cutting the grass

This may come as a surprise to some of you (not likely) but I've never mowed grass before... until today.

First, let's talk about me actually getting the lawn mower out of our shed. Apparently, teeny tiny frogs live in our shed. So tiny in fact, you can't even see them until you start to move something around and then all hell breaks loose. I survived the frog attack and managed to get the mower out. I went back in very delicately for the gas can. After about five minutes of trying to pour gas into the mower, I realized the gas can is idiot proof and by that I mean I could not figure out how to work the spout on the gas can. FINALLY I managed to fill the tank and was ready to go.

I found out the hard way that it's pretty difficult to start a mower while the mower is sitting in tall grass. I moved the mower out of the grass and, thanks to Google, also realized that I had to pump the button to get gas into the fuel line. Eureka! I got the bastard started! What a great feeling of accomplishment.

As I started mowing, there were herds of geckos in front of the mower running for cover. They were fast but I was still as careful as I could be in six inch tall grass not to run them over. As I was about to finish the first section of the yard, with my head down looking for geckos, I looked up only to realize that I'm about half a foot from walking into a banana spider. The spider was hanging out in its web at about eye level. Heyyyy spider. Needless to say, the grass below the web did not get cut.

Our yard is huge. Not only is it huge, it's lined with about 100 yards of cinder block. You know, to make it fancy. So not only is the cinder block ugly as heck, it's impossible to mow up to it, around it, above it, next to it. J does a much better job managing it but since it was my first time, my maneuvering wasn't very good. We also have quite a few snails that live in the cinder blocks.

Unlike the geckos, the snails have a hard time avoiding the mower. About halfway through my mowing, out in the middle of the grass, I stepped on something and felt a crunch. Yep, snail. Bleeeeeeehhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! I found another one in the grass and threw it to safety. I had to press on because I still had about half of the yard to mow but I was freaked out about mowing over and/or stepping on snails. I had to keep repeating to myself "circle of life, circle of life."

I am a mess but the yard is mowed... except for that one patch under the spider web. It can wait.