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Posted on Sunday, October 01, 2006
All The Trimmings
Pauline and Brent came over Friday evening with their dogs. Brent
brought a small hard drive for the upstairs Dell and he installed it and
we started the job of rebuilding Windows and reinstalling the programs.
It will take several days of Windows Updates and tinkering before the PC
is functioning as it was before the split second the power went off. Oh
well, Brent said, "I have nothing else to do anyway!"
Saturday we ate breakfast of sausage biscuits that Linda fixed, then
went out to trim some large bushes. I hooked up the Mule to the black
trailer, Brent picked up the chainsaw and I filled the gas powered hedge
trimmers with fuel. The bushes were in front of the little house by the
highway. Pauline, Stacey and Linda joined us once we had the first bush
trimmed. We had designated the girls as the pickup crew. They piled the
branches and limbs on the trailer and we took them to the creek bank and
drug the debris off the trailer. After several trips with the Mule and
trailer, I took the tractor and used the bush hog to chop the debris
into small pieces. The second bush was about twelve feet high and about
twenty feet in diameter, so we used the scoop on the tractor to lift
Brent high enough to cut the top. I forgot to say, the hedge trimmers
were useless on the second bush, it took the chainsaw to trim it down to
size. We trimmed the smaller third bush and hauled the trimmings to the
creek and chopped them up with the bush hog too. Then we moved over to
Regina's and I bush hogged a row of weeds, then used the scoop to lift
up a couple of pieces of fence that were about twelve feet long. I
flipped those over on top of the trailer behind the Mule. We hauled
those over to the fire pit and set them off. I popped three pieces of
concrete out of the ground that had been anchoring pressure treated
fence posts. I used the scoop and graded the dirt to make it smooth
enough for Regina to be able to drive her mower over the area. A light
rain began, so we all went to our house and ate home made vegetable soup
that Linda had made.
Sunday morning Linda fixed us pancakes for
breakfast. After eating, Brent and I took the tractor and chainsaw,
headed across the creek and began to cut the brush growing in the ditch
between the hay fields. It was what Phil Garmon couldn't cut with the
sickle bar on his tractor. I first used the bush hog to chop the weeds
and brush as much as possible. Then Brent, once again, rode in the scoop
as I pulled the tractor to the edge of the ditch and let the scoop hang
over the edge so Brent could stand in the scoop and cut the brush
growing out of the ditch. It worked fairly well and we were done in
about forty minutes. Later in the afternoon we went to Grumpy's for
lunch. We returned home and dug some mums for Pauline and Brent before
they left for their house around 3 PM. Linda and I mowed until around 6
PM, when Regina came over and wanted us to dig mums. We went to the
patch and dug several mums for her to take to the Center for the Aging
Monday morning.
Posted on Tuesday, October 03, 2006
It's Not Over Till...
It has been a good time for trimming up the edges of the hay fields and cutting the weeds along our trails due to the fact that many of the leaves have fallen off. The last two days I have bush hogged the area above the hay shed and the sloped area heading back in the 'holler'. Linda didn't work today and she mowed the area behind the house trailer and where the old house used to be. The weather has been hot and dry for the last few days and we have tried to stop digging mums because the dirt is crumbling away from the roots. We took the "Mums For Sale" signs down late Sunday night and thought that would slow things down and maybe we would only have 'come back' or repeat customers. Well, that hasn't stopped the people from coming and buying mums. It seems like we have had more customers than when the signs were up. People are buying the mums we've had on display for three weeks. Linda felt bad about the condition of one mum that a customer was buying and just gave it to her, saying 'it had about had it'. It seems like they won't take no for an answer. We even had a florist stop this evening and after he bought six mums, I told Linda, I thought a florist would've had better taste when it came to picking out nice looking mums. Oh well, we have about 40 large yellow mums still in the patch, but 25 of those are sold to the lady that runs the Home Makers clubs. There will be a party for all the Home Maker clubs and she uses the mums she buys as door prizes. We have about 10 purple and maybe 20 orange left in the field also. Some of those are nice enough to sell, but it's too dry to dig the bigger ones. Maybe we will get rain on Wednesday night or Thursday and we can get the rest of the mums out of the field. We will have to store the 25 mums in the hay shed for the Home Makers until the party on the 19th of October. That's the plan anyway, it may change as time goes along.
Posted on Thursday, October 05, 2006
Last Big Dig
Stacey made us Pop Tarts along with coffee for breakfast this morning.
