Spring has sprung.

Ahhhhhh . . . spring has officially sprung. Longer days; warmer days; snow melting; grass and flowers growing; birds chirping; the ability to park the car on the road without the fear of a ticket or being towed; wildlife scurrying about; my green bin contents scattered from one of the yard to the other every morning; the scent of cat pee around my yard and dog shit all over my lawn. Yes folks, spring has indeed arrived.

I kind of have a love-hate relationship with spring. While I'm glad to see winter disappear, I do NOT enjoy the muddy, bleak and teasing nature of early spring. I'm more of a 'late spring' lover - you know, when the grass is grown and the trees have leaves and the flowers blooming. And when I have to shovel shit, or worse, clean it off the bottoms of my shoes (or moreover from between my toes - because I hardly ever wear shoes); pick up last Thursday's dinner and yesterday's lunch from my front lawn and sidewalk or hose down everything outside of my house. Can you notice a theme here? About animals?! Animals that I don't own?! I don't own a dog, or a cat, but I'm forever dealing with the aftermath of our neighbours pets. The green bin issue is always 'user error', meaning that someone within our house has not secured the ropes that holds it closed (it's all rigged up with rope to keep it closed - because contrary to manufacturers beliefs, those bins are NOT animal proof - they easily get into it and have a buffet), so while that does piss me off to have to deal with, the reality is, it's our own fault. But the dogs and cats?! That is someone else's fault, and quite frankly, it really aggravates me.

I don't really like dogs. I mean I don't care if someone ELSE has a dog - good on them - but I definitely have NO desire to own one myself and to have to deal with all their upkeep. They're loud and barky; they're smelly; they're sheddy; they chew stuff; they're tough to find care for when you go away for a weekend; and they poop. There's nothing worse than me tossing a shitty old diaper outside my front door (wrapped in a bag) and finding it shredded across my lawn 10mins later; or going outside to play and one of the neighbour dogs comes tearing into my yard and knocks someone over, or it comes and drops a load on my lawn. THAT single handedly pisses me off the most. I've may (or may not) be known to scoop up the shit with a shovel and then toss it back on the offending homeowners lawn; and when I say toss, I literally mean toss. I stand on the road and flip it right over my shoulder (you know, to get maximum shit-flying velocity) onto their yard. Sometimes it all lands on the yard. Sometimes it lands on their driveway. Either way, I'm just giving it back. I can't tell you how many times my kids come running across our lawn on their way home from school and sploosh, they step straight into a pile of gross poop. And then they come walking into the house. My kids aren't trained to look for landmines . . . and really, why should they?! We don't have a dog, so our lawn should be 'obstacle free', right? What I don't understand is why these dogs are running around freely so much. I often find one of the neighbour dogs DIGGING in my yard or just simply coming over to find a place to poop. It takes off with my kids toys sometimes (or puncture their balls and leaves ME to deal with the aftermath). Drives me nuts!! With garbage, etc, we put it out to the curb on collection day, and more often than not, I'm out there rebagging the trash itself, and picking up the green bin contents because some dog has gotten into it; or cleaning up a runny shitty mess from my driveway or grass because the above-mentioned dog has eaten some of that tasty treat within the bins. I can't imagine the tummy troubles that some of the shit that dog eats must cause. YIKES!

And the cats?! They wander into my yard and kill the birds I feed; pee/spray on everything they can; and shit in my flower bed or the sandbox if it happens to get left open. My favourite is when the windows on the main level are open during the day and the cat from down the road comes up and sprays right through the screen into my kitchen. Oh yeah, that is AWESOME!!!

Grrrr!!!

But . . . I deal with it. The warmer weather has arrived, which means that I can spend hours upon hours outside. The kids love it; I love it, and most of it all, it means that summer is on the way. I can't wait for the hot and hazy days where we lounge around outside and do nothing much at all.

Well, nothing except cleaning up shit; cat pee; green bin contents and garbage.