Spring Mowing With Mulching Mower

I gotta tellya, grass can be a real pain in the ass in the spring when you put off that first mowing until April here in the Big Town of Savage. My 22" mulching mower does a great job later in the year when the grass is a bit drier and not quite so lush; but yesterday was like pulling teeth.

Weather had not cooperated with my mowing plan for the last week or so. The grass was already high, but each day was cloudy or rainy and the grass was never quite right for mowing. Saturday was bright and sunny, but the wind would almost blow you away, and the ground was still very wet from the 2" rainfall we'd had.

I figured Sunday would be the day, so a bit after 11, I went out and fired up the ol' mower and got at it. After a couple of trips thru the grass, it was obvious I would have to raise the mower even higher than I had planned. So I raised 'er another 1/2 notch for a total of 1 notch above the medium, normal mowing, position.

After mowing about 1/3 of the front yard, the mower got this constant churning sound from the accumulated grass under the deck. I'd back off on to the driveway and let the grass work out of the mower and it would start again after another strip was done.

Finally, took the mower back to the garage, tipped 'er up on her side and cleaned the wet, mulched grass accumulation from around the sides under the deck. Once the buildup occurs on the bottom edge, it tends to cut off the exit points for mulch residue.

Mower was much better after that, and evidently the grass wasn't quite as high as the spot I started in, so things went much smoother. I stopped and talked to neighbor Crazy Ray for a while about his Verizon DSL problems...turns out his telephone wire was being pressured downward by a tree limb and wasn't at all happy about it, severing his service. Earlier I had given him the security key to my wireless so he could use it until his Verizon DSL was working again.

I also talked to upstairs Don for a while about the stock market and the fact that it still hasn't bottomed yet. Don's into all this stuff much more than I am. Then I stopped and talked to neighbor Chris and wife Cathy while they were planting some flowers in front of the house. As you might imagine, all this talking was helpful in allowing me to rest my old frame from the constant walking and make it to the end without collapsing from exhaustion. I'll tellya, mowing after sitting all winter can be a trying exercise.

When I got to the back yard behind the garage, I found the ground was still too wet to mow, as there's poor drainage in that area. I also found a large mower cover that had blown into the yard, evidently from Saturday's high winds. I tried to determine who it belonged to, but could get no response early Sunday afternoon. I'll just hold on to it until I get a chance to ask around some more.

With the mowing done for the day, I filled the blower with fuel and wandered around blowing the grass off the driveway and walks. Of course, the residue grass was so wet, it was pretty well stuck to the driveway...so I have this black driveway with bright green designs on it this morning. Maybe if we get some of those rain showers today, it'll help a bit.
So, three hours later and ready for a shower and some lunch, I wandered back into the house. Managed to shower and fix a ham and swiss sandwich and a wonderful glass of iced tea and settle in front of the TV. I fired up the TiVo and got started on the NASCAR CUP race from Texas Motor Speedway about 75 minutes after the green flag.

Needless to say, the rest of the day was pretty uneventful, altho I did run into George who thanked me for installing a new lockset on his apartment door Saturday.

And that's all the news that's fit to post on Monday,
JD

PS - You'll have to forgive my rambling this morning, possibly my senses will sharpen a bit, later in the day!!! And it doesn't help that I'll have to mow the yard again in about 3 days to scatter some of the mulched grass clumps. Mulching lush grass is a pain in the ass (oops, I meant a pain in the back)!