She let the ducks out and we piddled around for a little while. I asked
Linda to help me hook up the old tractor to the old bush hog. I was
planning on using it back in the 'holler' around the trees. I can't get
the blue Ford tractor in close enough because it has a top and the scoop
makes it too long. It is a lot easier to use the old Ford to trim areas
with trees. Around 10 AM we hooked up the black trailer to the Mule and
towed it to the mum patch. Linda wanted to dig some mums for the school
to use for open house, so we filled up the trailer and headed back to
the house. I parked the Mule and mums in front of the garage and jumped
on the old Ford tractor and headed back in the 'holler'. I was almost
finished when it began to sprinkle rain, so I made a few more passes and
headed to the hay shed. As I was rolling across the hay field it began
pouring down rain and by the time I pulled the tractor in the hay shed,
I was soaked. I walked to the house in the rain because I wasn't going
to get any wetter. I changed into some dry clothes and we were ready to
take the mums to the school. I pulled around to the back of the school
and Linda unlocked the gate and we unloaded the mums, pumpkins, gourds
and a hay bale. As soon as we set the mums down, the teachers began
buying them. Linda used labels and marked them 'sold' with the teachers'
names on which ever mum they wanted. Before we left, we had sold most of
the mums. The worst part of that was, we had already sold some of the
mums and were supposed to deliver those the next day. We will have to
dig 'replacement' mums I guess. After school was out, we set the
remaining mums at the front door and returned to the farm. Since it had
rained, we decided to dig the mums for the Home Makers. We went to the
patch in the Mule with 30 pots and dug mums to fill those. It took a
while and Regina stopped after she got off work. We pulled the hay wagon
full of mums to the hay shed and parked it inside. We had decided to
'hide' the wagon load of mums in there so no one would stop to buy them.
That worked for about 10 minutes. Before we could even walk out of the hay
shed, a guy stopped and wanted to buy mums. He looked at the mums on the
wagon, but I said those were already sold. He asked if we had more, so
we went to the patch and dug him 5 large mums. We made it back to the
house just a little before dark.
The guy that had just bought the mums followed us into the driveway. He jumped
out of his truck and told us that we didn't charge him enough for the
mums he bought. We talked it over and he was right, he paid us the
remaining money and we said thanks and then parked the Mule in the barn
and went inside.
Posted on Friday, October 06, 2006
Sold Out
We had sold mums at the school yesterday, so we went to the patch in the
Mule and dug a few to replace those that we needed for delivery. We
transferred the mums into the bed of the truck and headed to the school.
We found that we had six small mums left so we loaded those in the truck
and drove around to the front to pick up the large mums we had set in
front of the school. A girl came out and bought 4 of the small mums. We
loaded the large mums and headed to our delivery at the finance and loan
office. We unloaded the 6 large mums there and a woman came out from the
jewelry store and bought the two small mums we had left. So we had no
mums to take back to the house. On the way home, Linda said the woman
wanted 4 more large mums, so we took the Mule to the patch and dug
those, then took them back to her. We ate at Grumpy's while we were in
town. Back at the farm, I used the old tractor to bush hog the open area
back in the 'holler' and then took the old bush hog off the tractor. I
used the blue Ford tractor and scooped some gravel out of the ditch
between the hay fields and dumped it in a hole that water had washed out
in the gully near the hay shed. While I was working on the ditch, Linda
and Stacey went to town, so after I finished I took a ride in the Mule
to see what else needed bush hogging. I stopped and took a picture of
the empty mum patch.
I'm considering the patch as 'sold out'. Below is a picture of the last two
mums that are good enough for digging.
Linda and Stacey came home and around 5 PM a truck pulled in the
driveway. I went out and it was Bruce Beck and his son, Jesse. They were
on their way to Star Point and were having trouble with their S-10
pickup. Bruce tried charging the battery, but that didn't help. He made
a phone call to Gary Brown, who was also on his way to Star Point.
Brenda and Gary came by our house and picked up Bruce and Jesse. Bruce
took the battery with them to have it checked and was planning on
returning on Saturday to try to replace either the alternator or the
battery, then continue with the truck to Star Point. They all stayed and
talked till dark, then left.
Posted on Saturday, October 07, 2006
Brownsville Car Show
We left home early in the HHR and drove to Edmonton to check out the
Pumpkin Festival on the way to Brownsville. Joe Strange had stopped and
bought mums from us and told us to come by and check out his booth at
the Pumpkin Festival. He sells pumpkins in Burkesville and wants to
start buying most of the mums he sells from us next year. The Pumpkin
Festival was on the Court House Square and in the streets around the
Court House. Joe had a lot of pumpkins, straw bales, gourds, squash and
other fall items for sale. His son air brushes faces and characters on
the pumpkins too. There is a picture of his booth below along with
another showing some of the other booths at the festival.
We bought some sausage biscuits for breakfast from one of the
vendors and Linda bought two blueberry bushes to plant at the farm.
