Your Leaf Blower Shatters My Fortress Of Solitude

Really? You fired up your leaf blower just to vanquish that dusting of grass clippings from the 18 feet of sidewalk in front of your house?

Eighteen feet – that’s three tall humans laying head to toe! Also, 2 female boa constrictors, 1 Narwhal, or 18 foot-long hot dogs. Not exactly a vast wooded estate.

Using a broom for 2 minutes would have killed you? You could have burned off one-tenth of your Pop-Tarts and frozen sausage breakfast. You live on a 1/8 acre suburban lot with no trees, hence no leaves to blow.

Or perhaps you intentionally wanted to annoy me at 9:18 on Saturday morning with your leaf blower’s uber-polluting two-stroke engine that generates a toxic stream of carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxide, and hydrocarbons at an eardrum crushing 90 decibels. That’s exactly the same sound pressure as if I’d pressed my ear against a roaring Harley Davidson engine. Not very neighborly.

I was deeply ensconced in a peaceful, sunny Saturday morning, enjoying my John LeCarre book, my morning tea, and some glorious songs from the birds in my yard, that your vacuum-cleaner-in-reverse scared the bejesus out of. Bye-bye birdies.

I’ve been to almost 100 rock concerts and not a single one, even that Guns N Roses show at that club in NYC, came anywhere near the eardrum punishment and anxiety-provoking noise your contraption for lazy, middle-aged homeowners just gave me.

Thanks for the buzzkill, leaf blower man. You shattered my fortress of solitude.