Summer Mowing

Part I --
Ah, glorious Summertime! I had another slight mishap while I was mowing. This time I mowed a little too closely to some lovely, downswooping, redbud tree branches as well as some grumpy, maple branches -- they kept whacking me in the head and face and grabbing at my earrings, but one of them (even though I did duck and lift the branch up over me), attacked my prescription sunglasses and tore the nose piece right out. Of course, since I was being whacked and thumped fairly frequently for a short spell by the branches, I didn't notice the attack upon my sunglasses, so by the time I felt something alien on my face, which was in actuality, the ripped off nose piece, I panicked when my hand felt some possible giant hard-shelled bug, and I instinctively flicked the supposed bug off into the field somewhere. Alas! I did not discover why my sunglasses felt funny until I came inside. So, mark down the score of them, "1" and Cindy, "0" for the start of the 2007 mowing season.

Of course, that reminds me of the most irritating and disgusting mowing mishap I've had -- why is it I always come out the loser? This particular historical mishap involved a huge, very fuzzy, black and yellow-striped bumblebee I referred to as Herman. He had been hanging around all summer but had never offended me or tried to hurt me. I didn't realize bumblebees are sometimes not happy campers, especially when one mows over a certain hole in the ground that belongs to them. As I mowed a swath around the outskirts of the field, Herman came up and flitted about me, but backed off and went his merry way as I went mine one fine summer day. I must be a little on the dense side, or perhaps certain, important factors don't always register right away, or maybe it's just that I live in Cindy Land, but I came back around for another pass next to the previous mowing strip. Herman buzzed up, unusually angry, followed me for a short spell, and I thought I lost him as I circled around the kennel, but lo and behold! Herman was still following me and still angry, so he stung me in the left temple. I could only think that I didn't know how many times bumblebees could sting, but if he got down between my sunglasses (yes, the prescription ones) and my eye, he might be trapped and sting me repeatedly in the eye. So, I did the only logical thing -- I flipped my prescription sunglasses off my face, but instead of flipping them to the side of the tractor as I kept on motoring and mowing, I flipped the bloody things in front of me, and the tractor mulched my prescription sunglasses! Dang! Bumblebee and Tractor, each "1," and Cindy, "0."

Perhaps the funniest moment in Cindy Mowing History was the time the steering wheel came off in my hand and I didn't know what to do. Let's face it -- I'm not mechanical! So I'm holding the steering wheel in my hands and screaming as the tractor rolls across the field toward the house! I couldn't think that fast that all I had to do was take my foot off the gas pedal. :( Tractor, "1" and Cindy, "0.")

And, of course, my kids still laugh about the first time I decided to mow. I had no clue how to operate the tractor, so I took the instruction booklet to the garage with me where I could tuck it into the waistband of my shorts in case I needed it while I was mowing or needed directions on how to stop (no, I did not have the first clue about a throttle, gears, a clutch, or anything else on the tractor!). I was conscientious and logical (yea!) -- I told the kids if they heard an explosion in the garage when I tried to start the tractor, not to come down, but just call 911!

Ah! The excitement of mowing while the barn swallows swoop me and catch bugs! I can hardly wait for the next mowing adventure!

Part II --
Drat! Another mowing mishap!

Today looked like the perfect mowing day, especially as the sun was shining but it was not too hot, tomorrow's forecast predicts rain, and I have to go back to work on Monday. But don't let that fool you, as it did me.

Yes, the riding beast started on the second try, and I did manage to figure out how to adjust the mowing deck height (I've been mowing all summer with it too high and I couldn't figure out how to get the bad boy any lower! And, yes, it's true -- last week when I mowed, I discovered I had finished mowing the field with the mower deck up by mistake, and I wasn't going back out there to remow it!). Unfortunately, though, after only a couple of swipes through the side and front yard, I encountered and came a teensy bit too close to a garbage bag left over from the yard sale that had blown out a bit from the porch onto the ground. Yep! You guessed it! I evidently got a little too close in my daring and mowed the garbage bag.

I didn't think it was too much of a problem at first because, based on previous overly close encounters, I figured the garbage bag would blow out into the yard in a chewed up chunk of itty bitty pieces. Wrong! Part of it blew out so I continued to mow. But lo and behold! The mower started making an unearthly racket that wasn't quite the norm. I figured not all the chunks had blown out, so I raised the deck and tried to make sure the pieces had clearance to blow out. Wrong! The unusual rattling racket continued. So as to not create more damage, I stopped and shut the mower down.

