The Conman Gardner Strikes Again

My last conman gardner post spoke to the attempts of a certain yardman to con me out of house and home – well, yard and driveway anyway. Turns out that the conniving fellow wasn't out to piss off just me however. Today, when I was leaving work to head to my 11 a.m. shift, that is to say, around 1:30 p.m. or so, there was a truck parked broadside accross my road.

So I chitchatted with the truckdriver for a while, and the neighbour-accross-the-street who's about to start construction. I Metioned I was running late for my fictitious 2 p.m. meeting but it made no difference. Ten minutes later, after repeatedly being told, "jus 2 more minutes man," they finished offloading the dirt and stones and the truck creaked away – to park broadside in front of my driveway ... score.

"Mum's problem," I thought heartlessly as I mozied on to the top of the road where I was flagged down by an elderly gentleman.

Now, being that I drive a 'taxi car' I'm pretty used to people flagging me down for rides. Usually, eye contact is enough to make them realize that I'm not stopping. This fellow, however, was quite persistent, stepping almost into the path of my onrushing wheels, so I stopped as he asked for 5 minutes of my time. I again mentioned my fabricated 2 p.m. meeting having no real desire to converse with the neighbourhood. He said "Well, 2 minutes then," and launched into full spiel. I sighed in my head, and resigned myself to the embarrassing stares I was bound to get from my invisible friends when I finally strolled into the board room at 2:20 or so and listened to what he had to say.

"Hi, I'm Ricky," he says. "I live on the property adjoinging yours and I have a problem with your gardner."

My gardner!? Can you imagine the shock and surprise? Why, MY gardner is the heart and soul of honesty, courtesty and industriousness.

"Really Ricky, and what might that be?"

"Well, everytime he does yard work for you he dumps stuff into my yard."

"Stuff?" I say.

"Yeah, right now there are a bunch of tree limbs just over the fence on my property."

That conniving no good work-shirker. And imagine he was asking me for a raise after the last paycheck too. At this point I'm so irate with the damn yard-man, pissing me off, and lashing out at my neighbours and all I could strangle him. I'm quite aware of how Ricky must also be feeling. So I do my best to be an understanding neighbour, one well aware of the shortcomings of his terrain manager and I say:

"My gardner? You sure? He would never do something like that! He always bags the bush and puts it out front!"

"Well he didn't last time. Beg you come move it for me please," was Ricky's annoyed response.

"Well, I'm off to work now, late for my 2 p.m. meeting with the board of directors. Won't be back till after dark. But I tell you what, tommorrow morning I'll come by and look into it."

Note my subtle attempts at appearing to be typical, oligarchal, class-predjudiced jamaican, the clear implication here being, "Well neighbour, lookit: I don't DO yard work. Yard work is quite beneath me, this is why I hire a yard-man in the first place. But since you are my neighbour and all, I will lower my status and deign to look into this niggling matter." The response I intended to garner was "Well yuh nuh really need fi bodda yuhself wid it yuh know, mi jus a mek yuh know so nex time yuh can tell im an im nuh do it again please." Instead, I got: "OK then Peter, I'll see you tommorrow."

So, thanks to my conman gardener, and my failed attempts at classism (I need more practice!), I have a date with a brushpile at 10 a.m. tommorrow morning, the heart of my sleeping time. Makes me feel like a teenager all over again. At least I've had a ton of practice.

Woohoo?