Masculinity and Lawnmowers FTW: Another Important Update

Lawnmower (Getty Images)

To get up to speed on what this is all about, see the first two installments of what has turned into a summer-long blockbuster: Part 1 and Part 2.

The proposed lawnmower repair instructional YouTube video continues as follows:

27. After failing to act on the problem at hand in any meaningful way for at least two weeks, and after being scared off of machetes by an all too real Google Image search, roll the ol’ mower around to the back porch and get back to work. 

28. Once again, try to determine how to access the carburetor. Identify four screw-like objects that seem promising. Notice that they have no markings that would indicate that a screwdriver (either the flat kind or the crisscross kind) might be the appropriate tool. Decide to call them bolts. Try out various pliers and wrenches. Pinch your thumb while using pointy pliers because they keep slipping off. 

29. Rest for two days. 

30. When your grass has reached the point in its growth and development that Donald Trump has started trying to deport it, invite your dad over to ramp up the repair effort. Have him bring his tools. Try not to show your disappointment when it turns out his tool collection is as incomplete and disorganized as yours. 

31. Two hours later, find the correct tool. You guessed it: socket wrench! Is there anything that guy can’t do? He’s like the Mike Tirico of tools. 

32. Unscrew the four screws (check that, bolts) in record time because you are now a socket wrench master. 

33. Remove the cover thing and find something that could be a carburetor or some other important engine part. 

34. Take a picture, text it to your friend that knows about “guy stuff” (mentioned in Part 1), and wait for further instructions. 

35. Receive instructions: “Unscrew the big bolt on the bottom and clean that out real good.” 

36. Spend 27 minutes unscrewing two tiny bolts that are completely irrelevant. 

37. Discover that the whole bottom part just unscrews by hand. Unscrew it by hand. 

38. Empty the collected gasoline out of the cap thing, rush inside to rinse it off in the sink (because, why not?), and hurry back to try to reattach it before the porch fills with leaking gasoline. 

39. Make it, barely, avoiding asphyxiation by a matter of seconds. 

40. The moment of truth: Let’s do this! 

41. Roll the mower outside and pull the start cord twice. 

42. On the second pull, when it sounds like the engine is about to catch, raise one hand in the air with one finger up a la Larry Bird after releasing the last, contest-winning shot in the 1988 3-point shootout. Drop your hand dejectedly when it turns out that, unlike Bird, your shot clanks off the rim (i.e., the engine doesn’t actually start).

43.  Pull the cord for an hour or so because, why not?

44.  A few days later, when your grass has reached the point in its growth and development that Donald Trump has started trying to deport its children, find out that an old friend just started a lawn service! Invite him to come do a one-time yard clean up.

45.  Wait patiently for him to come. In the meantime, calculate the probability that this one cut might create a bridge to winter (i.e., the glorious season of grass dormancy).

46.  To be continued…