Tuesday Odds and Ends

 

It's official.  

The Sears Craftsman lawnmower that came back home from Tony's shop last week is, indeed, ours.

We had doubts last week.

Bill came into the house one morning after filling the mower's tank with gas and asked,  "What all did Tony do to that Craftsman mower?"

I wasn't sure of everything he had done, so I pulled out the invoice.  It wasn't totally clear whether the items on the list involved that mower or the Husqvarna. 

"Why?" I asked.  

"It looks like it has a whole new engine," Bill responded. 

Well, "new engine" did not appear on the itemized list, so I had to go look for myself. 

Bill lifted the hood, and, sure enough, everything looked brand spankin' new.  

I also looked at the tires and noted that their tread looked as if it hadn't been worn one bit in the six years we've had the Craftsman. 

Bill was also pretty sure a light had broken on the Craftsman.  

A job-number label still hung on the steering wheel, so we chose to be completely honest rather than keeping the new mower and called Tony. 

He insisted that he had brought our mower back but told me to call the shop to see if the job numbers matched up. 

They did.  Still, not convinced that this was our mower, we agreed to wait overnight to see if Tony possibly would discover that our Craftsman was still in the shop and that possibly we had someone else's.

No call came.  Finally, I decided to go ahead and use the mower for a couple of patches of lawn last week. 

Yesterday afternoon I had climbed aboard the Craftsman again when I looked over and saw Tony standing by the greenhouse.  He had come with a new blade guard for the Husqvarna to replace the one Liam had destroyed with his lawnmower herding. 

Upon seeing Tony, I drove that way.  He handed me an invoice for the guard, and then I asked him if he was absolutely sure we had our own Craftsman. 

"Yup," he said, chuckling. "Those things clean up good."  

Well, they sure do, and all I've got to say this morning is that the moral of this story is that Tony and his crew sure do a great job in the repair shop. 

One more thing:  I'm shocked that I've kept a mower looking that good for six years AND the broken light that had "disappeared?" from the Craftsman:  it's actually on the Husqvarna.  

Suffice it to say:  we have a magnificent lawnmower repairman. 

As soon as Tony came, I switched lawnmowers to my favorite and actually finished the first full lawn mowing job of the year. Happily, some rain is coming later this week, and the second job will not be so dusty. 

I saw a column in the paper this morning by the county road boss Steve Klatt noting that his telephone had been busy last week as he fielded numerous calls about the inordinate amount of dust. 

Steve says to have patience and adds that applying dust abatement this early in the year means a repeat of what we've been enduring later in the summer. 

So, we'll groan and bear it. 

Dry conditions and more than enough wind have kept Northside Fire busy this spring.  Yesterday while mowing, I saw and heard a fire truck zip past.  

Later, another came.  All together three rigs came to put out a fire that had extended to some trees along the ditch north of us. 

And, if that isn't enough, I noticed a limb on one of my plumb trees blossoming yesterday.  

It seemed a bit early because usually those fruit trees are blossoming later in April. Well, this morning, it's evident we had an overnight freeze.

Fortunately, if the blossoms get hit, it's just one limb, and maybe the rest will wait until we don't have frost at night. 

Our plum and apple crop both suffered last year, and I'm hoping we don't lose fruit two years in a row. 

Fingers crossed. 

Off in Minnesota, Annie's enjoying her friends, and I especially liked the tree climbing selfie this morning. 

Hope you do too.  

Happy Tuesday.