The Yard
My front yard is a thing of beauty. The grass is cut and the edger runs on a regular basis. Fabulous flowers just about dazzle the eye.
The side yard is great, too. All along the house I grow flowers and vegetables. The lettuce is ready to eat. Herbs are doing well, beans are way up, three kinds of tomato plants are just going to town, loaded wih blossoms and tiny tomatoes.
Then the back yard. It's a jungle with horrible vines and rampant weeds.
Why, why, why? What's up with that back yard? Well, it's all about my yard person. Given his personal productivity, he's overbooked, took on too many jobs, can't get to all those houses. At least he cuts the parts of my yard visible from the street. He does this for me although not for the neighbors because I rush out and pay him the second he gets the front finished, and I overpay him. After I pay, he goes ahead and completes the side yard for me and then he puts away all his tools and goes to 7-11, comes back with a forty of Colt 45. Sits on the neighbor's front steps, drinks his drink, and goes home. Period. He's done. No more yards that day, no back yard job for me.
Isn't it stupid of me to pay him before he finishes the job? No. If I didn't do that, he wouldn't even be motivated to start. This individual is not your super-motivated person anyway. He and a chrony of his sit on a neighbor's steps by the hour doing nothing more active than to watch people walk past on the sidewalk and call out, "Hey!" Since I'm such a generous and prompt payer, he knows that he can count on getting beer money by starting to cut the grass at my house. No one else pays as much and no one pays so swiftly so no one else has a front and side yard looking as nice as mine do. Do I get disgusted with him? You betcha. Am I going to fire him? Not at all. It's only grass, not heart surgery. If he fools around drinking instead of cutting, nobody's going to die over it. He's a local character, very popular, well-thought of even by those who shake their heads about his unreliabitity regarding yard work. Eventually he does get all the grass cut on this block, just not very frequently...except for my house. My front and side yards get cut as often as he needs beer money, which is pretty often, thank goodness.
The side yard is great, too. All along the house I grow flowers and vegetables. The lettuce is ready to eat. Herbs are doing well, beans are way up, three kinds of tomato plants are just going to town, loaded wih blossoms and tiny tomatoes.
Then the back yard. It's a jungle with horrible vines and rampant weeds.
Why, why, why? What's up with that back yard? Well, it's all about my yard person. Given his personal productivity, he's overbooked, took on too many jobs, can't get to all those houses. At least he cuts the parts of my yard visible from the street. He does this for me although not for the neighbors because I rush out and pay him the second he gets the front finished, and I overpay him. After I pay, he goes ahead and completes the side yard for me and then he puts away all his tools and goes to 7-11, comes back with a forty of Colt 45. Sits on the neighbor's front steps, drinks his drink, and goes home. Period. He's done. No more yards that day, no back yard job for me.
Isn't it stupid of me to pay him before he finishes the job? No. If I didn't do that, he wouldn't even be motivated to start. This individual is not your super-motivated person anyway. He and a chrony of his sit on a neighbor's steps by the hour doing nothing more active than to watch people walk past on the sidewalk and call out, "Hey!" Since I'm such a generous and prompt payer, he knows that he can count on getting beer money by starting to cut the grass at my house. No one else pays as much and no one pays so swiftly so no one else has a front and side yard looking as nice as mine do. Do I get disgusted with him? You betcha. Am I going to fire him? Not at all. It's only grass, not heart surgery. If he fools around drinking instead of cutting, nobody's going to die over it. He's a local character, very popular, well-thought of even by those who shake their heads about his unreliabitity regarding yard work. Eventually he does get all the grass cut on this block, just not very frequently...except for my house. My front and side yards get cut as often as he needs beer money, which is pretty often, thank goodness.
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