Mark R. Hunter's Blog, page 9

Song Parody: Stop the Snow

I posted this a few years ago, but it's about winter generally, which makes it an evergreen. So to speak. The funny thing is, within days of me deciding to rerun it, the snow started melting away. I should write a song about freezing rain, or fog.

I hate winter. Well, only if I have to go out in it, or pay for heating the house, or if it’s winter. Otherwise I don’t mind. Anyway, parody songs are only good if you’re familiar with the original, which in this case is “Let It Go” from Frozen. If you have kids of a certain age, you’ve not only heard it, you’re sick of it. (I’m not–but my kids are all grown up, and I’ve only seen the movie once.) If you haven’t heard it, here’s the song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QnN6g...

Or see the original lyrics here:

https://genius.com/Idina-menzel-let-i...

I know what you’re thinking: “Why, Mark? Why?” Good question—I don’t even find it easy. But I present you with: “Stop the Snow”.


The snow’s piled high almost to my thigh
It’s so cold I want to scream
No sign of spring salvation
I’m stuck in a snow globe dream

The wind howls through windows, bringing swirling snow inside
Couldn’t keep it out, plastic sheets I tried

Let the dog in, his frozen pee
Is an icicle I never want to see
My hands can’t feel—this weather blows
Thanks to the snow

Stop the snow, stop the snow
Can’t get my car unstuck
If I had enough dough
I’d move away from all this yuck
I know just what the forecasts say
Get your storm rage on
I’m stuck in my drive anyway.

It’s funny how this temperature
makes everything seem blue
And if you don’t see the misery
there’s something wrong with you.

It’s time to go and break the ice
To start the car, oh please play nice
No lights, no juice, not to be rude
I’m screwed

Stop the snow, stop the snow
Just one day when it’s warm and dry
Car won’t go in the snow
Ice falls down from tears I cry
Here I push in four foot drifts
Till my hands freeze on …

A patch of ice takes me to the ground
Underneath the snow it’s all cold, dead and brown
And one thought penetrates my frozen brain
Summer’s not so bad—I don’t mind the rain

Stop the snow, stop the snow
My car’s buried in five foot drifts
I can’t feel, my own toes
I’ll never make it to my shift
My hands are blue and my face is white
I could use a lift
But the snow plow buries and passes by.




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Remember: Music makes the heart grow fonder, but reading builds the brain.

Buy Your Lady a Book For Valentine's Day. Or buy her nothing ... and suffer

My annual Valentine's Day book promotion also serves as a reminder to all you men that, yes, Valentine's Day comes every year.


As we approach the big Sports Bowl weekend, many men have trouble thinking of other things. If they thought really hard, they might remember Valentine's Day is coming up, and plan ahead for a special dinner, flowers, flowery dinners, and/or chocolate flowers at dinner.

But probably not.

Because they're men. So, for those of you totally ignorant of the fact that Valentine’s Day is an annual affair, the humor anthology My Funny Valentine is available in print and e-book. (I have a few copies on hand.) It's an anthology of humor pieces ... about Valentine's Day. It was really easy to title. (Note: One of the humor pieces is mine, but I would have come up with a lamer title.)

Maybe your loved one is allergic to flowers and chocolate, and how sad is that? Buy her a book. Women who read love books. So do men who read, but it's not so hard to shop for men ... or, to put it another way, women are better shoppers.

If your loved one has an e-reader, the Kindle version is just $2.99. If they don’t have one, don’t be cheap—buy them one. They'll know if you're cheap. Or, you could get the print version for $9.95 at Amazon:

https://www.amazon.com/My-Funny-Valen...


I’d advise against getting them the book for the second or third year in a row, though—they’d certainly notice. But I suppose in that case you could go over to http://www.markrhunter.com/ (or Amazon, or Barnes and Noble, etc.) and grab one of my romantic comedies for the loving one you love.



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Remember, when you forget to give your Valentine a gift, Cupids cry.

Covid Keeps Quarantines Coming

I'm not even sure how to start when it comes to Covid. As a writer I'm a professional smart-ass, but with this I got my ass kicked, and didn't feel too smart about it.

