Last Sunday was an example of good practices and procrastination running headlong into each other. It's been a great fall here in Cincinnati. Long sunny days and lingering warm weather have reminded me that I really like autumn. We had a massive windstorm on the back end of Hurricane Ike which blew most of our leaves out early (along with a lot of my roof. three cheers for homeowners insurance.). So the fall colors were pretty muted, and it's been really dry, which made for very slow growing in the lawn. About 10 days ago we started getting some rain, which is good, though it added to the overall shagginess of the yard.
All of this leads to last weekend, which started on Friday afternoon with sunny skies and 60 degree weather. I left work feeling good about things and thinking I could cut my grass that evening. I quickly realized that it was going to be way too dark that night, and I woke up Saturday morning to pouring rain and 45 degrees. The weather brought down the rest of my leaves, and it was oddly reminiscent of the time I went to Farm Aid, outside, in Chicago, in freezing rain, with a bad fever. But that's a whole different story.
Saturday was right out, but I knew the mowing needed to be done, so bright and early on Sunday I got out, dropped the mower one setting and set to work. Not 10 minutes into the job I turn at the end of a row and realize that it's snowing. Awesome. You feel so smart cutting grass in the snow. Now, we're not talking about Jack London-freezing-in-the-beard and dying in a snow drift or anything, but it's clear that you've waited too long for your last mowing if you find yourself in the snow.
The coda to the story is the fact that several hours later, sitting comfortably on my couch, nursing a beer and watching the Bengals tie the Eagles (who ties these days? there's something ironic about a team that can't even manage to really lose...) I heard a lawn mower in the distance. During a break in the action I looked outside and noticed my backyard neighbor cutting his grass - so I may have owed in the snow, but at least I wasn't the last one.