All posts by xdfben

Ex dairy farmer, theater guy, Husband, Dad and email addict...

2026, crops, Farming Update, Government, Music, Uncategorized

This week in our little corner-

June 20, 2026 xdfben 46 Comments

This week’s farming update from Ben

The rain predicted for Wednesday morning evaporated before it got here. We just got sprinkles. And it’s still rather cool. A bit under normal temps. Growing degree units are still above normal, thanks to the early spring. Corn is already knee high, so that’s good. It’s almost canopied meaning that will keep the weeds down. The soybeans are maybe 6″ tall. Long ways to go for canopy for them. The co-op sprayed the soybeans for weeds this week.

One of Kelly’s co-workers was in a bicycle accident and has broken her clavicle. Her collar bone. And you all know there’s not much to do about that. Strap it to your chest and go about your day. This woman was back at work two days later. Typing with one hand. She’s a very busy person in the first place, and she said she was home staring at the walls, so she may as well be at work. With one hand. Been there, done that.

I was at a business the other day, and the clerk was typing with her two pointer fingers. And I thought again, thank goodness for 11^th grade typing class. And I chose that myself; Mom and Dad didn’t even push it on me. And back in the 1980’s I don’t know why I would have thought that? But good for me. Glad I did. I’m still trying to learn the numeric keyboard without looking at it. 559096 3940 175 5607259357028593164 That was me trying to type out some familiar numbers without looking. It’s 85% accurate… Not quite good enough for my accounting though.

My brother-in-law is missing his left pinky finger. He says the Q and Z aren’t a big deal, but he sure misses the A.

I had election judge training this week; regular and head judge. And since I’ve been doing this for 20 some years, there’s not much to keep it interesting. So I turned it into a game of judging their grammar. They talked about when your vote has been “casted“ really? Casted? And at one point she said something was done “correctionally”. I spent a long time thinking about that. Is correctionally a word? I wanted to look around the room and say ‘did you all hear that? Is that what she said’? One guy talked about the “Safe At Home” program, but it sure sounded like he was saying “Save At Home”. Hmmm… Call me judgemental.

The farm this week has been odds and ends. I threw out a bunch of wildflower seed expecting rain. So now I’m out there with the water tank in the back of the gator getting that watered– fingers crossed. I figured if I didn’t water, it wouldn’t rain, and if I did water it would, so I watered. And it worked! We got just over half an inch on Wednesday afternoon.

Monday evening the dogs were barking at something down in the feedroom. Kelly had gone down and opened the door but didn’t see anything. At one point, Luna came and literally got Kelly. Clearly indicating she needed to come back down there. I went down to get some corn and when I turned on the auger to load more feed into the wall bin, a raccoon climbed out the top of the bin. She bounced off my shoulder and tried to make a get away. And there was the dogs and this raccoon at my feet. I have had my close encounters with raccoons before and didn’t really need another. At least I didn’t scream like a little girl this time, I just tried to get out of the way. Corn auger is still running, corn is spilling on the floor. It was a whole big thing.

Padawan is at a(nother) new job, so Padawan 2 is coming out to help. He’s been around before and he’s a good kid, too. I took the mower off the lawn tractor, sharpened the blades, replaced a spindle, (the bearing supporting a blade), changed the oil in the tractor and cut more grass. P2 replaced a carburetor on our secondary lawn mower, and we worked together replacing a fuel line between the tank and the fuel pump. Although it’s still not running. Hmmm…. While he was doing the carburetor I replaced the sediment bowl on Kelly’s C tractor. And that still leaks too. Geez, batting zero on these projects. P2 had success replacing a door latch and gas strut on a tractor door. We moved stuff around in the shed and got the corn planter and grain drill parked away until next spring.

We spotted this big moth on a tree.

What is this? It was about 3 inches tall. Six legs, furry antenna. Maybe a Cecropia?

The summer festival season has kicked off. It was the 152 Annual Viola Gopher count on Wednesday and Thursday with a parade and fireworks and a street dance. Daughter’s group usually goes to the parade, but she wasn’t really interested. She told me only lazy people go to parades. I tried to explain I didn’t think that was exactly true, but I had trouble not giggling and she’s not interested in rational explanations anyway. She likes to move, not sit and watch a parade. We let her stay home.

It’s also Elgin Cheese Days Thursday – Sunday this week. Carnival rides, food trucks, and more dancing. I drove through Elgin on Thursday, on my way home from getting more parts in Plainview. There were a lot of garage sales, and two little girls selling earrings on a boulevard. And the local strawberry farm has fresh strawberries. Oh My Goodness they’re good. They make my knee’s buckle they’re so good.

Peas are being harvested and guys are planting soybeans following the peas.

I needed a few new farm shirts, so I dug to the back of the closet, found a couple with long sleeves I haven’t worn in years. Cut the sleeves off and they’re having a new life.

Driving home from Plainview, I heard Spike Jones singing “Chloe”. If the title doesn’t ring a bell for you, allow me: A phone rings, he answers, he says, “You don’t say. You DON’T say. You don’t say.” Hang’s up. The band says, “Who was it?” Spike replies, “He didn’t say.” Then later, phone rings again, same bit. Again they say “Who was it?” “Same guy.” Makes me laugh every time. I looked up the song on YouTube. Following Spike Jones was Cab Calloway and the Nicolas Brothers. Now those guys could dance!

Kelly is hosting a ‘movie on the farm’ night for her work people. The Residents and Fellows in the Pathology program come out and we do a bonfire and show a movie on the side of the crib. This will be the fourth year. First year got rained out. Second year was sparsely attended. Third year was in September and it was so cold and rainy we moved it into the shop and machine shed and showed the movie on the shop door. It was a good crowd and they all had a good time. This year looks like sunny but cool weather. She gave them a choice of movie and I haven’t heard what it will be yet. They do a popcorn machine, a root beer keg, they got vanilla ice cream, and the fixings for S’mores. P2 and I got out some tables, and straw bales for seating, cleaned out the garage, and he cut grass.

