I have a new lawnmower. It is a top-of-the-line machine that works exactly as I expected, but performs nothing like how the commercials said it would.
This new machine has an engine so large that if you flipped the mower over, it should take off like a helicopter. It has more bells and whistles than a musical instrument from a Dr. Seuss book. You would expect the mower to chew up anything my lawn could throw at it.
Unfortunately, the people who design the latest models coming out of the great lawnmower factories of the Far East are apparently testing them on gentle Asian golf courses someone mowed the day before.
Well I live in Maine, and our lawns have so many rocks, sticks, weeds, trash, trees, dog poop, bricks, chicken wire, ant beds, and overturned lawn furniture that mowing the yard is more akin to operating a gas-powered garbage disposal on wheels than it is to the gentrified skills that lawnmower companies portray in their commercials.
You have to laugh at those commercials. They always show some handsome guy wearing a collared pullover shirt striding across a beautiful lawn, casually following a gleaming yard machine. It’s a great lawn, too. I want the TV lawn in the commercials, which apparently has genetically modified grass that cuts itself in half when it hears the approach of a two-stroke engine.
My lawn is different. When I buy a new lawnmower, bring it home and start it up, the poor thing takes one look at the battlefield that is my backyard, and it self-propels to the end of the driveway and throws itself in front of a passing 18-wheeler.
Like me, even lawnmowers hate mowing my lawn.
In fact, the only thing I hate worse than mowing the lawn is realizing that in a week I am going to have to mow it again. This is why so many men drink beer after they mow — to forget the soul wrenching angst of knowing all the effort amounts to nothing, like a yard-maintenance version of Sisyphus, eternally pushing a mower around the Greek afterlife with grass regrowing behind me and erasing my freshly clipped swathe, all as Hades looks on like a parent one can never please.
What’s the use of a nice lawnmower with an easy pull start engine that can propel itself up gentle slopes and quietly mulch the grass like a gas-powered milk cow? I need a device that can climb near-vertical cliffs, chew through discarded cinder blocks, and take down the raspberry bushes that Mrs. Chef begged me to preserve at the beginning of mowing season.
I don’t need a lawnmower. I need a Sherpa with a backpack full of machetes.
One of the more annoying things is the supposed ability of the lawnmower to spew grass to the side. Which it does for almost twelve seconds, and then you hear the engine labor and groan and the blades come to a sudden stop. Then you have to clear the grody grass clippings from the little hole in the side of the lawnmower and haul on the pull cord to start the machine. Twelve seconds later, it dies again. You can tell it’s going to happen too. You walk along, and the grass spewing to your right starts to peter out and become a flicking mist of clippings. Then it just stops, as if the mower were a tobacco chewer who took too big of a chaw and now he can’t even spit, and the green mush of grass and dew just dribbles down the mower’s chin.
I remember when I brought the latest machine home, with its new paint job, gleaming razor sharp blades, and sporty molding that apparently serves no purpose except to distract passersby from looking at the guy sweating behind the lawnmower.
When the new machine arrived, Mrs. Chef was excited, and said she wanted to take it out for a test drive. I’m no fool. I showed her how to start it, and then she began mowing the yard. I went inside to concentrate on another important chore I’d been putting off. Ten minutes later, she interrupted my video game to tell me that she was quite satisfied with the mower, but that I could take over if I wanted.
Translation: It became work. You do it.
Slawn Mower Salad
¼ cup butter
¼ cup sliced almonds
2 (3 ounce) packages chicken-flavored ramen noodles, crushed (reserve the flavor packets)
1/2 cup canola oil
1/2 cup white sugar
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
2 (3 ounce) packages chicken-flavored ramen noodles, crushed, seasoning packets reserved
1 (12 ounce) package broccoli coleslaw mix
1 bunch green onions, sliced
1 cup roasted cashews
1/4 cup roasted sunflower seed kernels
Melt the butter in a skillet over medium heat. Add the noodles and almonds to the skillet and stir gently until the noodles are browned, about five minutes. Transfer to paper towels to drain and cool.
Whisk canola oil, sugar, water, balsamic vinegar, and seasoning packets from the ramen noodles in a bowl until the sugar and seasoning packets have dissolved.
Combine the broccoli slaw mix, noodles, almonds and green onions in a large salad bowl. Pour dressing over the salad, toss and serve.
Andrew Birden is the general manager of Northeast Publishing and the founder of Fiddlehead Focus. He can be reached at abirden@bangordailynews.com or (207) 764-4471.