After talking with Joe a little while and seeing the 182 lb pumpkin he
had brought to the big pumpkin contest we loaded back in the HHR and
headed to Pauline and Brent's house in Smith's Grove. We dropped off our
dog, Missy, to stay with Pico and Poco, while we went on to see the car
show where Brent had entered the 1958 Triumph TR3. We parked behind the
bank and walked about a block to the show that was being held on the
Edmonson County Court House Square. There were quite a few cars and
trucks that were waiting to be judged.
The Lion's Club was selling BBQ dinners including desserts, so I had
to 'donate' my money for lunch. I chose BBQ chicken and baked beans with
pineapple upside down cake. After eating, I walked around and checked
out more of the vehicles and bumped into a buddy from the Corvette
Plant. Johnny Minyard and his wife had entered their Dodge 'Lil Red
Express' pickup truck in the show.
They described some of the work they had done on the truck and afterwards,
John and I walked around talking, while looking at some of the other
vehicles. I remembered that John had been working on the truck when I
was still working at the Corvette Plant. Most of the other builders said
their vehicles were multi-year projects too. Later in the day, Johnny
was presented a trophy by the judges for his excellent work on the
pickup. Linda and I were totally surprised when the announcer called
Brent's name and presented him with a trophy for the TR3.
After the trophies were presented, the car show was over and the owners fired
up their motors and left in a roar. We let Stacey ride with Brent and we
followed a few minutes later. We dinked around a little while at Brent's
and then headed back to Burkesville a little after dark.
Posted on Monday, October 09, 2006
Really Nice Day
After coffee, Linda and Stacey left in the Mustang for a trip to
Campbellsville and I remained home. I rode around the farm in the Mule
and decided to use the tractor to clean up a ditch I had dug a couple
years ago. It had weeds growing all around, so I first backed the
running bush hog over the entire 75 foot length of the ditch. Then I
turned the tractor around and used the scoop to clean out the bottom and
lift the debris and dirt out. That took a little over two hours. I've
got another 200 feet yet to do. I returned to the house and drove the
HHR to town and ate lunch at Subway. Back at the house, I decided to
ride around the farm on a 4-wheeler as it was too nice to stay inside.
A perfect day in my opinion, 83 degrees with scattered clouds and a
slight breeze. Well, there was one 'fly' in the ointment, sort of. There
were lady bugs by the millions flying everywhere. I locked the garage
door down, remembering how the lady bugs had invaded last year. We had
thousands in our garage from opening the garage door, once inside the
garage, it wasn't long until they were all over the ceilings of the
house. Hopefully we can avoid that this year. Linda and Stacey returned
home from shopping and Danny Allen and his wife stopped to buy mums.
Danny had worked with Boils Construction on our house and was interested
to see how we had finished the landscaping and upstairs room. We told
them there weren't many mums left, but we went to the patch and dug them
eight. Linda potted the mums and Danny set them in the back of his
truck. We talked a little while and then they drove out of the patch, we
went back to the house and Linda fixed supper.
I don't care who
comes to buy mums, there aren't any more for sale!
Posted on Tuesday, October 10, 2006
Ditch Work
About 8:30 AM I started the blue Ford tractor and went back to work on
the ditch. I figured out that I could just set two wheels in the ditch
and drive to the other end with the bush hog running to cut down the
weeds and small trees that had grown over the summer. That went a bunch
quicker than backing the bush hog over the ditch the entire length. I
cleaned out where I had a black pipe to allow for crossings and finished
scooping out the deepest part of the ditch.
I used the scoop to scrape and level the dirt I had removed, then
returned the tractor to the hay shed and went inside. Linda, Stacey and
I went to town for lunch. We stopped at the Corner Pool and Lunch and
found out it had been sold and was now the Corner Cafe. The place was
the same, only the people had been changed. The menu hadn't changed and
our waitress was the same one as before. Linda told me the previous
owner was working at the hardware store. I guess she had got tired and
wanted a regular job. We stopped at the video shack and rented two DVDs
and went home. Back at the farm I took a 4-wheeler ride and found a new
job that I didn't know about. Trees down!
We haven't had any rain or wind since I've been back that trail, so I don't
know what caused those trees to fall, but there they are, laying across
the trail. Maybe we should call the farm "Falling Timber"? I've heard
that if you don't have the woods logged the trees will die and fall
over. But it was logged a few years before we started taking care of the
farm, and those trees aren't really that big anyway. Those trees won't
be good for burning in the stove, they are too rotten, I'll just have to
cut them into pieces small enough for me to move out of the trail.