And then Sunday is Father’s Day.

Happy Fathers Day Dad’s!

ARE YOU JUDGEMENTALLYIST?

WHAT MOVIE IS GOOD FOR OUTSIDE?

2026, Farming Update, Uncategorized

Random Observations (and farming)

June 13, 2026 xdfben 22 Comments

This week’s farming update from Ben

First off, I am not a runner. Never have been and don’t expect I ever will be. So kudos to those of you that do get out there and run. Having said that, some runners have a much better form than others. And again, not criticizing anyone, this is just an observation. Some people just “glide” and they look so natural as they run. And others, they really don’t look like they’re enjoying it. And some look so “clunky”…I wonder if they’ll have joint issues in a few years. But still! At least they’re out there exercising.

The amount of construction going on in Northwest Rochester is kind of mind-boggling. There is dirt being moved everywhere, and there are so many excavators and dump trucks and earth moving equipment…it’s a kids dream come true! Most of the construction is for apartment buildings. So I guess it’s good for those construction companies, and the operators, and good for the developers. I don’t know how good it is for everyone else.

I was at this intersection Thursday:

Years and years and years ago, this was out in the country and this was a gravel road and I believe there was a trailer house in those trees. I remember going there to visit a friend of a friend or something. I don’t remember any of those details, but I’ve always had a good memory of locations and driving and I just know that I was there once. Now it’s a pretty major intersection on that northwest side of town, and I’m kind of surprised that the trees are still there.

====================================================

Back on the home front, the fire flies are back and that makes us happy.

Daughter had a birthday and she’s now 31! Wow.

We finally got some rain. Wednesday afternoon about 4:30 we were getting a nice light rain shower and then suddenly the wind picked up. Kelly and I were both working in the office, and papers blew off the desk and she went to close one set of windows while I was closing another set and in that short amount of time, the wind shifted around to the south and the rain came HARD and it was starting to get a little bit scary, and about then it was over. And then I got a call about a tree down on a township road. I was changing clothes when I got another call about the same tree. We had a few branches down on our driveway but nothing serious. Before I got to that tree, a sheriff Deputy called to tell me the tree was down. Yeah I know, thank you. Before I got there, I found a second tree down. It wasn’t blocking the road, just on the shoulder. Got that one cut up got and got a call about a third tree down. Finally got to the first tree, the Deputy was sitting there with his flashers on. We talked township business for a bit and by that point a second supervisor had shown up and the two of us cut up the tree. It was a limb from an oak tree and a lot bigger than it looked in the picture.

Objects may appear smaller than they actuallly are.

But we got it off the road, and we have a real good tree service the township works with. I told them they could come out the next day to pick up the mess.
The inch of rain that we got came pretty hard, pretty fast, and there was a little bit of erosion in my new waterway. The wind was so intense I saw some corn really bent over. It was about knee high and it should come back yet, but still, it is traumatic to the plant.
I thought maybe the new tile and the springs would be running again but nope, hardly anything there. We’re gonna need more rain than this I guess to cure the drought.

Rebuilt a little bit of fence in the area we call the swamp. The neighbors said they’re gonna bring their cattle out this weekend. I redid one corner of the fence where I planted the Tamarac trees and one little area that we mow and I needed a little more room for the lawnmower. It gave me an opportunity to dig out some bags of electric fence insulators that I still have but typically wouldn’t need to use anymore. I had some barb wire left on an old roll that I’m pretty sure I got from Kelly’s dad 25 years ago. (Not having cattle myself, I happily quit making fence.) It probably would’ve rusted away except it got a bunch of oil spilled on it once and that’s kept it from rusting. Which is good cause I needed about 30 feet of that.

I finally got the dog wash in the garage hooked up and operating. We had hot and cold water added in the garage a couple years ago, and that’s been very helpful, and we had a drain line put in at the same time. I built the walls and base and while I don’t have it tiled yet, I connected the drain and Luna and Humphrey both got baths.
Neither of them appreciated it as much as I did. But Humphrey did submit and stood quietly. He’s a good dog that way.

A niece and her husband came to visit along with their two girls. They have done a real good job convincing the oldest one how cool Uncle Ben and Aunt Kelly are. And when they come to Minnesota, going to visit Uncle Ben on the farm is a pretty big deal.
She throws out corn to the chickens, we collect eggs, we ride in the tractor and the gator.
She’s 5 1/2 years old. I might have a couple years yet that we are still cool.
Her little sister is about 2 1/2. She’s very busy. She’s figuring out we’re the cool aunt and uncle.

I think next week I’m gonna buy a couple bundles of shingles and re-shingle one side of the little building where we store bags of feed. The one side of the roof that needs work is only about 12′ x 8′. I shingled the south side several years ago but the North side desperately needs it.
I’ll get one of my summer kids to help shingle. A skill everyone should have.

Ever washed a cat?

Describe something graceful.

2026, crops, Farming Update, Uncategorized

GETTING BY

June 6, 2026 xdfben 21 Comments

This week’s Farming Update from Ben

You know, if he was gonna leave the excavator here for a week, the least he could’ve done was leave the key in it. He even locked the door. It’s like he doesn’t trust me. Or maybe just that he knows people like me….

Graduation season and the local newspapers have been highlighting the top graduates at the four High Schools in Rochester and you read about the achievements of these kids and where they’re going to college and what they’ve been involved with and double majors and even one triple major and pre-med and you look at their pictures, (We were all that young once!) plus I’m struck by how senior photos have changed. Nothing formal in the studios anymore; they’re sitting in the grass or leaning on a railing or holding a basketball, anything they want. One kid in shorts that I thought to myself I could hear my mother‘s voice “you can’t have your picture taken in shorts!”

