Tree Gator Alert! City Gains Emergency Funding for Tree Gator!

TreeGator is filled once more! Union Avenue, Knoxville, TN.

I'm guessing it must be the federal stimulus money. Shame on you readers who have criticized this program! All summer while the temperatures hovered in the mid to upper 90s with no rain in sight, melting streets and causing grown men to cry, the Tree Gator sat, empty, neglected, set adrift in this urban ocean with no purpose.

Those of you who may have missed the previous posts, the TreeGator started as a mystery. It was helpfully solved by a reader named "anonymous." When first we saw the Tree Gator, it was full of water and full of purpose. I noted that it was sad the city could only afford to save one tree at a time, but who could have known what would come next?

Once empty, the TreeGator was never filled again. It remained around the base of the same lone tree on Union Street, just off Market Square beside the Market Street Kitchen, languishing and humiliated. It must be that not only could the city only afford one TreeGator, it could only afford one round of water - until now! Just in time for these most excellent 75 degree, cloudy and rainy days, I was shocked to see it bulging with that most precious H2O, once more. I had to jiggle it with my toe, just to see if it was true.

The stimulus money must not have been enough to purchase more TreeGators, because it is there, all alone, helping save that one, single, privileged tree. Maybe we'll snag another one during the next recession.