Cleaning up trees that fall 'out of the blue' is probably my second
biggest job. Mowing takes the top spot. I saw Larry picking up his rolls
of hay and he thinks he will be able to unroll those and maybe the cows
will eat them. He said there were about 20 rolls that had been in the
flooding creek water. It was almost dark as I went inside.
Posted on Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Somerset Shopping Trip
Rain was coming down and the forecast was for scattered showers the rest of the day, so we loaded in the HHR and headed towards Somerset. We took the DVDs back to the video shack and continued east on Highway 90 out of Burkesville. About half way there, Linda declared she was ready to eat, so the first place we stopped was Fazoli's for lunch. We made several more stops including the Somerset Mall, Office Depot, Paul's Discount, Home Worx and a few other places. We also stopped at Aldi's and loaded up on canned supplies for the pantry at home. Big Lots was our last stop and then we headed back home on the Cumberland Parkway. We were watching the lightning strikes a little to the north of our intended path, but ran right through some heavy downpours that included some small hail. As we neared home, the rain was mostly behind us, but after pulling the HHR in the garage and unloading our supplies, I checked the rain gauge and there was a little over two inches in it.
Posted on Friday, October 13, 2006
Friday The 13th First Frost
Last night there were several weather forecasts for frost, so I backed
the HHR out of the garage and parked it in the driveway. I went to the
hay shed and started the old tractor and let it run while I opened the
door on the end of the shed, then I pulled the tractor around and hooked
up the hay wagon full of mums. I towed the wagon to the house, unhooked
it and pushed the wagon of mums in the garage. Linda and Regina were
down at the mum patch digging mums. They ended up selling eight more
mums, where they got them I don't know. They came back to the house and
we had a meeting about growing mums next year. We talked about what mums
had done well and what mums had not done as well. We decided to order
1,100 mums next year, which will be one hundred more than we ordered
this year. We are going to order a few new types of multicolored mums
that we haven't grown before. Having paid for the tiller we purchased
with portions of the profits from the last two years, next year we
should be able to show a bigger profit to split. As with everything, ah,
next year will be better!
The heat pump was pumping heat through the house last night, it was
the coldest night so far this fall. This morning there was a heavy frost
as the temperature had been down to 31 degrees and the sky was crystal
clear. I don't know how the mums would have done in the hay shed,
probably ok, but I didn't want to take a chance, since Edith has ordered
the thirty we have on the wagon for the Home Makers. I guess it's time
to bring some of the wood we've cut and split to the back porch and get
ready to use the wood stove. The temperature is going back up to the mid
70s for next week, but sooner than I want, the cold weather will be here
to stay. The first frost came earlier this year, last year it was
October 28th when we had the first frost.
Posted on Saturday, October 14, 2006
Dog Sitting
Pauline and Brent brought Pico and Poco when they came over late Friday night. Pauline, Linda, and Stacey loaded their bags in the car and Brent drove away about 9 AM heading for IN. I stayed home to do the dog sitting. The crazy thing about it is, Cooter is just as big a baby as the little dogs when they are here. He wants to be inside and doesn't want to go out unless they all go outside. I think Cooter is trying to make the change to being a 'house dog'. I fed them a Mc D's cheeseburger for supper and gave Cooter some table scraps. I still have the mums in the garage as there was a frost again last night. I think the mums will be ok to move out Monday evening, as the forecast is for milder nights.
Posted on Sunday, October 15, 2006
Wood Work
Earlier in the summer, probably around early June, a large tree fell along the edge of the hay field. I didn't cut it up then because I didn't want to ruin the hay. I didn't cut it the next time that Garmons cut the hay because it was 90 degrees a lot of the time and that's not a good time to cut wood. So today was a good day for cutting, cool and a slight breeze. I started the blue tractor and drove across the creek to the spot where the tree had fell and hooked the chain to the trunk of the tree and then to the scoop of the tractor. I slid the tree from behind another tree and backed out with the root end of the tree dangling in the air under the scoop. I backed the tractor across the field dragging the tree to the edge of the creek so that any junk limbs that were to be cut off could be shoved into the creek easily. I unhooked the chain and went back to where the tree had fell, then used the scoop to push the small limbs into the edge of the woods. I started the bush hog and cleared away the tall grass and weeds that hadn't been cut because of the debris, then drove back to the hay shed and parked the tractor. I loaded the chainsaw, climbed in the Mule and drove over and hooked up the black trailer. After driving across the creek to the location of the tree, I started the saw and cut the tree trunk into pieces. I loaded the pieces on the trailer and pulled it to the hay shed, where I backed the trailer inside and hit the dump lever, then rolled the pieces off next to the splitter. The splitter needed gas, so I drove to the upper barn and parked the Mule, put the gas can in the back, then went inside and let the dogs out. I loaded the dogs in the truck after a few minutes and we rode to Columbia and picked up 5 Wendy's sandwiches. One for me, two for Poco, Pico, and Missy and two for Cooter. Cooter was waiting back at the house. We ate our sandwiches, then drove back to the farm and fed Cooter his sandwiches. We checked out the water level in the pond to let the dogs do any business they needed to do before putting them back inside. I went back to the hay shed and split some of the wood after filling the splitter's gas tank. I quit before very long and went to put the ducks up and let the dogs out again. Better safe than sorry!