Here’s a sub question, what do you think of that, good or bad they get to do what they feel like in the photos?

And how about those kids working two jobs? Supporting their families? Working a job, going to school, raising kids or supporting their parents, and just trying to survive? Too bad they don’t get celebrated in the papers more often.

I realized the other day we didn’t get any lilacs this spring. We have a row of lilac bushes 75 feet long and there was one branch on one end that got a few blossoms and nothing on the rest. I expected them to be coming and all the ones in town blossomed and ours are always a week later than that and then the other day I realize we never got any. They must’ve frozen off at some point. And then we have that one tree that does it in the fall and I don’t know what’s up with that either. But I miss the lilacs.

Let’s see, on the farm, the Oats was sprayed with fungicide, it looks really good this year and it should be heading out I’d say in a week.

Corn was sprayed last week with herbicide, the weeds are starting to get bad in places. Over on some of the rental ground there’s a neighbor that is not a fan of the spraying so the Co-op can only spray there when the wind is out of the north, or there’s no wind so there’s no drift around their place. Plus I asked the Co-op to leave an extra buffer around their place. And that’s not a problem, I completely understand where they’re coming from, it’s just tough to find the right weather conditions. It got sprayed Friday morning.

Last week I took the back off the chicken coop and have the fan going in there.

On Tuesday I had a contractor fill in a gully and dig in a tile line out in the pasture. This one area is what started all of this work I’m having done with SWCD this year. Soil & Water.

“Before” – The “S” line is the gully. It was too big to drive over even with a tractor.

img_6433-1 — Luna inspecting the new tile inlet

img_6435-1 — Padawan in his natural habitat. On his phone. Notice the spring water at his feet, the tile inlet in front of him, and the dozer finishing up in the background.

I was just gonna put a culvert there in the gully and fill it all back in but they said we should really get to the root of the problem which was a much better idea. There’ll still be some work to do on the upper end of this, building a small dam once the oats is off (because some of the dirt they’ll need will come from a field where the oats is). It’s sort of two problems: Some erosion at the top end, and springs on the bottom end where they put in the tile, which will take the spring water underground down to a swampy area, and then the other work up top will prevent further erosion. The excavator mentioned above was used to dig in the tile line. The work was inspected and approved Wednesday morning and I got it seeded down Wednesday afternoon. Just needs a little more rain than the .2” we’ve been getting. I also seeded down another area. It’s a long slope and I’m having a grass headland area created, with two small berms to help direct the water off to the side. Hard to get a good picture of the work done, but Humprhey approves.

Wednesday night Padawan and I went to the opera movie. I can’t tell you what it was called because I can’t pronounce it because it was all in Spanish. But it was about the day of the dead and the artist Frida Kahlo and her husband Diego Rivera. I was gonna go with Kelly and then she ended up with a work thing, so Padawan said he’d come with me. I let him leave at intermission. Which was longer than I expected him to last.

Thursday I spent a chunk of the day navigating one of the chloride trucks applying chloride oil as dust control on the township roads. It’s an annual thing.

Refilling. I was riding shotgun in the smaller truck.

Friday Padawan and I returned some left over seed, picked up some parts, and got a ton of egg layer ration. At the feed store, I saw a 50 pound bag of ‘Garlic Salt’. For cattle. They say it helps deter biting insects. It’s a natural way of stopping horn flies or face flies. HUH!

We also stopped at DQ.

Then when home, we went out in a corn field and measured out 175’, which is 1/100^th of an acre. Other years I’ve talked about measuring 17.5’ , 1/1000^th of an acre, and counting the plants, which gives us a ‘final stand’ count. A colleague told me yesterday, measuring 175’ is a much more accurate count. As I was riding around the township in the chloride truck, doing 2 mph up the road, I was looking at the corn “singulation”. That’s how well the planter does placing ONE kernel of corn EXACTLY where it should be. Not TWO kernels, or not SKIPPING a kernel, but ONE KERNEL ONLY EXACTLY THERE. My corn planter does a lousy job of singulation and it shows up in the rows now that it has emerged. They look terrible; lots of skips and doubles. Newer planters do better. But even at 99% singulation, when you look at a seed every six inches, and moving at ten MPH, it’s still gonna miss one every now and then. So I planted at a rate of 32,000 seeds / acre. Final stand count is between 28,200 and 30,500. Obviously, the better final stand count, the better crop.

I put some of the new purple LED lamps in the planter monitor.

It won’t make it plant better, but it makes me happy.

I replaced some bearings in the corn planter gauge wheels. The bearing presses into a hub. I put the bearings in the freezer in the shop, to shrink them a bit, then press them into the hub.

I heard a YouTube farmer say, “You can fill one hole with two gates, but you can’t fill two holes with one gate.” And as obvious as that sounds, anyone who has dealt with cattle knew exactly what he meant. We’ve probably all been in that situation.

I was sweeping out the feed shed before putting in the new pallet of egg layer. I have this broom in there.

I had to laugh. I must have a handle I could put on this. But the building is only 8’ x 12’. And I only sweep it out once or twice a year.

Are you ‘Making Do’?

2026, animals, chickens, crops, Farming Update, Technology, Theatre, Uncategorized

TICK’ED OFF

May 30, 2026 xdfben 30 Comments

This weeks farming update from Ben

Yeah, I know. When I was planting crops I commented on how nice it was to have good lights on the tractors and lights outside the shop so I could keep working after dark. But now that the crops are in, and I’m on the rest of my ‘to-do’ list, it’s a good thing it gets dark so I know enough to quit and come in the house.