Illness or injury traditionally accompany our vacations: Last December Emily and I came down with the flu when we were supposed to visit her family and friends in Missouri. This year we decided to head down on a Thursday.

On Wednesday we started to feel a little ... off. By Thursday morning we had to call it--we couldn't risk giving her father whatever bug was now traveling with us. It wasn't until Friday night that we began to suspect the modern medical boogieman, Covid. We missed the trip, we missed Saturday's Holiday Pops concert, and I felt so bad I couldn't even write. By the time it was done I had to contact my editor at History Press to push back our deadline for the Haunted Noble County book, because I'd planned to use half of my vacation to work on it.

The only question left: Could I turn it into a funny blog?

No. No, I could not.

The only thing we did was marathon the TV show The Expanse, and unsuccessfully try to listen to Good Omens on audiobook. (We kept having to go back when one or another of us fell asleep.)

You know, watching TV and reading books wouldn't be such a bad vacation. The problem is that for the first couple of days we were unable to enjoy anything, and in fact we were too sick to sleep. You heard that right. Over that first weekend I, who can't function on less than eight hours of sleep, stayed awake for twenty-fours straight. Even Nyquil wouldn't put me out.

Then, for a week after that, we were too sick to stay awake. That was the period during which we kept having to go back and decide what we remembered last from the audiobook.

"It was Agnes Nutter and the book, wasn't it?"

"No, it was Adam and the Them meeting the dog."

(We were both wrong: It was Crowley terrifying his house plants.)

Part of it--let's face it--is that I'm no spring chicken pox. When I was in my early 20's I once rode the back step of a fire engine to a mobile home fire on the edge of town--while running a fever.

A couple of years later I rode a different engine to Kendallville, to a tire fire so big it could have been seen from the International Space Station, if there'd been one at the time. I was coughing up junk that looked like it belonged in an alien invasion horror movie, despite never getting into the smoke. Yet there I went, for twelve hours. Our Chief later ordered me to go home and go the hell to bed.

No more.

It's not just that Covid is bad. My normal temperature runs around 97.6, and by the time it hit 100 not only could I not go to a fire, I couldn't pick up the TV remote. (Thus the marathon of one show.) It reached 102 at one point. My skin kept trying to crawl away to somewhere cooler, or so it felt.

Emily was running about a day behind me, so I had the pain of knowing what she was about to go through. She's still got a terrible cough weeks later, while mine is just awful. We were like the grandparents in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, just laying there in a lump. Christmas preparations? Hah! We'd bought a new, pre-lit tree, but we never even got a chance to fluff out the branches, let alone decorate it.

I was so sick--brace yourself for this--I lost my appetite.

I can count on one hand the number of times I've completely lost my appetite, and I was in the hospital for most of those. I dropped six pounds. This is not a recommended diet.

The moral of this story is, of course, don't get Covid. We didn't mind at all being quarantined, at least not until the chocolate ran out. (Everything tasted salty or metallic, except chocolate.) Other people in this area passed away from it, so we count ourselves lucky now that we're feeling 50% better.

Yeah, I'm exhausted all the time, but I work nights--I was already halfway there, anyway.


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Remember, books aren't effective as masks, but they're great for quarantine.

Santa After Christmas

(Bonus points if you can identify all the TV shows referenced.)



Santa Claus had a ritual, one he followed every year after delivering gifts for all little boys and girls. It involved whiskey.

His main elf assistant, Evergreen Iciclepears, poured him a shot, and started to walk away with the bottle. Santa snapped his fingers. “Keep ‘em coming, Iciclepears. I just delivered 1.4 billion presents.”

(Evergreen Iciclepears’ real name was Charles Anders. But Mrs. Claus, who was always sound asleep when Santa got home from his big business trip, had renamed all the elves to make them sound more festive. The Elves accepted this because North Pole work paid well and had great benefits – including dental – but privately they called Mrs. Claus Cranberry Cuddlecane.)

Alcohol was not all of Santa’s routine, of course. After taking care of the reindeer he plodded to his big easy chair, pulled off his boots, and stuck his aching tootsies in a tub of hot Epsom salt water.

