Joe Kinsey
Videos by OutKick
Here we go with the 2023 TNML mowing season
Let’s start this morning by thanking Jason R. in Far Nor Cal(ifornia) who stepped up Wednesday with some chalk art to set the mood heading into the new season.
Jason R. has been one of my favorite league members going back to early in the 2022 season. He came to TNML unsure if he would fit in. First of all, he’s in California where he’s not sure if he’ll be arrested for operating a gas-powered mower. Then, there’s his yard. It’s small. Would it stand up to the powers across the south who are laying down nasty stripes on a weekly basis?
And then Jason R. became our resident driveway chalk guy.
Now I look forward to dispatches from northern California where he’s just a guy trying to get through life. Jason R. takes great care of his small yard. He edges. The lines are straight. You can see he takes great pride in the slice of the Dream that he’s been able to acquire and that’s what this league is all about.
This morning I salute Jason R. and all of you who are about to go on this sixth-month journey.
BTW, I didn’t commission this work from Jason R. This is just how passionate the guy is about the league.
TNML news and notes:
- We will be crowning a TNML National Mower of the Year at the end of the season.
- I’m looking for the 10 best league members over the ’23 season. Then the league members will vote for the National Mower of the Year.
- What will the National Mower of the Year win? That’s to be determined, but I’m going to spend the summer building out this program. I’ve spent a few bucks on stickers for league members. I’ll figure out something.
- I’m looking for the 10 best league members over the ’23 season. Then the league members will vote for the National Mower of the Year.
- How will we determine the 10 Most Valuable Mowers? Consistency, league promotion, league participation, and determination to hoist that trophy (pretty sure I have the best damn trophy idea in the history of mowing in my head) at the end of the year.
- Do we have a league participant who is willing to take things to the next level? Is there a Ric Flair of mowing out there that we don’t know about?
- I feel like by the end of the summer we will have an undisputed TNML National Mower of the Year and over the next 5-10 years it will become the most coveted trophy in mowing history.
Remember, I need to see this content. Email: joekinsey@gmail.com or use the social channels.
TAG YOUR SPONSORS (USE THE @ FOR THE BRAND…DON’T USE #TNML…I DON’T CHECK TAGS! Tag @outkicktnml on Facebook)
Let’s have one helluva season.
• Derek from Michigan writes:
Wanted to share a mower upgrade with the TNML crowd. I tried talking to my wife, but she didn’t appreciate my excitement regarding the mower. To give context… I bought my first mower 6 years ago (first-time homeowner).
It was a the cheapest brand-new Cub Cadet push mower I could find. As the lawn got thicker over the next couple of years the mowing became increasingly difficult. Next up was a hand me down (free) yard machine lawn tractor. It came from my boss who upgraded to a zero turn. It was nothing special but worked fine for two summers.
This spring while wasting time on Facebook Marketplace a Bradley 32 inch commercial walk behind caught my eye. I dreamt about it for a week before pulling the trigger. Attached are pics of the old and new. The Big League Lawn striper should make the Mrs. proud.
Next project is transitioning the wood deck to composite. Any advice from the community?
Kinsey:
Ladies, please respect the fact that this stuff truly does excite your husbands. They tell me details about mowing they’d never tell you because I understand. I’m their mowing shrink.
I can’t help Derek with the composite decking. I’m working with a poured slab and a 40-foot tree off my patio.
• Al in Onalaska, WI writes:
I can see that my sticker should be arriving today just in time for opening day!
Unfortunately, I will not be able to participate tomorrow as here in western WI we went from a record of 90 degrees last week to 9″ of snow on Sunday!
Mowing will need to wait a little longer till all the snow is gone.
Now dealing with flooding along the Upper Mississippi Valley and the first 20ft. of my shoreline is under water. Always a fun cleanup when it recedes back to normal.
My question for the Screencaps community regards birds building nests in spring.
I have several lights outside around the house under the roof overhang that birds just love.
Momma thinks it’s just fine for them to build a nest there while I know once the eggs hatch it’s a bombing zone from the parent birds till they vacate the nest. And it’s a mess.
I have to sneak around tearing them down before she sees them and have gone so far as putting foil over the lights to keep them off.
We have several trees throughout our 3 acres that they can build wherever they want, Ill take my chances when mowing around those areas.
Last year I missed a nest under our elevated deck and found out about it during a family get together when one of my niece’s kids poked the nest and all the chicks fell out.
The mayhem from the bird community was straight out of Alfred Hitchcock’s movie “The Birds” (truly scary when it came out). The ladies and kids all ran back to the house while some of the guys tried to get the chicks back into the nest. Needless to say the rest of the day turned into garage beers (which wasn’t the worst)
Question: Where do you draw the line for birds invading our outdoor fun zones?
Kinsey:
Here at the HQ, we’re lucky to have just one or two in the same spots every year and the sparrows aren’t bothering us too much so I leave them be. We have plenty of trees for a wide variety of birds to nest. We even have resident bats that come out at night and swoop around an open area behind our pool. It’s pretty much the Wild Wild West here with birds. There are hawks, ducks, geese flying around, turkey vultures, migrating birds. I just let them be.
