Saturday, July 6, 2019

Lawn Mower Tales

No pictures on this post. I wasn't thinking fast enough.

You might recall that I am a delicate being and do not put fuel in my car. Yes, I know how and I did do it while on my trip. Two times, in fact, once on the way and once again on the way home. Necessity. While I was there, my grandson took care of it. With this in mind, read on.

I mow. I mow a lot. I do all the prep mowing with the push mower. I mow a wide swath around my gardens and under the trees. I mow my back yard, my side yard and the other side yard area between the main building and the pool. I keep my blade low, liking a clean shaven look. I mow about every third day. I do gas up the mower out of necessity, but will happily take advantage of having someone else fill the tank. I don't like to fill tanks. I know how, I just don't particularly want to.

I mowed my back yard. I do a thorough policing of my yard before mowing and pick up all the poop. After mowing that I took the mower through the shed to continue my self prescribed assignment for the day. I start the mower and discover that self propel function is not working. I was not happy about it. As I said, I mow a lot.

Next day, when HeWho fills my car with gas and is in charge of mechanical things around here informs me that I have killed another mower. He says I ran it out of oil. Me. I am not in charge of maintenance! I haven't a clue about where to put oil in a mower, how much or what kind.

He bought me a new mower. I was happily mowing my back yard Thursday morning, knowing I would not have a chance until Monday to get it mowed again. Early start to my day, I was patting myself on the back about how much I was accomplishing. I mowed close to the fence and felt a rock come out and hit my leg. It stung, but it wasn't going to stop my progress. I mowed on, until I happened to look down at my leg to see if the rock left a mark …...

Not a rock. A screw, philips head to be exact, was embedded in my leg. Just sticking out, so I reached down and grabbed it, intending to yank it out. I was annoyed at the interruption. It was stuck in that soft tissue. Wouldn't budge. The attempted removal hurt worse that the initial injury. Made me feel a tad queasy. I had heard the dogs bark earlier and thought maybe HeWho was out to get his daily dose of cholesterol laden food was back. They bark because he usually gives them a treat.

No, he was not in the house. It was too early to go banging on a kamper door and demand a screw removal, so I grabbed a pair of needle nose pliers and clamped down on the screw and gave it another yank. That really hurt. I sat down and gave careful consideration to my current dilemma. Should I try unscrewing it? Just the thought of that gave me pause. I called HeWho and told him to come home, that I had shot a screw into my leg.

I was awaiting his arrival on the front porch in the rocker, with my injury propped on the other rocker. I had the good sense to grab a couple of ice cubes and hold them on either side of the screw. Xylocaine would have been better, but I had nothing with xylocaine in it. As he approached me, asking what kind of gun shoots screws, I held out the pliers and turned my head and told him to just get it out of my leg. 

I must say he did a fine job. It was fast and didn't hurt nearly as bad as the anticipation did. I even finished mowing after dousing the wound with peroxide and applying Neosporin and a band aid.

I realized later that I had failed to get a picture of the screw in my leg. The peroxide caused it to bleed and there was a considerable blood stain on the concrete. I wanted to chalk a body around the blood and put up crime scene tape, but HeWho has no sense of humor washed it away.

6 comments:

dkzody said...

Oh, my Lord, I have no idea how you managed to survive that. Just reading it made me want to faint, dead away. Wonder if you should have had a tetanus booster.

Joanne Noragon said...

I would have called 911 and laid down to die. And get a tetnus shot.

Kathy G said...

YIKES!

Val said...

The thought of it stuck so hard you couldn't pull it out made me gasp! I will even thank you for NOT posting a picture, because I know that I would not be able to look away.

Whew! I am light-headed. Yes, you need a tetanus booster every 10 years. I had to get one when a chipmunk bit me (because the county health center didn't know if they carry rabies), and again when I ripped my arm on a nail on the garage wall where Hick hangs fishing poles.

River said...

My daughter would have totally put crime scene tape around the blood stain! Maybe a chalk outline too if there's any chalk left.
I might have headed to the nearest hospital if I got a screw in my leg, but being out in the country that's not an option for you I guess. I probably would yank it out if I didn't have anyone home to help, then limped around swearing a lot.
I'm surprised that you didn't know about putting oil in the mower, HeWho should have mentioned that after you killed the first mower.
Yes to the tetanus booster, as soon as possible.

luksky said...

Whoah...that sounds like it hurt. I too, and the "yard gal" of my family and sometimes get spewed with random debris. I'm impressed that you mow every three days, I'm good to get mine done every week. Most likely why cutting my lawn is more like bushhogging than mowing.