Pleasantly Surprised

I own a Craftsman 6.75 horsepower self-propelling lawn-mower. Despite it's quirks, I've gotten fond of the old beast and it does the job. In June of 2007 while I was galavanting in Cyprus, it seems the lawn mower had a mishap and the 'control bar' of the lawn mower, some piece of plastic that you keep depressed while mowing lawn that serves as a dead man's clutch, cracked.

We spent all of last summer, using electrical tape to tape this plastic piece to the handle so that it would stay on and mow after we'd get the beast started. I wanted to order a new part, but could not for the life of me find the owner's manual, and yet I knew I had 2 of them, one in French and one in English.

I finally stumbled upon the manual about 2 weeks ago, found teh part number and called Sears to order the part. When it arrived, I took one look at it and figured they sent me the wrong part. It looked nothing like the original part, in black plastic. This was black metal. But I tried the part, and low and behold it fits, and being in Metal, it's far more robust. I don't think I'll be changing this part again. I was incredibly surprised that the replacement part was made to last.

I also ordered a filter and a spark plug for the lawn mower. To be replaced next spring when I do the oil change. And since we were calling sears we also ordered new sensors for the garage door opener. Samer examined the garage door opener it and he concluded one of the two sensors was dead. I had gone to the conclusion that it was either the sensors or the wiring to the sensors. He narrowed it down. Here's keeping my fingers crossed that the new sensors will fix the garage door opener.

Samer painted the cement floor in the garage. It makes it look so clean and pretty. Reminds me of that Canadian Tire commercial where the husband just finished organizing his garage and asks his wife to take her shoes off to come in and see what he did with the space. :P

Of course now that the lawn mower is fixed, I have no excuses to avoid cutting the grass. Sigh.