We are currently experiencing our third snow storm in four weeks. Our city has major thoroughfares designated as Emergency Snow Routes where one is not allowed to park during storms so that the plows can clear them. Vehicles parked on those streets that aren’t moved are to be towed. Well, the Snow Emergency designated street I drive to work on has at least a dozen vehicles covered in snow that haven’t been moved since Halloween. They haven’t been towed. This seems unfair to me.
Our city has the oddest street clearing habits. We once had a major storm in late April that left huge amounts of snow and ice on the streets, and the city commissioners, to save money, chose to leave the streets uncleared because “Well, it is all going to melt in a week or two, anyway.” We drove in the worst bumpy conditions for more than a month!
I was concerned with Margaret’s dilemma yesterday of needing a vehicle towed. If she lived in my town, it seems that she could leave her car on the street with impunity.
What are your experiences with tow trucks?What municipal policies do you think are unfair?
Plan A: This plan originated in September, when Daughter purchased her tickets for a flight home for Christmas. She would leave Seattle/Tacoma on December 22, fly to MPLS, have a nice long layover, and fly into Bismarck at 11:00 PM. We would pick her up that night and take her home.
Plan B: This plan originated late last week when I saw that we were to have patchy blowing snow the night of the 22nd, and the wind chill was predicted to be -51. Daughter decided that she would spend the night of the 22nd in Mandan with the mother of her childhood best friend, and we would pick her up on Friday, when the snow was predicted to stop blowing.
Plan C: This plan emerged after Daughter saw that the weather was going to be a little snowy in MPLS, and that, if her flight to Bismarck was cancelled, she would stay with a friend in the Cities. Alternatively, if the friend couldn’t get to the airport to pick her up, she would stay in a hotel close to the airport. With either option, she would hope to get to Bismarck on the 23rd.
Plan D: By Sunday, Daughter started to panic, and thought that she wouldn’t get out of Seattle/Tacoma because there was a snow storm predicted on the 22nd, and there had already been many cancelled flights after only 1/2 inch of snow. She planned to prepare herself for being stuck in Tacoma.
Plan E: This plan emerged in the wee hours of Tuesday after Daughter saw the terrible storm predictions for MPLS. After convincing herself that she wasn’t being impulsive, she cancelled her reservations for the 22nd, and rebooked herself on another airline for the 25th that would take her to Denver, and thence directly to Dickinson by 9:00 PM. The weather and winds in Denver and Dickinson are predicted to be manageable on the 25th. She didn’t book this sort of flight in the first place because she really dislikes the Denver Airport.
What is your plan B?Have your thoughts about winter travel changed at all over the years?What is your opinion of John Steinbeck?
These weeks before Christmas are a time of waiting and anticipation for many Christian believers. In our community for the past several days we have had an additional anticipation event in the form of a “monstrous” snow storm predicted to last from Monday night into Thursday. We may get 8-11 inches after a spate of freezing drizzle.
Like most everyone else in town, Husband and I have been planning what we will need if we are stuck at home. We have been to the grocery store three times since Friday. A young couple was buying many gallons of paint in Ace Hardware yesterday in anticipation of finishing a home project if they are snowed in. There is a party atmosphere in the grocery stores, people chatting to each other in the checkout lines, strangers smiling at strangers. Excitement is in the air. People want to be snowed in. Husband insisted on buying a large quantity of dog toys and treats since no one wants to be cooped up with a bored terrier puppy. Kyrill is supposed to be neutered on Tuesday. We shall see if we can get to the vet office on Tuesday morning.
I had planned to finish all my Christmas baking by last night, so that I could get all the goodies we are sending to the UPS store today. The storm anticipation has helped me slow down, and I plan to finish everything in the next few days and send them out on Thursday or Friday. Being this frenetic isn’t good for me. It is interesting, though, how staying at home necessitates so much planning.
What is the most elaborate party you ever planned?What would you need to stock up on if you were to be snow bound and had time to plan? What is the allure of being snowed in?
Our bathroom remodel started the week before Halloween. We are working with a main contractor who designs everything and who subcontracts with a home builder company for the carpenters, plumbers, and electricians. The first two weeks the carpenters came and got everything prepped for the drywall installers, electricians, and plumbers. It took a couple of weeks for those folks to get their work done, and then we had a couple of snow storms that put everything behind.
