Sanity found at home

Farm in the Summer

It kinda rained.

It is amazing how much more normal our home lives can be.  I can truly say that I love my family, home and life.  Sometimes the career I have chosen drains me and I am always revitalized by the ones I love.  Thanks to all for refilling the cup.

More open space to fill at a later date

Before I went back to work I did sneak out and move some more shelves out in the old house.  I just couldn't help myself.  I was on a role and didn't want to lose the momentum.  I still have plans on making it out there this weekend.  But today I did not make it.

It took me a week to get the old wheat truck licensed.  Three trips later and one phone call and I ended up with a 10 day permit.  The truck cannot be re-certified as a farm truck unless the farm is "exporting" enough farm product to warrant the need for the truck.  As the farm is in CRP and is not producing it cannot be licensed. If we had a hundred sheep the DMV farm guy said it would warrant a farm designation.  Now here is the weird thing.  A 10 day permit, by law, does not allow the vehicle to carry a load.  But there is nothing that does, so I was told the 10 day permit would have to do.

Today after filling up the truck and grinding a few gears, Sarah and I went to town.  We of course went via the back roads.  This way I didn't have to have a stream of cars passing us as I went 45 mph.

I need another overhead light.  Starting
to look like someplace I could actually
work in.
I had forgotten that direct linkage steering in an old wheat truck takes a lot of muscle and some serious attention to the road.  Potholes attain a whole new level of respect when the entire steering wheel tries to wrench your arms off at the shoulders.  The whole time we are going to town I made Sarah clean all the surfaces inside the truck.  It was full of dirt, probably had not been cleaned in 30 years at least.  Once we had our load we drove to the car wash place and used the pay vacuum cleaner.  We filled the trash can and our $3 in vacuum fees sucked up about 3# of mice turds and 5# of dirt from inside the cab.  Luckily for us there is a oil changing business right there so I sauntered over and asked how much to have the oil changed.  Someone had to come over and pop the hood to see what size the engine was and we went back over to the boss who told me $45.  Sounded reasonable so after the truck was clean we drove into the bay.  Thirty minutes later it was not so easy.  The old wheat truck takes an old canister oil filter, no one in a 60 mile radius has one.  There is a conversion that can be placed on the truck to use a newer style filter but no one ever bothered to do that.  Luckily, the filter is still manufactured so the gentleman ordered two.  He then showed me the air filter which of course looked awful (even after the guy had beat it out and then blown it clean with a air hose), so I said go ahead and change that also.  No go, another special order item.  So they put clean oil in the truck, old oil filter back on and told me to come back after Tuesday.  No charge, he said we could square up the bill on Wednesday when I bring the truck back.  There are times I do enjoy smaller towns.  Plus driving an old green Chevy 1968 wheat truck does add a certain amount of memorable customer to it.  

Bridge on a truck!

 Sarah and I had to make a second trip to town to pickup some used lumber and a 12x20 dog run (all free, best price).  It was hot!!  95 degrees and we were parked on the railroad tracks on hot pavement loading up the pickup.  She did ask what would happen if a train came.  I told her they would honk (it is a private freight spur for the flour mill).  I figured we were pretty safe on a Saturday.  We came home and had to unload everything in three separate spots so it was all in the correct location.

In two weeks it will be bridge time.  I have a couple of people coming to help and it should go quickly.  I am going to spend that Friday before setting all the tools up and getting ready so we can hit the ground running on Saturday morning.  I need to do some calculations so we are cutting everything at the correct lengths before then also.  I am getting excited to get this project done.  After that it is onto the barn and fixing the doors and adding a window so the hay does not get wet!!

Future bridge, these wood piles are 20 feet end to end, the bridge will be 38 feet long once completed.