The third episode (Year 3) of Esther & Her Hostas vs. The "Landscape Workers" and Their Deadly Sprayers...

Tuesday, rather late in the day, I finally had time to check my mailbox. The dread document I had been awaiting was finally there: "Notice to Residents - will be spraying weedkiller and pesticide on Wednesday and Thursday. Do not walk on lawn for 24 hours after application." Considering the extreme damage to my hostas, heucheras, and other plants done by this spraying for the past 2 years, I decided that enough was enough! I did not want to spend the rest of the growing season looking at dead, heavily damaged plants, not when I'd waited all winter for the glory of their spring emergence.

It was already 6 p.m. I spotted my next-door neighbor who shares a love of gardening and ran over to her, waving the notice. She is Chinese and does not read English very well. I read it to her and we both collectively did our separate but equal versions of "Oy vey!" Then we went into Keystone Kops mode in a frantic effort to shield our respective gardens from the dread Weedkiller wielded by the Landscape Workers. She brought out a bunch of large clear trashbags and handed them to me, while using the reserve for her own garden. I ran upstairs to find anything I could use as a stake, some packing tape, and scissors. I ran around the circumference of my garden and drove in the stakes at the edge. I frantically cut the garbage bags so I could stretch the plastic into a broad strip to tape to the stakes. I finished up at 1 a.m., and then ate dinner (oh, for the love of hostas!). I called the co-op office on Thursday to ask if the spraying had been completed yet. The receptionist said, yes, it was done, and I'd better remove my plastic sheeting, as the property manager "had already taken a picture of it" (as ammo for a nasty letter to me, obviously). Well isn't that rich? The property manager hires unskilled people with no conception of landscape care to do the landscape work. They do tremendous damage to residents' gardens, spraying them with weedkiller, trampling plants, bending I.D. tag stakes in half, etc. And he is upset because very temporarily, I have unattractive plastic sheeting put up to protect my garden against his hired help?

I didn't want any problems with this guy. He tends to be very vindictive. So I ran outside at 4 p.m., when I'd finally finished some essential tasks, to take down the plastic. Not-so-Accuweather had predicted thunderstorms at 5 p.m. But the heavens apparently hadn't gotten the memo. So at 4 p.m., thunder was rumbling, and it was CLOSE. There I was, frantically tearing down the plastic and uprooting the stakes while lightning flashed and more thunder crashed, the first raindrops appearing. Didn't stop me, continuing to grab, pull, and fold my quarry, lightning be darned. By the time I stuffed the whole bunch of plastic into the recycle can, I was soaked. I didn't care....THE HOSTAS HAD BEEN SAVED!! Evil did NOT triumph this year!!!