A few Japanese Maples
I have Pruned

Not long before coming to Vashon to live, I spent a whole summer bicycling through the Massif Central area of France. As I rode, I would stop to pick up trash along the road until I just couldn't carry any more. Then, when I came to a village, I would unload the trash and sort the recyclables in the public area set aside for that, and head into the village for a cup of coffee - always at a bar, because there were no cafe's. Then I would bicycle around the village and look for public gardens that needed weeding. I didn't ask permission, just got out my gardening tools and went to work. I wasn't trying to hide what I was doing. I wore my bright reflective bicycling vest the whole time. 
One day I noticed that I was being watched by a local woman. I expect she was seeing if I was stealing the flowers, or doing the work correctly. She eventually came over to me and said something to me in French. My French was, and is, too poor for me to understand what she said. But I guessed it was something like "Who are you, and what are you doing?"  Based on that assumption, I turned to her, smiled sweetly up at her and said in the best French I could muster:  "C'est mon cadeau pour le village, madame."  In English: "It's my gift for the village, Madam."

She smiled, nodded, and walked away. YESSS!!!  It worked!
The photos below are from that summer: before, during, and after photos of gardens I weeded, and an example of the bike loaded with road trash and recyclables. 
It was the best summer ever. I had a blast, and people were very good to me.