Posted on Monday, October 16, 2006
Pickup At Smith's Grove
It was raining as morning came, so I opened the garage door and after letting the ducks out of their cage, I pulled the hay wagon full of mums out into the driveway. The little dogs ran around outside while I was out there moving the wagon. After getting the dogs rounded up and back inside, I went to the hay shed and split the remaining wood I had cut and dumped in the shed. Around 1 PM, Linda called from the car in Louisville and said they were on their way home from IN. I loaded up the dogs and some stuff I needed to take and we headed to Smith's Grove to pick up Linda and Stacey who were returning with Pauline and Brent. I pulled in their driveway and only had to wait about 20 minutes till Brent drove in with the girls. We went inside while they unwound for a few minutes and played with the dogs. I heard stories about what had happened and who they had seen the rest of the evening as we all loaded in our HHR and went in to Bowling Green. I returned an item to Office Depot while Brent returned some things to Best Buy. Pauline needed to buy something at Penny's while Brent and I checked out some prices on pressure treated lumber at Lowe's. We picked up the girls, then we took Linda to Kohl's and over to Hobby Lobby where she bought a gift for a member of the Home Maker's Club. Finally, the shopping was done and we stopped at Applebee's for steak dinners. The steaks were good and after eating we headed back to Pauline and Brent's house for some more conversations before we left for the farm around 9 PM.
Posted on Tuesday, October 17, 2006
Water
Linda was to work at the school, so she left early. We had two days of
light rain and I had pushed the wagon of mums out of the garage and let
the rain water them naturally. I decided since it was cloudy to leave
them outside.
The small streams coming out of the 'hollers' are running again and
make nice natural water features. The recent rains were not enough to be
real 'gully washers' but have rinsed a lot of the leaves out of the
hills. Even with the rain knocking some of the leaves off the trees, the
hills are still filled with color.
After lunch in town, I finished cutting up the tree I had drug out
to the edge of the hay field and Stacey picked up the smaller pieces of
wood and loaded them on the trailer. We hauled the pieces to the hay
shed, then I split the larger pieces with the log splitter while Stacey
stacked the split wood. Larry Anderson stopped and paid me for the hay
he had cut and we talked about cleaning out the creek in a few places.
He has access to Cumberland County's heavy equipment and is using a
front loader to move a couple of gravel bars. The gravel bars form and
then scrub trees grow on them, then stuff catches on the scrub trees and
the areas get bigger until they block the creek water. Larry said he is
shoving over the scrub trees and covering them with the gravel to make
the creek banks higher. 
He hopes this will keep some of the flooding creek water out of the hay fields
and flowing down the creek faster. I have found battling with nature is
always unpredictable and when I think I have won, nature throws in
something new that I never expected. I think what Larry has planned will
help though. Linda came home from school and later we went to Pizza Hut
for the 'Family Special'.
Posted on Thursday, October 19, 2006
Home Makers Party
Late Wednesday evening, Regina, Stacey, Linda and I wrapped the pots the
mums were in and set 30 of them in the red trailer. Linda has been
working every day at the school, so today Stacey and I went to Subway
for lunch. Linda called from town around 3:30 PM and said the church was
open and we could haul the mums in and set them inside. It was raining
so I backed the trailer almost to the door, then I asked Stacey to hand
the mums out to me, I carried them inside and Linda set them on the
stage and steps. It took about an hour to unload the mums and carry them
inside. Stacey rode back to our house with Regina and Linda followed me.
Stacey and I remained home while Linda and Regina went to the party.
Linda said, Edith acknowledged Bonnie Holly for her 500 hours of
voluntary community service.
There was a dinner of BBQ, beans, potato salad and dessert for a $5
donation. Then the Home Maker's 'Comedy Beauty Contest' was started as
contestants paraded down the aisle and were judged.
Teresa, the lady with the walker, bribed the judge with a $5 bill and was
then declared the winner. The mums were given away at the end of the
party.
Posted on Friday, October 20, 2006
Gravel Bar Moved
Larry worked on the gravel bar near the mum patch for a day and a half.
