ForbesOnTech

Trying to Garden in Soil That's Been Compressed by Tons of Remodel Trash

For most of the gardening season this year, my best plot was rendered unusable by a  hulking construction debris box chock full of tons of lumber, plaster, concrete, and the detritus of our remodel.

            The debris box was hauled away, emptied and returned three times, to it’s spot over where for the last five years I’ve grown vegetables and been tormented by a clan of truly evil field voles.

            So when the debris box was finally removed a little more than a month ago I had feint hopes of getting at least one crop of tomatoes from the plot, and I sincerely believed that the local snakes would have wiped out the shallow burrowing voles. But when I got around to preparing the soil in the upper garden for planting, I quickly discovered the effects of tons of trash sitting in a metal box on what previously had been “perfectly balanced lose soil”. One week of using a pick and Maddox later, I was able to use my tiller to build two small rows for my last of the season French heirloom beefsteaks.

            How hard was the soil?  Well I’ve had to reset and sharpen the tines on my mighty Mantis two-cycle tiller and I’ve added 10 cubic feet of soil amendment to get the dirt back to a Ph level that’s conducive for tomatoes. And even after all that, four of my prized French beefsteak heirlooms, croaked within one week of going in the ground.

            On a whim I also planted Mad Max giant orange pumpkins in the just-reclaimed upper garden patch.  They took off right away, giving me just enough false hope to believe I might actually get something out of the beloved patch.

            And two weeks ago I discovered that the local vole and rattlesnakes were working in concert with the damn debris box to dash my hopes for produce in my upper garden this year.  

Unbeknownst to me, the voles and rattlers had signed a mutual non-aggression pack while living quite happily under the debris box. The net effect of this is that the voles now frolic in my garden, free of concerns about being injected with venom and subsequently eaten whole.

How was I to know that every vole in the county has an insatiable hunger for tender young pumpkin plants? Four plants in two weeks?

I surrender—until this winter during which season will have eradicated each of the little pests.

In the mean time, I have nearly two score tomato plants down in the lower garden, free of attacking rodents and later this evening. I may excavate and harvest the last of my Kennebec potatoes.

Of such small victories are smiles on a gardener’s’ face created.—Jim Forbes 07/20/2008.

Ode to a Debris Box-- The Remodel is Officially Over

Oh green construction debris box

Mighty sides of steel

I happily overfilled you using loads of barrow wheel

You were one of three but the last

Now you’re gone, because the remodel has past

 

Packed with lumber, sheet rock and scraps

I ended up cleaning out the garage to rid it of crap

Your Portapotty cousin left too, last night

Now I’m free to garden with all my organic might..

The end.

 

Good friends don’t let their other friends remodel.

Peaches go Plop In the Night-- I Harvest 45 pounds

Gardening has become a core element of my stroke recovery program. It keeps me engaged in something that requires moderate physical activity. And it forces me to think critically about several processes that if done somewhat correctly yields tangible and tasty results.  Rolling past the middle of my gardening season I’ve already broken open and unearthed my Kennebec potato crop, picked and consumed several dozen ears of tasty fresh corn, and harvested enough tomatoes to fill four buckets.

            While I’ve written mostly about vegetables I have something to confess: I also have 28 hybrid tea rose plants in my rose garden, 48 cymbidium orchids in pots in my back yard and my garden is edged with California golden poppies and double blossom giant carnations.

            But it’s my small stone fruit orchard that gives me real pleasure. As I’ve learned, growing great fruit takes patience, planning and a lot of work. One of my biggest goals this year has been to grow and harvest a “perfect (freestone) peach.” I started my season by trying an organic solution to control peach leaf curl (which hinders fruit production by  often causing fruits to drop long before they’re ripe.

            When I discovered the solution didn’t work I fell back on plan B; removing each effected leaf  by hand—a process that kept me crawling around my two peach trees for three weeks. I also hit my peaches with an extra dose of manure, in the hope that I could stimulate vegetative growth.  In addition, I thinned my crop to give the fruit more room to grow.

The good news is that the sound of heavy plops in the middle of the Friday night awakened me to the fact that my peaches were almost ripe and ready for the picking. This afternoon I picked 45 pounds of peaches and I suspect I can talk MaForbes into making fresh peach cobbler tomorrow. Yum yum.