Then he took three ibuprofen, which always waited for him on a tray full of other items, brought by Nutmeg Sugarlights and placed right by his chair. (Her real name was Josephine Hendrickson.)

The other stuff including soothing eye drops, because the screaming wind dried his eyes out. Then there was a cough drop, for similar reasons, and some antacid, because in the space of twenty-four hours he’d eaten approximately 423,000,000 pieces of candy and cookies.

Once Santa settled, Forest Tinselstockings came in with the anti-static brush. (His name actually was Forrest – Forrest Gump, no relation. Since that Tom Hanks movie came out he kind of liked his new name.)

Santa delivers all those presents by means of a space-time wormhole tesseract, a device given to him in 1032. At the time Santa, using his magical reindeer, could easily get around and deliver gifts to all the good children. Just the same, a strange man arrived at Santa’s home in the Forest of Burzee – literally inside his home, materializing in a small blue box and calling himself The Doctor.

The Doctor informed Santa that he’d someday need time saving devices, and gave him a Bag of Holding (which proved to be bigger on the inside) as well as the tesseract. All he asked in return was for Santa to make him a power tool that could open doors and make routine physics calculations, but that would still fit in his pocket.

I asked one of those AI sites to give me an image of The Doctor ... and I have to admit to being a little freaked out. There are at least three Doctors mixed into the results.

Santa came to realize he’d need those items. First, he didn’t have the heart to give toys only to good kids, despite the protests of his Chief Naughty Judge, Toadstool Chocolatecake. Soon out of a job, Toadstool moved south to England, where he fell upon hard times and took a servant job after changing back to his original name, Dobby.

Second, Santa could not predict the ability of the human race to … shall we say, expand. He originally served a population of a 250,000,000, which seems like a lot until you subtract adults and bad kids. The Viking kids almost never got presents, but up north they appreciated the coal.

As a result of the devices, Forest – Forest Tinselstockins – had to use the anti-static brush every December 26th. It not only helped static, it also removed tachyon particles that became attached to Santa’s wool clothing and beard during the trip. If not for that treatment, at random intervals Santa would find himself flung to a very hot planet circling the star 40 Eridani A, where absolutely no one believed in Santa and his jolly nature was seen as quite illogical. Getting back to Earth was a pain.

My point is that Christmas was a stressful time for Santa Claus, even more stressful than for anyone else. At least Santa had a team, led by the trusted Merry Toffeebaubles, to get the lights untangled and strung up. (Merry’s real name is Mary; she considers herself lucky, especially since her last name used to be Weirenkawoski.)

So he had his Jack Daniels, his over the counter meds, his foot bath, and his combing. He relaxed with a couple of glasses of the good stuff while listening to gentle, soothing songs sung by Blueberry Embercane (previously known as Elvis). Planning for next Christmas started on December 27th, so the relaxation time was very important.

Later he’d be checked over by Dr. Gingercane, who had a degree, maybe ironically, from The University of Hawaii. Santa always had various scratches, bruises, and the occasional burn, and dog bites weren’t out of the question. He hadn’t been seriously injured since Saddam Hussein tried to shoot him down in 1989, and that was just a little shrapnel.

“Merry Christmas, Santa!” said Evergreen Iciclepears after Santa had, shall we say, warmed up a bit. “Preliminary indications are that it went very well this year.”

“Well, I got back with all the reindeer,” Santa replied. “So yes – Merry Christmas, indeed. Is breakfast almost ready?”

“Oh, absolutely. Partridge Emberwine is cooking up all your favorites. So, do you have any New Year’s resolutions?”

Santa paused to think. “Well, back in 1914 I resolved not to give gifts to bad kids anymore, but I just couldn’t stick with it. In 1964 I resolved to lose weight, but the wife wouldn’t allow it. ‘The kids expect a fat Santa!’ she kept saying. Who could foresee this health craze? Now she wants me to get a Wii Fit.”

Leaning back, he sighed. “I guess I’ll just resolve to keep going … and maybe, someday, if they come to understand giving enough, more of the bad kids will become good kids.

