Lawnmower Graveyard

Apparently my house is where all lawnmowers come to die. Admittedly, some are my own doing, but other times I have had nothing to do with it. My very first lawnmower was a gift from my father. It was one of his auction finds and something he generously brought to me when we bought our first house. It managed to muster up the strength to get me through the first mowing season but died shortly after the spring mowing season began the following year. Then I bought another used beauty to get me by. I just didn't want to spend the money to get a new one. Unfortunately, this one was a bagless mower so raking the yard was also one of my required yardly duties. I managed and this mower got me through most of the year. That's when mower #2 decided to be inexplicably weird. (**disclaimer- the following will be an explanation of what was wrong with my mower and will require some technical knowledge of the workings of a lawn mower. Unfortunately, I have no said knowledge of mower workings so prepare yourself for a lot of descriptors such as "doo-hickey" and "thingy".) There is that little thing on the arm of the mower that has the switch to change it from turtle to rabbit mode. Well that thing completely broke so I now had no control over the choke. (I think that's what it is). So when I held that bar down or let it up on the top of the mower, it did nothing to turn the mower on or off. What was I to do? So I took the mower over to the "Nicolaides house of mower repair and jerry rigging". We ended up zip tying the choke so that it was always open and manually plugging and unplugging the spark plug to start and stop the mower. So ghetto, but it worked and I still didn't have to buy a new one. With its new and less than user friendly improvements, mower #2 lasted me the rest of the mowing season. Thus began the spring of this year. "Frankenmower" was alive and still kicking. By this point in time I have began to really want to just buy a new mower. However, just like my television, I refuse to buy a new one as long as I have a working one. I really, really, really want a mower that has a bagger on it. I'm so sick of raking up grass after mowing. But alas... Mower #2 was still functioning so my dreams of a new mower would have to be put on hold. Until today. I am leaving the country on Friday morning and will be gone for 11 days so I needed to get the yard mowed before we left. I decided to get up early this morning and do it since I am short on time and its going to be a billion degrees out by this afternoon. I usually check the oil every time I mow, but in my rush I forgot to do that this morning. And this was the beginning of the end. Shortly after starting to mow the yard it started to cut out on me. The grass was really thick and a little dewy so I thought it was just having trouble cutting through it all. Not the case. It was dying due the lack of oil. I thought maybe I could add some more oil to it and let it cool down and a miracle would occur and it would start up again. This was sadly not the case and mower #2 was sent off to that great yard in the sky. Good luck ol friend!

So.... now my yard is 1/3 mowed. Thankfully, I have some awesome friends in my life and one has already volunteered to take care of it for me. That's one more thing off of my to do list. Now I just have to worry about buying a new one when we get back from Venezuela. Yay for a new mower! One that bags the grass for you! If I'm lucky, I will also find one that will pick up the dog poop in the yard too. And pick up all the apples from my apple tree. And weed eat. And pull weeds from the flower beds. And wash my car. Ok, maybe not. But a guy can dream.