Sometimes that happens because I’m still at the college so I don’t get home and doing anything until 5:00, or the last few days it was so hot I didn’t go out until late in the afternoon, I worked in the office and did bookwork and fought with websites and dealt with government bureaucracy in the morning, and then I went out and fixed the hole in the bottom of the feed room door and finally got half of the larch trees planted, and weed barrier around them one night, and then the next night rounded up the weed barrier that had blown away, got them all stapled down and found some hoses and gave the trees a good watering. I gotta find a good place to put about 10 more larch trees.

Kelly and I worked one night, finishing the mulch around the seedlings, and building the deer fence over the windbreak seedlings. The deer sure like the Ninebark. They aren’t bothering the gray dogwood, but they’re peeling the bark right off the Ninebark. Stupid deer. When we finished that night Kelly had 6, SIX ticks on her! And she had applied tick repelant! No one hates Hates HATES ticks more than Kelly. She still shivers when we talk about it. I said it’s because she’s irresistible.

I got a 12Volt pump hooked on the large water tote and that’s working pretty slick. Now one person can water the trees from the cab of the gator.

The dairy guys are working on that first cutting of alfalfa. Good weather for that. Some guys are making hay from cover crops they planted last fall, and will get soybeans in after they take that off.

I’ve got a contractor out and he’s gonna fill in a gully and construct a couple berms to help control erosion. And then fill in another gully, and get a tile inlet and perforated tile installed to prevent a gully from returning in a place that has springs. As dry as it is, the springs are pretty well stopped for now. It’s all part of the Soil & Water projects that I’ve got going this year.

I’ve got the last of my college rentals on Saturday, and then Tuesday is officially my last day for the year, but there is an ongoing project that I’ll stop and work on throughout the summer. It’s no big deal, doesn’t need to be done until fall. It’s sound baffling for the music department.

Padawan had a minor hiccup with his job so he’s still helping me out for a while. At least that’s what he says, that there was a minor hiccup. We believe 98% of what he tells us. “Trust but verify“

Soybeans are finally up enough we can see the rows.

They need some rain. I was talking with one of the agronomists from the Co-op the other day and she said everyone is in the same situation. Just waiting for rain.

Growing Degree Units: to Date 631, Normal is 370. 261 above normal… jeepers. Need some rain. The corn is looking real good, it’s about a foot tall. The co-op was out and sprayed for weeds on Thursday.

The chicks are enjoying being outside. They’re about half full size. They’re big enough to get OUT of the fence, but can’t figure out how to get back IN the fence. Unless Luna is “following” them, I’ve seen them freak out enough they fly over.

Chickens always look so ticked off.

Stop taking pictures and put me back in the pen!

Last week I worked a GOP debate at one of the local high schools. They brought in 3 candidates for governor. Three that “agreed to abide by the Republican Convention endorsement and support the candidate who the convention endorses”. Well, that left out a few.

Wasn’t much of a crowd to be honest.

I just turned on the lights and let the local TV station crew and the schools IT guys sort it all out. The technology of live broadcasting has really changed from the days of the Van with the big tower coming out the top. So that was kind of interesting.

In the past I have mentioned the monitor that works with the corn planter to alert me if a row stops planting seed. It’s a box with 6 light bulbs and orange covers over them. This is 1980’s technology and they’re like old flashlight bulbs. Well, one burned out on row six, and I really hoped it wasn’t row six that ran out of seed first. I was almost done planting and I didn’t have a spare. So I figured I’d get LED versions of those bulbs. And then trying to get a bulb out of the unit, I dropped the bulb in the tractor cab and it vanished. I thought for sure I saw it in a tote I carry in the tractor and I took out the paper towels to get the bulb and it still wasn’t there. Don’t you hate that? Where could it go?? Well, no matter, I took out another one. And then I found out I can get PURPLE replacement bulbs. Well, yes, Please and Thank you! Now I’m looking forward to planting crops next spring with my purple light bulbs. I hope they work. Sometimes, because LED’s take so much less power, it messes up the circuitry and things don’t work right… In theater lighting, sometimes we have to put a ‘dummy load’ backstage, just something like a 15 watt incandescent bulb to pull enough current to make the LED dim properly. New technology has mostly solved that, but it’s not unheard of to need a dummy load in addition to the LED. In regard to the planter box. I may need to leave one row as an old bulb. We’ll see.

HAVE YOU EVER HAD ‘TRUST BUT VERIFY’ ISSUES?

ANYONE TICKED YOU OFF THIS WEEK?

2026, crops, Farming Update, History, Mysteries, Nature, Science, Uncategorized

This Week

May 23, 2026 xdfben 50 Comments

This week’s Farming update from Ben

I think it’s really interesting that aluminum foil in the oven doesn’t get very hot. I can pull it out with my fingers. So I googled it. And learned this:

Extreme Thinness (Low Mass): Standard foil is incredibly thin (about 16 micrometers). Because there is so little metal, there isn’t enough total heat energy to warm up your thick, water-filled skin. The instant you touch it, your cooler fingers absorb the tiny amount of energy, dropping the foil’s temperature immediately.
High Conductivity: Aluminum is an excellent heat conductor. Heat passes through it and dissipates into the cooler room air almost instantly.

Isn’t that interesting!

Wednesday was my first day of half summer vacation. I work half time at the college until June, then I’m off for a couple months. I worked at home ALL DAY Wednesday.

I had my annual performance review at the college the other day. As I prepared for that and looked for a paper copy of last year’s review I found a phone book on my desk. I guess I kinda knew it was there. I haven’t opened it in a while. It was from 2014. I put it in the round file finally.

I finished planting soybeans last Saturday.

Sunday I drove over it all with the drag. The fields look great! Smooth and even. Hopefully they get lush and green soon.

It was sprinkling late Sunday evening when I was out with an old hand cranked seeder spreading grass seed on one of my new field boundaries.

This thing has hung in the basement as long as I can remember. Asking my siblings, we all played with it but no one remembers seeing anyone actually use it. I’m thinking dad used it to seed grass around the house after it was built. But I’m sure I’m just making that up.