For the last three weeks one young man has been working to install the shower and bathtub liners, grab bars, etc. He said he would be done on Wednesday of this week, but he ran out of caulk and had to go back to Bismarck to get more. He showed up again yesterday to install the shower doors, do the caulking, and finish the work on the tub and shower. He isn’t a plumber. He just installs the shower liners and tub liners and grab bars and such. To his dismay, he discovered that the hardware for the shower doors wasn’t in the large box the doors came in, and were back in Bismarck at the warehouse. He won’t be able install the doors until today. That is another delay. Until he is finished, the carpenters and plumbers can’t return with the toilets, vanity, and sink and install the flooring and new light fixtures.
Yesterday the carpenter phoned and said we needed to pick out the flooring so that he and his crew can come as soon as the tub/shower guy is done. We did so today, and found that it will take a good two weeks to get the flooring delivered. I am puzzled why he waited until now to tell us to pick out the flooring. I thought we had already picked out the flooring, but apparently that wasn’t the case, so the earliest our bathrooms will be done is the week between Christmas and New Year. That is two months of chaos.
Our home is in absolute disarray, and is full of drywall dust. Our tempers with each other are getting short. An enormous snow storm is predicted to hit our region on Monday, bringing up to a foot of snow. It may be very hard for the Bismarck carpenters to get to our town next week.
The only good news is that the downstairs bathtub/shower was usable starting yesterday. All that needed to be done in that bathroom was for the tub/shower guy to screw in the mixer handle that turns on the faucet in bathtub and caulk it. He did that, and then told me that the plumbers needed to come because there wasn’t any water coming out of the faucet. I asked him if he had opened the shut-off valves for the pipes to the tub. He said there never are shut off valves like that for a tub. I went to the basement, found the shut off valves that had been installed a couple of years ago by a local plumber, and flipped them open. He was impressed. The water is flowing, and now we will have two bathrooms for us and our daughter when she visits over Christmas. There won’t be new flooring, towel bars, or a bathroom mirror, but the essentials will be there.
When has Fate’s fickle finger mucked things up for you? Do you have a litany of woe?When have you bested the experts?
Our daughter lives in Tacoma, WA. The last two days she has texted and phoned me several times about the school and business closings because of snow. “Mom! It snowed half an inch and they closed my agency and local schools. This is ridiculous!”
I patiently tell her that West Coast has very little snow removal equipment, no one has snow tires, and few people there know how to drive in slippery conditions. It was the same way when we lived in southern Indiana, and everything stopped when it snowed. Daughter is a tough North Dakota girl and these arguments do little to change her attitude that she is living with a bunch of weenies.
A friend of ours is a retired college librarian, and she tells of a time when she taught Middle School English at a rural South Central North Dakota school when they had “mud days” when the rural roads were too muddy to run school buses and they called everything off. It was perfectly understandable to her. She grew up in Bison, SD. She also lived for a while in Nashville, TN, where everyone just drove as fast as they could when there was cold, icy weather so as to get home more quickly . She said that didn’t work so well, and she marveled at their foolishness. I am just glad I don’t have to go anywhere for the next month except to Bismarck to pick up my tough girl at the airport for Christmas.
Are you a weather wuss? What is the worst weather you ever experienced? Who are the biggest wusses you know?
Got my corn harvested last weekend. Best yields I’ve ever had plus a decent price so that’s all nice. Inputs costs were exceptionally high, which cuts into the profits, but all in all, it ended up being a good year. Was it the weather? (It was a later spring than we like) Was it the lime applied last fall? Was it the co-op applying custom rates of fertilizer? Was it the fungicide applied to the soybeans? Was it some of everything??