Vegas stories
• Chris P. writes:
I lived in Vegas from 2006-2012 and no true great gambling stories myself but working at a large bank I saw some things. Here are a few stories that I’ll never forget:
- Came to the bank one morning and some rough-looking guy was asleep in front of the door. I figured it was the typical homeless guy and we opened like 20 minutes later. Then he stumbles in reeking of alcohol and I had no idea what to expect. Well, he starts pulling cash out of his pants, t-shirt, shoes, and everywhere else. Ends up having 30K stashed on him and he said he was drunk and hit a jackpot and then was stumbling around and got lost and saw the bank and figured he’d pass out there. He’s lucky he didn’t get followed outta the casino and mugged.
- Had a guy come straight from the airport in a taxi. Explained that he was a contractor from Ohio and withdrew 100K. Less than 2 hours later a casino limo pulls up and he gets out and withdraws another 100K. Never saw him again so who knows if he made his money back or lost another 100K.
- Guy comes in saying he wants to deposit a check and proceeds to pull out a casino check for over 200K. I pulled up his bank account and he had like $300 to his name previously. Classic story of waiting for his wife to get ready for dinner so he goes down to play the slots for a few minutes and hits a huge jackpot. He seemed to realize it was life-changing money and he was going to pay off debt and invest it so good for him!
- Saw athletes all the time come to town. Superstar NBA player was in town and we were going to deliver 250K cash to his hotel room and I was going to get to go but then some older guys pulled rank and I got left out. Some Broncos players came in with their 80K paychecks but their accounts had negative balances so not much we could do but then five minutes later their “team banker” called and authorized us to cash the checks anyways.
- Every Monday morning strippers would come in like clockwork and the top-tier ladies would deposit the 10K that they made that weekend. They had street smarts and better business acumen than most people with a fancy degree.
• David W. writes:
Here’s what could’ve been an epic Vegas story.
This was a few years ago.
Young good looking guy in our gym, pharmacy rep, is in Vegas for a conference. At the same time as the Adult Video Awards show. Same hotel. Yes, porn stars everywhere!
The poor guy gets food poisoning and can’t even get out of his hotel room the whole time!!
What could’ve been?
Kids not having kids
• Rick D. in Nashville writes:
My son and his girlfriend have lived together for 5 years and at this point they say they don’t want kids. Both 35, both earn six figures plus and own their own home. Their reason, they don’t want the burden of kids to interfere with their lifestyle of extensive travel and activities of self-indulgence. I have 3 kids all over 21 now, and from my experience, raising kids is a very temporary thing. The first few years require constant oversight.
By the time they are 6, they’re at school half the day. By 14, they are doing their own thing most of the time. At 18 they’re off to college or full-time work. It’s really not that hard or long. It’s also incredibly rewarding and fun. Raising productive members of society is the most important thing we can do with our life. In my view, not having kids by choice is a travesty and a life wasted on yourself.
• Kirk P. in Naperville, IL writes:
Long-time reader, first-time formal emailer (other than my Twitter note requesting a 2023 TNML sticker 
). Anyway, as I read the piece on Tuesday 4/18 about people not having kids and thought about writing in but the day got away from me and I kind of forgot about it. Then as I was reading today’s Screencaps, I saw the response from Tom F. and wanted to share my perspective as someone who doesn’t have kids. Now, to be candid, this isn’t about our kids not having kids. This is about us not having kids. I just turned 50 at the end of March and got the old snippity-snip sometime in my early 40’s so that ship has sailed.
In Tom’s response, he says “I can’t help but think the current crop of kids are just being self-centered and selfish. Can they ‘afford’ kids? Of course! Maybe drive your car a few more years instead of buying a new one (or two!). Get into a smaller house instead of a McMansion. How about ‘sacrificing’ a trip or two to the Caribbean or skiing in Colorado? These kids are too worried about themselves and not ‘building’ a family and it’s to their detriment. In the long run, do you think they’ll be wishing they took one more trip to Europe or, maybe that they have a grandkid or two so they could cheer them on at their soccer or baseball game? Just my thoughts.”
I’m sure there are some people that fall into that category but it isn’t always the case. For us, when we got married (I was 28, she was 26) we both thought we’d have a kid or 2 eventually but knew we had to get ourselves established. As the years went by we’d talk about it and never really felt “ready”. I was (and still am) very focused on my career and I worked long, crazy hours. She works as well but isn’t as career driven as me which is totally fine because it creates a nice balance.
Eventually, we got to a point and when we talked about it we just realized that we didn’t feel a need for or desire to have kids. It’s as simple as that. We don’t live in a giant house (it’s a pretty normal split-level). We do have two cars that are nothing extravagant (a Jeep and a VW), but that’s because we need to get places and it’s not always the same place at the same time. And while we do travel, we don’t go to places that are crazy expensive and it’s only for a week once or twice a year. At the end of the day, it was never about making financial choices other than really early on while we were getting our legs under us when we first got married.