            Did I grow my  “perfect peach?” No, but I came damn close.  The fruit is so good looking and plump that you instinctively cradle the fruit after it’s picked and take extra care to make sure it’s not bruised in the harvesting process.

It didn’t take very long for my neighbors to notice me on thw ladder picking peaches.  Two of them showed up with their own buckets and helped with the harvest.

            The pay off for me isn’t the size or even the quality of my crops. It’s the pure satisfaction of working outside and growing something that’s healthy, refreshing and quite tasty. And every year I do this I learn I enjoy it more.

Now if I could only master growing a simple damn watermelon.

Oh well, there’s enough time left in the year to put two more vines in the ground.  Besides, if that doesn’t work, I have some monstrous pumpkins going in an unused corner of the garden. Who would have dreamed I would I turned into Farmer Forbes after a long career in journalism?—Jim Forbes 06/23/2008.

Putting Distant Remembered Things to Good Use-- Welding using What's On Hand.

Sometimes necessity brings back useful memories or lessons from long ago.

            Like yesterday when I discovered my favorite patio chair was broken. I thought I might be able to repair it with some sort of epoxy.. buty nooooooooooo! The epoxy joint lasted less than 5 minutes after curing for 24 hours. In case you don’t know this: Epoxy’s strength is to withstand tortional, not lateral forces.

            But as I cursed and stared at my broken chair, I was struggling to remember some quasi-important factoid that seemed to have been lost in my stroke, several years ago.

            Then walking around to my boat port to the unused flower pot where I store tie-downs, the fog lifted and I suddenly remembered being taught an emergency welding technique in high school and actually using it on a drive down Baja California, once.

{Author’s note, there was a time, several decades ago in Pre Prop 13 California, when high schools had classes in industrial arts. In addition to learning how to make roach clips, some students learned basic car repair, wood and metal working.}

            What keyed my memory was seeing one of the two humongous 12-volt batteries in my boat as I stuffed an unused tie down strap in the old planter. Simultaneously, I remembered I had some thin welding stock in my garage.

Off to the garage I went, pulling on my old leather lovess and searching for some welding rod sock I knew was somewhere on my bench top. I pulled my damaged chair over behind my boat and then hooked my jumper cables to the freshest battery in the boat. I then took my cordless Dremel, grinding a shiny spot in the metal of the chair about one foot away from the area I wanted to join (which I had previously sanded as well).

            I attached the clamp from the negative terminal of my battery to the cleaned contact point near the area I planned to join and then clamped the rod stock (which I had first ground a point on using my Dremel tool) and gingerly began sparking. Wearing my mirrored sunglasses I focused on starting an arc while maintaining the circuit.

            I knew that the battery lacked enough current to allow me to get enough heat to make a flowing joint so I just tacked both sides of the broken piece in place.

            In about five minutes I had repaired my chair, using something I think I learned in high school and have used only once before, when I had to repair my 68 VW bug 200 miles south of San Felipe, Baja, California at about 4 AM.

            I have no idea whatsoever what other memories I’ve lost track of because of that damn stroke. I do know that I’m often at a loss when I’m in former work setting and someone comes up to me and says, “Hi, Jim how are you?”

            I just stand there grinding mental gears thinking ‘I suppose I remember this person but who are they really?”

            Thank God for names on badges, sometimes it’s enough for me to make a connection, sometimes it’s not.”

            Regardless, I at least can smile, reply  “I’m doing great!” and sincerely mean it when I ask what they’ve “been up to recently?”

            Another day, another reason to smile and maybe even the inspiration I need to do some retail therapy at Harbor Freight, which has small welding set on sale this week. Oh boy, joining metal to metal with electric fire. Be still, my pounding heart.—Jim Forbes 06/16/2008

(Mandatory disclosure: the management of ForbesonTech does not recommend or endorse the use of unauthorized and potentially dangerous emergency welding techniques. Never ever arc weld without eye protection and leather gloves. The data in this post is provided for informational purposes only. Void where prohibited by law—jmf)

My Tomato Cages Aren't Plumb or Level, But I Don't Care-- Dancing Through Another Gardenining Season

The 100-foot patch of land where I normally garden here at Rancho Bizarro has been taken over by a huge construction debris box and a portable toilet for the contractors working on my two-day-from-completion remodel, so I’ve found new dirt to grow things in.

