The lawnmower [Wo]man

When I was little I saw the Steven King movie "The Lawnmower Man" It was about a guy who was dumb and mowed lawns until these mad computer geniuses converted him into some sort of crazy computer killer. I'm not sure how I saw that movie. I'm sure it wasn't Mom-approved. In fact, I just googled it to make sure I hadn't just made it up.

Anyway, none of this has to do with the story I'm going to tell you all today.

So, I'm house-sitting out in Highlands Ranch for 2 1/2 weeks total, and they have - you guessed it - a lawn. Now, I house-sat for these people last summer and had lawn-mowing duties, but Brian and I had just started dating and he claimed that he "really liked" mowing the lawn, so I just sat on the deck with a delicious drink while he did it.

So, this year I brought up the lawn-mowing with Brian, and he said he'd do it, but as the grass grew higher and higher, there was still no mowing going on. Finally, Brian said that I'd better just do it - sweet!

Now, I don't understand what the problem is. I mowed the lawn at home in Michigan plenty without too much going wrong, so I would think that this would be a relatively simple task, but no.

Here's how it went. I put the dog, Ruby, in the house where she began barking and high-pitched yipping and didn't stop till the fiasco was over. I pulled the lawnmower out of the garage and looked it over. I tried pulling the handle bar thingy and pulling the cord, and this did absolutely nothing. I then decided to start fiddling with everything. The fiddling included putting the blade all the way down. Now, in Michigan, you had to put the blade up and down depending on if you were mowing or not. But, I guess that's just cause it was a riding mower. I tried holding down the handle and pulling the cord again - nothing.

It was at this point, that one of my old harbor experiences popped into my mind. I had been sent by my Crew Chief, Andy Lappan, who I'd grown up with and was the same age as me, to mow the harbor lawn. I fondly think of Andy as my Arch Nemesis. But, anyway, there I was in the same damn situation trying to figure out how to start the damn lawnmower. I think I starred and fiddled with it for 1/2 an hour before Andy came up to "help." "God, girls are so stupid!" he said, "I can cook and sew, why can't you start a lawnmower?"

"I can't cook or sew either," I replied, and in my head said, "but at least I didn't fail out of community college, you A-hole!" After replaying that dialogue, I returned to the present, where I was even more irate at not being able to start the lawnmower and determined to prove Andy Lappan wrong.

Finally, I found the little choke button thingy and pressed that a few times. then I tried holding the handle down and pulling the cord again and eureka, it started. Now, if you think back to my fiddling paragraph, you'll remember that I put the blade all the way down, which I remembered as the dirt started shooting out while the lawnmower cut below even the roots of the grass. Of course, happy I'd started it, I just started pushing along, thinking, "huh, that grass is really short, I don't think I should be seeing so much dirt." I stopped the lawnmower and pulled the blade back up to its original position. Hmm, hope the Rutenbecks don't mind that I turned their front yard into half a baseball diamond - oh well.

I finished the front yard and headed for the backyard while screaming at Ruby to shut up. As I began the backyard, I noticed that a lot of cut grass was being left on the ground. I kicked the grass bag, and sure enough, it was full - probably full of dirt from the front yard. Anyway, there was a little handle on the bag, which I naturally tried pulling, and of course the bag wouldn't come off. The Andy dialogue came flooding back as I kicked the bag some more and called it a Mo-Fo (but didn't actually abbreviate). This cursing and kicking was only interrupted by interludes of screaming at Ruby to shut up! Finally, after fiddling some more, I got the bag off and finished the mowing, all the while muttering and cursing the dog, the lawn, and Andy Lappan under my breath - stupid Andy Lappan.

After recapping this story for Brian, he apologized and said he'd never let me mow a lawn again.