Wow

The new lawnmower was delivered yesterday. They guy who brought it over from the store gave me a crash (um...) course in how it works. I think I retained about a third of what he showed me. After he left, I climbed aboard and learned by doing. I began to get the hang of it so I decided to start mowing for real. The grass was relatively dry and it wasn't raining.

Most of the north and west forties seen from the deck.

The mower cut the tall grass with very little effort. Granted, I had the cutting deck raised to its highest lever as is recommended when cutting high grass. But I was impressed. I stalled out a few times, of course. Overall, the cutting went well. Toward the end it started raining, so I stopped. A mild thundershower skirted us to the north.. I realize that I will have to adapt my normal cutting pattern to the new mower. That will take some trial and error over the summer.

The rest of the north forty.

Still, with all my fumbling, I did in an hour what was lately taking me two or three days to do. Some trim work remains as well as the strip outside the hedge and along the road, but that won't take long. This morning I think I'll go through the owner's manual to be sure I'm doing things right. And there's one lever that remains a mystery to me. I hope to find out what it does.