He used the front loader to dig the gravel and sand and move it to the
creek bank. Some places the gravel was five to six feet deep and as he
encountered trees, he pushed those to the edge and buried them with
gravel.
The stream of water had been about seven to ten feet wide in places and now it
is about thirty feet wide at the narrowest place. The widening should
improve the water flow and reduce the backup of water on our upstream
hay fields. Larry thinks building up the banks will prevent creek water
from flowing through Regina's fields too.
I had mentioned that there was another place between Garmon's Farm
and ours, and if he had time he could work on it. He was able to move
the gravel bar and pile it along the creek bank at that place too. After
Larry was done, I rode the 4-wheeler up the road to Garmon's barn, where
they were stripping tobacco.
I had already talked to Phil about Larry moving the gravel bar, but
I wanted to mentioned that the gravel had been moved. Phil was glad it
was done and hadn't cost either of us any money.
Posted on Monday, October 23, 2006
Hardware Store
The principal had called last evening and told me that Linda didn't need
to work at the school Monday. I relayed the message to Linda last night.
This morning at 6 AM the school called and said they needed Linda to
work. Linda got ready and went to the school. About an hour later, Linda
returned home saying that neither child that needs a helper came to
school, so they didn't need her to work. Hmm. As it has been getting
colder, I decided to take the Sea Ray to have it winterized and asked
Stacey and Linda if they wanted to ride along. They did, so we took the
truck and hooked up the boat trailer and towed the boat to Davidson's
Marina. We left the boat there and went to Jone's to eat lunch. When we
finished I pulled into the lumber lot at the hardware store. We loaded 6
pcs of 4" by 4" by 16', 4 pcs of 2" by 8" by 12', 12 pcs of 2" by 6" by
12', 2 pcs of 2" by 4" by 16', all pressure treated lumber. I went
inside and picked out 8 lag screws and some other screws to put together
the wood. I paid and we started back to the farm driving about 40 mph
hoping that the wood would make the trip without falling out of the
truck. We made it OK and I backed the truck to the hay shed and unloaded
the wood. Below is a plan I've drawn using
Google's FREE SketchUp program.
If you have SketchUp you can click the image to download the file and rotate
the image and work with it as you see fit.
I wish working with the
real thing was as easy as working with the drawing software!
Linda
and Stacey went to the house and then Linda left to work at the day care
for the after school kids.
Posted on Wednesday, October 25, 2006
Construction Begins
Since the mowing seems to be done for the year, the mums are all sold,
and the weather is a little cooler, I have started work on building a
shed on the end of the hay shed. When I had the hay shed built, I bought
enough metal siding to completely enclose the open side. But after using
the shed as built, I have decided to leave the side open as it enables
easier access to what ever is inside. The orientation of the shed has
resulted in hardly any rain or snow being blown inside anyway, so I'm
going to use the extra metal siding to construct the shed on the end.
I've dug six holes and set the 16' posts in them, struck a level line
across them, removed the posts and cut them the appropriate lengths.
With some help from Linda I have placed three poles in the holes,
plumbed them, and lag screwed them to the existing hay shed. I then set
the other 3 posts and we secured those with temporary boards to hold
them in place after plumbing them vertically. Linda filled in the holes
with dirt and tamped it firm around each post.
I'm done for a few days as it is supposed to rain and we are going
to Bowling Green for a Dierks Bentley show at Diddle Areana. Hopefully,
the rain will set the posts in solid while we are gone.
Posted on Friday, October 27, 2006
Dierks Bentley Concert
Our Thursday started early, getting ready to go by hooking up the red
trailer to the truck, taking showers, drying hair, and loading Missy in
the truck. The first stop we made was to eat at Mancino's in Glasgow,
then to Lowes to buy some pressure treated lumber for the shed I'm
building. After about an hour of sorting the wood, loading it on the
cart, paying and then loading the wood in the red trailer, we left Lowes
and pulled in to the gas station and filled up with gas. We left Glasgow
and went to Smith's Grove and then over to Pauline and Brent's house. We
went inside and played with the dogs a few minutes, then loaded Brent's
lawn mower and riding mower in the trailer. We left Missy there and
headed into Bowling Green about 3:30 PM. I wanted to buy a cordless
drill/driver at Sam's Club, so we stopped there and shopped for a while.
