A little greener and a lot of nostalgia

We bought a new mower this past weekend. We thought it would be a little ridiculous to buy a gas powered mower when it will literally take 15 ~ 20 minutes to cut the entire yard (not like the 1 1/2 to 2 hrs on a riding mower in DE). So here's to going green! Do you think it will offset the amount of gas we use driving the Excursion? Probably not, but it's a start. Having a push mower like this reminds me of the neighbors we had growing up. The Hamerdingers lived two doors down from us. They had 5 kids. 1 girl - Ronda (who babysat me) and 4 boys - Mark, Dana, Andy, and Rusty. Rusty was the youngest and at a year or two apart we were friends. There are so many crazy, silly memories I have of this family... Mr. Hamerdinger did the best Donald Duck impression of anyone I know - hands down. He was also one snazzy dancer (He and his wife stole the show at my wedding). The boys would walk up the street to our house and demonstrate their 'boyness' by swallowing live goldfish - much to my horror and fascination. Their family won a car (an orange gremlin , I think) on a game show and once their whole family was on the Family Feud. Dodson asked the question "Answer something you lick" and Rusty answered "your nose". Oh so many memories... Believe it or not, Rusty taught me the 'finer' points of house cleaning. Both our moms worked so when we got home from grade school we had chores to do before we could go out and play (no homework in those days). He would come to my house and help me complete my chores then we'd go to his house and I'd stand back and watch as he'd sweep everything off the kitchen counters into a trash bag and declare it clean. (Works for me!) His mom also had this plastic indoor rake for fluffing up their shag carpet. So after sweeping off the kitchen counters and raking the floors we were free to catch bees in glass mayo jars and shake them up to get them really buzzing or he'd show me where his brothers were growing pot in his mom's garden (like I had a clue what the stuff was...) there were also many a fort built down the street a little further in the open field. Most of kids in the neighborhood walked to school together and on chilly mornings we would always be a few minutes longer waiting at the Hamerdingers because Rusty's mom would put his shoes and socks in the oven to warm them up for him - sometimes they'd get a little crunchy. Well, I could probably go on and on if I sat here long enough and tell you more stories like the time the boys put a snake in our mailbox for a surprise when we got home from vacation, or a couple of sleep walking episodes a couple of the kids had, but this post was about a lawn mower... The Hamerdingers had a push mower (the only family I knew who owned one) and I always felt a little sad thinking they should have an industrial gas powered mower like my dad's. I wonder what the neighborhood kids will think of me when they see me pushing mine and I wonder what the H family is up too...