The Mowage De-Commitment

Today appears to be the best opportunity for mowing the yard I’ve had in several days and may not have again for several days. So at 2 PM, out the back door I go. The temperature is 90°F, heat index 103°, humidity 65%.

I go to the garage, get into my Jeep, start it, pull it forward as far as I can, turn off the engine, climb onto my lawn tractor, start the engine, and begin to maneuver the tractor between the back of my Jeep and the garage door opening. But I have trouble steering, so I look at the tractor’s front wheels. Both of the tires are flat.

I pull the tractor forward and turn it off. I retrieve my electric tire pump (which plugs into the Jeep’s cigar lighter), I plug it in, I turn the Jeep’s ignition key to ACC, switch on the tire pump, then get out of the Jeep and try to reach the lawn tractor’s front tires with the pump. Won’t reach. I get back into the Jeep, start it, back it up about 2 meters, turn it off, and try again to reach the tractor’s front tires. Still won’t reach. I push the tractor up to the side of the Jeep. Now the pump hose will reach the tractor’s tires.

But what is the correct inflation pressure for these little tires? I get on my knees in front of one of the wheels and, using a little flashlight built into the pump, I try to read the small print embossed on the side of the tire. I have to read upside down. It takes about 5 minutes of reading various notations upside down, but I eventually determine that the maximum pressure is 14 psi. (My friend CyberDave would have insisted that I write “96.5 kilopascals,” but as I noted, “14 psi” was embossed on the tire. I’m only willing to stretch this metric thing so far.)

I laboriously inflate one tire, then the other. The first tire goes pretty easily: remove the valve cap, plug the air hose’s locking chuck onto the valve stem, inflate the tire, remove the chuck, and put the cap back on the valve stem. The second tire goes much the same until I get to the “remove the chuck” part of the show, and then the chuck does not want to let go of the valve stem. I pull this way and that way with all my strength, but the hose chuck has the grip strength of Jaws! But after a few minutes of battle, during which I ponder mowing the yard with the air pump attached to the left front wheel, the chuck suddenly lets go. I screw on the valve cap and push the lawn tractor back into its hidey-hole. I return my car to its normal spot inside the garage and close the garage door. My shirt is damp with perspiration. The day seems hotter and the humidity is definitely higher. This job can wait.