Old Phone New Phone

       I got a new phone a couple of weeks ago.  It’s just the third phone I have had since my first cell phone.  Unless you count the smartphone I bought for the Goodwife some four or five years go.  

     She was always complaining that we were out of date, that I didn’t want to try something new.  So I bought her the smart phone. 

     She never figured out how to use it.  She kept going back to her old flip phone.  One evening we dressed up a little to attend an event of some kind, maybe an alumni reunion.  She put the smartphone in her sweater pocket.  There it stayed for months.

      Normally, I could find it by calling it.  But this time, the battery was discharged and it refused to ring.  It lounged in the closet in the sweater pocket for months, until the Goodwife decided to wear that sweater again.  There it was.

     By that time, I had quit paying the bill for the thing. Upon discovering it, I decided if she wasn’t going to use it, maybe I could.  It had one attractive feature for me.  Its driving directions were much better and much more up-to-date than the Magellan (worthless) and the Garmin (somewhat better than worthless) we keep in the car.

      I reupped with Tracfone.  We had to have a new number.  We lost the old one when we quit paying for it.  I used the smartphone when we travel.  It’s handy for finding a motel you can afford or a nice place to eat.

       I really needed to replace the old flip phone.  The smartphone is too bulky to carry when I am working.  Plus, it is subject to breaking when I carry it in a pocket.

     The old flip phone has lost its external speaker.  The environment has to be pretty quiet in order for me to hear it ring.  The hinge on the cover has lost its spring and won’t stay closed.  If there is something besides the phone in my pocket, like my ear plugs, they can find their way between phone screen and cover.  That turns on the light and runs the phone battery down.

    The old phone is so old it doesn’t use the standard charging port.  I had to keep one cord just for that phone.  And one thing I will miss:  the old phone had a charging cradle.  Pop the phone into the cradle correctly and it charges without fumbling around trying to line up port and plug.

      Most of my arguments against having a smartphone have an answer.  There are smartphones that have a cover to keep it from getting broken.  There are smartphones with teeny-tiny screens so they aren’t all that bulky.    

     I held out for an old-fashioned flip phone.  The new one is quite a bit bigger and heavier than the old one.  There are many more features than the old one, too, like a camera, “cloud”, U-Tube, maps, Google, internet, email, FM radio, weather, and other stuff.

     Wait a minute.  This isn’t a smartphone?  It’s certainly smarter than I am. 

     I am making progress in using the new phone.  The old one was a Samsung, the new one a Nokia.  Different systems, different way of doing things.  It takes a few more button punches to get to the phone book, for instance.

     When I changed from my first phone to my second one, the store clerk magically held the two phones head-to-head, said a few voodoo words, and all of the contacts from the old phone magically appeared on the new one.

     This time, the young man who tried to help us couldn’t perform that magic.  He said since my old phone did not have Bluetooth, he couldn’t make the transfer.

     The Goodwife’s old phone did have Bluetooth, but he couldn’t figure out how to make the transfer of contacts form her old phone to her new one (identical to my new one) in one fell swoop.  He showed me how to do it one contact at a time.  So I did it, and it took a little time.  He said his time was worth $30 an hour to make the transfer.  My time wasn’t nearly that valuable, so I did it.

      I had to transfer my contact list one at a time, too.  But I had to type in the names and numbers.  That took a lot of time. 

      The process asked for first name, then last name, then number.  If there was more than one number, I had to punch “Add a Phone”.  After I put in that number, I had to punch “Change Phone Type” and select home, or work, or whatever.

      I discovered that the thing was alphabetizing by first letter of first name.  No, I can’t have that.  I started entering last names in the blank for first names, and the first name where the last name goes.  That didn’t work, either. 

       I go a-hunting (“A hunting I will go”) whenever I have to find someone in my contact list.  I am not sure how it is alphabetized, now.  If all else fails, I start at the beginning and scroll down.  Fortunately, my contact list isn’t that huge. 

     Ah, these time-saving devices.  I have figured out how to set the ringtone (“Nostalgia”—bell sound like an old landline phone) and the volume.  I can hear it now.  And I do know how to answer it.

     Give me a call.

Flex Rod

   I stood behind the running tractor in the hundred-degree heat, hands on hips, surveying the damage, wondering what else could go wrong.

     The story actually began in May when I dug the old Flex Rod out of its grassy cover, its last use in 1989.  The Flex Rod was built in Bird City, Kansas, probably in the sixties or seventies.  The factory was short-lived,  so there are probably not many left in the world.

     I came by the machine from my local ag junkyard, which I sorely miss.  It proved to be a little too big for my 2-cylinder John Deere tractors, so it didn’t ever get much use.

      When I dug it out in May, it was just to be a fallback in case I couldn’t find something bigger and better for my “new” tractor.  Sure enough, I haven’t found anything yet, and the weeds in the summer fallow refuse to engage in a cease-fire while I continue my search.

     So, last week I began restoring the old thing.  It had one inflatable tire, two tires more than half consumed (I suspect ground squirrels or pocket gophers), and one rotten tire.  On Saturday, I arranged for four new tires and delivered the old rims to the dealer.

     I picked up the new tires on Wednesday and spent Wednesday afternoon and much  of Thursday packing rusty wheel bearings with grease and mounting new tires.  I finished the job Friday Morning.