The directions are on the bottom:

I have a few thoughts. I don’t know what 2.5 MPH is when walking, and a spread of 18 feet?? You gotta really be cranking that thing to get 18 feet! Man, I don’t know how the old guys did it back in the day seeding acres and acres with this thing.

I am planting ‘BLM #4’. It’s a quick growing pasture mix commonly containing ryegrass, tall fescue, and Kentucky bluegrass.

At home Padawan and I got a lot done this week. Cleaned out the seed and power washed the corn planter. Parked it outside for the moment and pulled out the seed wagon. Cleaned that off and parked it away. As we were rounding up flowerpots for Kelly, we got sidetracked by crap in a corner of the old shed and ended up hauling out a gator load of scrap iron and a gator load of garbage.

I’ve wanted to clean up that corner, just didn’t intend to do it then. It was clean back in 1968 when we were living in the machine shed, then it turned into the tire storage corner. I’m down to about 5 old tires to get rid of, and 3 good spares I store there. And once you start a spare tire corner, it becomes a junk corner real quick. Padawan cut the top off a tote while I was cleaning the planter so we can use a second tote for scrap iron. I forgot about a zoom meeting on Wednesday. Had it on my calender… even knew about it in the morning. Then got a text from someone asking if I was coming to the meeting. I joined from the tractor.

Padawan and I made a fence and got the adolescent chicks out.

We put mulch around the seedling trees and starting making a, sort of, ‘tent-fence’ to keep the deer from eating the tree’s and peeling bark off the tiny little things. Stupid deer! These little tree’s are costing us a lot of money! Water totes, pump, hose, fencing, Mulch was free, then more fencing and more posts… jeepers. And who knows how they’ll survive next winter. I don’t have high hopes.

I need to clean out the grain drill yet.

Oops. Forgot to turn on the drill in time there.

Right up at the end of our driveway there’s this gap in the oats field.

It’s the first thing you see driving in. I’ve seen it coming all spring, I need to get out there and replant that. Course it will always be a month behind. But a bare spot allows weeds to grow. And I have several bushels left in the drill to clean out so I may as well go plant that and fill in a few light spots in another field.

Padawan has gotten a new job. He’ll be working 11:00 AM – 8:00PM Tuesday – Saturday. I’m gonna miss him. He and I have really connected the last few months. I enjoy having him around and he kinda likes having us as his surrogate family. In fact, he listed me as “Family Friend / Dad” on the job application. Awwwww…

Happy Memorial Day Weekend! Welcome to summer!

ARE YOU A FAST WALKER OR A SLOW WALKER?

EVER CRANK STARTED ANYTHING?

2026, crops, Farming Update, Theatre

Corns UP!

May 16, 2026 xdfben 46 Comments

Corns Up!

WE’re at 384 growing degree units. Two hundred over average and 600 predicted in the next 14 days. It takes 100-120 units for corn to emerge.

Remember GDU’s come from a formula using temps above 50°F and under 86°F. Divided by 2 and subtracting 50. And…I don’t know, my mind went blank when they put parenthesis in.

The tree service was in on Tuesday with their remote controlled stump grinder and he ground out twenty-some stumps in about an hour. Pretty slick!

Kelly and I watered the seedling’s a second time. Got a bigger tote and strapped it in the gator. Haven’t got the pump hooked up yet… maybe next week.

The first part of this week was commencement set up. Monday I picked up the rental lights just outside of Rochester. Got them hung, cabled, and running on Monday. A few extra trips up the lift because something weird was happening. Tuesday they start adding decorations to the stage. I add some lights on the ground to uplight banners, and just some ‘eye candy’ for the crowd while waiting for 2 hours. Yep, Grandma and Grandpa / moms and dads arrive at 4-ish for a 6:00 ceremony. Gotta get a good seat, right?

I’m working on planting soybeans.

On Thursday another piece fell off the planter, and on Friday, after fixing, I got rained out.

Kelly and I always enjoy taking a farm tour in the gator, but it’s been awhile since we have had time. We fit one last week. Saw a male and female pheasant. The next day, doing fieldwork, I saw 3 pairs. There are several males that don’t seem to be too afraid of me and the tractor– as long as I’m moving. If I stop to take a picture, they scatter. They are so pretty, and nice to hear.

I heard a song on the ’40’s radio station last week, called ‘I never See Maggie Alone’ by Kenny Roberts. He’s a yodeling cowboy. We were just talking about that!

Here’s part of the chorus:

One night while we were out walkin’
And she grew tired of talkin’
She invited me up to her home
I turned the lights down, they were too bright
Oh, what a night, but when I turned on the light
There was her father, her mother
Her sister and her brother
Oh, I never see Maggie alone

There are several verses, he never does get Maggie alone. I sure do enjoy the ’40’s music. They don’t write songs like that anymore.

As I plant, especially for corn, I need to think ahead and how the combine will be moving through the field. It needs room to turn around on the ends and it can’t make corners too sharp.

Especially when planting over at the cemetery, because it’s so goofy shaped, there was a few times I apologized out loud for leaving a dead end row or doing something stupid. The nice thing is Craig, in the combine, is pretty good at just shifting over a row or, when done right, he can sort of cut sideways at least enough to make a path. But still, folloing along and suddenly the row ends?? What the heck, Ben. Yep. Sorry about that.

The guys who harvest my corn use a 16 row corn planter, and their corn head is 8 row. Everything fits nicely. I have a 6 row planter. The first pass through the field he has to take 8 rows. The six is no problem, row 7 and 8, it depends how well and straight I planted as to how well he can get those two. Once open though, and once he has a path, then he’ll leave two rows empty and just take the 6. And you never want to take the outside 6 rows first, because there may be a tree down or something on the edge you need to go around. So they take the second set of 6 on that first pass. Later on, once there’s room, they’ll come back for the outside rounds. And with the deer damage, there’s not always much there anyway.

