The Third One Was the Charm

Last Sunday, I had grand intentions of mowing the lawn after church on Sunday evening. Under most normal circumstances, I do not mow the lawn on Sundays, but my grass was about to get out of hand seeing as how I had not mowed since Memorial Day. Since we have gotten a lot of rain lately and I had a busy schedule on Saturday, Sunday was going to be the day… and then it rained.

So, the mowing plan was pushed out. I couldn’t do it on Monday because I go to the chiropractor on Mondays after work and this particular Monday was our church Ladies’ Night Out. Tuesday was the final Lord of the Rings screening and Wednesday night was church; so, that meant that the mowing was pushed to Thursday, which worked out well since it rained again on Tuesday – the yard had two whole days to dry out.

Yesterday after work, I went home and was ready to tackle the yard. I should have taken a before picture because it was so high I was embarrassed that it was my yard. It was probably close to two feet high. I am usually very prompt about mowing, but we had a drought and there was no need to mow and then when it started raining it didn’t stop for a couple of weeks and neither did the growing grass. I knew I would have to go over the yard twice and was prepared to do just that since I wanted it to look good once again.

The first thing I did was the weed eating, which had not been done since before Memorial Day. On Memorial Day, I had attempted to start the weed eater, but never succeeded and instead only ripped off a rather large piece of skin in the process. I was dreading trying to get the weed eater started, but miraculously, it started right up and I was able to get all the trimming done first.

Then I pulled the lawnmower out of the shed only to discover it was having issues. I got it cranked up and it would only run for about two seconds and this is not an exaggeration. I could count it one…two…dead. I cranked it up probably 20 times and each time this happened. I called my dad who was of no help and I should have known that would be the case because bless him; he doesn’t know anything about repairing lawn mowers. I ended up calling our family friends Naaman and Cheryl to see if I could borrow their mower. They live about a quarter of a mile from me, so I drove over and after a brief tutorial loaded it up and was on my way. I got most of the back yard’s first run knocked out and started on the front. I had emptied the bag a couple of times but when I emptied the bag a third time, I couldn’t get it to start back up. I gave Naaman a call but he was in a meeting so I went over to my handy dandy neighbor Jeff’s house and asked for his help. He couldn’t get it started either and so, he let me borrow his mower.

I told him I would try not to tear it up too. He tried to start it while we were standing on the sidewalk and it wouldn’t start. He said my property was cursed. I said, we should try to start it on the grass, which we did and it fired right up. I finished up mowing the front and went to the back and mowed it again and got all the grass bagged up and the sticks picked up and carried out to the street. I returned Jeff’s mower and he helped me load up Naaman’s. I returned it and told him what happened and told him to let me know if I owed him anything for causing it not to work.

My yard looks so much better and it will stay that way for a few days at least until it’s time to mow again. Before that time comes, however, I’m in need of a lawnmower repair person that won’t charge me an arm and a leg to get my mower repaired. If you know of anyone who works on mowers in the Huntsville area, please let me know in the comments. Hope you all have a wonderful holiday weekend!

Freshly mowed lawn - the morning after