Yes, I had to get down on the ground and look under the beast, and to my horror, I saw an insane amount of garbage bag had wrapped itself tightly around a mower part above the blade. At least, the mower was off, so I knew that was safe, but I was deathly scared of slicing off my fingers since I knew those were blades of steel, or carbide, or whatever is used to make blades of death and destruction. I tried the delicate operation of pulling the entwined garbage bag out, but to no avail. After contemplating the situation, I decided to call my middle brother who bonds with machinery. Sadly, he could not make a house call as he was at a boxing tournament in Columbus, but he did tell me to get pliers to pull the garbage bag remnant out (I had thought the weapon of choice would be a screw driver.)

Fortified with a drink of cherry coke, and armed with two funky-looking pairs of pliers and two bent screw drivers I deemed suitable for the job, I ventured outside and reclined on my side on the ground. I was stressed. I, plain, flat-out hate anything mechanical, as anyone who knows me will know. I'm mechanically-challenged. I started the delicate operation with the funky wrenchy thing that clamped together when I squeezed the handles which means they are kind of pliery things, too. A few small chunks of garbage bag came out, but the bag part was tightly twisted many times around the thingy above the blades. I figured Matthew's hand was too big to get in there, not that he was home anyway. Fear of no fingers made me more cautious. I tried again and again, to no avail -- only a few small pieces came off. I started to get that sick feeling in the pit of my stomach when things go wrong that I can't fix and couldn't, even if I knew how, which I didn't.

I came inside, took a deep breath, tried to calm my jittery self, and considered more options. No one in the hood seemed to be home. I didn't want my dad to have to lie on the ground and hurt himself. Matt was still at work. Beckert's Tractor would charge me an arm and a leg. What should I do? I considered anyone I thought I could call, and looked again at all the neighbor's houses -- even "Hippie Dude" at the apartments was gone. So I steeled myself to go back out and attempt this surgery again.

This time I dug at the S.O.B. garbage bag with the bent screw driver. I realized using the screw driver created a different hazard than the wrenchy/pliery thing -- it caused you to jerk your hand as you dug at the garbage bag and I didn't want to jerk down, hit the blades, and have no fingers. I took a deep breath. You would think that someone driving by would see a female in distress and stop to help, but no. No white knight on a charging horse appeared. As I regrouped, I saw some of those thicknesses of grass crud you are supposed to scrape off your lawnmower after use, which I never do as you can't turn a riding mower upside down, so I knocked a few of those clipping chunks off. Hey! That was pretty successful, so I felt a little more confident.

I tried digging some more with the screwdriver and pulling with the wrenchy/pliers. I worried I would cut something that I shouldn't -- maybe there was a belt or something under the garbage bag chunks. (Heck! I don't know what it's supposed to look like under there.) Or maybe I wouldn't be able to get all the garbage bag off there because some of it might have ended up inside some working part. I definitely didn't want to create more damage as that would cost more money to Beckert's Tractor Services.... again. More chunks came off.

Finally, there was a small piece of rubber band-looking thing wrapped around -- was that more of the garbage bag or a belt? I decided I had to go for it and cut through it! Eureka! The garbage bag chunk was off. (Have I told you how much I hate doing anything like this? I really hate it with a passion! Let me clean a toilet or something else bad instead.)

You might think my story is a successful encounter with the riding beast. But, no! I did start mowing and things were going well, but then my neighbors came home. I don't see them very often, so I stopped the tractor in the field by their house to see their baby and talk for a few minutes. When I tried to start the tractor afterwards, it didn't start. Maybe I should have used that choky thing again, so I tried to start it again with the choke pulled out. I tried to start it 4 or 5 more times. The neighbor came over and I said I probably flooded it. He agreed and said there was some smoke coming out which probably would support that theory, and that mowers like that usually don't like you to try to start them too many times or the battery goes dead.

So, I'm writing this blog entry while waiting a decent spell before going out to try to start the monster again. (Hopefully, no one has the guts to steal the evil beast since it is sitting in the field close to the road, looking innocent, and I really didn't want to push it all the way to the garage.) Summer 2007 Mowing Update -- Mower, Trees and Bees: 5; Cindy, 0.