espo Posted June 17, 2019 Share Posted June 17, 2019 I have been selling some used lawn equipment since I purchased a new riding mower. I listed the old rider on Cragslist as well as some equipment for dethatching and aerating the lawn. Go thru the usual people wanting the best price without knowing anything about what they're looking at in the pictures. Finally a guy calls that is a genuine buyer and we arrange for me to deliver to his new home since I have a trailer that I tow with our Jeep. He has asked all the correct questions for someone who has never owned or operated a rider before, they really are not hard. I'm trying to go over the controls and offer some operational tips but he's just wanting to hand us the money and have us leave. My wife even had to tell me it was time to go since he wasn't interested in hearing anything. The next day late in the afternoon he texts me wanting to know if something is wrong with the mower. He had driven it around the yard several times and adjusted the deck height as I had shown him and he said it wasn't working. I text him back and ask him if he had engaged the blades as I had shown him, but it seems this was about the time he had lost interest in any additional operation information I was trying to give him. In my text I described the push/pull button on the dash. He sends me a picture of the rider and asks if it is the button with the circle containing the picture of a mower blade on it. Bingo, I can't understand why people don't want information about something they know little or nothing about from someone offering the obviously much needed info. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redneckrigger Posted June 17, 2019 Share Posted June 17, 2019 You did well to keep from blasting him. As an old fart who has little if NO patience with those who know everything, I'd most likely have reacted a bit differently. Good on you sir! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
espo Posted June 17, 2019 Author Share Posted June 17, 2019 5 hours ago, redneckrigger said: You did well to keep from blasting him. As an old fart who has little if NO patience with those who know everything, I'd most likely have reacted a bit differently. Good on you sir! Actually my wife and I were laughing most of the evening about the whole thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JollySipper Posted June 18, 2019 Share Posted June 18, 2019 I had over an acre to push mow when I was a teenager...... the year I moved out, my parents bought a brand new John Deere riding mower....... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
espo Posted June 19, 2019 Author Share Posted June 19, 2019 When I started high school I had moved to live with my father and step-mother. No problems there, but one of my chores was to mow the yard. They had 1/2 acre for me to mow but it was on the side of a hill and each terrace was 1 and a 1/2 passes with the old Toro that was not self propelled. Not so bad working my way down the hill side but dragging that mower back up the steps was tiring. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jim N Posted June 20, 2019 Share Posted June 20, 2019 I was not there, so I will not presume anything, but people do learn differently. Personally, I struggle with verbal instruction. Give me something to read and I am good to go. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
espo Posted June 21, 2019 Author Share Posted June 21, 2019 20 hours ago, Jim N said: I was not there, so I will not presume anything, but people do learn differently. Personally, I struggle with verbal instruction. Give me something to read and I am good to go. I had left him with all of the owner's manuals and instructions on both the mower and all of the other parts. I even suggested that he read the operation manual on the mower before operating since he didn't have the time to have me show him. These things aren't really hard to operate but it helps to know what the switches are for. I know what you mean by different ways of learning, I'm more of a visual type but have found the more complicated things it helps to read provided the instructions are well written. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Geiger Posted June 21, 2019 Share Posted June 21, 2019 Back when my kids were young and involved in town sports, they made all the fathers work two Saturdays as “Field Day”. They just took these untrained office workers and set them loose on equipment! They had an International Harvester large mower that was essentially a small tractor. On my day they asked, “Can anybody drive a tractor?” I got the job because I was the only one who could drive a clutch! So off I went to mow the fields! On a day when I wasn’t working my family and I were headed up the gravel path towards the fields to our game and here comes the tractor the opposite direction spitting rocks at everyone. I jumped up on it and disengaged the blades. Nobody had told the guy how to do that.. he didn’t even know he had to do that! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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