Soybeans and oats doesn’t matter so much because you don’t need to follow the rows. The different headers will cut across without issue.

Podcast listening this week has been “Strike Force Five”, in honor of Stephen Colbert’s show ending. The Strike Force Five is Jimmy Kimmel, Stephen, Seth Meyers, John Oliver, and Jimmy Fallon, who started this podcast back in 2023 during a writers strike as a way to support their show staff. Now, with Stephen leaving, they’ve reunited. And they laugh a lot and tell stories and it’s fun to listen to them.

LATE NIGHT TALK SHOWS. FIRST ONE YOU REMEMBER?

2026, animals, Automotive, crops, Farming Update, Music, Science, Theatre, Uncategorized, Weather

POLISH THE SILVER

May 9, 2026 xdfben 40 Comments

This week’s Farming Update from Ben

Hang on tight, I feel like this blog is more ‘all over the place’ than most of them.

I’m so close! A couple more big days, and that will be it for spring work. I finished planting corn about 9:30 PM Thursday night. Just in time as I had to get back to ‘work’ work at the college. Commencement next week. Hung lights over where the stage will be, so the stage can be placed over the weekend.

Things have really moved fast this last week in the farming world. With the nice weather, THOUSANDS of acres have been planted.

I still don’t know which day is which yet.

Last Saturday I spent all day working an event at one of the high schools.

Sunday and Monday I think I farmed.

Over on the rented ground I run, it got fertilizer applied on Tuesday while I was out with the guys doing Township Road inspections. (The roads are all still there. Need a culvert replaced on one road, and some tree’s trimmed, and some ditches cleaned). Wednesday I dug up the fields again, to incorporate the fertilizer, and get it ready for planting. Hoped to have Padawan digging so I could plant, but he’s not a big fan of the tractor. And I don’t want him on the highway. I found him other work to do.
I mentioned he was all about cars. One day he said, again, “What should I do about my car?” I said, “Get a girlfriend?” He didn’t like that answer.

He spent 5 hours figuring out what was rolling around under my car. Eventually he found a golf ball had gotten under the seat somehow, and then under the frame. Well. Clearly I put the golf ball in the car at some point… one of those from the tractor and I must have put it in the car. Then forgot about it…

I cut off the stumps of the dead Ash tree’s that were cut down earlier. Got a company coming in to grind them off on Tuesday, then will plant the Larch tree’s. …. pause for us all to say, “The Larch”.

Kelly and I moved a couple of the windbreak shrubs, just to fill in some places we missed. And we rigged up a barrel and hose to water them. That worked but it was kinda slow. I have ordered a 12V pump but it won’t be here until Monday. And then I went up a hill and the barrel slid out the back and busted off the hose attachment. Oops. Should have put a strap behind that… Wonder why I didn’t think of that at the time. Woulda Coulda Shoulda.

I listen to podcasts in the tractor. Smarter than Me with Julia Louis Dreyfus is a favorite. Then The Moth. Or a lighting one called Light Talk, modeled after Car Talk. Smarter Than Me is really good; highly recommended.

I listened to Arturo Sandoval for a while. I knew a couple of his songs, then heard an interview on NPR’s Weekend Edition. Since I was a trumpet player, I listened to Maynard Ferguson, one of my musical heros. His birthday was May 4^th. I believe I have a good embouchure and breath control from all those years of trumpet playing.

Wednesday late afternoon I got over to the last 35 acres and started planting. Got about 2 acres in when a gauge wheel fell off the planter. That’s an important part. It was 5:45PM. Called John Deere and they had the part. Drove the planter back home, drove to Plainview for the parts, (after hours, they leave parts in a metal locker out back) (and got sandwichs at the sub place in town), $130 for that part. had it fixed in about 10 minutes and called it a night.

Thursday Morning Padawan got a different car. Maybe that will calm down some of his talk. Maybe.

But Thursday I got all the corn planted! Friday the co-op applied fertilizer for soybeans and they will be next.

When we replaced some points on the digger last week, I used special, ‘Long-lasting’ points. Supposedly they’re extra hard. And I notice the steel looks different once shined up by the dirt:

Interesting pattern on the long lasting points.

A flat tire filled with mud. Hmm…..that’s weird. I had to cut it open because it was so dang heavy we could barely lift it. Well that explains why.

Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms!

EVER HAD TO POLISH THE SILVER?

ANY STORIES OF A SAMOVAR?

2026, crops, Farming Update, Kids, Nature, Seasons, Theatre, Uncategorized, Weather

The Larch

May 2, 2026 xdfben 42 Comments

This week’s Farming Update from Ben.

Man, I’m tired. Oh wait, that’s old news.

Things really have been going well so far. Last Saturday we closed the spring college show, the last show for the director, Jerry. He’s retiring at the end of the academic year. He and I have worked together at the college for 25 years, (I was free-lance the first few years) and have known each other longer than that.

Did you make the connection? His name is Jerry. And we like ice cream.

Our buddy Brian, in a scene from the play. Brian has been around, like, forever. As a student he was the thorn in my side. A fun thorn, but one of those kids that pokes the bear right up to the edge. He’s one of our besties now.

Monday we got 0.65 inches of rain. I had concert rehearsals Monday and Tuesday with a final spring concert on Wednesday and we finished planting the windbreak bushes. The oats started poking out of the ground on Thursday. Got some more corn planted, too. Making progress.

I have 25 Tamarack trees to plant yet. I didn’t realize they’re also known as a Larch. And when I heard that, my head immediately said, in that Monty Python voice, “The Larch”.

Saturday, at one of my other jobs, I’ll be working the Bernie Sanders visit to Rochester. As usual, I’ll be way in the back in the booth. His advance crew has been very nice and on our walk through with six Rochester Police officers, the high school kids were sure staring at us. I saw one young lady, whose mouth fell open at the sight of us, and I said, “You’re in trouble now.”

