my neighbor donated a weakly blue spruce for my front yard. he had to get rid of it because it was not getting enough sun in his yard and would eventually die. and he informed me that apparently the city has some ordinance stipulating that there be at least one tree in the front yard of every house. so on a sunny afternoon he came and knocked on my door with a 9 foot tall, lop sided blue spruce much the worse for wear. i slipped on a pair of tennis shoes and ran to get a shovel (how do you decline a tree that has found its way to your door?) with the help of his friend (with a ciggie sticking out of his mouth as he labored with tree and shovel, by turns), we put the tree into the ground and secured it with stakes borrowed from another neighbor. but it swayed precariously with every gust of wind. it was a shoddy planting attempt at best. so two days later, two other neighbors helped to take it out and replant it. within a few days, the top began to brown. i rushed to zamzows for 'save a tree' and found out i was already too late. apparently, if you apply a product called 'guarantee' to the roots before planting, the tree is 'guarantee'd to live. now all that was left to do was apply some diluted zamzow's 'thrive' around the tree and pray.
to date, the tree continues to brown although if it is about to die on me, it sure is taking its sweet time, like bad acting in some shakespearian play.
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**Update**: not surprisingly, the spruce is dead and thus has become a stone in my shoe. my nyc trip had a lot to do with it, cuz we had a heat wave in the valley in my absence and it got fried. plus, i had turned down the sprinklers to diminish grass growth (grass got fried in places as well but is back now with ample 4am waterings). now i need to get rid of it and have no resources to do so (lack of vehicle such as a truck, not to mention, a number of strong male friends). so will most likely end up having to pay someone to get it out of the ground and transport it away.
