So here’s the long story about how I wound up responsible for mowing the lawn:

Last time the landlord’s dad (Mike) went away for a few months, he asked the neighbor to mow the lawn in exchange for using the lawnmower on his own lawn. The neighbor seems like a nice guy. He also seems like a person who has kind of an overwhelming life. Four kids, (maybe), a couple dogs (the bigger one of whom is clearly not trained at all, and not exercised, either), and more yelling at the house than I would ever be comfortable with. Recently Mike repaired three broken windows at their house, because he was worrying about their AC bill and because he is a super, super nice guy. Me, I was curious about how three windows get broken. One, sure, accidents happen. Three?

But moving on… also last time he went away, Mike texted me regularly asking me about the lawn. Had it been mowed? Was it getting too long? And the answer was usually, “Well, no, and, ah, maybe.” But I hated being the lawn police. Really not my style. And, to be blunt, there are no circumstances under which I am ever, ever going to tell that neighbor that he needs to get his a$$ in gear and mow our lawn. (Incidentally, he is not the one doing the yelling, although he is sometimes the one being yelled at, so this is not because I’m afraid of him. That would be a different issue.)

When faced with the question of how the lawn was going to get mowed while Mike was gone, I therefore volunteered to mow it. It’s not a big lawn, nor a major chore. I can tell you from personal experience now that it takes 25 minutes to mow. Even in Florida weather, that’s a reasonably trivial amount of effort, not exactly hard labor.

But, OMG, do I hate lawnmowers. As you may recall, the first time I tried to mow the lawn, it took three tries, because the lawnmower kept dying on me. Mike replaced that lawnmower with another lawnmower — not a new lawnmower, but the one from his own house. I’m kinda gonna guess now that in order to transport the lawnmower in his car, he took the handle off. Just a guess, I don’t know that for sure. It could be entirely random that the screws holding the handle in place on one side were so loose that they fell out, making the lawnmower impossible to steer.

Urgh. I spent about ten minutes struggling with it, before the problem became excruciatingly clear to me. I then spent another ten minutes, maybe more, carefully retracing my steps over and over again, looking for the lawnmower part. Did I mention that it’s not a big lawn? It’s not a big lawn! (I know I told you that already: the question was rhetorical.) But I couldn’t find the piece at all. The best I did was to find a chopped up piece of black plastic that might have been part of the handle cap. So, so, so annoying. It was, of course, 90+ degrees outside while I was doing this, so I finally gave up, put the lawn mower away, and went back inside to start researching the problem.

I did what people do these days when confronted with such a problem: two minutes of research and then a quick purchase of lawnmower replacement parts from Amazon. Then I waited for the parts to be delivered. In the interim, I did the things one does, including taking the trash out. Lo and behold, sitting next to the curb, a black plastic thing that was clearly the missing lawnmower part. ARGH! I hadn’t had the lawnmower over there at all — on that specific day — but it was where I’d finished mowing a week earlier. It hadn’t even occurred to me to look on the street.

Still, the handle was missing the piece that would hold it in place (a black plastic piece that presumably got chopped up) so I comforted myself with the knowledge that I needed my Amazon order after all. It arrived with all due speed, and I tried to put it on and… No. Maybe the universal bolt wasn’t so universal as all that, or maybe I just wasn’t strong enough to screw it into place on a handle that was slightly corroded from a week sitting in the sun and rain, but there was no way I was getting that handle back on with that handle top. Also, the two pieces that needed to be held together — the actual lawnmower and the metal handle — needed to slide smoothly into place, and also, No. I just could not make that happen. Jamie tried to help, but he couldn’t get it, either, and the frustration level was rising dangerously high, so I finally just said, the hell with it, and did a crappy job. Will it last until Mike gets home? Probably. Is it good for the lawnmower handle to be kinda loose and wobbly? Probably not. Is it good enough? Yes.

But at that point — remember, 90+ degrees — I was not going to mow the lawn.

So this morning, bright and early — although not too bright and early, because I do like to be kind to my neighbors — I set out to mow the lawn. I managed two rows… and the lawnmower died.

All this to say, next time around, I will be the lawnmower police and nag the poor neighbor whose life is already overwhelming. Because I’m fine to mow the lawn, but I am really not at all fine to manage lawnmower maintenance and repair.

As for the dead lawnmower, I didn’t think it should need gas, because Mike filled it right before he left, but I added gas anyway and lo-and-behold, it started up again just fine. I spent my time mowing worrying that maybe gas was leaking and maybe the whole thing would explode, because yeah, that’s where my mind goes, but eventually reconciled myself to the idea that maybe all the times I started and stopped it yesterday while I was trying to figure out what was going on with it just used a lot of gas.

And now my lawn is mowed and I get to feel all triumphant and tough. Shine on, self, shine on. Go, me! A good start to a hopefully productive Monday.