Since this blog is mostly about my stress level

Or perhaps I should say, whine level....

I am now further behind.

I got to the field last night and there were three flat tires on the stacker.

I went to sleep mowing yesterday and The street sign with the mower so hard I almost knocked it out of the ground.

I propped it up, I'm going to blame it on Student drivers.

I'm almost positive no one saw me.

I'm betting that today will be a wonderful day.

Please tell me if you can see what is been mowed and what is not.

Because I can't really tell and I'm the one mowing it.

What I'm doing after "work" today

Filberts....

I quit last night after knocking over a stack. I was working up to a discussion of when you realize you are old with yesterday's post.

But I just brought my iPhone to the bathroom this morning...

Overkill horsepower but good a/c for Lulu. 

She fixed a broken bale problem on her own. With the help of the manual and text messaging.

 A monumental step!

The end of summer?

I woke up this morning and looked out the window. There was a heavy dew, it was almost like it had rained. I looked over the river bottom where the heavy fog is laying in like a fall morning.
It is only the first of August.
My wife called from the living room to let me know there may be showers tomorrow morning. She wondered if I wanted someone to bale wheat straw. I pointed out that there was not much point in baling wheat straw when I had a hundred acres of grass straw to pick up before I could get close to wheat straw.
I'm at the point were there is not really much point in even looking at the weather forecast...
I suppose I could call in sick to work...
Yesterday I needed to adjust the hitch on the two-tie baler.
I have a fairly new New Holland BC5070 baler. The hitch bolts screw into the tongue. I needed remove eight bolts, raise the tongue and lower the PTO shaft, hook up the moisture tester, baler stroke counter, lights and adjust the plunger.
It took me four hours to adjust the hitch. The modern New Holland company apparently buys crappy cheap steel from China to build their implements of frustration. The metal is soft and the hitch bolts are grade eight. I had to re-tap several holes.

To add insult to injury the fasteners seem to be a curious mix of metric and standard.

I have not been as careful about keeping the baler undercover. It sat outside through a couple rain showers covered in dust. The metal is rusting under the paint.
This baler sold new for $24,000 (not what I paid). You would think New Holland could come up with some sort of metal coating to prevent rust in five years.
I finally moved the baler to the field and starting baling. It is a very nice baler design. It is just made from tin foil.

I took my daughter for a motorbike ride. We were off to a good start when she remembered youth group at the Christian Church. So we modified our course to arrive at the Church instead of Starbucks.

AND now I see it is 7 a.m.
I must go to work. I think I will just post this and perhaps finish it later. An installment blog. Whoop, whoop!

Any bets on if it will ever be finished?

It ain't the same speech, it was the same speechwriter! Navin R. Johnson wrote both speeches...

Of all the things that annoyed me enough to write a blog post it was the idiotic claim that Melenia Trump copied Michelle Obama's speech.
The reason they sounded the same is that they were both a collection of similar phrases and idioms.
Saying, "my word is my bond," was not invented by Obama's speech writer.
Not to be horribly cynical but really there are only so many versions of the "I was born a poor black child" speech.
"I was taught to work hard, tell the truth, and never to steel hubcaps. Being poor is tough and family is important," see I did one myself!
I'm just glad when Navin R. Johnson wrote their speeches he didn't put in that joke about finding out what his special purpose was for...

Weather and whether

The mower is broken. It is a New Holland 1411. I suspect it was made around the turn of the century. It had all its shields until this year so it felt new to me.

A gear is out in the cutterbar. In theory our local new Holland dealer will have a complete cutter bar gearbox section for a few hundred dollars and we can bolt it in and go. Total repairs for this mower this season have well passed 20 percent down on a newer Hesston 1345 which is what I want.

Rain has been scheduled for Thursday through Monday. We have 15 acres of alfalfa and 100 acres of grass to mow.

The 4th of July usually is the start of swathing fescue for seed. Many people have started combining. Not a good time to be waiting 3 days for parts or a week for rain.

Stacker is broken anyway. Need a solenoid coil for a gresen electric valve which of course, New Holland doesn't have...

My wife appears to still be ill.

I can't decide which motorcycle to ride to work.

I forgot the frying pan

Last night Lulu wanted to go camping. We were making t-shirt screens and I screwed up both of them when washing out the emulsion.

I said lets go.

She loaded up the recently acquired furd exploder and we headed for the river.

We had food but I forgot the cast iron.

I did have a shovel. I burnt the paint off it, scoured it with gravel. It sort of worked. It would have been easier to drive back home for breakfast...

My week

I have a new assistant. She is a history major. She likes to discuss the War of Northern aggression.
She can argue about theology, (can actually quote scripture), politics, guns, philosophy, and she is learning to back a trailer.
It is amazing to encounter a young college student who is interested about everything.
Sometimes she gets a little carried away with her driving.
It could be that I am a bad example...
She did get a little close to the beaver pond. I was actually impressed at how far she got off the trail with the Gator.

In other news...
I left the Ford Ranger in the middle of 350 acres. Someone stole the wheels off of it. We have let some young people go fishing at our farm. A friend of a friend is a tweeker.

I called the Sheriff. There is really nothing you can do about it. No serial numbers on aluminum rims and half worn out tires.
Speaking of half worn out tires... What sort of a moron steals worn out tires and aluminum Ford Ranger rims? You risk getting shot and go to all the work of exchanging wheels at 4 a.m. over something you could get for next to nothing from your local scrapper?
We got the license number of the vehicle leaving our farm. Just thought it was one of the kids fishing.

On the other hand...
My faith in humanity was restored yesterday.
I was moving the Tedder down highway 99W and my hat blew off. I of course slammed on the brakes because I didn't want to lose my hat. My bald spot would burn.
A passenger in one of the cars that I backed up, (a long line) jumped out, grabbed my hat, and brought it to me.
I said, "thank you very much."

My nephew from Portland came to visit. He got to experience farming. I sprayed molassas on the rained on hay. He helped. I rigged up a sprayer on the bumper of my pickup and we followed the windrows around the field.
I suspect he thinks farming is boring and full of strange misadventures.
He seems to be somewhat saddened by the violation of my Ranger. I suspect he respects my ability to not get stuck with bald tires.