“Now, let’s get to that breakfast – I’ve got my early massage scheduled.”

The annual appearance of Emily's Wreath Of Kahn





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Remember, reading books in January is far safer then sledding, whether you have reindeer or not.

Looking To 2024 With Fear and Trepidation

Good riddance, 2023. To paraphrase "True Grit", "the love of decency does not abide in you".

The problem is, I said the same thing at the end of 2022.

That being the case, I no longer make noises about the next year being better than the last one. 2023 started out with losing a nephew, paused in the middle for the death of our dog, and ended with my wife and I both down with Covid. Those are just the highlights. We also had to replace our car, and oh, yeah--our microwave caught fire. Again. (It was just smoke.)

Then there was the sinus surgery which, it turns out, doesn't prevent Covid. Emily had to face the death of one of the horses she worked with. We didn't get a new book out in 2023, and had to push back the deadline on the one we're working on. Oh, and I had a biopsy on my TONGUE.

Could 2024 be worse than that?

Yes. Yes, it could. I mean, it's an election year, so there's that all by itself.

This year a third of the people are going to pick a candidate to fight a different third of the people who the first third hate, and the second third is going to pick someone who they hope will be horrible to the first third, while the middle third do their best to ignore all of this, even though they're the ones who'll suffer the most.

It's politics as written by Joseph Heller. We'll call it "Catch 24".

(Hey, I just had an idea for a new novel!)

There's not much we can do about a lot of this, including the elections, once the graveyard votes are counted. So what are we to do about the world's current state of affairs?

Laugh.

That's right, you heard me. Laugh, even if it scares people.

I'm going to make an extra effort in 2024 to make people laugh. I'm not going to guarantee health, or that my appliances will keep working, or that Congress will start acting responsibly. (See, that last made me giggle right there.) I'm fairly certain at this point that the Presidential election will be a farce regardless of who wins, so why not poke fun at it, too? Maybe, with luck, in the coming year I'll have another exploding lawn mower to talk about.

Okay, I don't want to go that far. Again.

But laughter often is the best medicine, at least for your brain, and I'm going to work on turning it into an epidemic. The laughter, I mean. Because we can't change a lot of bad things with the exception of politics, so we might as well feel better about them.

Maybe we'll even sell more copies of our humor books.

Okay, let's not expect too much. After all, it's still the 2020s.



Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B0058CL6OO
Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/&quo... R Hunter"
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show...
Blog: https://markrhunter.blogspot.com/
Website: http://www.markrhunter.com/
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Remember, it takes fewer muscles to smile than to frown, and we're all tired.

How I Saved Christmas, Kind Of

In the dollar store

I don’t make this stuff up—

I ran into the Grinch,

And his reindeer, the pup.



“What brings you to town?” I asked, to be nice.

“The last time I heard you suffered the vice

Of hating all Christmas, the presents and lights;

Yet you stand in the isle of Yuletide delights.”



It’s true: We were right in the holiday lane,

The same place I cursed when Halloween came.

There were pine trees by pumpkins, costumes with wreaths.

You could get pumpkin spice with mint or with wraiths.



(See what I did, there?)



“I’ve joined the club”, he told me with a sneer.

“I’m going full out on Christmas this year.

I’m buying up lights and tinsel and stuff;

Don’t know what this is, but I can’t get enough.”



The thing he held up was a Thanksgiving display,

On clearance from last month, but I didn’t say.

“But I don’t understand,” I told the green guy.

“I thought you hate Christmas, and want it to die.”



“Oh, I do,” said the Grinch, with a Darth Vader like laugh.

(I don’t think Vader chortled, so that may be a gaff.)

“I’m joining the club; I’m going all in.

The result is a club they won’t want to be in!



“I’m putting up stockings, a tree in each room,

Outside speakers from which carols will boom.

Gaudy garland to drape all over my cave,

And starting that evening: all night holiday rave.



“I’ll not have tree skirts—oh no, tree gowns!

My garland will go wrapping around and around

Not just my home but the whole doggone mountain—

And a red, green, and yellow spice flavored fountain.



