Wow, what a shocker, Ken. But at 7:30am you got some great service from the city!
Oak leaves and especially the evil little flowers really get into the gravel, but I have a new tool that has "Changed My Life" - a rechargeable leaf blower! It's small and light, and I don't have to fuss with a cord every time I want to go out and clean the pathways. So I just pick it up and happily blow everything away - the paths do get done just about every day now. One battery takes me all the way around the house if there's not a lot of stuff. It takes two batteries to do the front driveway, but they fit in my pocket so I can change out and keep blowing. I did the gutters and the roof with it last weekend, too!
Home Depot carries them. We have the Milwaukee 18 volt system, as DH the mad engineer is a convinced Milwaukee fan. The batteries run a whole range of other tools too. DH recently gave me a reciprocating saw (like a Sawzall, but again smaller and lighter with no cord) that runs with the same batteries, and Yikes! Am I ever getting lots of pruning done now!
