Kris is the gardener in the family: she thinks about flowers and plants and trees; she waters them regularly so they don’t croak. I’m called in for two things: I mow and I do the heavy stuff. This Spring we had some landscaping done, including a short brick walkway to our new garage. Along that sidewalk the landscaper put in some grass. Read on.
The new grass areas in the lawn began to sprout weeds, so Kris thought it might be a good idea to kill the weeds. This calls for the one who does the heavy job. I love to tool around in the yard with my “spreader,” so I bought a bag of fertilizer and weed konker, filled my little spreader, and ran around the yard a few times, concentrating on the bad spots, and felt good about myself. That was last Friday. On Monday we had a surprise — the grass started getting brown. Here’s a picture of my success: the weeds are definitely dead, and so is the grass. So, what’s next? I guess I need to plant some grass seed, but I sort of suspect the fertilizer just might still be active enough to kill it too. Could be the making of another story.

If my sister-in-law reads this, she’ll give me the business for using fertilizer (she’s “greener” than we are). What to do?