“Candles and pillows and shelves of snow globes,

Warm but so gaudy sweaters and robes,

Pillows and rugs and a gingerbread house—

And my wife will be decored … if I find me a spouse.



“Decoration limits? We won’t have any lid.

My holiday lights will take down the whole grid!

I’ll blind passing planes, then I’ll darken the state.

And then I’ll light candles and start a clean slate.



“And, oh yes, I’ll put my own name up in a blaze,

In rich Christmas colors, to cut through the haze

So all the Who’s down in Whoville, that dump

Will know it is I who gave Christmas a bump.”



I have to admit, I was a bit mystified.

When it comes to the Grinch—well, this wasn’t the side

You think of when picturing this big green guy.

(Sure, he’s no Hulk, but still.)

So with great trepidation, I had to ask: “Why?”



“Why? You want to know why?”

(He sounded very much like Jack Nicholson at that point.)

“I’ll tell you why.



“My plan can’t be stopped, so I’ll tell you the reason:

By the time I’m done you’ll be sick of this season.

Everyone will hate Christmas: The music will grate,

The spice cinnamon stuff will make them hesitate



“To go out and carol, even if it's fat free!

Or at least that’s how I’d feel, if caroling me.

And when it’s all done, they’ll feel the same way

As they feel about me—the Grinch—every day.”



I have to admit, he’d made a good plan.

Immersion attack from a Christmas hit man.

And it would have worked too, except he didn’t see

It had already been done, with consumerist glee.



I began to explain, but we’d hit the checkout,

And I realized what he was about to find out.

The clerk rang it up, a green sounding ring,

The numbers kept rising with every new bling.



The Grinch stumbled back, his hand to his head.

“With that bill the reindeer dog won’t get fed,

The heat will go off, hot chocolate won’t trickle—

I’ll end up a homeless, frozen Grinch-cicle!”



And he left his load there: every last light and trinket.

“If I knew of the cost I never would think it!

I’m going old school, next year I’ll lay low

And steal all the stuff from the Who’s down below.”



It’s an odd way to save Christmas, I think you’ll agree.

But that’s just how it happened … take it from me.





Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B0058CL6OO
Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/&quo... R Hunter"
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Remember, every time you buy a book the Grinch's small library grows three times.

I have an awesome wife (who may read this)

What do you get for the woman who has everything?

Or more importantly, what do I get for my wife? She certainly doesn't have everything, but I can't afford a winter house in Hawaii, and the whole hiding a horse in our garage thing didn't work out well at all.
Or even something like a horse.

I can't even get her another dog, because it turns out I'm allergic to them. Not as much as I'm allergic to cats, but these lungs are getting old.

I can't get her another car, even though in the long run they're less expensive than horses. That's usually not a problem with us, but with only one car we can't exactly split the shopping chores.

Maybe I should get a star named after her, like in the commercials. Oh, it might not be official, but what are the chances someone's going to go there and change the name anytime soon?

Emily and I have been married for so long that by now she knows I suck at little things like gift shopping, special event planning, romantic surprises, cooking, knowing where I left--anything, and a lot of other stuff. It helps that I do a bang-up job of washing dishes. In fact, I can load the dish drying rack with seven times its normal capacity, which gets me very close to a national record.

Playing Janga with dishes isn't very romantic, but no chore is perfect.

Emily was born on the shortest day of the year, as I've mentioned before, and that means something to me. From that moment, the days get longer. This time of year I go to work in the dark and get home in the dark, but spring will come again. Emily symbolizes my life getting brighter.

Which reminds me: I think last year, 2022, I promised her that 2023 would be better. Well, that didn't pan out, did it? I guess I have a lot of work to do in 2024.

No matter what I get her--and I do have something in mind--I know that she knows I love her, and that's something. In fact, I tell her that every day: "I love you! Don't go looking for someone better ... you'll probably find him".

On Free Books, Covid, and Publishing Delays

I didn't think I'd get a blog out this weekend, between all the sleeping and the complaining. (That would be me complaining: Covid sucks.)

