I took some deep breaths. My patience was thin. I had been outside for an hour trying to get the mower to work. In 100 degree temperatures. I smelled like sweat mixed with gas. The liquid gas, not the ass gas. “Tom,” I said, teeth clenched. “You didn’t TELL me that.”
All he told me was to get oil and gas for the mower. The oil was baffling enough because I had all these choices:
And then when it came time to get the gas, I overfilled the container so gas spilled all over my favorite flip flops. So then I grabbed the squeegee thing that people use to wash their windows and started washing off my flip flops and this guy pulled up behind me and was like, “Uh, that’s not what that’s meant for.” As though he thought the main reason I came to the gas station was to wash off my flip flops with a dirty squeegee.
“Is this enough gas for a mower?” I asked, ignoring his comment completely. I held up the container.
“Yeah,” the guy answered. He was still looking at me as though I were wearing my bra on my head. He probably updated his Facebook with, “Saw some chick washing her shoes at the gas station.”
Then it came time to put the oil and gas in the mower. I unscrewed each of the caps. I didn’t know how much gas was supposed to go in. I just filled it until I could see the gas. Same with the oil. It wasn’t spilling out of the mower, therefore I thought I could put the entire bottle in.
But no.
I guess not.
Because mowers are bitches.
“You were supposed to put enough oil in until you could see it on the dipstick,” Tom said. His teeth were colored thanks to the M&Ms.
“It should say that on the side of the mower,” I answered.
“Most people know that already,” Tom pointed out. “Did you remember to prime the mower? Maybe that’s why it won’t work.”
“Don’t patronize me, Tom. I know how to prime a mower,” I replied. I mean, okay, I had forgot in the past. But I’m older and wiser now. Sort of.
“You’ll have to drain the oil then,” Tom said as though it were the easiest thing in the world.
“I’ll do no such thing.” I lifted my chin. “You can deal with it when you get home.”
Tom comes home next month from Korea. I’ll be like, “Welcome home…..the backyard looks like a jungle! Yay!”
“You have to take care of the yard,” Tom said firmly. “Or else you’ll get a citation and I sort of want a house to come home to.”
Since we’re in base housing, we can get citations if our yard doesn’t look nice. If you get some many citations, you can get kicked out.
“Well, I’m not draining the oil,” I said stubbornly. “You told me to put oil in the thing, I did, and therefore it should work.”
“You don’t put an entire thing of oil in a mower.”
If I were there, I’d have tossed a handful of M&Ms at his smug face.
“But,” Tom continued. “If you don’t want to fix the mower, I’ll just buy a new one. A self propelled one.”
Ugh. He’s been obsessed with self propelled mowers forever. I made him get a regular one because it was cheaper. His precious self propelled one was an extra hundred bucks.
“No. You can drain the oil when you get back,” I said firmly.
“It might be too late. The mower might be a goner.” Tom said this a little too hopefully. He probably was already picturing his brand new self propelled mower. He’d probably name it Prop. (Oh wait, that’s me. I name inanimate objects, Tom does not.)
Tom might be right about the mower being a goner though.
I’ll try to figure it out.
If all else fails, I could always kick it and hope it comes back to life. Don’t things work like that in Jackie Chan movies?
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