D. Braun

While some of the newer and current appliances may look nice to some, the stuff just breaks far too often.  Those glitzy control panels seem to self destruct quickly and are very expensive to purchase.  I am weary of the over priced and under performing offerings that are pawned off as wonderful in these times.  Seems the engineers are under a sort of "publish or perish" dictum from the manufacturers.  Sad.

Keep it simple and you will be far better off.  The more they complicate things the more prone they are to fail.

Well, at least you are not in Pacific county, Washington-the home of the dumbest building codes in the state.   A high percentage of the minions in Washington state are failed civil engineers who are thoroughly convinced that water runs up hill naturally.  I bet they will hit you with installing a "mound" system before long and ignore completely the fact that you are seeking a composting setup-which they already have sidestepped.   I wish you luck but the toads up in that part of the country are abysmally stupid and seem to think that Jerry Brown is the answer to any problem that they can't understand. Most counties on the western slope of Washington state have simply adopted one version or another of California building codes.  So much for intelligent thought.  To require a septic system for a composting toilet is one of the most outrageously stupid responses I have ever heard of.   Welcome to King county.

Buy the turds a cup of Starbucks and maybe they will jitter away down the road and leave you alone...  Good luck.

Not sure about the meditative part but I am more comfortable with the quiet and dependability of a manual mower.  No gas, no oil, no "why is the thing running so ratty THIS time?", no overpriced batteries to replace, no cord to cut by mistake.  The price was right as it was free at the dump and it works any time I want it to.

Family down the way has a Sears model and it cut badly.  No grease in the drive wheels-what there was had dried out.  The main problem was the cutter bar-it was set for another universe and if the cutter bar is off a push mower will not cut well at all.  

Enjoy the meditation.

I have been living with macular degeneration for 25 years now.  It comes and goes in severity and I have found a lot of it is stress related for me.  The fancy vitamins were not worth messing with as I never saw any difference with them or without.  I try to eat decently and not get into situations that induce eyestrain.  I will tell you that bright light is a problem.  If nothing else. go to the library and look up "Amsler Grid".  An eye doctor will surely give you one but if you want to avoid an appointment cost go make several copies of the thing and tack it up on a door or wall and use a pencil or such to locate the problem fields you have.  if you use the original as a base then you can change the grid once in a while and see if it gets better or worse and if the bad areas shift around.  Here is a link-choose one and run off some copies if you have a printer.

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=Amsler+Grid&t=peppermint&iax=1&ia=images

Avoid high consumption of alcohol as this seems to aggravate it.  Not experience talking but a medic told me that.  Good luck but DO keep abreast of what is going on with it.