So, I gotta talk about this thing I dealt with, this ‘Don Bush’ situation in my backyard. Wasn’t really a specific type named Don Bush, that’s just what I ended up calling this beast of a shrub that absolutely refused to leave.
It all started simple enough. The wife wanted a new flower bed there. Looked easy on the surface. Just a big, overgrown green thing taking up prime sunny space. I figured, grab the shovel, maybe the loppers, an hour tops. Yeah, right.
First Round: The Easy Way (or so I thought)
I went out there, all confident. Started digging around the base. Immediately hit roots thicker than my wrist. Okay, fine. Got the big loppers. Snapped a blade clean off. Then I brought out the saw. Made some progress cutting the top stuff down, but the main stump? Forget it.
- Shovel? Bounced off the roots.
- Loppers? Broken.
- Saw? Dulled pretty quick.
Spent a whole Saturday sweating, digging, sawing. Got the top half cleared, but the root ball was like concrete mixed with rebar. It wasn’t budging. Looked like it had been there since the dinosaurs.
Round Two: Getting Serious (and desperate)
Next weekend, I rented one of those stump grinders. Thought I was smart. This machine roared like a dragon, chewed up dirt and small roots like nothing. But when it hit the main core of this ‘Don Bush’ stump? It just bucked and stalled. Tried different angles, chipped away at the edges. It was slow, hard work. And noisy. The neighbors were definitely giving me looks.
Found some weird stuff buried around it too. Old bricks, bits of metal, like someone used it as a dump site marker years ago. Made the grinding even harder, hitting that junk.
Why Was I Even Doing This?
You might wonder why I put myself through this torture for a bush. Well, like I said, the wife had plans. Happy wife, happy life, right? She had these diagrams, pictures from magazines. That spot was destined for prize-winning roses or something. Plus, after the first weekend failing, it became personal. Me versus the Don Bush. I couldn’t let it win.
It reminds me of this one project I had at my old job. Supposed to be a simple data migration. Ended up being this tangled mess of legacy code nobody understood. Spent weeks untangling it, felt just like hacking away at those damn roots. You start something thinking it’s straightforward, then you’re deep in the trenches, covered in dirt (or bad code), wondering why you even started.
So, Where Are We Now?
Well, the Don Bush is… mostly gone. I got the main stump ground down below soil level after another full weekend and returning the grinder late. But I know, deep down, some of those monster roots are still lurking there. Waiting. Ready to sprout again if I turn my back.
The flower bed is in. Looks okay. But every time I look at it, I don’t just see the flowers. I see the ghost of Don Bush. And I remember the sweat, the broken tools, the neighbor’s stares. Sometimes the simple-looking things are the ones that fight back the hardest.
