lawn mowers... who needs 'em?

This AM I decided to be nice and try to get the lawn mowed before Eric got home from work.  I get all the prep work done.. clean up the dog poop, get out the yard debris can, get out the mower and prime the motor pull the cord and VAROOM... it is running and not two seconds later, sputter and nothing... dead.  Ok just a fluke, I prime it again, hold the throttle lever pack and pull the cord, VAARROOOMMM....sputter, sputter and dead again?!!!
So I call my husband, ask him "is there something wrong with the mower?" No worked fine last time I used it, which was Saturday morning. hmmmm who knows!! So being the non mechanical person that I am, I look the Toro website up and start trying to find trouble shooting... I even break down and call to ask my dad if he has any ideas what might be wrong.  Nothing, from no one... so Eric is home for lunch and he takes it to a mower place to look at it... they say it will be a week before they can even look at it, and it would be $40!  yikes!!
NOW WHAT?!! I need a mower!
Ok so now after watching Utube, I feel a though I can take this thing apart and fix it! Ha!  This should be fun, this is why I took small engines shop in highschool.  Oh I feel all the dirt coming back!  For one thing our mower is a MESS!  Someone needs to learn to clean it up!
I got the thing all apart and wow there is gunk everywhere.. and I smell like gas....air filter is black, the carb bowl is caroded and the oring is nasty..guess I will send for parts and carb cleaner tomorrow.  Hope I can get this thing back together.  wonder if it will run? 
Check back with you tomorrow... with an update.  Still need lawn mowed.  it is at least 6" long right now.
update; yes, we fixed it.  the carb clean utube video did the trick.  Got the mower back together and running, mowed the lawn and we are ready for a new adventure!  Thanks a lot Utube!!!