The stars at night are big and bright...

The stars at night are big and bright...
The stars at night are big and bright...

Thursday, August 7, 2008

Man vs Machine


I decided to finally break down and buy a lawn mower. For those that don't already know, I live in the middle of a hayfield (literally). I don't have much of anything resembling a yard so a mower was never high on my list. Anything I needed cut I used my tractor and brushhog. After the fire destroyed my brushhog (see: The South40 January edition), it was time to find a mower.

I'm too fat, lazy and just plain don't want to push a mower, so a lawn tractor it was.

I made the trek to Decatur and did a quick bit of comparison shopping between WalMart and Lowe's. Both were about the same but Lowe's had a better selection, brandnames and also had some used mowers. Advantage Lowe's.

I found a lightly used TroyBilt that looked in good shape marked down $200. It had been returned and repaired. I found out the repair was installing a new battery. We cranked it up and it barely ran. I did a quick looksee and found the sparkplug was loose and cracked. HA! I bought the mower and did my best to contain my smugness for burning them so badly in the deal.

Little Sister would be proud of my mad shopping skillz.

I get home, install a new plug and fire that mother up... It barely runs.
F*** me!

I start to question just how great of a deal I got and my wisdom in making it. When all else fails, call for backup. The call went out to BrotherInLaw. Luckily, he was'nt doing anything important so I loaded up and headed over.

I gotta tell ya, he's a freaking miracle worker with machinery. All we he did was remove the bowl from the carburator and put it back on. Varrooooom! The thing runs like a hotrod. (Told ya he was a miracle worker.)

So I head back to The South 40 and mow for about 5 minutes before it starts to vibrate badly. I mean whole lotta shakin' goin' on. I jack up the mower and the blades look like a pair of pretzles. Apparently my new TroyBilt is not as tough as I anticipated. Nor is it a replacement for a brushhog. The small brush and weeds I was mowing twisted my blades in a way Mrs. Baird would have been proud of.

Tomorrow I get to buy a new set of blades. Remind me again why I needed a lawnmower?

1 comment:

just a girl... said...

lol, in the beginning I could actually see you beating your chest.