They finished the corn harvest on Saturday, I finished chisel plowing on Sunday, and Tuesday, the co-op spread lime on the fields we didn’t do last year. I plow at about 6.5 MPH. I was doing about an acre every 15 minutes. Something I think about while I’m out there, it works up pretty rough. And that’s intentional because we want it to hold snow and prevent wind erosion. So driving across the field is really rough in the tractors. 50 years ago, when doing traditional plowing, it turned over all the residue, and if the conditions were good, left the field fairly smooth. And with the smaller tractors and smaller tires, that wasn’t a problem. It was probably in the mid 1980’s that we started doing conservation tillage, meaning we quit using the old traditional ‘moldboard’ plow and started using a chisel plow. One of the rules of the chisel plow is that you need to keep your speed up when plowing because the shovel is only 3” wide, and you want it to physically throw the dirt as it moves through the soil. The shovel is twisted to one side or the other, so my machine has 11 shovels; 5 throw dirt left, and 6 throw the dirt right. The whole thing is about 15 feet wide. Not burying all the residue also meant the machine has to be built to allow more trash to pass through it without plugging up in the shanks of the shovels.
The first chisel plow we got only had 7 shovels. And the tractor was not front wheel assist, meaning it had small tires on the front, and boy, it was really rough going across the worked ground. My tractor now, with MFWD (Mechanical Front Wheel Drive) and the larger front tires, makes it slightly less rough.
Course I had my tractor buddy Bailey with me the whole time.
If it got too bumpy she’d sit up and lean against my leg and I’d rub her head, then she’d lay back down again. It was tough going with some frost in the ground. Some places were frozen more than others; maybe different soil types caused that? There was a few minutes I was working in a snow squall. Weird.
My brother made the comment, “Thank goodness for heated cabs.” I agreed, and said I had thought about that too. I have spent time planting or doing fieldwork wearing a coat and gloves on open tractors. I also said I would have had to quit sooner because the lights weren’t so good back then.
With my bad foot, I generally get a new pair of shoes every fall because I’ve worn one of them sideways. After getting the soybean check is generally when I go shoe shopping. I only want steel or composite toe shoes. I move a lot of heavy stuff and I got enough problems without smashing a toe as well. And safety toe shoes are expensive to begin with. With the brace I wear on my right foot, I take out the insert and need a size 11 for that foot. I have a custom insert for the left foot, which is 9.5, but since I have size 11, I add my custom one on top of the original and I get along OK. Yet It seems silly to pay so much money for shoes and then I’m taking out some of the main thing. And they have to be built right to fit the brace in the first place. This year I’m trying a pair of Keen boots. $170 at Fleet Farm. Gosh. I’ve been wearing a pair of Sketchers that have been good. These are the shoes I wear every day. I’ve also got a pair of Red Wing work boots I wear when farming. I think I can get another year out of them.
There are a few places that deal in mismatched shoe sizes for amputee’s or other issues with the feet. One place says, “Find your ‘sole mate’.” I’ve never tried them, but I think it’s a wonderful idea.
ANYTHING MISMATCHED ABOUT YOU?
WHAT HAVE YOU GOT THAT YOU COULD EXCHANGE WITH SOMEONE?
I’m kinda grumpy about this weather. It feels like January and it’s only November.
I was feeding the ducks the other morning and while I was in the feed room getting another bucket of corn, I noticed a couple of them fly up to where I had spread the corn. Of our 10 ducks, only a couple are actual mallards that can fly, the black and white ones, (The Swedish breed) and the poufy one can’t fly. And then I saw Rosie, the new black duck fly in! I didn’t notice if Guildy can fly too, but Rosie sure did. And they do have a sleeker look than the other non-flying ducks. What interesting cross breeding is what I thought. And good for them! Can’t you just imagine their delight and surprise when they figured out they could fly too?? How cool.
Driving around town the other day I saw a car with a headlight out. And I thought to myself ‘PI-DIDLE!’ only I was alone and didn’t have anyone to kiss, so it had to wait until I got home. Are you familiar with the term ‘Pi-didle’? Meaning a car with one headlight? And then you kiss your date. Or that’s how I heard it. When I googled the term, I got a few other definitions, including some not suitable for this website. Most include touching the ceiling of your car and / or punching someone.
I thought that was only when you saw a ‘slug-bug’.
This (clean) site has some official rules for the pi-didle game:
They are just starting to harvest my corn as I write this on Friday. The corn would have been out earlier this week if the weather wasn’t so crappy. (Sweeping generalization on the weather) Because mine goes to the elevator and theirs they take home, they plan to do mine during the day when the elevator is open, then work on theirs in the evening. Couple days they’ll be done. When he and I spoke earlier this week I was optimistic I might yet be able to get some fieldwork done. With the temps the last few days, I’ve kinda given up on that. Although I just put a couple driveway markers in around the yard and the ground wasn’t frozen here. So…. Maybe?? I’ll give it a try tomorrow.
