New fear unlocked: becoming like the old men with newspapers who yell, “Hey, kids! Get off my lawn!”
One guy on TikTok is dangerously close to this —only he isn’t using a newspaper, he’s using automated sprinklers!
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His form of pettiness to protect his lawn against trespassers has resulted in some hilarious videos. But many people are also divided.
Thomas Lyons (@tgunz81) has it out for “lawn pirates.”
These are the people who walk on his grass every day to shave some time off their commute.
After they ignored his requests to nicely use the sidewalk beside his house, he took matters into his own hands.
In his first viral video, which has over 39 million views, his security camera showed his solution to “when people won’t stop cutting across your lawn.”
The video showed people running away as soon as their movement triggered the automated sprinkler to turn on.
In the comments, people were divided over the sprinklers, with some questioning the definition of “trespassers.”
“These are school kids,” one user pointed out. They recommended that Thomas put a stone path in instead to let them walk across. “It’s just grass, kindness means so much more.”
“Girl let those kids get home a minute faster,” another viewer commented.
Another complained that it’s actually “kinda rude” to stop strangers from crossing on your lawn because they may need to “go somewhere fast without access to vehicles.”
One person vouched for this, writing that cutting across grass has saved them from missing the bus many times.
When more people emphasized that it’s “just grass,” that didn’t sit well with everyone.
“I don’t understand. I was raised to never walk in someone’s yard, especially strangers,” this user commented.
Another commended the lawn owner for their creative solution. “I LOVE this level of pettiness. It’s your lawn, so do as you wish.”
In a second video, Thomas shared the original audio. This included an alarm blaring in addition to the sprinklers going off.
Some people weren’t a fan. “get rid of the alarm and add more sprinklers so it’s unavoidable,” one wrote. “It aint that serious,” added another.
There were many people recommending Thomas take a page from *The Princess Diaries*.
“You need the princess diaries audio – when they yell ‘GET OFF THE GRASS’ in English and then I think Albania and Italian.” Others had more creative ideas, like setting up sprinkles that go off at every angle.
For the most part, people liked the alarm.
They also still couldn’t understand why no trespassers were using the sidewalk, which is right beside the grass.
“There’s literally sidewalk,” one wrote. “And they still didn’t use the sidewalk, they walked in the grass next to the sidewalk,” another added with an eye roll emoji.
Since people were *still* divided over Thomas’s petty solution to trespassers, he shared a video of what life was like “before the sprinkles.
“More lawn pirates! Asked nicely everyday to stay off the lawn but people just keep coming,” the video was captioned. It showed several people walking right across his lawn.
During the day and at night, bikers even rode right across.
Then, the video showed the people “after” he got the sprinkler installed. Those who tried to cut across were sprayed with water and ran away.
People were still divided over this. “It’s not that serious it’s just grass.”
Many rushed to Thomas’s defence, reminding people that it’s rude to walk on someone’s grass and that doing so can actually kill the grass.
“It isnt just about walking on the grass. We owners have to clean up the garbage they drop, replace grass that is killed by constant food traffic,” this person wrote.
Where do you stand on this lawn ordeal? Are you for or against the sprinkles? Let us know in the comments!