So, I am experimenting with replacing Facebook as my blogging tool of choice. Here is a post I wrote there yesterday.

TL;DR Free lawnmower available. 

Full version: Let us pause to honor fine machinery. 

I don't even know how old this mower is. It came into my possession as a hand-me-down from a generous friend of  who was getting married. It replaced a terrible, corded electric Craftsman that tried to kill me once by whipping me across the groin before it burned out after only three years. The mower, I mean. 

Anyhow, I thought this one, which was up to four or five years old when it was given to me, would last a couple of years before it died and I replaced it with something nicer. 

That was in about 1999. It has never died. It has probably mowed (let's see, figure a quarter-mile of yard a week times 20 weeks a year times 20 years) a lot of miles of scaldingly hot Texas grass since then. It can be finicky to start, but it has never been tuned, never even needed a new spark plug -- I think I replaced the air filter now and then and sometimes added oil. 

I used it once this March, then picked up a cool battery-powered mower from Craigslist. That one has been running great. So it's time for this one to go.

I just now pulled it out of the garage, added a little gas, and, after about 5 minutes of pulling and priming, it coughed to life with a cloud of smoke and a hearty American fossil fuel roar.

It's free for any friends who could use it. It'll be posted for $25 on the neighborhood market site later, the price reflecting that it is still a viable tool. Maybe needs new wheels and a sharper blade. I'll throw in the gas can and half a gallon of gas for free. 

May we all be so hardy and surprisingly long-lived.