            Well it’s not exactly new dirt, judging from my experience tilling and cultivating the 80 by 20-foot patch in front of my house.  To be quite truthful, I’d have to classify it as dried hard-packed Triassic adobe. In one place the damn dirt was so hard I wiped out the teeth on my Mantis tiller. That really bummed me out.

            But I’m not a quitter, so I went to plan B: chopping ground like a mad man with a long handled mattock.  What the hell, I don’t really have anything else to do and I’m not about to sit out a gardening season because of a little thing like a massive remodel. The good news is that I’m about half way through the 2008 gardening season and all my neighbors have gotten baskets of fresh beefsteak tomatoes, fresh Italian broccoli and bags of fresh Kennebec potatoes.

            I’ve survived two massed attacks by voles and gophers and convinced the local bird population that it’s less worrisome to take the free food in my bird feeder than it is to dig up seeds I’ve planted.

            Two weeks ago I caged up my last crop of tomatoes.  My older brother, Saint Chuck, happened to be down for the day and I was showing him my garden, somewhat proudly.  So St.Chuck (who in real life is an accomplished land surveyor who teaches that trade to apprentices here in Southern California) looks at the cages cracks a frosty smile and says, “Why aren’t they plumb and level?”

            There never seems to be a pick ax around when you want it, damn it!

            I have to admit it: my steel wire cages are in their third season and have seen better days; furthermore, I really don’t pay a lot of attention to how they’re set, when I put them in.

            But to someone who checks and certifies the alignment of support girders in multi-story buildings, I suppose everything should be plumb and level at the top. Needless to say St Chuck went home with only a few beefsteaks that evening.

            I’m not a linear gardener. And truthfully, I don’t care a whit if my tomato plants are aligned perfectly, or if my rows of beets wander  left or right.

            I do love gardening, feeling the back of my neck grow a little redder every day I yank a bucket of weeds from my patch. And, I’m a full contact gardener, so I get to smell rich earth as the year cycles through. My gardening clothes are stained brown from rich San Diego soil, my fingers are dirt-stained and calloused, but I’ve found an avocation that keeps my busy, exercising my afflicted left hand. And at the end of the day, I find I have a little more fine motor control. That’s part of why I love gardening and why I don’t quit.

            Besides when I get discouraged by crops that don’t respond to my husbandry, I can a voice in the back of my mind, quietly speaking across five decades, “ Now, Jimmy, don’t be a quitter, and take time to enjoy what you do.”

Lordy me, it’s been 50 years this week since that voice was stilled, but I still hear it from time to time down here on perfect and imperfect days alike, in the nurturing soil of rural Southern California.—Jim Forbes 06/12/2208.

Organic Gardening And Celebrating My Returning Weasels

Monday of this week, I was in garden heaven. The noontime temp out in the vegetable patch was right around 100 degrees. I picked four ripe tomatoes and a double handful of broccoli. It’s months like this that makes me glad I live in San Diego, where you can have a garden that produces table crops abundantly on a near year-round basis.

            The only limitations to my gardening are those imposed by my commitment to sustainable organic techniques.  I use no petroleum- or manufactured chemical additives of any kind and thus far the results of my four year commitment to this type of gardening have been very good.

            Also, I don’t grow Frankenfruit produce and limit myself to seeds from organic suppliers—most of which adhere to open pollination standards. This means in most years I’ve used $.88 bag steer manure for fertilizer, crushed oyster shells for calcium and ash from burned hardwood for potash. I also screen and fine my soil by hand at the start of the gardening season, carefully pulling out grubs, Jerusalem crickets and the like and putting them in a bucket for the neighborhood scrub jays and mocking birds, who seem to delight in my method of soil prep.

Once my garden if established I revert to Tom Sawyer-like pest control.  In middle age, I’ve managed to resurrect the ability to catch lizards by the diving and scooping technique of my long-ago youth. While my method of pest control may seem funny to some, I like using natural things to get rid of garden pests. I just wish the local ‘zard population had a taste for the slugs that are gobbling up my potato vine leaves. When bugs overwhelm the ‘zards I do use organic pesticides; a Canola oil based product and the old stand by of a mild soapy water and nicotine.  I’ve found that slugs really don’t like nicotine and for now this seems to be working on my potato patch.

