Great weather for bookwork

Christmas is over, son's on the way home, snow on the ground, good day to do bookwork. Stopped at the www.Honeville.com world headquarters this morning and discussed ebay and Amazon. Started a couple brush piles on fire, then took Sue to Chilton's for lunch. 

It's times like these I wish Dad had insulated the shop.  We've talked about it, even looked into the spray on foam kind I'd REALLY like to have. I think the estimate as $12,000.  I'm pretty sure it was more than Dad gave for the shed.  We've discussed going to Ken Nichols (http://insulationfactoryseconds.com/) and buying foam board but have never calculated the cost.

I guesss the bookwork won't get done if I don't start

"Get up!  It's Christmas"

There are times you miss having little kids around.  But not if you like sleeping in on Christmas morning.  Here are a few phone-camera photos I took at Mom's the other night when we gathered to see Kyle.

The first is one of my favorite subjects.  They were fascinated with "Grandma Reeeta's" (you have to get enough e's in her name) nativity set under the tree.

 Reminds me of someone telling of a problem they had at their church Christmas program.  Seems someone took baby Jesus into protective custody.

Yes, it is a lousy photo. It's about as good as she lets me get it.

20 days and counting

Has it really been almost 3 weeks since I entered anything?  Time flies, having fun or not.  I did spend a bit of money today.  Rather than post the same thing twice, see the farm page at www.bumpusfarms.us

So what else had been going on?  I went to an auction Saturday in West Union.  It was Alice Utterback's estate.  It was like any other auction, some stuff went too cheap, some went too high. And don't bid unless you are willing to take it home.
Just to remind me of that fact, I have a $20 pool table in the crib.

I hope to get through the week with no funeral home visits.  It's been a trying month for the community.  I was waiting on the salesman to get back today I was dealing with on the tractor.  He had been to a funeral for a 20 year old young lady.  When her folks left for work one morning she was still in bed.  When they got home they found she was still there.  No apparent reason, she just didn't wake up. That would be rough.

The new preacher has been at church for 3 weeks.  I have even heard one of his sermons!  Between leading Junior church in December and special programs and special family dinners on Sunday evening I think I've only heard one of his sermons.

Speaking of church, I think we have had a major failure.  The closer for the back door is messed up and may need replaced.  That is significant because the opener had a characteristic squeak every time it opened. Coop commented one time to never let it be fixed because it alerted you to someone coming in the building during the week.  Right now they'll know from the WHAM it makes closing.

Anyway, Merry Christmas.  Be careful out there.

I know, I know ....

I know, I know ... the old guy is supposed to keep his blog up to date and post interesting and artistic photographs and spell everything correctly and be grammatically correct.  I guess if you are not happy I can refund your admission price.

So, what's been happening?  Harvest is done.  Fall tillage probably is.  Irrigators are ready for winter ... 'cept for that one underground line I need to pump out. I guess that's job security. 

Need to start shop work.  Black truck blew the heater core during harvest.  We just bypassed it and kept running. Need to change oil in the 9270, 8630, maybe one of the Magnums, the 560, probably need to change the loader too.  Forklift still doesn't like me.  It's either going to run to my satisfaction or find a new home.

I keep toying with the idea of insulating the shop so we can heat it.  Dad never saw any advantage to that, but then again up until the last couple years he never got cold.  Maybe I should do some measuring and figuring.

New preacher got moved in this week.  Well, all the stuff is in the house anyway.  I doubt it is all set up yet.  But then again I think we still have boxes that haven't been unpacked since we moved 10 years ago.

Sue's working on addressing Christmas cards.  I could set up a database and print them so much easier but she likes to practice her calligraphy.

OK, gotta get going. It's 1st Wednesday and we eat at 6;00 at church.   I did put a couple photos on the farm site www.BumpusFarms.us .  Later Y'all.

Harvest is over!

OK Kiddies, what caused this in the corn field?

Beaver damage.

It's 11 PM and I should be in bed ...

It's 11 PM and I should be in bed.  Harvest is rolling fairly well.  We are getting crops out about as fast as the ground allows.  Today we started shelling corn, finished up on corn east of the highway; switched to milo and finished the last of the milo; switched to beans and got the last beans east of the highway;  moved west and are cutting some very nice ruts trying to get the beans out. But we got out about 75 acres even with all the switching and moving.  Not bad for us.

Yesterday was ... interesting.   Ben (Aman's brother) took a vacation day to help us by running the grain cart.  We had 20 acres of corn that had to be carted close to a 1/4 mile to the truck.  Things just went incredibly smooth until just before noon Aman turned the end to shell the last 3 rows and the combine stopped moving.  Phone call to Stan at Farm Pride.  We pulled the combine to the shed.  Mechanic came out, took the hydrostat pump off,

took it to the shop and replaced the shaft and coupler (second time in 4 years) and had us going by 6 PM.

But back to 11 PM.  I've been fighting a cold, don't feel great, need to hit the ground running in the morning.  But about 8:30 PM some guys made a serious mistake involving a Jeep and a tree stump.  Fire Dept stood by while rescue removed one guy from the wreckage and put him in a helicopter.  So I am still a bit too wound up to go to sleep.

And everyone said when it stopped it would really stop ...

All summer folks were saying when the rain stopped it would really stop.  Guess what folks, it hasn't stopped yet!  But I guess we are doing better than a lot of people.  We are about half done with commercial corn ... but then we didn't have a lot this year.  If we could get 3-4 good days of corn shelling we could probably be done with it.  Beans, well, I don't want to talk about beans.  We  have a little over 100 acres around Mom's and around 170 acres out west, with 40 - 50 acres of double crops left.  And 10 acres of milo.

I have made a few calls about renting a second combine.  Apparently I am slow, because everything has already been rented.

Oh well, Romans 8:28 still works.  I keep telling myself that.