On Tuesday the township had a culvert replaced on the only road into our place. The neighbor and I just planned on staying home. As part of my township duties, I went up and was an official inspector. They had a shovel I could lean on.

It was interesting to watch them start the project. Another contractor had a high-pressure water jet, and a giant vacuum, and they made a trench to expose the two telephone lines and the fiber optic line that bisected the culvert on the West side. That fiber line through the culvert is what started this whole thing. Turned out to be another phone line on the East side. The old culvert they could cut in pieces to get out. The new one, the contractor put all the way to the west, then slide it in under all the cables. Added the aprons on both ends, and add some rip-rap. Good for another 85 years.

Padawan is getting more experience every day. There are days I feel like I spend all my time explaining things and answering his phone calls. I try to remember he really doesn’t know anything about this stuff. And the more he learns, the more valuable / knowledgeable he becomes. The other day I had him move the tractor and digger on to the concrete, then I showed him how to replace digger points, and I went out and graded the road. He found a broken shank, which he learned how to replace one other day, although this one was a bit more difficult, and it took a few more phone calls but he got it. Two weeks ago he would not have know what a broken shank was or that it was important.

He cut grass. Until he ran it out of gas. I mentioned that it has a gauge. “That thing sucks!” he says. “Don’t blame the tools” I remind him. “That gauge was blinking way over there. I cut grass for another hour!” …so you had an hour’s warning to fill it?? He walked away from me. And got a gas can and refilled the mower.

He has a one-track mind and that track is cars. My goodness he talks about cars a lot.

Friday morning a crew was out to burn the CRP ground. Conservation Reserve Program. They burn every five years as part of the regular maintenence.

I spent 6 hours chisel plowing the cemetery field I started running last year. It was the last field to be harvested last fall, just before it snowed, so I didn’t get it worked up last year. After I got that worked up I spent an hour planting corn.

It’s been some real nice weather.

BEEN TO A BEN AND JERRY’S ICE CREAM STORE?

GOT A FAVORITE MONTY PYTHON OR FAWLTY TOWERS MOMENT?

2026, chickens, crops, Family, Farming Update, Music, Theatre, Uncategorized

FARMING – amongst other things

April 25, 2026 xdfben 23 Comments

It was a year ago on the 25th that mom died. Here’s to mom.

This weeks Farming Update from Ben:

It was April of 2021 I started writing these farm updates.

This week I learned if I use the diesel pump for semi’s at the gas station, they pump fast. Like really REALLY fast! Twenty two gallons in about a minute! It’s awesome. I’m gonna make a habit of filling the truck with them when available.

I thought Padawan should have his own set of chainsaw chaps. (We have big plans for summer! He may not know this part of them yet…) I have pretty good chaps from Stihl, a very reputable name. When Kelly bought them for me – I think it was a Fathers Day Present- she said if I was going to have some, they better be good ones. Yep. I’d agree. And now I’m looking at them for P and I’m not sure how much we’ll really need them and good ones are $150+, so I look at cheaper ones and then I think, I’m going to skimp on something that could save his life?? I pictured myself at the ER. “Well, Doc, I thought they’d be good enough.”

I bought him a good Stihl pair.

It’s a little crazy around the farm. I went from late nights in rehearsal to late nights in the tractor. Life is still relentless! Daughter asks me why I’m out in the field. Well, because. Work to be done! I just keep thinking, what if I was still milking cows?? Add another four hours into my day.

Padawan is going to be able to go full time for me this summer. That will be huge. I was listening to a podcast in the tractor the other night and they talked about jobs and how people have ‘soft skills’ and ‘hard skills’. The hard skills can be taught. It’s the soft skills he needs help with. That can be our goal this summer. He’s got some of them, he’s a really nice young man, but he’s 19 and they’re not his focus right now. Just gotta bring them back to the surface.

I had him doing fieldwork. A hard skill.

Sold some more straw to the Fire Department. They add it to their practice fires to make smoke. They tell me it’s the least toxic way to make smoke.

The oats is all planted.

Used the new Track Wacker! Or ‘Track Eraser’ as I learned the company calls this machine. It took a little finagling to get it adjusted and folding properly, but it worked great!

After the first 100 yards I stopped to check and be sure everything was working on the grain drill. That’s when I made a terrible mistake. I backed up with the drill in the ground. The drill uses two disc’s, in a V shape, to get the seed into the ground. The front is the point and makes the seed trench. The back is open. And when I backed up, I filled that open V with dirt. I knew it felt wrong as I backed up and it took driving ahead another 20 yards before I saw it plugging up and knew what I had done. Crap. It’s tough cleaning them out. I had to go back home and get a long screw driver and vice grips and I got all but one cleaned out. The last one I had to take one disc off to get it cleaned. NOTE TO SELF: Don’t do that again.

Wednesday I hooked up the new drag — the new to me drag– and went over all the oat fields. It worked pretty slick!

Got the corn planter out and greased and ready to go. Paddie did that and hauled out deck furniture while I was using the drag. I gotta get a list of jobs for him when I’m doing something else. He needs more self motivation. Is that a hard or soft skill?

I headed out to the corn fields Thursday afternoon. With my buddy.

The chicks and chickens are doing well and they love a field of freshly tilled dirt.

I thought, what should I listen to as I begin? I chose a ‘favorites’ playlist on shuffle mode and the first song was Mingo Saldivar playing ‘Rueda De Fuego’.

Tex-Mex Ring of fire. Haha- perfect!

Got a good start; enough to check seed depth, placement, and be sure everything was working on the corn planter. Then it rained a bit and I had time to go home and take a nap before coming back for another college show.

