:: in.a.mirror.dimly ::

I was out to set a world record for mowing our lawn this morning. With a new mowing pattern I was zipping through our quivering blades of grass, set to have it all done in about 90 minutes… a ridiculous number for a lawn that sometimes takes well over two hours.

And then I forgot to raise the blades over the tree roots.

CLUNK, CLUNK, CLUNK, BBBBRRRRRRR, THUNK.

It happened so fast I didn’t catch it in time. I think something on the mower deck where the blade spins got knocked loose. It’s kind of crooked. So far I haven’t figured it out.

Not to be deterred, I rolled out the push mower. After all, I only had the front lawn to mow, which isn’t large or thick. So I yanked on the cord. I yanked and yanked. On the fifth pull the tiny engine roared to life.

Unfortunately the starter chord flapped out of mower. The whole thing hung lifelessly in my hand.

This meant that I couldn’t stop the mower. Stopping meant I was really screwed. So I pushed it all over the yard and made good progress. Unfortunately the blade level can sometimes shift on this mower, and today the front left section dropped way down to the point that it was digging into the dirt. Within a minute the mower cut off.

Two mowers down in 15 minutes. Unbelievable. 20% of the lawn remains.

At the least the neighbors will have something to talk about.