Saturday I topped off my truck ($50) and headed over to the Owyhee River to help teach a fly fishing class. As usual, fishing for brown trout in a green river that flows through redrock country was a fun trip. The Owyhee just looks, feels and fishes differently than any other river.

I mention that only for comparison purposes. On Sunday I spent most of the day working in our front yard, most of which I also spent cursing the fact I was working in the yard instead of fishing, or doing anything else fun. My frustration peaked when I went to the local landscaping store and bought a load of bark for $56.

Even at ridiculously high gas prices, putting bark in my yard cost more than going fishing, and to add to the misery, it required a lot of boring and annoying manual labor. I planned to reward myself by going for a bike ride after I was done, but I was too tired. It wasn't the gratifying, "I accomplished something" tired, it was soul-sucking fatigue that comes from forcing myself to do something I basically detest.

It's a constant battle for me between my Oregon Coast hillbilly tendencies (when you only have three sunny months a year, you don't spend them doing yardwork), and the Better Homes and Garden's mentality of suburban America.

A manicured yard makes no sense to me. It's a mass hysteria perpetuated by some unkown malevolent social force. You have to spend too much time, and/or money so your yard looks like everyone else's, even though you really don't do anything but look at it. You don't eat the plants, and I can't remember the last time I saw someone playing volleyball or badminton on their perfectly manicured lawn.

I think rocks look as nice as plants, and require a lot less maintenance and no water, but apparently, the rest of America doesn't feel the same. People love their grass, shrubs and flowers.

I am midway through a xeriscaping project in our front yard, which is an expensive way to save water by spending a bunch of money on landscaping so you don't use as much of it. Believe it or not, I am pretty happy with the way it's turning out, mainly because I can mow our front lawn in about three minutes, which is about my tolerance for yardwork.

But I also had to pull grass where I didn't want it and then put grass seed where it doesn't want to grow, then put a bunch of water on the new grass so it will take root and not need as much water later.

Sheer madness.

The xeric plants we planted last fall are doing much better. I only killed one out of five, and they seem perfectly happy and content in dry, cracked soil. So far, they've required no maintenance. They are my kind of plants.

The front yard is getting close to completion, but don't get me started on the backyard. It's a nasty-looking weed patch that resembles an untended vacant lot or the yard at an abandoned house. It's up next for an extreme xeric make over.

The irony is our back yard abuts the Foothills, which are currently lush and green with knee-high grass. I don't do a thing to it except mow it all down in the summer to reduce the fire hazard.

But I will spend hundreds of dollars and countless hours of drudgery making my backyard look presentable, while the hill behind it sprouts, blooms and grows on its own, then I whack it down because it's growing too well.

It's all just plain crazy.