Shovels, they come in all shapes and sizes. You can get them in varying handle lengths, colors, finishes and uses. There are coal shovels, snow shovels, trenching shovels, garden shovels, scraping shovels and just plain digging shovels.
Think of what earth would be like without shovels. First, you would have to get something else to pick up the stuff you do with a shovel. Think of the gravel in the driveway, the sand on the beach, the snow in the drive or the….shhh, dog doo in the yard. Hmmm, even a dust pan really won’t work for this, too close to the project.
If you are carrying stuff in the house and you are by yourself, prop open the door with the shovel. If you have an old window that just won’t stay up, you guessed it, stick a shovel handle under it. If you are working on your car and have one wheel jacked up and she wants to roll, stick a shovel under the wheel. For those of you who own little ankle biting dogs, you stick that shovel in the ground, chain Fido to it and you have an instant dog tie out.
Of course there are the usual reasons we have a shovel. The before mentioned dog excrement clean up, digging flower beds, weeding between the rows of your garden or just digging a nice deep hole in the yard. A nice deep hole? This may be my personal favorite. Yeah, most people have a nosey neighbor who just can’t stay out of their yard, especially in the evening or when you aren’t home. OK, remember the presents your dog left in the yard? Here is a new use for them. You dig your deep, wide hole in the yard. You line the bottom with the canine landmines and spray it down with about ten gallons of water from your garden hose. This will soften up the older ones and recreate the old aroma. You then spread some sticks across the hole that fell out of the trees during the winter and then its time to head to the cheap carpet store down the road. You get a piece of that nice, crunchy indoor-outdoor turf grass and spread it over the sticks. Now throw some dead leaves and grass on top to help camouflage the bright green of the astro-turf and abracadabra!; you have a nice nosey neighbor welcome mat! I will let your mind run free for a moment thinking of your “favorite” neighbor stepping on the welcome mat and landing in the aromatic recycled dog chow lying at the bottom thanking them for visiting…….now that they are in there, where’s my shovel?
There is also the last, but not least, extremely important use for a shovel. Remember, there are few problems in life that can’t be solved with a good solid whack from a quality shovel. Whether it is a stubborn rock in the yard, digging a welcome mat for a nosey neighbor or…….
smacking the crap out of some idiot that truly deserves it, a shovel is hard to beat……
