I do all the lawn mowing for our place. The terrain is lumpy, has two acutely slanted sections, also lumpy, and numerous glacial boulders poking through the surface.

For years I struggled with #@&%#$ gasoline operated lawn mowers, the rubber choke buttons which either don't work or in which the rubber melts down, the pull starts designed to dislocate a woman's shoulder at every pull, and which hardly ever work, and which often come unwound and lie there like impotent skinny penii. I rarely curse. Gasoline mowers caused me to utter streams of four letter words each time I hauled one out of the garage.

At last, I rebelled and got one of the cheapest electric mowers Canadian Tire sells. It cost a hundred bucks three years ago. It's light enough to be pushed or dragged with one hand. It always starts. It's every bit as successful at taming our expanse of weed infested half wild grassy half acre as any of the others were. It has a replaceable blade. I don't care if it uses electricity. I don't own a clothes dryer, a dishwasher, or an electric stovetop. An electric mower is my personal electric luxury item.