Aerating the Yard - Ninja Style

Just when I thought I was getting the hang of all this do-it-yourself stuff indoors, Spring comes along and there are a hundred other jobs to do outdoors. The latest pain-in-the-butt has been the grass in our yard. We had several places where water accumulated over the winter and I thought we might have a drainage problem. However, I read on the Internet that I might be able to "aerate" the soil to remedy soggy spots and help grass grow deeper roots etc.

I could have rented an expensive super-industrial-strength-power-aerator from Home Depot. But I'm cheap. So first I bought a "garden cultivator" ..... basically a stick with cowboy spurs on. It's *supposed* to aerate your yard, but they forget to tell you on the box that you have to apply a great deal of pressure, as if a female hippo is wearing tiny little cowboy boots on your yard. Cute idea, but it takes a HUMONGOUS amount of effort to aerate a patch about as big as one lawn chair. Not cool.

Although it looks big and scary up close...













From far away you can tell it's just a little stick with some spikes on... pretty pathetic if you want to grind up 9000 square feet of dead grass in your yard. Admittedly this thing scared the poop out of my mom's dog Rusty, so that did give me some satisfaction.









Anyway onto our story. So I've been researching online about these sandals with spikes coming out that you simply wear when you mow your grass and they aerate the lawn as you walk. My grandma (fountain of all wisdom) said that my Aunt Jo tried something similar but considerably more red-neck by hammering nails through her shoes. This struck a certain chord with me that I can't explain. Maybe it's because I had previously glued sparking metal to the back of my shoes for fun on my scooter. Maybe it's because I'm cheap and didn't want to buy the real thing. Maybe it's because I need one more stinking project to keep me busy. Who knows.

So of course tonight I spent an hour hammering nails through my shoes to surprisingly pleasant results. Enter, The Dragon, baby! (Bruce Lee reference for those over 60 reading this)















... and here's a ninja pose for those who want to try this at home:


















Now all I need is about 8 hours to walk around my lawn in circles. Hopefully the neighbors won't call the police or anything. I know what you're thinking: what an awesome way to save a whopping $17 bucks right! .... And as long as I don't step a rock when I walk and the nails don't back-protrude into my heel it barely hurts AT ALL! Yet another home do-it-yourself project executed flawlessly.