The corn kernels themselves are not sensitive to picking up moisture like soybeans or other crops are. But the snow on the leaves gets inside the combine harvester and makes everything wet and then things plug up and it just makes a mess. So we either need warmer weather to melt the snow off, or colder weather to reduce the moisture in the snow. I guess we opted for colder.
Normally I’d wait for the corn to be out, then mow the roadsides down so they’re clean and won’t catch snow, then we get the driveway markers installed. Always a fun day when daughter and I ride in the gator or 4-wheeler and she pounds the fiberglass markers in. Every time, as she readies the hammer, she quotes Homer Simpson, “Steady…. Steady…” You’ll have to google that if you’re not familiar with it. Anyway, all that is more fun when it’s 40°F than it is when it’s 20°F. I may be doing it myself at 20°.
There’s a local guy named ‘Machinery Pete’. He’s been reporting on farm auctions since 1989 and he’s very well respected for that. His name is Greg Petersen and evidently he’s a pretty good golfer too.
On his facebook page, it seems this year every post starts with “New record high price” for that particular piece of machinery. Should we blame Covid for that too? Well, sort of. The usual material sourcing issues led to shortages on new equipment, which led to demand for good quality used equipment, which lead to higher prices. Plus crop prices are high, land values are high, so…everything is high. But I have to laugh that there’s always a new high price. “Fourth record high price on 1992 tractor!” Is fourth record high a thing?
I haven’t filled my diesel barrel yet. I order 500 gallons which will last a year for me. I read of a large dairy farm out in New York, he said they got 7000 gallons delivered on Sunday and that would last them 25 days. Yikes!
Today, I took the day off ‘work’ work to get a few things done here at home. I’m gonna go mow the roadsides. Maybe that will blow the snow off the road too. Or I’ll hook the blade up and scrape off this couple inches on the road. Time to get it in the shed I guess.
I stopped at one of the local theaters today to check on some things. Someone used an orange extension cord to plug in an artificial tree onstage. It’s an unwritten rule that you only use black or dark green cords onstage. Orange cords on the stage drive me bonkers. Why doesn’t everyone know this!!?? How many times do I have to tell you this??
One of the days I was in Nashville, Pat and I drove out to Arrington Vineyard – a lovely place about 45 minutes from the city. It was so beautiful that day and the winery is definitely set up and marketed to folks who want to come out and enjoy it. Various dining venues including outdoor tables and umbrellas as well as picnic tables on the hill overlooking the vineyard.
Bringing your own picnic is definitely encouraged but if you need to add a little spice to your meal, there are pre-packaged olives, cheese/salami slices, crackers galore, pickled vegetables, and lots more. Even desserts. The stars of the show are, of course, the wines and you can purchase bottles or you can get flights of wine to go with your meal. I’ve never actually purchased a flight of wine before so was a little surprised at first that you can’t just pick your own four wines (or six depending on what size flight you want). I guess the winery figures they know better than you about which wines go together and which don’t.
The little gal who was working the register looked to be about 15. Obviously she had to be old enough to sell liquor, but the older get, the younger they all seem! I ordered the flight we wanted and the young gal asked me for identification. The shock must have shown on my face; after all it’s been 40+ years since I have been underage. She quickly told me that they are required by law to card everyone. Seems like a lot of wasted breath to asked clearly geriatric folks for their ID. But I did consider slipping her a big tip!
I tend to have anxiety at the best of times, but my trip to Maryland has been one for the record books. I haven’t traveled much during the pandemic, and I haven’t flown anywhere without Husband for many years. I think Husband acts as a distraction, and his absence left me lost to my own awful imagination. I had a lot of sleep problems the two weeks before I left. My professional tricks for anxiety reduction were only marginally helpful.
I have fretted about countless small things, like was my hotel reservation ok since the confirmation email never arrived after three attempts by Marriot to send it. Of course, a weather system moved into our area bringing the first snow of the season the day I had to head to the airport. I have to drive 100 miles to the airport. There was slush, but I traveled safely. I spent the night in Bismarck since my flight left so early in the morning. I spent the night worrying whether it would be icy driving to the airport. It wasn’t.
