, healthy meadows are illegal as
the lawn nazis have passed laws against not destroying the environment.
Municiple codes with possibility of frequently make the natural habitate
recommended by the Lawn Conversion Program fineable offenses. A healthy
environment is viewed as an eyesore &amp all wildlife therein as vermine.

-paghat the ratgirl
--
Get your Paghat the Ratgirl T-Shirt he
http://www.paghat.com/giftshop.html
"In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to
liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot." -Thomas Jefferson

Here is my take on lawns: See item 12 "Lawn Mowers"

http://www.rationality.net/foibles.h...0Lawn%20Mowers

--
Walter
www.rationality.net
-
"Mean Mr Mustard" wrote in message
ups.com...
Look fake, poisonous and manufactured by Chem-Lawn. Gimme clovers,
dandelions, mole trails, grub damage and moss any day.

"Mean Mr Mustard" wrote in message
ups.com...
Look fake, poisonous and manufactured by Chem-Lawn. Gimme clovers,
dandelions, mole trails, grub damage and moss any day.


You are right. It's the American way.

On Mon, 14 Aug 2006 22:29:36 -0400, "James"
wrote:


"Mean Mr Mustard" wrote in message
oups.com...
Look fake, poisonous and manufactured by Chem-Lawn. Gimme clovers,
dandelions, mole trails, grub damage and moss any day.


You are right. It's the American way.


I almost hate to bring politics into this, but on 60 Minutes last
Sunday, Mike Wallace did his alpha dog thing with the president of
Iran and he was knocked off his stealth.

The Iranian was intelligent, tried to give answers, but was shut down
and asked to make simple answers of yes and no to many of his complex
questions.

I looked at that and thought, The Ugly American. I wonder if Wallace
has a lawn!

On Tue, 15 Aug 2006 12:34:33 GMT, Jangchub wrote:

On Mon, 14 Aug 2006 22:29:36 -0400, "James"
wrote:


"Mean Mr Mustard" wrote in message
roups.com...
Look fake, poisonous and manufactured by Chem-Lawn. Gimme clovers,
dandelions, mole trails, grub damage and moss any day.


You are right. It's the American way.


I almost hate to bring politics into this, but on 60 Minutes last
Sunday, Mike Wallace did his alpha dog thing with the president of
Iran and he was knocked off his stealth.

The Iranian was intelligent, tried to give answers, but was shut down
and asked to make simple answers of yes and no to many of his complex
questions.

Wow - guess we weren't watching the same interview.

Amena-whathisname IS crazy (he belongs to a particularly virulent
branch of Islam), but crazy like a fox. He never did give an answer
to ANY of Mike Wallace's perfectly legitimate questions. He's tied
with our very own Condi Rice in using up air time giving long,
meaningless non-replies.

But Mr. Iran President, former mayor of Baghdad "Israel must be wiped
off the face of the earth" outdid Condi, as does any mouthpiece for
Islamic world hegemony, and now terrorism.

Ya gotta remember that the Arabic language (which I wish I had enuff
years left to learn!-- a glorious literature, especially poetry --
too little translated in the West) is what holds together
Arabic-speakers all over the world, regardless of their branch of
Islam, their ideology, whether they are Arabs or no, etc.

Arabic-speakers are in love with their language.

But they -- especially Arabs -- express themselves very differently
from English speakers and other speakers of Western-European
languages. They use what we would consider flowery, over-blown
rhetoric, littered with hair-raising figures of speech, and much
sabre-rattling. Also, the norm in Arabic language is to constantly
invoke the name of God. That is not my value judgment; it's actually
the way the language is used. (Visit MEMRI.org for translations of
Arabic-language materials.)

The Arab mind works differently from the pragmatic,
scientifically-oriented Western mind. (See the basic analytic work in
this field, by the late, great Raphael Patai "The Arab Mind",
companion volume to his "The Jewish Mind").

The Arabic mind envisions a thing; therefore it is as good as done.

I.E. how they view the wars which they actually lost, but which they
perceive differently. Most Arabs, especially the great masses who do
not have access to wider soources of information, live in a dream
world, harkening back 1300 years to the "good old days". If you dare
to wonder why the Arab countries (with the possible exception of
Turkey) are all repressive dictatorships that have to import
technology from abroad; that have no civil liberties or freedom of
religion; that oppress women and minorities; that have high levels of
unemployment and soaring birth ratea; that are obligated by their holy
book to kill all infidels who will not convert -- their answer is that
everything is somebody else's fault. Usually Israel; also the Great
Satan (the US) and its allies.

What a waste of potentially useful human capital!

Arab leaders and the uneducated masses they infuence never take
responsibility for the backwardness created by their own fanatical,
death-oriented drive to recreate the Caliphate world-wide. They have
been slaughtering each other for many hundreds of years over who is
the true successor to their founding prophet.

The only Arab intellectuals who see the need to bring the Arab
countries into the real world are writing from the Diaspora --London
or the U.S. Try it at home and you're jailed or killed.

