Frazz by Jef Mallett for July 31, 2024

If it’s dormant in the summer, and covered with snow in the winter, it’s only green in spring and fall?

No Grizzly Bears?

And if there are grizzly bears around, don’t walk barefoot on the brown grass.

Ahhhh another Frank Zappa reference… good one.

Smart man, Frazz.

I wish my grass was dormant so I wouldn’t have to mow it.

When I was a kid, the school across the street would turn off the sprinkler system in the summer and let alone go “dorment”. Two weeks before school started, the gardener would show up and set the lawn on fire. Then he would turn on the sprinklers, and by school time there would be a fresh lawn.

Bryson needs to get one of those fancy electronic signs that are everywhere now.

When I lived in a little town in Northen Ontario I was billed $80 a year flat rate for water. People used drinking water to hose off their driveway and I had a gorgeous lawn all summer long. Then we moved to a larger city and I knew we were billed based on usage. Still, how much could it be. So first year, I watered my lawn. Then I got my first trimester bill… well I learned about “dormant” in a heck of a hurry.

No, the grass is dead because your school is too cheap to water it.

Did you ever ride your bike down to school to see if they’d but anything up on the bulletin boards yet?

It’s against my religion to water the lawn.

The young couple on their honeymoon were about to spend the week camping in Yellowstone, but first they had to listen to the ranger’s orientation speech. He was particularly emphatic about bears. “They’re a protected species, so we’ve got lots of them, but they’re still dangerous. Don’t approach them under any circumstances. And don’t try to outrun them; they’re faster than you are. And climbing a tree won’t help, either; they’re better at it than you.”

The nervous groom asked what they could do about it.

“Well, some people stop by the gift shop and pick up wristlets or anklets with little bells. Sometimes if they hear you coming, they’ll move off before you get there. You can also get cans of pepper spray in case you surprise one. Oh, and be on the lookout for fresh bear scat; that’s a sign that they’re around and you might want to leave.”

“What’s scat?” asked the bride.

“Bear droppings. You can tell what kind of bear it is by what their poop looks like. The smaller ones, black bears, have scat that’s kind of firm and roundish, like dark ping-pong balls. The really dangerous guys, the big grizzlies, have softer, flatter, lighter-colored droppings, kind of like cowpies, except they usually have little bells and smell like pepper.”

In my experience, dormant grass is a myth. When it goes brown, it never comes back.

Don’t mess with brown, if you can help it.

But bears don’t hibernate. I thought that was well-known by now.