I just looked at my last bill and I used about half the amount you did and the water portion of the bill was $38. But last month I was gone for a few days and we were only allowed to water twice a week. Now we can water three times a week until the end of August. In the winter we can only water on saturdays but I don't bother..we get some rain in the winter.
I bought my lawnmower new for under $100 fifteen years or more ago, as the hardware store put them on sale in the fall so that he wouldn't have to store them through the winter when no one is buying lawnmowers. It hasn't been in very good shape for the past few years. It runs but it sounds horrible, and I lost the filter a few years ago. Each year, I think about buying another lawnmower because they aren't so very expensive. But then, each year, my old lawnmower starts right up in the spring and cuts the lawn well enough for me, so I stick with it. Just today, I was shopping for lawnmowers and thinking about trying an electric one. Instead, I dug the old one out, and it started on the first pull.
I got our old garden tractor out from the barn and expected it to start first try like it has for the past 29 years, but no luck this year. I think the starter must be bad. I replaced the solenoid but that didn't quite fix the problem. I hooked up the battery charger with a "start" cycle, and it started with some difficulty, but it won't start from the battery. I still use it to till, pull wagons, and mow areas where we don't want to take our other mower. I will replace the starter, but replacing the tractor would cost almost $4000.
I bought a battery powered mower about a month ago. I've mowed my small lawn 4 times (I think) and the mowing takes maybe 20 minutes max, and the trimming and blowing another 10. The mower battery is supposed to be good for 40 minutes, so that hasn't been a problem. The local lawn guy wanted $65 a month to do that, and another $75 every three months to trim bushes, etc. HOA sets the irrigation schedule, which is fine with me. Otherwise 750 systems would all go off at the same time. This is in central Florida
Back in the 70s we had a department store here called Zayre. It was sort of a KMart type of place. They had a sidewalk sale and there was a brand new lawnmower out there cheap! I looked underneath and there was a fine mist of green, as though someone started cutting their grass and it died pretty quickly. It still had gas in it (ah, the good old days.) I pulled the cord and it fired right up, but it surged. I got out a dime and used it to turn the fuel/air mixture screw, and it straightened right out. Sold!
This week, I have been working out in the yard and garden areas, and was pulling out a lot of the weeds from underneath the tree where we have a little flower bed, and it had been overtaken by my mint plants. Well, hidden in the mint and other leaves , was some poison ivy. I have gotten it on my hands before and not had much problem, but this time, I had my bare legs right into the mint as I was pulling it up, and managed to get the poison Ivy all over on my legs and ankles. I have been taking burning hot showers every night, and also spent an hour in the swimming pool at the fitness center when we go there, and between the two things (plus bunches of calamine lotion, AD&E ointment, and aloe Vera ), my legs are starting to heal up, but it is going to be a while before it all goes away. Next time I will just use the weed eater, but i didn’t want to get any hidden flowers, and I wanted to pull the mint out by the roots as much as possible. We still have lots of mint, but I want some flowers to grow under that tree again.
I guess I'm stuck with this lawnmower for at least another year. It sounds so bad that my neighbor came over once to tell me I needed to do something with that lawnmower. He couldn't get it to run any better either, though. Then, when he suggested cleaning the filter and I told him it didn't have a filter, he gave up on me. Poison ivy keeps coming up around my yard too, but I have never reacted to poison ivy so I just pull it up by hand. The problem is in getting rid of the root system as it has a labyrinth of roots just below the surface.
I noticed a bunch of 3 leaf stuff as I was weed-eating today. I'm not certain if it's itchy stuff or just 3 leaved stuff. I hate that stuff.
Ugh, I feel for you, Yvonne. My husband is VERY allergic to poison ivy and gets a rash nearly every spring/summer. I hope you are better soon. Like Ken, I can pull poison ivy up with my hands and it never causes any reaction at all.
We have a lawn service that mows, trims, edges, and blows off the paved areas of our front and back yards each week. We have quite a bit of edging around the fence and pool area, and we pay $35 a week for the service. It's a crew of 4 guys and they swarm over the yard in less than 30 minutes and are gone. At the same time, my husband mows and takes care of his mother's yard each weekend. He just bought a new John Deere zero-turn because she has three acres to be mowed and they sold the tractor a while ago.
Fortunately, poison ivy/oak is one of many pesky things we don't have here. I spent many years around poison ivy and nedver reacted, but when I lived in California, I encountered poison oak and broke out on both legs. When we were only married a few months, I was scheduled for a seminar in Charleston, SC. Wife decided to clear a bunch of brush under an old apple tree on our property in NC. She went to Charleston with me and was miserable the whole time we were there with poison ivy rash.
Normally, it does not affect me when I pull it out and get some on my hands, but apparently the stuff that got on my bare legs was more potent, because I had ripped it apart and exposed more of the burning oils. Or maybe I am just getting more allergic to it. In any case, I will be more careful next time and not wear my shorts for yard work if I am going to be doing anything that might put me into contact with the evil vines.
I bet he loves that zero turn. If I had the money (and storage), I would buy one to mow my 7 acres. My neighbors (they are brothers) each have one, and the 2 of them have cut my property a couple of times. Those zero turns do the job way faster than my tractor's belly mower, and the result is golf course quality.
Have you heard of a product called Tecnu? It works pretty well. It's a lotion you apply as soon as you are able after exposure...the sooner the better. Then you rinse in cold water (so your pores do not open up.) It washes away the urishiol (the oily compound that causes the allergic reaction.) Drug stores carry it.