As we became more established and financially stable we totally could have had a couple of kids and maintained our standard of living without much, if any, changes in terms of what we would be able to afford. Now there would be changes to the time we had available to do those things because if you have kids they are, and should be, the priority.
At the end of the day, we enjoy each other and that’s enough for us. We have 14 nieces and nephews and are also at the point where those kids are now adults and having families of their own which is great because we’ve been able to be involved in their lives at varying levels over the years and we’ve enjoyed watching them grow into adults. Do we think about what happens when we’re older and who will take care of us if one of us is sick like we’ve done for our parents? Sure we do. But that’s a problem for the future and more than a few of our nieces/nephews have said they would be able and willing to lean in if necessary to help my old ass out if I broke a hip because I’ve been there for them over their lives. Some might say we are selfish and maybe we are but it wasn’t for material things or for expensive trips. We just realized we didn’t need kids to feel like we had a fulfilling marriage.
I guess my point is that everyone is different and having kids is a very big decision in my humble opinion that shouldn’t be entered lightly. As I said, we evolved into our decision based on what we, as a couple, decided we wanted. I’m sure that if I was super-bullish on having a munchkin that my wife would’ve said yes and vice versa but we were both on the same page every step of the way. I just don’t believe that people should have kids unless they are truly committed to raising a family which we obviously aren’t.
This feels like it’s getting a bit long and maybe rambling. I’m hopped up on pain meds because I had the lovely experience of having a hemorrhoid removed on Monday. BTW, I hope none of the other Screencappers have to have that done. Not a pleasant experience and I’m going to miss opening night of TNML because of it. Luckily the weather is going to suck Thursday so it was going to be rain-delayed either way.
Thanks for pumping out the great content every day. I look forward to reading this every morning and it gets my day off on the right foot.
Barbershops
• Mike in Cedar Park, TX writes:
I walked into the Libertyville barber shop for the first time on a Friday afternoon in 1994. I waited for about 15 minutes than sat up in the chair. The guy on the right asked me if I wanted a beer. I said sure and he went back behind that door on the left and came out with a few Old Milwaukee’s. He tossed me and a few others a beer and kept one for himself. We drank beer while they razzed me for being a Bears fan (they are all rabid Packers fans and huge hunters/ fishermen). I went there for 5 years until we moved. I think they are still open today for a $13 haircut.
Northern northern North Dakota weather update
Our crew in Crosby, ND won’t be hitting the links this week.
• Dillon L. writes:
Our high school golf practice started inside last week and we finally just got outside for practice Monday. Today (Wednesday) we have school canceled by 4+ inches of snow. It’s supposed to keep snowing through tomorrow potentially 12+ inches. We unfortunately will be missing opening day tomorrow. Included a picture of a local who doesn’t seem too bothered by the snow driving down main street in the golf cart.
Kinsey:
I asked. No, the town does not have a golf simulator. “We had some major discussions for a new community center that would include one but it got shot down,” Dillon L. reports.
This should make NYC a desirable place to live, visit, work, play
I’m not even going to open the link. They’re 100% coming for your mowers and your real burgers.
Hey Eric, watch this!
JoeBucsFan sent in this video and the timing couldn’t have been any better:
Do any of you still receive Netflix DVDs in the mail?
I saw this and wondered if any readers still use the red envelope service. If so, I need to know the reasoning behind such savage behavior.
Now THIS is an email on a Thursday morning!
• Tom S. writes:
A) I’m tired of figuring out the best app/email/messaging app, etc ad nausea to send anyone a message…including you. I’ve sent you emails that you published, then I didn’t see a Screencaps for 4 months.
B) Tommy’s Barbershop in Atlanta… he was in Forbes and the Coca-Cola museum…
C) Vegas… I got taken to the “kitchen” of a bar at old Rio when (20+) years ago I started a fight with the DJ and his friends when he wouldn’t play Outkast because “they promoted gang behavior”. Sent me om a tailspin to get Outkast played in every club I went to in Vegas…
D) Any help for TNML when I’ve hired a 65 yo vet and felon to cut my grass because it’s a good thing? I’ve paid him 2-3 weeks in advance, or helped get his car out of hock, or any number of things, but me not cutting my own lawn has its own reward. 6) My son started at 11. But divorce makes different hard work ethics… my ex didn’t want him doing hard work because “school”… he is a great man at 26, but I got 20% of that work ethic.
Kinsey:
- Tom did write to me back in October about wood piles. I’m not sure why he didn’t see Screencaps for four months. It’s right there with a “Nightcaps” tag on the front of OutKick.com.
- I have questions about the (D) part of the email.
That’s it. I have one helluva busy day ahead of me. It’s going to be 84 degrees and beautiful just how you want to dial it up for Opening Day.
Get after it!
Email: joekinsey@gmail.com
The Anderson Field mowing extravaganza is surely the benchmark that MLB has to attain.
I saw a question in this article asking where you ‘draw the line on birds’ in your yard or outdoor area. I believe it depends on the size of the bird, but the rule of thumb is draw the line where you can keep as much meat for bbqing and use the rest to make a stock!