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2004-06-09 - 8:37 a.m. The Erstwhile Adventures of Gerald the Toad (or �We�re never going to get to Alabama, Mom.�) Mom is safely home, I�ve crawled through enough mud, mulch and cicadas to create a suitable test sample for the new wash machine�s �Heavy Duty� cycle, and the landscaping is done. (See Roland�s diary for pictures.) Done, done, done. (Okay, so we need to put in some lights. And more plants later in the fall. But done for now.) Saturday, Mom and I went to Home Depot to get a few more things. Wow. Issues. This was the store that had given us so much trouble over the hot water heater we cancelled, but I thought picking up a few annuals was safe. Fuck no. Every Home Depot employee was rude to us. My mom was literally flabbergasted at the behavior, from the head cashier who brushed us off, to the guy wearing the apron that said �I help in all departments� who refused to help her because it wasn�t �his section�; to the employees who stood talking and watching while my mom and 1 climbed boxes to reach an item too high for us (which finally prompted another customer to stop and help us); To the cashier who watched us struggle through the self check out, but was uninterested in helping us until I said �Fuck this. I�ll just leave this pile. I�ve never had to work so hard to buy anything in my friggin� life.� (Yes, I said �F*ck in front of my proper Southern mother, and she just nodded in agreement. It was a bad bad day.) But the piece de resistance was the price check. When I went back to show the employees where the items were labeled $15 not $30, I was rudely told that was the overstock area, those tags didn�t apply, and if I�d gotten down on my hands and knees I would�ve found the correct tag. I fussed about this and was told that they couldn�t help anyone who had so little common sense or inability to read. I stopped dead, and said, Wow. You need to stop speaking to me that way now. They employees went on to protest they weren�t being rude, I was the problem. And, that will be the last time I set foot in Home Depot. But, I spent 25 minutes on their customer complaint line telling them about their problems. Done with the rant part now. Saturday, it rained, misted, was overcast � but we worked in the yard anyway. Ripping out the bushes, as it unfolds, was the easy bit compared to the spade work of reshaping the bed. Mom, stop using the broken spade. She stuck her tongue out at me, but did pick up the new spade. We shaped the bed through the afternoon, hacking problematic tree roots left and right, until the heavy rain let loose and forced a retreat. After Mom and I (at least I come by it honestly) scraped the mud off our clothes and changed, we sallied forth for more supplies. Roland, despite being the ditch digger crew through the work, just had to change his sweaty shirt. Freak. Honey Mom says , Roland is not like us. He stays clean when he�s working. This time, we went to Lowes, a lovely store full of helpful people, to get drainpipe supplies and to the nursery (where �sigh- Mom indignantly showed Roland where they sold thistles) to obtain mulch. We didn�t get enough mulch, but then you never do. It�s a law of the universe. You never get enough mulch, you will always loose at least five socks a year in the dryer, and the TV remote will be where you�ve already looked three times. Sunday was balmy and clear, perfect outdoor weather, and we worked like house elves. Arranging and planting and smoothing and moving rocks and potting annuals and listening to banjo music. Banjo music you ask? As the event unfold, the teenager next door (who is starting to resemble Bo Duke with a buzz cut) obtained his first banjo Sunday and spent the day idly picking away on their front porch. I noticed this as the strains of Oh Susanna drifted across the yard on continual repeat, always breaking down at the chorus. Dear lord, is that boy never going to get to Alabama? Mom looks at me like I�m an idiot. Oh Susanna? I say. �I come from Alabama with a banjo on my knee?� Again, the chorus breaks on �ba-ma�, just in time for me to wince, and my mother to smile in understanding. Roland ignored the entire thing. Banjo music is not his idiom. I left Mom and Roland putting down the black plastic (weed blocker technology.) This is usually tedious and muddy work, but the cicada population added spice to the operations. Each time Mom cut a hole for a plant, cicadas swarmed from under the plastic cause her to dance. Mom does not like crunchy, big, ugly bugs crawling across her hands. And, fun insect fact, cicadas cannot climb plastic because the feelers on their feet can�t grip. About thirty of the escapees wound up in an angry buzzing heap at the edge of the bed, unable to go forward or back. I had to move them all before Mom would put down mulch. While they worked their way through the cicada symphony, I gleefully destroyed the ugly cedar bush around the mailbox. I was just tamping down the freshly turned earth when the earth moved under my foot. I screamed and an indignant looking toad, about 5� long, popped out the ground, right in the center of my footprint. He croaked and stared about, irritated his cedar bush was missing. I, of course, picked him up and admired him, much to the amusement of the banjo player. After Mom and Roland admired him indulgently, I set him free, figuring that would be the last I�d see of the toad. Nope. He hopped behind the mailbox post and sat there, eyeing me, as if to say, Well? He watched while I dug the hole and planted the new bush, waited for the potting soil to be smoothed. Then, he cocked his head and hopped right back under the new bush and set to redigging his home. I, charmed by the saucy creature, dubbed him Gerald, because the tree was named Herman. Mom wanted to know why I didn�t transplant over where he might eat some of the cicadas that were driving her crazy. Oh, Susanna, oh don�t you cry for me�. � � � 
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