Remember When I Said I Was Handy?

Previously, on the Avid Bruxist blog, our heroine had bought a new gas-powered motor because she had allegedly killed two electric mowers in five years (we’ll get back to that part). She had hesitated at buying a machine with a pull-cord because pull-cords that, when pulled, don’t result in engines starting make her throw a goddamn rod.

Her brand new mower had revved up like a dream the first time, and she mowed to her heart’s content….

Then came the second time.

Goats and monkeys! Fuck if that thing wouldn’t start.

Now it’s possible that my shed is a little cluttered. And, when putting away the mower, I may or may not have struggled to find room. So it could be that I sort of picked up the back wheels and set them on top of the broken electric mower. And if I did all that, perhaps I left it like that—slanty—for a week or more.

When I took it out to start it, not only would the motor not crank but some semi-viscous liquid began dripping out of a part that didn’t look like it should have any semi-viscous liquid dripping out of it.

I called my brother-in-law, who swooped in with a screwdriver and can of

What had happened was, when I supposedly left the mower tipped up like that, oil spilled into…I don’t know. Whatever. He got it started.

AND he picked up the carcasses of my electric mowers to see if he might tinker ’em back into shape. Turns out, the more recent one just had a whosie-whatsit popped off its anchor, making the ass end drag on the ground. No wonder it was so hard to push. E re-attached it, and it was good to go. The older mower, well, he took off the blade and it looked like

Yeah, I may have hit a tree root. Once or twice. And a rock. Perhaps a coral reef.

And I guess I had taken the blade off at some point? Because it was installed upside-down. That’d make it run a little rough, I suppose.

One time I was visiting my dad at his office, and a colleague of his said, “When it comes to technology, your father has the opposite of the Midas touch. Everything he comes in contact with turns to shit.”

I’m feeling remarkably like the Scott paterfamilias right now.