Another pest control measure I’m using this year are rows of tobacco and burley plants on three sides of my garden. Anecdotally, this seems to work very well—providing you keep the tobacco four to five feet away from unvaccinated tomato plants.  So far this year, I’ve not seen a single white fly or horned worm in the garden. And, the tobacco (mostly Havana, but I also grow a Virginia hybrid) looks quite attractive.

One final thought on pest control. The weasels are back so that means that the gophers and voles that routinely feast on my vegetable roots have changed tense; going from “are alive” to “were alive, but have been consumed.” Damn I love watching the two weazettes gallop through the garden, even if they do occasionally eat my alligator lizards. And, like last year, on of the chick weasels appears to be nursing—always a good thing for a wild thing making a slow comeback.

Late last year, after talking to an agricultural biologist I met at my favorite nursery, I learned the secret to attracting weasels. The California long-tailed weasel really wants a supply of fresh water—which exists in my garden in the form of a 120 year-old hand made stone and cement watering trough set amidst my rose garden. And proof that the weasels like it can be seen once a week or so when I find a desiccated rattlesnake carcass at the bottom of the tank, and little weasel foot prints in the ground on the ground around the tank.

Wild weasels in a garden;  good. Rattlesnakes amongst my hybrid tea rose bushes;not so good.

Yeah Weazes!

One of the new crops I experimented with this year is an Early Girl-like tomato developed in Siberia. Although its fruits aren’t as large as an Early Girl, the Siberian tomatoes are sweet and seem to bear in about 45 to 50 days.

As my plants bear and die back, I uproot them and toss them to the part of may garden that “I’ll plant in June. I turn the decomposing plant material into the soil in the hope of raising the nitrogen content of my garden and aerating the clay-based soil.

Although it was hot early in the week, it’s raining cats and dogs now. And the temperature is dropping. I just checked my trusty barometer and saw that the pressure has dropped two-tenths of a point so I might just tent my tomatoes and potatoes in case it hails tonight.  Another year, Another garden. Jim Forbes, from rural San Diego County on 5/23/2008.

Touch Computing Ready to Be Mainstreamed

    For the last 16 months, I've been deeply immersed and influenced by the concept of touch computing as a big part of my everyday computing experience.

I made "touch computing" part of my life in a big way when I began using a ThinkPad X41 Convertible portable and then stayed with it when I upgraded to a ThinkPad X60 -- which is among the finest portables ever made.

    A big part of my experience with touch computing has to do with the fact that in mid-life I became handicapped and lost fine motor control in my dominant left hand. In other words, at the age of 52 a stroke kicked my ass and ended a great career in journalism. That damn stroke closed one door but opened another. After moping around for more months than I care remember, I found my interest in touch interface technology and pen-computing was heightened.This happened because I was using a Palm Treo as a cellphone. I distinctly remember the day when the light bulb turned on. I had pulled over to the side of the road to take a phone call and needed to note a phone number. I my pulled out my pen stylus and wrote the number down on my Treo's notes screen. I then cut and pasted the information into my appointments file and continued on to a local college where I was going to speak to some fourth-year marketing students.

     That was my Aha! moment. I realized that although it was difficult to read my writing, I could use touch computing to enter data on my screen and then cu about t and paste that information into an appropriate program. And the company that enabled initial he discovery was Palm, the grandfather of touch/stylus-based computing.

     Portable computing technology and my interest in touch-based computing merged at roughly the same time. Lenovo let me review an X41 tablet computer and I was soon completely immersed in tablet computing, relying more and more on entering manipulating data using a stylus or even my finger and touching my notebook's digitizer screen.

     All that of that is to be expected from touch interfaces but I soon discovered another advantage that dovetailed with my life but more importantly helped me improve a skill lost to a stroke --but which as a reporter/writer I view as a defining skill that defines me-- the physical act of writing. Every morning for the first three years post stroke. I would practice writing on notepads designed for elementary school children. So, when I unpacked my first convertible notebook and booted it up, I found myself in a well designed application that helped train my notebook to recognize my hand writing.

