I have been living with a noisy outdoor water hose problem for 1 1/2 years now. Today, I finally had enough and decided to fix the problem. When ever someone uses the hose to water the garden, I can hear a harmonic sound resonating through the water pipes inside the house—quite loudly, in fact. Thinking that the problem was the hose bib, I switched the hose from one bib to another. No luck. The sound still permeated the house when I turned on the hose. So, I searched for noisy water hose on Google and found some sites mentioning that the problem may involve the backflow preventer on the hose bib. Thinking the problem may involve the hose bib, I returned outside and disconnected the garden hose. Turned on the water and I heard nothing but the sound of gushing water. So the problem was not the hose bib after all. Long story short, I switched out spray gun, turned on the water and the problem was solved. All this time, I thought the problem was with the hose bib (which would be “impossible” to fix), but it turned out that the spray gun was the culprit. Should have trouble shooted this like 18 months ago. Live and learn.

I have a large cedar that lives in the front yard. I needed some broken tree limbs removed and called three tree service contractors. The bids and recommendations were all over the place. The contractor I ended up hiring had sent out a certified arborist to evaluate the tree. The arborist recommended that I only remove the broken tree limbs. She said that the tree should not be trimmed back, especially at this time of the year. The other two companies offered to remove the broken limbs and trim back the tree.

Initially, I was hesitant to call an arborist. To me, “certified” means “more expensive.” However, in this case, the recommended course of action by the arborist ended up costing less than the full trim offered by the other contractors. Sometimes, following the advice of someone that you think will be the most expensive will actually cost you the least.

Out of the box, the Black and Decker LawnHog come pre-assembled. Put away your tools because you won’t be needing them. All I had to do was

1. Straighten the handle and hand tighten the nuts and bolts;
2. Assemble the rear bag, which entails slipping a mesh bag over a metal frame;
3. Replace the mulching attachment with the rear bag.

That’s it. Oh, also, I had to adjust the clipping height which was remarkably easy. However, to get started, you need an extension cord. So, measure out the distance from the further corner of your lawn to the electrical outlet and add about 10 feet. You need some slack to turn the lawn mower around. You also need an extension cord with the correct gauge; i.e., not all extension cords are the same!

This mower just pushed my rake into retirement. With the manual push reel lawn mower, I had to spend way too much time raking up all the grass clippings after I was done mowing. The LawnHog sucked up all the grass and leaves, so I didn’t have to clean-up afterwards. The lawn was pretty clean except for some pine chips that my cedar tree has been shedding since Fall. Not too sure what to do about that since these slip through the rake too.

Lived with the hand push reel mower for 8 months, and now it’s finally time to set it to rest. I had no problem cutting grass with a manual lawnmower. I can zip around the front yard and back yard quickly in no time. However, raking up all the grass just got to be a drag. Clean-up took longer than the actual mowing. So, I could either hire a gardener or try out an electric lawnmower. I got some quotes from a few gardeners and their price was much higher than I had expected. Gulp. I followed Consumer Reports lead on this one and picked up a Black and Decker LawnHog. I also checked out the mixed reviews on Amazon, with most complaints focusing on the durability of the lawnmower. Without much other choices to pick from, I went ahead with the purchase. Now, the box that the lawnmower came in was big and heavy. That’s as good a reason as any to order from Amazon. The UPS guy dropped off the box at my front door, and the lawnmower has been waiting for some action since then. If I have some free time this weekend, I’ll unbox the lawnmower and test it out.

A gardener and automatic sprinklers make lawn maintenance a snap. I don’t have to remember to water the lawn. When the lawn needs a hair cut, someone comes by every week or every other week to give it a trim and clean-up all the cut grass and dead leaves hanging about. In fact, maintaining a lawn looks a little too easy until I had to write a check to the gardener and another one to the water company. Then, I realized that low maintenance doesn’t mean low cost.

So, in a bid to tighten the belt a little, I tried cutting the grass myself. Trying to make the “environmental” choice, I started off with a manual push reel mower. Lured by the promise of low maintenance and “free” exercise, I jumped at this opportunity. I now realize the error of my ways. I did not find a manual mower to be difficult or slow to operate. I probably could cut grass with a manual mower as fast as I could with a powered mower. However, where the manual mower failed was when it was time to clean-up the mess. It takes quite some time and effort to rake up all the clipped grass. In fact, the clean-up takes longer than cutting the grass itself. I could never get the rear attachment to work properly and catch the clipped grass. So, I will be continuing my lawn experiment, but will be looking at an electric mower.