Another Moa

With 5 acres to attend to you need a fairly substantial piece of equipment. It mightn't match the Big Boys' Toy that I have to mow the croquet lawns but it's a darn site more fun and a darn site less nerve-racking and there is no-one to tell you that you haven't got your lines straight. Not that it would be wise to tell Wendy that anyway!

Stranded

After Croquet on Tuesday I remembered that I was on the rosta for mowing the lawns. Straight back into things with a vengeance. I remembered how to start up the mower and drive it too - it had some idiosyncrasies which I'd mastered last time. Now it has lost some of those and gained others. Of course there is nothing idiosyncratic about needing fuel. I forgot to put fuel in. So half way through I was left stranded in the middle of the lawns with them half cut. Fortunately the can did have fuel so I just had to fill the mower and off the two of us set. I like mowing in the warm sun.

A Job Done

The Marewa Croquet Club has six of the best lawns in New Zealand looked after completely by its own Members under the watchful eyes of Frank Wharton and Noel Charteris. Until now I, like most of the Members I suspect, have taken for granted the quality of the lawns and the fact that they are always there and in tournament condition even for our Club games. Having joined the group of volunteers charged with the responsibility for mowing them (the band of Moas) I suddenly have a new perspective on that which I have so far been accepting as the norm.

Today was my first mow. Now I am not of a nervous disposition but as I started up the mower which certainly qualifies as a big boy's toy capable of wreaking terrible havoc in the wrong hands, a sudden fear came over me. What if.....?

As you sit at the wheel and look down the massive expanse of lawn the enormity of the task strikes.

Having managed after the first run to forget to lift the blades before I stopped the mower (which can have serious consequences for the lawn) I began to wonder if this was really more than I was cut (sorry) out for. But after about five lengths of the area I started to feel more confident.

By the end of the afternoon I was beginning to enjoy it.

Postscript: This morning when I looked at the results it became obvious where I had missed a few wee strips where I'd not quite overlapped. Oh dear.