FIRST BLOOD, PART DEUX

Yeah, it's a little like being Rambo... only with a lawnmower. And with my shirt on.

I started my seasonal gig at WRG yesterday, and I'm already bleeding. Now, you might think that my injury potential has declined this year since I'm not actually working in or near the animal enclosures--WRG has no penguins. However, it does have rosebushes. The Gardens consist of two main parts; a Conservatory, which houses the butterfly show I worked at in March and April, and a series of outdoor gardens over about 3 acres of ground. The tour de force (from a marketing standpoint) is the "Wedding Garden" which is, of course, designed to be rented out for weddings. It's a large swath of green turf lawn, bordered by crushed limestone paths on one side and a brick walk covered by a trellis on the other. Framing the edges of the garden are those typical wedding plants, the rosebushes. One of my new duties is to mow the wedding garden, in perfect stripes and along the edges... which is where the blood part comes in. Just a few scratches, of course, but still. A peculiar thing, as my coworker pointed out, is that people like to sit and watch you mow the wedding garden. I'm not sure why this is--do they wish THEY were mowing the wedding garden? Are they fantasizing that their own lawns might someday look like this ode to turf? Or are they just glad to see someone else sweating behind a mower? Either way, sure enough, once i got started, a family of three just sat on one of the benches watching me mow. Point being, of course, that this seriously curtailed the stream of profanity that might otherwise have resulted from my encounter with the rosebushes. Just as well, a cussing gardener doesn't reflect well on the Gardens or the Zoo. Still, though.... %$#@&!