Long time NPR listeners will remember a Saturday morning staple, Car Talk hosted by the Tappet Brothers, Click and Clack, aka Tom and Ray Magliozzi. For many years it was the most highly rated show on NPR. One of the regular features of the show was their Puzzler. Frequently it dealt with subjects automotive, but not always. The one of interest for this blog posting dealt with lawn mowing.
This particular Puzzler involved a gentleman who had had the same lawnmower for many years. He had always been able to mow his lawn with one tank of gas. The last year or so, he had to refill the lawnmower’s gas tank to complete his household chore. Of course, with it being Car Talk you were thinking of various causes mechanical. After much joviality and obfuscation, they finally arrived at the answer. Turned out the gentleman in question had advanced in age a bit and was walking or pushing his lawnmower slower than before, thus it was taking more time, and thusly was using more gasoline.
I sometimes think of this particular Puzzler as nowadays, I generally take a break between mowing the front yard and the back yard. And yet another break before I jump in with the string trimmer and leaf blower. So, I am taking more time than I have in the past to mow my yard.
All things being relative I do my yard quicker than one of my neighbors. I was sitting in the driveway winding new string on to my trimmer when he came across the street to jaw with me a bit. One of the things that he mentioned was that it now took him two days to mow his yard. His back had gotten so bad that he had to rest between bouts of lawn maintenance.
He had another interesting observation. This neighborhood is composed of folks who have been here for a while and are now retired and younger families with working parents and children. He had observed that houses around the two of us are all retirees that still mow their own lawn. I have not actually done a knock on your door survey, but I am guessing well over half the folks in our immediate cul-de-sac web of residential streets use a service. I suppose that if you are working, using a lawn service gives you more family time or time to do what you really want to do. Of course, I was walking Prancess Lily one evening when I passed a group of these 40 something fathers talking on the sidewalk… about video games they were currently playing. We all have different priorities.
Even when I worked I mowed the lawn. Señora, for a bit when I was in Memphis, hired a service, but she sent them packing as she did not like the job that they did. I am quite sure that every one of the retirees around me could afford to hire their yard mowed, but prefer to do it themselves. I just simply hate to pay someone for something I could do myself, unless it is something really nasty. However, I actually enjoy mowing and doing yard work. It gives me a sense of accomplishment when I am done.
No real point to all this, but I thought I would share the ruminations I engage in as I take a break between our front and back yards. Just another one of the wonderful things about aging, but then again, as a retiree, I have the luxury of time to take that break.
If it weren’t for the hills, we’d do ours. As it is, those hills are freaky scary using the riding mower, and after one such ride a few years back, I swore I’d never do it again. I simply don’t have the weight to keep it safe. And using the push mower, even with self-propelled, getting it up and down the hills is exhausting.
Moral of the story – we use someone to mow, but it isn’t a service. It’s an individual who uses a push mower. The heavy mowers the services use just destroy our yard.
I am one of the older and slower guys that still mows his own lawn. It takes me two days but that is deliberate since I get “My Steps” in at least twice a week. It’s great exercise.