Still, there are those times when the coughing wakes us up (Emily has it too), so I figured I should do something. I won't be able to get back to work until Friday, and honestly I'm a little concerned about my ability to make it through a 12 hour shift even then. But enough about Covid for now; I've collected enough material to do a whole blog on the subject, although I question whether I can make it funny.

On a brighter note, Coming Attractions is once again free until December 31st, thanks to the Smashwords 2023 End Of Year Sale:

https://www.smashwords.com/profile/vi...

#SmashwordsEoYSale


The catch: It's part of the Smashwords promotion, which means, let's face it, you have to get it on Smashwords. But it's availalbe on epub, mobi, and pdf formats, or as an original document. It should be readable to anyone with an e-reader, cell phone, or computer. (The book is thus far unavailable on cuneiform tablets.)


Now for the bad publishing news: Due to the Covid and various other horrible stuff that's happened this year, we've had to push back the publication of our Haunted History: Noble County book. My plan was to have most of it done by now, and I've hardly even started on the interviews; nor am I going to interview anyone face to face, until I'm sure we're done with this crud. So at this point the book I promised in 2024 is probably going to be released by History Press in 2025 (which is not an outrageous delay in traditional publishing).

Better a delay than a poorly put together product. I'm bummed by it, yes, but I'll be cheered up by all those people buying our books this Christmas season. Get buyin'!


Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B0058CL6OO
Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/&quo... R Hunter"
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show...
Blog: https://markrhunter.blogspot.com/
Website: http://www.markrhunter.com/
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Remember, no one ever went broke buying free books. Reading them, maybe.

A Chocolate Revolution

Now, before you panic (like I did), keep in mind that this dire prediction has been made before. I even wrote about it in a past column:

https://markrhunter.blogspot.com/2014...

The prediction: a chocolate shortage.

Okay, you can go ahead and panic now.

Yeah, it didn't prove to be so bad after 2014, but this is 2023. Everything is proving to be bad in 2023.

The reason for the shortage is, of course, climate change. About two-thirds of the world's entire supply of cocoa comes from Ivory Coast and Ghana in Africa. We think of Africa as a dry place, but West Africa had been getting way more rainfall than usual, leading to the lowest cocoa harvests in decades. The rain makes cocoa flowers fall off before they can bud, and can also cause a cocoa-killing fungi.

As if that wasn't bad enough, there's a sugar shortage thanks to the climate condition called El Nino. So with two of the main ingredients in short supply, major candy manufacturers are raising prices to compensate for a 46 year high in cocoa value. And worse, just before Christmas. What are the odds?

Hm. Just before Christmas. What are the odds?

This is giving me S'More ideas.

I smell a rat, here, instead of a chocolate bunny.

What if it's a conspiracy, designed to put money into the pockets of fat chocolate industrialists. (I'm not being insulting: I just assume anyone who deals with chocolate all day may end up fat.) Maybe they're hoarding all the cocoa and sugar, to make the prices go up? What if the Bilderberg meetings were nothing more than an organized plan to get chocolate into the hands of its members? (which would require a napkin, of course.)

I can see them all sitting around, dipping chocolate into a chocolate fountain, chortling in the way bad guys do. That's why Bill Clinton went over there, to donate his supply of chocolate after Hillary bugged him to eat better. Their Number One is probably a guy named CocoaFinger. Where's James Bond when you need him?

"CocoaFinger, do you expect me to talk?"

"No, Mr. Bond! I expect you to snack! Try the left Kit Kats, they're so much better than the right ones."

Look, we've put up with pandemics, wars, and so many idiots in Washington that the whole town looks like a Three Stooges movie. I'm done putting up with things. Do they think we'll sit idly by while they stockpile Wonka Bars that rightfully belong in my mouth? I mean,our mouth? Mouths?

It's time for a revolution.

Let's make the illuminati illuminate their secret society Snickers silos, stat. We want free M&Ms, not Free Masons! And quickly, before we all waste down to Skull and Bones! The Knights Templar don't scare us, and neither would a visit from the Men In Brown. All we're scared of is low blood sugar. They can have our chocolate when they pry it from our sticky, delicious hands!