     Voila! The bond between me and my pen-based, touch interface notebook  became cement strong. And, like good cement,this bond has become stronger over the last year and a half.

     My handwriting still sucks, and I've come to accept that I'll have this disability for the remainder of my life. but touch computing has become so important to me, that I think it should be a part of desktop computing as well. Enter the HP Touch Smart IQ all-in-one desktop. Paired with a fully functional all-in-one Touch computing is so compelling that my 90 year old mother, now a resident of my household is playing solitaire, after avoiding computers for the last 20 years.

     Touch computing is about to go mainstream, a leap that's long overdue. So far, this key interface technology has been limited to Apple, Compaq, Fujitsu, Hewlett Packard, Lenovo and Palm and Toshiba.  I suspect that is about to change in the immediate future as Microsoft supercharges its R&D efforts into mainstream computing and other PC makers increase the bond between consumers and their brands with touch computing.

     And all of this comes at a time when computing technology is increasing rapidly and the price of such technology (including digitizer screens and memory) is plummeting. It's the beginning of a new era in personal computing and I'm glad I made it to the point where personal computing is indeed "personal"-- Jim Forbes 05/21/2008.

 

How a Stroke Opened New Topics For My Writing

One of the many useful pieces if advice I got when I was in a rehab ward following my stroke was as simple as it was daunting: “Try to find happiness in relearning things that you did before your stroke.”

The one thing that I feared would be absent from my post stroke life was writing. I made my living as a reporter for 35 years and as I was lying in bed on the sixth floor of a hospital in San Mateo, California, not knowing when I would be able to go home, I realized that my career was over.

That singular truth hurt a lot. No more racing deadlines. No more contests to see what color I could find in simple stories to make them livelier. No more racing to interviews and most of all, no more feeling like I had accomplished something really important by making a deadline and moving on to the next story.

By the time I was a year post stroke and still above ground, I noticed I didn’t miss my old life as much as I thought I would have. And, at two years I had moved away from Silicon Valley and settled into a much more pastoral life on my little mountaintop in rural northern San Diego County.

But to be brutally honest, I still miss reporting. And that brings me to the advice I got from my rehab specialists all those years ago ”…find happiness in relearning things you did before your stroke.”

And part of that mantra has become a theme in my stroke blogging. Quite honestly, I really enjoy writing. I haven’t given it up. But today, thanks to Six Apart’s offer to give me a space to blog, I can write about things I care a great deal about, on my own schedule.

Lordy, I love blogging. Where else would I be able to write about the extreme efforts I’ve gone to in my quest to eradicate the hated gophers? And, if it weren’t for blogging, how else could I introduce new generations of city-bred trout fishermen to the wonders of the San Gabriel River’s East Fork, my natal stream? And a weekly feature on lawn tractors?

Be still my scarred heart!

Part of what’s happened to me since my stroke is that I’ve been able to expand the things I want to write about. And that’s come about because now I get to write about things that interest me, not just the things that are defined by a marketing driven tag line on an industry publication.

If you’re one of my stroke blog readers, my message couldn’t be clearer; take the time to pursue your passions!

That’s what has worked for me. Besides, writing about full contact gardening, getting even with gophers, portable and pervasive computing is a hoot. And every so often the wild weasels come calling. And that’s just too perfect an opportunity not to blog.--Jim Forbes 04/21/2008

Stroke Recovery--On Becoming Your Own Guru-- Laughing My Way to Wellness

One of the questions that gets directed to my blog via Google from other stroke patients is: how long does it take to recover from a stroke?

            It’s a great question but it’s hard to answer. Strokes, or cerebral vascular accidents (CVAs), seem to be pretty randon and not everyone has the same results or is left with the same lasting, permanent, effects.  I wish I could honestly say that I completely recovered from my stroke.  If I did, I’d be lying.

            I’ve noticed a big change in my personality. I get frustrated that I can’t do things that I use to take for granted and my frustration turns quickly into anger. The local gophers and voles as well as my favorite 3/8’s-inch socket driver have all run afoul of my anger since I had my stroke. The gophers paid dearly for invoking my anger, the socket driver only went about 15 feet before it ran out of forward energy and fell to the ground in my driveway.