We checked out and loaded the stuff in the truck, then headed to WKU and
the weather had turned foul. The rain was coming down hard, then it
would lighten up, then rain hard again. I found Coach Powell's house
with a little help from Linda and we were lucky that Joey, Coach
Powell's wife, was backing out of the drive as we pulled up. Linda asked
if it would be OK for us to park the truck there while we went to the
concert. She said yes, so we parked as she left. We walked in the rain
towards Diddle Arena and Joey pulled beside us and we talked a few
minutes to Coach and Joey, then continued to the arena. There were lines
to buy tickets and also lines to enter the building. They were too long
to wait in, so we walked on around the arena and found a much shorter
line. As we were about to enter the line, Stacey met one of the mascots
for a radio station that was sponsoring part of the concert. We got in
line and was able to move under the entrance and get out of the rain,
whew, that was a major benefit.
The time was about 5:20 PM, ONLY one hour and forty minutes till the
doors open. Really, the time went fairly quick as there were kids around
making jokes and cutting up. We noticed we weren't the oldest people in
line, but close to it! Finally, the doors opened and we rushed inside to
find that there were NO CHAIRS on the main floor, so we picked some
seats in the raised area that were centered on the stage.
This is when we realized we were 'of a different generation'. We
didn't have a cell phone to call our friends and say, "Where are you
sitting, I'm sitting right back here!" Almost everyone around us was
doing that very thing, it was funny to Linda and me, almost like a cell
phone was a status symbol that was a required piece of their 'outfit'.
It seemed like they would have been lost without that 'cell phone
security blanket' to play with when they had nothing else to do.
Similiar to a pacifier given to an infant. Whatever, it's just an
observations of two non-cell phone users. Oh well, the show started
about 7:40 PM with the Randy Rogers Band playing the first set and they
were pretty good. Their set lasted around 50 minutes, then about a 15
minute intermission while the equipment was changed.
Next up was Miranda Lambert, and she was quite a bit better. The
crowd knew several of her songs and she had them singing along and
dancing at the rear of the arena. She played a little under an hour and
ended her performance with her hit, "Kerosene", and the crowd loved it.
So there was another short intermission, then the main show began a
few minutes before 10 PM. The crowd was extremely loud when Dierks
Bentley took the stage and he responded to their enthusiasm. I will say
he was a superior performer that had the crowd involved better than most
performers we have seen. Dierks interacted with the crowd and brought
them to a frenzy several times by changing a few lines in songs. Once he
seemed to fall down and let the girls grab him, I believe it was all
planned, but it had an effect of generating excitement through the
crowd. Later, Dierks began a song and there were five or six bras thrown
on the stage toward him. He reacted by picking those up and gesturing
towards the direction from where they had been thrown. He managed to
dance with a girl in the crowd without leaving the stage and he
generally put on a great show.
Dierks finished his set with "What was I Thinkin'?" while a dozen or
more 'little white tank tops' were thrown on the stage. After about 3
minutes he returned for an encore. He played four more songs, then
brought out Randy Rogers and Miranda Lambert to all join in a finale.
The concert ended at 11:30 PM and we walked to the truck and drove to P&B's
house, hooked up the trailer, talked to Brent a minute or two and left
for Burkesville. We made it home, driving through the rain and fog, a
few minutes before 2 AM.
Posted on Saturday, October 28, 2006
Hayride
Pauline and Brent came over around 8 PM Friday night, so Brent and I
were able to start work on the framing for the shed early. We screwed
the joist hangers on the beams I had marked and then we screwed those in
the notches I had cut on top of the posts. We cut 2 by 4s and screwed
those in place to hold the posts vertical, then measured and cut joists
for the ends.
We started cutting joists to fit between the beams with the hangers
and were able to cut 3 or 4 before we were called to lunch.
Linda, Pauline and Stacey had fixed cheeseburgers and they tasted really good
after working and tasting pressure treated sawdust all morning. It was a
little after 1 PM when we finished lunch and Brent and I went back to
the shed and put up our tools. It was almost time for us to go out on
Jones' Ridge to a fall party. Linda had aired up the tires on the
4-wheelers and the girls had made some spiced cider and candy corn mixed
with nuts to take to the party. Linda drove the Mule, Stacey drove a
4-wheeler, Pauline rode with Brent on a 4-wheeler, and I rode a
4-wheeler. We followed Linda to Nancy and Steve Riddles place. They have
land out there and have built a pole barn that everyone used as shelter
off and on during the night. We immediately got involved in a game of
corn toss while drinking pop and snacking on several crock pots of soup,
chili, nachos, and Halloween candy. A couple people asked if I had a hay
wagon, which we do, so Brent and I rode one of the 4-wheelers back to
the farm and unhooked the bush hog, hooked up the hay wagon, loaded on
10 bales of hay and pulled it up the hill to the party. It must have
taken at least 1/2 hour to do all of that. I parked the tractor and went
back inside, but was told people were already loaded on the wagon and
ready to go for a hay ride. I went out and started the tractor and more
jumped on the wagon.
