Legends of the Fall

I was at a meeting recently where someone stood up and said, “Fall is here, so please remember not to drive through piles of leaves along the road. There could be children playing in them.”

I’ve heard that a hundred times, and a hundred times it sounded like something that grew out of urban legends. On the flip side, we were told as kids not to play in the leaves near the street for the same reason. As usual, this drove me to the internet. Low and behold, SNOPES.COM does not dismiss the warning as a myth, but cites several horrible accidents as proof that playing in the leaves can have deadly consequences.

But there’s a more pressing reason you shouldn’t play in the leaves, particularly not the leaves piled on the street in front of my house. That’s because they are filled with dog poop. Those are the leaves I raked from the backyard over the weekend, and while we try to stay one step ahead of the dogs, it’s tough in the fall. The problem? Their droppings are camouflaged by nature’s colorful bounty. That sounds very poetic until you stroll through the leaves, or worse yet, you spend three hours raking them up. Then nature’s colorful bounty is a stinky, disgusting mess.

So, don’t play in the leaves and don’t drive through the leaves, and for Gods’ sake, wear clean underwear in case you get in an accident.

3 thoughts on “Legends of the Fall

  1. human speed bumps..

    back in my younger days, I wasn’t above putting pumpkins from Halloween under the leaves.

    Toss in the old clothes from the porch scarecrow and viola.. instant panic

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