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patser

Smaller homes on smaller lots

patser
17 years ago

mean less snow shoveling when you're having a blizzard! And we are blizzarding today in Chicago! Two full rounds of shoveling done, 1 more to go tonight...if the wind ever stops blowing everything back onto the walks.

Comments (6)

  • johnmari
    17 years ago

    But it's SO much nicer to hire a plow guy and have some privacy. ;-) $25 per storm (not per plowing, he says it balances out) is WELL worth it! Then again, somemany people would consider 7/8 acre to be a small lot... :-)

    I do miss having the neighborhood preteens who shovel snow for pocket money, though, because DH kinda blows it off and does it halfarsed sometimes. When I was a kid I made a LOT of money toting my shovel around the neighborhood whenever it snowed. I put up a flyer at the convenience store down the street last year and not one kid called, although I got several calls from landscaping services that wanted to sell me a "complete snow removal package" for 3x as much as "guy down the street with plow" - shoveling two sets of steps and 20 feet of walk is not worth fifty bucks!

    We're getting your blizzard tomorrow... it just started snowing, have an inch so far and expecting over a foot before it finishes off Thursday. The dog (being {{!gwi}}) is going to LOVE it. His absolute favorite thing in the world - second to food, that is, again being a proper Spitz type - is to be literally THROWN into a snowdrift higher than his head. I mean we pick him up and toss him into the fluffy snow, and he just bounds and tunnels through the snow.

  • patser
    Original Author
    17 years ago

    We have kids around here who will shovel, but they usually don't show up until 48 hrs after the snow has fallen. At that point...it's a tad bit too late! Anyway, given the choice of cutting grass vs. shoveling snow - I'll take snow shoveling any day. I love the peace of the outside world when the snow has stopped, everything is white, no one is out, and it's me and the shovel. That's my favorite kind of winter day. And, oh do I have more shoveling to do today!

  • flgargoyle
    17 years ago

    Snow isn't much of a problem here in FL! We do mow the lawn year round, though. Makes me glad we only have 1/6 of an acre!

  • jakkom
    17 years ago

    Unfortunately we have a small home on a large (for a city) lot, which means a lot of gardening time. Great for now, but plan to sell within the next 10-15 yrs and move to an apartment. We'll be ready for the "zero upkeep" life by then -- guess I'll have to go to Trader Joe's to buy my weekly bouquets!

    I moved from Chicago to San Francisco in 1989 and believe me, I don't miss that weather AT ALL. It's 60 degrees and sunny, I was out in the garden in short sleeves today.

    I like snow -- it's very pretty in photographs, which is where I like it best, LOL.....

  • patser
    Original Author
    17 years ago

    The one thing I HATE about our small lot is the lack of gardening space! In about 6-8 weeks, that's going to matter alot more than fewer feet to shovel!

  • johnmari
    17 years ago

    Our lot is weird, it's a very long skinny wedge and most of it is driveway. :-) Our whole "lawn" is maybe 30x100 feet of lumpy, bumpy sorta-green stuff (mostly crabgrass I think), too sloped to even put a picnic table on, and the rest of the lot is scrub woods. I'll gladly let someone else do the gardening, I hate grubbing in the dirt and I just don't understand the people who think it's so darn much fun! If I didn't have such a desperate need for privacy (I don't really like people that much!) we'd have bought a condo where outdoor maintenance was included... a house really is an awful lot of hassle, but I was so miserable in condos and apartments. The last two years we've had a mow-and-blow landscaping service provided by my DH's employer (in order to free up his time to work ridiculously long hours... 80 hour weeks were common, he worked through two vacations and for 5 years there wasn't a single day when he didn't do SOMEthing for his job), he's left that job and is going to have to do the yardwork himself now - oh is he going to b*tch. :-)

    We got a nasty 10" snow/ice mix. Yuck. It was so windy every time DH shoveled or Plow Guy plowed, the snow blew back over the walk and stairs and d'way, and then it settled and froze solid today. Very unpleasant.

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