On Tuesday I didn’t realize until after I checked my bag and went through security that the ticket agent forgot to give me a baggage claim check, so I worried all the way to DC how I would find my bag if Delta lost it. To cap the whole experience, the guy sitting next to me on the plane out of Minneapolis watched a movie about two women climbers stuck on top of a cell phone tower. I am really afraid of heights, and I tried to not to peek over at his screen, but I just couldn’t help myself. I could hardly stand it!
Well, I wrote this in my lovely hotel room in National Harbor that was waiting for me with my reservation. . My suitcase arrived when I did. The heroine was rescued from the cellphone tower, but not until she killed a vulture that attacked her and she ate it raw to give her strength to keep going. There is good weather predicted for Bismarck when I fly back. Why on earth was I so worried?
What about travel makes you anxious? What are your strategies for anxiety management?
There was supposed to be a hard freeze Thursday night. Only got to 35°. We’re down in a valley so whatever the TV says the low will be, we’re going to be about 10° colder. It’s coming. Sooner or later. Minor cold spells, I unhook the hoses and put the pressure washer in the barn. Once it gets seriously cold, I’ll have to get more things picked up and put somewhere warm.
Driving to Plainview for parts last week showed a lot of farmers harvesting soybeans. Sounds like they might get to mine in the next few days. Good to hear. It was fun to see all the different combines. Some John Deere’s, some Case IH, even one Claas. You don’t see many of them in this area. I’m not even sure who the dealer is for Claas. That’s a big thing when buying equipment; who’s going to support it when needed. I really liked the Deutz tractor I bought back in 1986. But eventually it was hard to find mechanics or parts locally. There was a shop over in Wells MN that did good work on Deutz tractors, but 86 miles is a long ways to go for parts or service.
I’m bummed all the sweetcorn froze last week so that’s done for the season. What a shame; one cold night and that’s it. Glad we got some froze a month ago. It felt early when we did it, but this is why I guess.
We drove to Plainview so I could pick up some oil filters for the lawn mower and gator. My local dealer has most of my equipment in their records, but they didn’t have the gator for some reason, and I have a hard time remembering all the equipment model numbers. I knew it was an 835, but was it an “E”, “M” or “R”? And there’s a serial number break that uses different oil filters… shucks. I don’t remember. Eventually I found an email on my phone from the insurance company that had the VIN number so we got the right one. I wrote it down. In my phone where I have a file of oil changes on equipment.
All the tractors and machinery have model numbers. I know a lot of them but sometimes I forget. Is the soil finisher a 714 or 716? Wait, it’s a 724. The chisel plow is a 714. Or 716… Know there’s a 7 in there. Maybe this weekend I can get the oil and fuel filters changed in the truck too.
We quit filling the bird feeders this summer when the avian flu was going around. I filled them again this week, but so far nothing has come back.
Rosie and Guildy are still fine. The chickens seem to think those two have better food than they do. It’s all the same food, but it’s inside a pen so it must be better. One of those ‘grass is greener’ things. Right up until this happens.
See what happens when you do things you shouldn’t be doing? You get hung up and need to be rescued. She wasn’t there long. Kelly and I were out picking pears and then having a gator date when we spotted her. Once rescued she ran off to the pen and didn’t even appear too dizzy.
I haven’t seen anyone harvesting corn yet. The kernels are probably a little too wet yet and it’s early enough no one wants to pay for drying the corn yet if they don’t have too. Shelled corn (really, any crop) must be 15% or less moisture to store without spoiling. I’m guessing most corn is still upper 20’s. The ears are mostly still standing upright. The old timers used to wait until the ear had tipped down, then it was ready to harvest. I was just reading that corn on the stalk loses about .5% moisture / day. Course that depends on the weather. It dries a lot more at 70° than it does at 40° of course.
This is a good looking ear because of how it’s filled all the way to the tip. If the plant had any stress it would abort the kernels at the upper end. And there are some ears in the field that are not filled. But it’s neat to see this ear and know the crop had everything it needed to make good ears. Enough rain, the right nutrients, and no stresses. Think about how we could all do if we had no stresses and everything we needed to prosper?
Trail Baboon 