            But the one permanent stroke effect that disturbs me a lot is losing my sense of spatial relationships (like those needed to back my boat on its trailer into a slip at a launch ramp in San Diego). The loss of this same skill and ability has turned me into an idiot when it comes to things mechanical, and the frustration I feel around this issue is exacerbated by my memory of enjoying working on my ‘68 Volkswagen bus. Some of my abilities to solve problems involving spatial relationships have returned to the point where I can safely work on my lawn tractor without damaging it irreparably. For me that’s a big advance.

            But this giant step forward has only come about because I still work on the small stuff of stroke recovery—specifically rebuilding fine motor skills in my left hand—every day.

            It’s taken me a long time to accept several permanent stroke effects that I view bitterly:

One, I can’t write legibly with my left hand (and I am seriously left hand dominant) and have been unable to change to my right hand for writing;

I was mildly claustrophobic before my stroke and now that condition is worse. Much worse. The really good news about how I deal with claustrophobia is that I spend a lot of time outdoors working in my two gardens and although it’s barely mid-April, I’m already tanned and fully freckled from hours in the sun.

            I have attention deficit disorder and minor difficulties remembering some things. Since I can’t write legibly, I can’t use Post It Notes or handwritten reminders. But I can and do use my computer and programs like Google Notes and Microsoft OneNote to write things down and I happily check off those tasks as they are completed. Of such small things, a new life can be made.

            It’s unlikely there is no single answer to how to “overcome stroke-related problems.” What’s worked for me is getting outside, forcing myself to remain physically active and most of all, mentally involved in my life.

But without going all metaphysical: I’ve discovered that I can put together a pretty good day by just accepting that I had a stroke and going on about my business, occasionally taking the time to share a few smiles with good friends and basking in the occasional yips of joy from a small dog with a big heart named “Perro” (Spanish for “dog” and an appropriate name for a one-time feral Chihuahua).—Jim Forbes on 04/19/2008 from a small mountaintop in Escondido, CA.

Get Your Lawn Tractor Running, Head Out to the Fields-- Looking for Some Fresh Lawn

Let’s have a conversation about a very manly yard  toy:  lawn tractors (also known as riding mowers).  Love, hate or merely endure them, lawn tractors are fun. I’ve owned three but bought four (one was a gift to a buddy whose byproduct of mowing an unkempt field in the middle of the summer has been the nickname “Sparky—“given to him by the local fire department which has responded to blazes in his field twice).

            Sparky isn’t your typical urban refugee with a big yard. After spending a disastrous year living abroad in Provence, he returned to the US and quickly bought a multi-acre lot with a designed-by-a-retired-shop-teacher-custom\ house that also had a structure euphemistically called a “barn.”

            In France and while subsequently touring Italy -- before his triumphal return to the US-- Sparky was seriously bitten by the winemaking bug and the European concept of “Garagista” artisan wine making.

            A few more words about my best friend “Sparky.” He spent his formative years in and around London, returned to the US t o attend college and eventually ended up at UCLA’s film school. Meanwhile, as the years reel by, Sparky acquired an English wife who’s seriously into horticulture, had three children, a couple sheep dogs,  a fluctuating flock of chickens,  three miniature sheep.            Meanwhile, on his return to the US, Sparky realizes his then brood of two girls need clothes, so off to the local Sears they go.  On the way out the door, Sparky passes a display of riding mowers, when the flash of inspiration hits him: “Voila, I have acreage, but no mower!” So, Sears being Sears, happily delivers the mower to Sparky’s baronial estate.

            Sparky is now on his second riding mower and cruising in high gear towards his third

            So let’s talk about buying your first or second riding mower. Prices for riding mowers range from under $1,000 for a five-speed unit with a 42-inch two-blade deck to almost $4,000 for a high-end unit with a 46 or 52-inch swath, automatic multi-speed transmission and a parasol to protect you from the hot sun.  Most riding mowers come with a convenient cup holder for your favorite non-alcoholic beverage and use electric starters. The size of your lawn should be the gating factor in what you buy.