Diogenes

In article , Diogenes
says...

But Mr. Iran President, former mayor of Baghdad "Israel must be wiped
off the face of the earth" outdid Condi, as does any mouthpiece for
Islamic world hegemony, and now terrorism.

Ya gotta remember that the Arabic language (which I wish I had enuff
years left to learn!-- [....]

So, let me see if I have this right.

The president of Iran used to be the mayor of Baghdad, and he's part of
a greater Arabic culture.

What's an Arabic-speaking Iraqi doing as president of Persia? Couldn't
find any qualified Iranians for the job?

Guess that means the Iranians are over the resentments of the Iran-Iraq
war....

--
is Joshua Putnam
http://www.phred.org/~josh/
Updated Bicycle Touring Books List:
http://www.phred.org/~josh/bike/tourbooks.html

On Tue, 15 Aug 2006 17:37:36 -0700, Joshua Putnam
wrote:

In article , Diogenes
says...

But Mr. Iran President, former mayor of Baghdad "Israel must be wiped
off the face of the earth" outdid Condi, as does any mouthpiece for
Islamic world hegemony, and now terrorism.

Ya gotta remember that the Arabic language (which I wish I had enuff
years left to learn!-- [....]

So, let me see if I have this right.

The president of Iran used to be the mayor of Baghdad, and he's part of
a greater Arabic culture.

What's an Arabic-speaking Iraqi doing as president of Persia? Couldn't
find any qualified Iranians for the job?

Guess that means the Iranians are over the resentments of the Iran-Iraq
war....

Yikes...my head was up my...

I meant mayor of TEHRAN!

Sorry.

Diogenes

Let's see what God might have to say about this:

Imagine the conversation The Creator might have had with St. Francis
on the subject of lawns:

GOD: Frank, you know all about gardens and nature. What in the world
is going on down there in the Midwest? What happened to the
dandelions, violets, thistle and stuff I started eons ago? I had a
perfect, no-maintenance garden plan. Those plants grow in any type of
soil, withstand drought and multiply with abandon. The nectar from
the long lasting blossoms attracts butterflies, honey bees and flocks
of songbirds. I expected to see a vast garden of colors by now. But
all I see are these green rectangles.

ST. FRANCIS: It's the tribes that settled there, Lord. The
Suburbanites. They started calling your flowers "weeds" and went to
great lengths to kill them and replace them with grass.

GOD: Grass? But it's so boring. It's not colorful. It doesn't
attract butterflies, birds and bees, only grubs and sod worms. It's
temperamental with temperatures. Do these Suburbanites really want
all that grass growing there?

ST. FRANCIS: Apparently so, Lord. They go to great pains to grow it
and keep it green. They begin each spring by fertilizing grass and
poisoning any other plant that crops up in the lawn.

God: The spring rains and warm weather probably make grass grow really
fast. That must make the Suburbanites happy.

St. Francis: Apparently not, Lord. As soon as it grows a little, they
cut it-sometimes twice a week.

God: They cut it? Do they then bail it like hay?

St. Francis: Not exactly, Lord. Most of them rake it up and put it in
bags.

God: They bag it? Why? Is it a cash crop? Do they sell it?

St. Francis: No Sir. Just the opposite. They pay to throw it away.

God: Now let me get this straight. They fertilize grass so it will
grow. And when it does grow, they cut it off and pay to throw it away?

St. Francis: Yes, Sir.

God: These Suburbanites must be relieved in the summer when we cut
back on the rain and turn up the heat. That surely slows the growth
and saves them a lot of work.

St. Francis: You aren't going to believe this Lord. When the grass
stops growing so fast, they drag out hoses and pay more money to water
it so they can continue to mow it and pay to get rid of it.

God: What nonsense. At least they kept some of the trees. That was a
sheer stroke of genius, if I do say so myself. The trees grow leaves
in the spring to provide beauty and shade in the summer. In the
autumn they fall to the ground and form a natural blanket to keep
moisture in the soil and protect the trees and bushes. Plus, as they
rot, the leaves form compost to enhance the soil. It's a natural
circle of life.

St. Francis: You better sit down, Lord. The Suburbanites have drawn a
new circle. As soon as the leaves fall, they rake them into great
piles and pay to have them hauled away.

God: No. What do they do to protect the shrub and tree roots in the
winter and to keep the soil moist and loose?

St. Francis: After throwing away the leaves, they go out and buy
something which they call mulch. Then haul it home and spread it
around in place of the leaves.

God: And where do they get this mulch?

St. Francis: They cut down trees and grind them up to make the mulch.

God: Enough. I don't want to think about this anymore. St.
Catherine, you're in charge of the arts. What movie have you
scheduled for us tonight?

St. Catherine: Dumb and Dumber, Lord. It's a real stupid movie
about...

God: Never mind, I think I just heard the whole story from St.
Francis.