Somebody's a little upset that I'm spending valuable petting time outside raking instead. But while I was raking I realized two things: 1) I am not cut out for manual labor, and 2) I've never lived in a house with a yard larger than around 30 square feet. I was trying to figure out how to get wet leaves to release their stranglehold on the pavement and then how to get them into a bag effectively when I realized these are probably skills most folks pick up when they're young. But aside from a stint in Navy housing before I was in school and a half a year or so during the Master's, I haven't ever lived a serious yard. Which almost excuses my cluelessness about these things.