            To begin with, take a close look at the mower. Here’s what you’re looking for:

            An external oil filter—do not buy a riding tractor that uses “splash” oiling (where the end of the engine’s connecting rod caps dip into the oil pooled at the bottom of your engine).Most contemporary lawn tractors have oil pumps and external oil filters. Engines with integrated oil pumps last much longer than those that use “splash” oiling.  And if you lawn is hilly, splash oiling systems run the risk of running “dry” if our oil rushes to the down hill side of the engine case. A well lubricated connecting rod assembly and crank shaft is all part of happy, long lasting power plant.

            External lube fittings-- (called “Zirks” by mechanics and people who can make bolts and nuts fit together correctly even when it’s dark and their greasy knuckles are oozing blood after two hours of futilely trying to get nut “A” to accept “bolt B. I prefer mowers with spindles (the shaft that has a pulley on one end and which goes through your mower’s blade shroud and which provides rotational power for the blades) that can be lubed. The reason I prefer such systems is that I’ve had two replace several spindles and shaft bearings in various lawn tractors I’ve owned or worked on. The front and rear axles should also have Zirk nipples.

            Single or multiple cylinders—Every multi-cylinder riding mower I’ve ever had a long-term relationship with has lasted longer, much longer, than a single cylinder engine. Yes they cost more, but in the end, they offer a long life. My next lawn tractor will definitely have a two-cylinder engine.

            What size deck?--- I own a Deere 100 lawn tractor with a 42-inch wide cutting path. It takes me about 25 minutes to mow my one-acre front lawn, which includes a double row of stone fruit trees. If I had more lawn to cut, I’d consider a wider deck in my next lawn tractor. Or, if I needed to cut an au-naturale field regularly, I’d also want a wider deck.

            Zero turn or not?—If your lawn is an obstacle course a zero turn lawn tractor may be a consideration. They’re more expensive than conventional mowers, but the convenience can be worth it, particularly if your job involves regularly cutting the grass in a grove.

            What brand, Deere, Craftsman, Toro, MTD, Cub Cadet or Door Number 3? --- one of the secrets of the lawn tractor trade is that one or two companies make most of the machines sold by all of the branding entities. The one big advantage of buying a John Deere or a Craftsman lawn tractor is that both organizations offer national service. If you live in East Lizard Spit, Idaho, you may want to make sure you can get your trusty tractor fixed on-site if it breaks down. A quick test to see if the local selling agent really backs his product is to get him to show you a replacement blade and/or air filter from his inventory. If the sales person can’t supply either of those parts on the spot, from his on-hand inventory, walk away.

            Extended warranty or not?--- Go ahead and get the extended warranty with on-site service. You’ll sleep better at night and mow your estate with greater confidence. Yes, it’s expensive but you only live once.

            External water hose connector on the blade shroud?—Yes that’s right, you want a lawn tractor that has female or quick connect water hose coupling on the blade shroud.  Getting rid of the built up solidified lawn gunk that sticks to the inside of the lawn tractor’s shroud is a very good thing. And it eliminates the source of those worrisome noises as big ass chunks of dried lawn goo come roaring out you mower’s discharge port. Connecting your hose to that fitting with the water on and flowing turns your blade deck into a high pressure water system that generates as much as several hundred PSI; enough to thoroughly clean out your deck.

            Accessories: I’m not a fan of bags that collect lawn clippings. Beside, lawn clippings add nitrogen to your lawn, cutting down the need to feed the green monster in front of your house. Moreover, have you ever seen a golf course’s greens man use a tractor with a bagger? I haven’t.

            A small seed or fertilizer spreader comes in hand occasionally. And for some people, like owners of small vineyards, an electrically powered spray rig is a great accessory.

            So let’s have a conversation about lawn tractors as we cover important topics in the coming week like how to avoid starting conflagrations by mowing dry weeds, how to not kill yourself by bringing you lawn tractor to safe stop after rolling backwards,out of control for 400 feet, and the importance of keeping yourself well hydrated if you do have to cut a two-acre field of wild grasses and need to extinguish a fire using only those body fluids in your system and the only applicator that makes sense and comes to hand in such situations.

            And Sparky, Thanks for the inspiration, the overnight lodging, all the opportunities to make “Jim’s Special Burritos, and all the laughs. And most of all, your next book should be “ Sparky Moves to the Country and Neighbors Flee, Screaming.”—Jim Forbes 04/12/2008