LAUREL COUNTY, Ky. — When my faithful, 10-year-old, self-propelled Toro lawnmower finally gave out two weeks ago, I made up my mind to buy a new one and get the old one repaired to use as a back up.

I don’t want a riding mower because I have too many trees, bushes, and flowers to get around and they’re dangerous.

Two weekends ago, Toro just wouldn’t start. Mow man did everything he could, such as changing the spark plug and cleaning the air filter, but to no avail. So, I got an old push mower that hadn’t been started in about 15 years from the outbuilding. Mow man check the gas and oil and then pulled the string. After pulling the string several times, it started to my surprise, but it was running fast.

I told mow man to go ahead and mow and see if it would idle down by itself to a normal speed. He mowed a small portion of the back yard, then it quit. He started it back up, mowed a little bit, and it quit again. When it quit the third time, it wouldn’t start back. I don’t know if it got too hot or what. That’s another mower I will see if I can get fixed.

I’ve been having a feeling for the past couple of years that my mower might quit on me for good so I had been thinking about buying a new one. It would quit sometimes, but would always start back up.

Sears has been having their Craftsman lawn mowers on sale and I knew it was a good brand, so I decided to buy one.

The ad said I could get 5 percent off with a Sears card, but I don’t have one. I asked my sister if she would buy it with her card and let me pay her back. The final price, including the sale and the 5 percent, was supposed to be $284.99.

When my sister ordered it online from the local Sears, she got $20 or $25 more off. The total amount I had to pay was only around $275 which included tax. That was a good deal for a brand name mower that has 6.75 horse power.

The new mower doesn’t have a choke on it and has a place to connect a water hose to clean out the grass from underneath. The manual recommends cleaning the mower twice a season.

Mow man filled the machine up with oil and gas and adjusted the height of the cut a little higher than normal because the grass hadn’t been cut in two weeks. He started the new mower with one pull of the string. That’s the sound of pure joy.

Mow man had no trouble mowing the entire yard in record time. I like the mower so much I named her Ruby because she’s red and she’s beautiful.



cmills@sentinel-echo.com