We will not go quietly into vanilla flavored desserts!

We will not let our chocolate vanish without a fight!

We're going to snack on. We're going to survive. Today we celebrate INTERNATIONAL CHOCOLATE DAY!

Okay, that's actually in September, but it's the principle.
Say, did anyone just hear the music from "Independence Day"?



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Oh my gosh, the hidden chocolate supply--that's The Secret of Oak Island!

A Conservative Lawn Mower

While I was mowing the lawn a few years ago, oil started spurting out all over (from the mower, not me). Investigation revealed the oil did not come from an opening oil should come out of. No, it was a brand new opening.

Going back still another year, while I pushed that that very same mower, the handle suddenly dissolved into numerous pieces. They scattered across the lawn in a pattern that spelled out “Ha!” I found what I thought was one of those pieces still on the mower deck, and picked it up. The pattern of that bolt, which -- it turned out -- was actually from the engine, is imprinted to this day on the palm of my hand.

No connection could be established between that red-hot doohickey and the auto-dismembering handle, but what are the odds?

The lawn mower before that lost its life when I pulled the handle to start it, but failed to notice the rope didn’t retreat back into the machine, where it belonged. Then I mowed over the rope. It wasn’t pretty. My father eventually took that mower to his Home for Mistreated Machines (established in my honor), where it happily whacked away for years more, without a care. (In other words, without me.)

The one before that is the Infamous Exploding Lawnmower, which caused the first ever Level One Hazardous Material Emergency in the history of Noble County, and was featured on both CNN and “The Simpson’s”. The parts that could be located are on display in the Smithsonian, after being borrowed by an investigation team from the History Channel program, “Engineering Disasters”.

What I’m saying is, I have a history.

After the most recent lawn mower sacrificed its lifeblood (still visible in a dead patch of grass that spells out “help me”), a friend let me borrow his. I know – dumb friend!

Ironically, the mower ran just fine under my borrowship. It was a freakin’ miracle.

Then my friend gave me the mower, maybe assuming it was tainted. He wasn't wrong.

My mowers never screw up the same way twice. One time it's the starter rope; another time a cracked head (not unlike the one I got from a low hanging branch); then it’ll be sheets of flame and a towering mushroom cloud.

So I’m mowing the lawn the day after the mower officially became mine, and it stops. Just stops, after once around the lawn. I manage to get it started. Once around, it stops again. After some effort, including changing the gas, oil and sparkplug, and some imaginative praying, I get it going again. Once around, it stops.

Changing fluids is the extent of my capabilities. Yes, I can change the sparkplug, but that task once led to me regaining consciousness on top of the neighbor's car. But eventually, a realization hit me:

When the mower leaned toward the right, it kept running. When it leaned toward the left, it stopped. Every time.

I had a conservative lawn mower.

Okay, but how do I go the other way?

Luckily, very little of my lawn is level; in fact, there’s every indication the entire property is sliding downhill. The US Geological Service estimated that within the next hundred years my house will be west of the old car wash on the next block, which is bad because right now it’s east of the car wash. The same team that handled the Leaning Tower of Pizza is working on the problem.

But my lawn can't wait a hundred years, so my solution was simple: Keep the mower’s right side pointed downhill at all times.

I gotta tell you, that’s nowhere near as easy as I thought it might be:

* Sooner or later, you’ve got to turn around. Otherwise, the neighbors will get annoyed.

* When you back up, you can’t watch both the mower and the dog droppings.

* Slipping while pulling a lawnmower toward you is the closest thing you can get to an instant of sheer terror without being in a plane crash.

* Pulling a lawn mower toward you is dumb.

This was a genius way to torture me. I possessed a mower that was perfectly capable of mowing, as long as it’s tilted in one direction. Why replace it? That’s money I could use for other things, like utility bills, food, or crutches. Besides, this is Indiana – I’m surprised there aren’t more right leaning lawn mowers. So I spent the next few years wearing out one side of my shoes.

Sometimes I think my lawn can’t slide away soon enough.



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Remember, if you don't stop to read, your lawn mower might inspire the next disaster movie.