MY lawnmower is defective. It is designed so that the little vent that shoots the cut grass out the side is not open far enough, and it clogs with grass constantly.

There’s a spring loaded door that covers it up completely, and a plastic adapter that holds it open a little, but not enough. I rekkon that the US manufacturer is worried about getting sued if debris fly out and break a window, so they made it that way. Nevermind the fact that it can’t cut grass.

So I modified it. Now it spews grass 20 feet and doesn’t clog, and I don’t have to stop the motor every 5 steps and clean it by hand.

Back in the day, NAUI dive tables were so conservative the joke was “If you’re diving NAUI tables, why dive?” PADI tables were much better, and everyone switched to PADI. Now, NAUI barely exists. Thank gawd for dive computers, people don’t use tables anymore.

It seems like the guys buildig lawnmowers never mow lawns, some of the the guys writing dive tables never dive and there are so many other examples. Sure, things should be safe, but I won’t say they should be as safe as possible. If you were really scared of breaking a window with your lawnmower, the safest thing to be would never mow. If you were worried about dive injuries, the safes thing would be don’t dive.

But nobody wants to live that way. Besides, what if, for example, I get tired of cleaning my mower vent every 15 seconds, kill the engine, stick my hand in there, clean out the grass, restart the engine, mow another 15 feet, and repeat? What if, for example, I modofied the dead man switch on the mower so I could stick my hand in there with the engine running? The danger of getting some fingers cut off is worse than the danger of breaking a window.

Anyway, that’s my rant for today. This weekend, I plan on finishing the painting on the back porch, and building a plantstand to hold a lot of plants, a multi-shelf, long heavy duty plant stand with wheels.

Have a great weekend!