Seriously, what would Stella do without leaf piles?
I believe the expression is Full Tilt Boogie!
I have hated leaf blowers all my life – the noise, the wasted energy, the unPuritan laziness of not raking. But as I’ve gotten older, I have found raking harder and harder, and alas last last year I bought a battery – operated leaf blower. But I also do mow/mulch until they get too thick on the lawn.
Leaf blowers work great for cleaning out the ash catcher underneath the BBQ grill.
If it’s a breezy day, beware which side you’re standing on.
Having grown up in a time and place where leaf blowers weren’t a thing I felt the same, until I needed to get leaves off my driveway. Raking it just creates a mass of leaves and gravel.
So I got a battery powered leaf blower.
We have a battery operated leaf blower, but we don’t blow leaves, they are vacuumed up by the mower… The leaf blower is used for 10 minutes a week to blow grass clippings and dirt off of our walkways. It’s wonderful; far quicker and easier than a broom.
All in all, you’re just another leaf on the lawn.
I’d say, “The Booker Prize for you!”
Unless you compost, mulch-mow them in place. They’ll decompose and fertilize the lawn by spring. Just leaving them matted over the grass with encourage moldy grass.
If you compost, many leaf blowers will work as a vacuum/shredder (such as our Toro electric). This compacts the leaves down to a sixth or even a tenth of original volume, and it speeds up the composting greatly. We don’t use the thing as a blower, except as a way to dry the car after washing it. Much better than towels.
Back in the dark days of the previous millenium, when I rented a little house in town, the guy across the street (whom everyone called “Curly” behind his back, due to his preposterous orange-dyed perm) had a leaf blower. He had several large sycamore and cottonwood trees. Whenever a few leaves fell in his yard, he would be out there with his blower in a flash, blasting those leaves into the street or onto someone else’s property. He never raked or mulched his leaves, he just made them someone else’s problem. I think that mowing might have been a tenet of his religion, and he wanted everyone else to mow all the time, too. I have little doubt that it was Curly who made an anonymous call reporting that my lawn went unmowed when I was on vacation once. I came home to find an ordinance violation ticket for my grass being too tall.
The DeKay’s brownsnakes at my house seem to prefer spending the winter underneath my patio. They are cute little things, about the size of a pencil.
That is generally my strategy, too.
Now that I live in the country, I sometimes procrastinate on my lawn-mowing, and the grass will get 8 or 10 inches long. This leads to my in-laws sometimes making jokes about expecting that I was going to bale it. Har har hardy har har. 
That illustrates why Labradors are the best dogs ever.
Now that is a video worth watching! Called my wife over to watch. We love when all you can see after the leap is the tail wagging. Good dog!
M problem is that I’ve found decomposing leaves provide food for millions of swarming gnats that make my outdoor space unbearable.
And they eat slugs and snails!
I was going out to sit on the front lawn, drink a few beers, enjoy some of the last good sun of the year, and bask in the Ottawa RedBlacks actually winning a game for once, just in time to see a gang of kids going by, looking to make money raking leaves.
So yeah, pay some kids a few bucks, is my suggestion.
I’m not sure if I’m more curious as to what it does or how you acquired it.
It’s basically a hopper on a metal stand that works on a similar principle to a string trimmer. I don’t remember where I got it but it was probably Lowe’s or Home Depot.
I have an earlier, cheaper version of this model.
I really feel like doing that today, or the gloominess will end me. If you need me, I’ll be going around the neighborhood, looking for the unattended leaf piles.
Ah, Satan’s Shredder.
My emphasis.
The ales have it.