Friday was a road trip (me and the dogs) to Byron for a 275 gallon water tote to water the trees. Then to Plainview for parts, then to Wabasha for another 100 trees. Back through Plainview, picked up stump killer for Kelly in her pursuit of buckthorn, and finally home. It was a nice drive.

I planted another 40 tree’s. 60 to go! And it was Arbor Day to boot!

So farm so good!

HARD SKILL OR SOFT SKILLS?

2026, animals, Art, Farming Update, Kids, Science, Theatre, Uncategorized

Lighting the Way

April 18, 2026 xdfben 18 Comments

This weeks farming update from BEN.

Just got through another Tech week. That final week of adding costumes and lighting and sound and dress rehearsals before the show opens. It’s always exhausting and long days and late nights. I only yelled once and that was just to get the cast to be quiet. It wasn’t at anyone directly. I’m pretty good at staying calm around the cast. I tell them that sometimes I yell but it’s not at anyone directly, it’s just to get their attention so they don’t hurt themselves or break something. I make a specific point of telling them we don’t want anyone to get hurt. “Don’t bleed on my set.” You know, showing them that I care.

Then sometimes on opening night I go down and tell them the campus inspector said the building was settling and I had to shift everything two feet to the left and reverse it. So, nothing has really changed for them, they just have to do it in reverse. They stare at me. Finally, one person will call me on it and I just walk away. I love messing with them. They’re so young. I told one girl we’d turn on the AC but it doesn’t have a thermostat so it turns into a meat locker. She looked at me with her big eyes and said, “Meat lockers are cold, right?” …….. She’s a really nice young lady.

And they’re always busy and talking and wiggling and just being young.
All that energy wasted on the youth.

Last Friday Kelly took down the snow fence. On Saturday Padawan and I pulled out all the fence posts. I didn’t count, but 75 or 80 posts. There are various methods to removing old metal “T” fence posts: You can wiggle them back-and-forth side to side and front to back enough to make it loose and pull it out by hand. Sometimes you pull it out a couple inches, then wiggle it some more. Typically they’re in the ground about fourteen inches. The stubborn ones, we wrap a chain around it, hook the other end onto the tractor loader, and lift to pull it out. Some people use jacks or other means of mechanical leverage, it just depends. I had gotten maybe 30 loose by hand. Padawan got a good system going of wrapping the chain, pulling it taught, and I’d lift it out. He said he liked the work. I think he’s starting to see the feeling of accomplishment.

I bought Padawan and me new shovels. Friday I picked up 100 seedlings. Next week I’ll pick up another 75. We are planting gray dogwood and Ninebark to create a natural wind break rather than the snow fence. Kelly is excited not to have to do snowfence anymore but there’s a lot of work that has to go into this before we get to that point. Using a string and a 100-foot tape measure and downward marking spray paint, we painted a dot every 6 feet apart in two rows 8 feet apart. Thankfully, the heavy rains did not wash off the dots. I also bought 500’ of plastic fencing and garden staples, and we’ll try to protect these tiny plants.

The show at the college is called ‘8 Minutes’ by E.B.Lee. It’s 9 different scenes of people with eight-minutes left until the world ends. It’s not as bad as it sounds. It’s really several nice scenes. One is a person who is trying to get home to his dog- from the dogs perspective. One person is taking care of his mother with dementia. Two people are stuck in a car- she wanted to see the cherry blossoms, he has allergies, and now they’re stuck in traffic and why did they wait until NOW to go?

Or the couple with a shelter, but he’s lost the key. So, it’s got funny scenes and touching scenes. My scenic design turned into ‘connections’, some made, some missed.

I am using four, 2000 watt Fresnel fixtures. One wasn’t as bright as the others.

I love these huge lamps.

I got these light for free from Mankato State when they swapped everything out for LED a few years ago.

It’s not supposed to look like that.

I’m using two lights called ‘Parcan’s as side light. They take a lamp that looks like an old car headlight. A sealed beam round light. 500 watts. It’s old technology from the hot and heavy days of Rock and Roll before the days of moving color changing lights. One light, one color. They make an oval beam of light, and you reach in the back and spin the bulb to get the oval the way you want it. It used to be a whole big thing. I felt a little nostalgic when I reached in the back and spun that lamp. My gosh I’m old.

ROCK AND ROLL! Back in the old days with 300 parcans.

Thursday this week I got my Twenty Year award from the college. An engraved marble pencil / flower / thingy holder. It’s nice!

At the farm, one recent day, I replaced shovel points on the digger, replaced a broken bolt, and found a broken bracket that supports the coil tines at the rear. Still haven’t gotten the bracket off. Started with a hammer, got a bigger hammer, got a torch, and a grinder. Back to the torch and grinder again the next day. Ordered new parts, went to John Deere and got them on Thursday. They’re still sitting in the shop. Between planting tree’s maybe I’ll work on that.

New shovel vs old worn out shovel. Isn’t it interesting how abrasive dirt is??

A late Friday update: Padawan and I planted 50 tree’s before we got rained out Friday afternoon. It went well. We had a good rhythm going. The tornado sirens were going off and we just kept working. It all looked fine out there. There was some small hail. We took the dogs and the gator and went up to the highest point on the road and everything looked fine. Then my neighbor texted and asked if we were OK and said, “I saw the trees!”. Uh… what trees?? Oh, you mean the 6 tree’s across the township road? And a few evergreens that tipped over across the road. Power was out, power poles leaning, broken, a couple sheds blown over. Just a narrow swath in our area, maybe some straight line winds. Once again, Thankful for our sheltered little valley. We had several people helping cut up and clean up and a few neighbors stop to check if we needed help.

A good community is invaluable.

As of 11:45PM, power still out and the generator still running.

ANYTHING MAKING YOU FEEL NOSTALGIC LATELY?

WHAT’S ABRASIVE IN YOUR LIFE LATELY?

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