It was a great place for a hay ride, old logging trails that weaved
through the woods along the top of the hills. We never met a single car,
saw a few turkeys and 3 deer. After about a 20 minute trip, I turned the
tractor and wagon around, raised the scoop and let Brent take a picture
of everyone on the hay wagon. I pulled the wagon back to the party place
and some of the guys had built a large bonfire.
There were hot dogs and marshmallows being cooked over the fire and
people were having a nice time. Some of the kids were dressed in their
Halloween costumes.
After dark, a couple of the adults asked me to take the kids for a
short hay ride, so I told a couple of the boys to get the rest of the
kids loaded on the hay wagon. The adults headed out on 4-wheelers as we
were pulling away from the pole barn. They had me take the kids over to
an old graveyard and stop the tractor, then everyone pointed their
flashlights at the headstones. Someone told a scary story and then I
started the tractor and we continued on our way. The kids weren't really
scared, but as I went up a small hill, the tractor died and the lights
all went out. All of a sudden, the adults jumped out of the woods with
scary masks on and yelling loudly. This time the kids were screaming and
hollering as the adults grabbed them. That worked just as planned. We
rode back to the barn and I parked the tractor. The parents had other
games and events to entertain the kids. We left the tractor there
overnight as I didn't have lights on the hay wagon. So about 9 PM Linda
and Pauline rode in the Mule while Brent and Stacey rode one 4-wheeler
and I rode the other one as we headed home. It was a cold ride home!
Posted on Monday, October 30, 2006
Shed Construction Full Speed Ahead
Sunday
Brent had a taste of working on the shed and he was
eager to start Sunday morning, maybe his body wasn't as sore as mine.
OK, maybe full speed ahead was a little too much, it was more like take
our time and make some progress, but don't kill ourselves. Anyway, we
started cutting the joists or rafters and screwing those in place. We
were doing fairly well until we run out of 2" by 6"s. Whatttttt? We
needed one more to finish the roof. We jumped in the truck and went to
town, but the hardware store's lumber lot was locked, so we returned to
the farm and continued working by laying the slats across the joists and
screwing those in place on the half of the shed that had all the joist.
We also screwed on the 2" by 4"s on the sides to use to fasten the metal
in place. The girls called us to a lunch of chicken and rice with
steamed vegetables. We ate and then Pauline and Brent took long naps. I
went back and screwed some boards along the back wall of the wood shed
to stack wood against. Brent came back down and we finished up as much
as we could do before they packed up their dogs and headed for Smith's
Grove about 3:30 PM.
Monday
Linda went to work at the school, so Stacey and I were on our
own. I called Davidson's Marine and Joe said the Sea Ray was almost done
and I could pick it up after lunch. Stacey and I left the farm and drove
to a place that sells metal for pole barns. I ordered 8 pieces of metal
13' long for the roof of the wood shed. The lady said they should be
there Thursday. We drove back past the farm and on to town and stopped
at the bank, then over to the hardware to buy one more 2" by 6". I
loaded it in the back of the truck and went inside and paid. We then
stopped at Subway for sandwiches. After eating we drove south out of
town on 61 to Davidson's. I paid Joe for winterizing the boat, then
hooked it to the truck and we headed back to the farm. I backed the boat
in the shed and unhooked the trailer, then parked the truck in the hay
shed. Stacey helped me work on the wood shed a little while, then we
went to the house. I called the stone quarry and ordered a load of
crushed stone. The pit man said they would bring it their last load of
the day on the driver's way home. I went back and finished the framing
on the wood shed using a ladder and the power driver.
About a half hour before dark, the dump truck brought the gravel and dumped
the load at the edge of the driveway. I moved a few scoops with the
tractor to the back of the barn and 3 scoops to fill the floor of the
wood shed.
Posted on Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Happy Halloween
The forecast was for scattered showers, so I went outside early and used
the scoop on the tractor to move some gravel to the back of the upper
barn. We have been parking the 4-wheelers and Mule in the loft of the
upper barn and when it had rained the Mule tore up the grass and was
begining to make tracks that turned to mud. The gravel will let us get
in and out of the barn without walking or driving through the mud.
Stacey and I also leveled the gravel I had dumped in the area for the
wood shed. Later, we made a trip to town for lunch and rented 3 DVDs at
the movie shack. Linda came home and she fixed us ham and cheese
sandwiches for supper and then fixed the stuff for the 'trick or
treaters'. Around 5:30 PM we received the first of several groups.
Since Linda has been working at the school, more kids are coming for
treats. Most of the kids' parents were with them and came inside too.
The 'trick or treat' time was over at 7:30 PM, and we watched "RV",
starring Robin Williams afterwards.
