Why did the gardener get upset with his lawnmower?

This joke prunes its humor from a classic case of wordplay, specifically a pun. The phrase "cutting corners" literally refers to a lawnmower's action of, well, cutting the corners of a lawn. However, the humor blossoms when we understand the common idiom "cutting corners," which means doing something poorly or incompletely to save time or money. The gardener, a person dedicated to meticulous lawn care, would naturally be upset by any equipment that performs its task in a shoddy or inefficient way.

The idea of "cutting corners" has been around for a long time, often used to describe shortcuts taken in various trades and professions, from construction to cooking. It implies a lack of attention to detail and a disregard for quality, which can lead to frustrating results. In the context of gardening, a perfectly manicured lawn is often a point of pride, and any tool that undermines that perfection by literally or figuratively failing to do a thorough job would certainly earn the gardener's ire. This joke cleverly plays on the dual meaning, giving a mundane machine a human-like tendency for laziness, much to the exasperation of its green-thumbed owner.