      It was all complicated by the hundred-degree heat (combined with 74 years of experience) and the tall grass that the wet spring produced.  Using the frontend loader on my other “new” tractor, I was able to dislodge the machine and get it out of some of the grass, but there was still plenty of growth since May.

       The last wheel packed and tire mounted, late Friday morning found me trying to get a hydraulic cylinder mounted.  My first choice wouldn’t work because of plumbing problems. The one that worked had to be removed from another machine.

     Then, I had to free up the rods and grease u-joints and other bearings.  Finally, about 2:30 P.M.,  the minute of truth arrived and I took it out for a test run.  It passed!

       I took off for the summer fallow.  I had the machine out of the ground to travel the half mile to the field.  But I didn’t get very far.  Bouncing up and down over the rough ground dislodged the hitch pin.  The hydraulic hoses were all that was dragging it along.

     Fortunately, I looked back in time to see what happened before any real damage occurred.   No longer fastened to the tractor, the weight of the Flex Rod was all behind the wheels, resulting in  the front end of the machine, the hitch frame, sticking up about six feet in the air.

     After a few moments of contemplating who or what in the universe had it out for me and was enjoying my frustration, and a few (more than a few?) unprintable words, I realized the solution was to carefully lower the machine using the hydraulics, trying not to let it fall with a thump and really do some damage, to itself, to the tractor, or to me.

      Once both front end and back end were safely on the ground, I disconnected the two hydraulic hoses and went through the process of hooking up to the machine all over again,  (Note: when speaking of farm implements “hooking up” doesn’t mean the same thing as it means in modern parlance.)  In about ten minutes, I was on my way again.  This time, the hitch pin was also pinned so the tongue could not escape no matter how severe the bouncing.

     I am happy to report that the powers that be found no more amusement in frustrating me.  I was able to get over the 160 acres without further incident.

 

     “As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods; They kill us for their sport.”  Gloucester, in King Lear.  Or maybe they just pester us some.       

Aw Hail

       It didn’t look like it would amount to much.  I could keep disking, I thought.

      But then, it started sprinkling.  Within five minutes, it was really letting its hair down.  I was headed for the house when the ice started falling and the wind really picked up.

     I rode out the storm in the tractor cab.  It didn’t seem so bad at first.  The trees didn’t lose any leaves.  The weeds didn’t get knocked down much.  The rain gauge showed a half inch.

      That was Saturday afternoon about 3:30.  We took off for the weekend Sunday morning.  When we returned on Wednesday, nothing looked quite right.  The wheat seemed prematurely ripe, losing its green color.  Some of the grass around the farmyard, which I hadn’t mowed for three weeks, showed signs of damage, drying up, not rank and green as it should have been after a rain.

      About 8:30 Thursday morning, I called the insurance company to report Saturday’s hail storm.  By 10:00, two hail adjusters pulled into the yard.  They had been nearby, checking out hail damage.  They stopped in because they were close. 

      I was greasing tractor and disk, getting ready to try to finish disking the newly chiseled ex-crp ground.  It has been a long haul.  Taking a week to empty a grain bin that should have been done in two days, two flat tires on the new tractor, various and other breakdowns, I am behind in my work.  Nothing too unusual about that, I guess.

      I started disking and the crop adjusters took about 45 minutes to do theirs.  They waited for me at the end of the field.  They didn’t have much good news. 

      Maybe three to five bushels per acre, he said.  Damage?  No, expected yield. That’s what’s left. Ouch.

      The heads were not finished filling.  Damage to the plant would prevent the filling process from finishing.  What was left would not be very high quality, low test weight, for example.  Plus, severe weather such as wind and heat would further deteriorate the quality of the crop.

    Options.  Let the crop stand.  Plow up the crop.  Hay the crop.  Harvest the crop, three-to five bushels of poor-quality grain.

     Not too many good options, for sure.  It’s too late in the season to plow it up and get anything planted.  The neighbors have moved a swather into position, apparently ready to make hay of their ruined crop, when it dries up enough.

      I will explore the possibility of having someone make hay out of it.  I don’t need any hay, so I would have to try to find someone who does need it.  With the wet spring we have had, good-quality hay will probably be abundant this year. 

     So, it looks like leave it stand, the fallback option.

      Anyway, it wasn’t a good year to lose a crop, having bought “new” equipment and all.  I guess there’s never a good year to lose a crop.  That’s why you buy crop insurance.

     “Into each life some rain must fall,” old Longfellow wrote and the Ink Spots sang.

     Hold the ice, please.

 

Jack's Bin

     It might have been a cobra in that pit, its beady eyes mesmerizing the three of us as we peered through the narrow doorway.

     But no.  It was grain, wheat, slowly sliding down the sloped concrete floor into a running auger.  It was a sight we had hoped to see three days earlier.  It was, at last, a welcome sight.

     On Tuesday, three trucks showed up to carry away the contents of the grain bin at Jack’s place.  Brother Harry and I had been working hard to get things set up and ready.  We had loaded a pickup with tools, gas, shovels, belts, and two augers.  A third auger on wheels dutifully followed the 4010 to the bin sight.  

      Using the front-end loader on the 4010, we had managed to drop one of the augers down the tube and into the grain at the bottom of the cone-shaped pit.  Three semis pulled up about that time.

     We were just getting ready to start moving wheat, but when I started the other auger, the one that relays the wheat from the pit auger into the truck, the belt driving the pit auger flew off and got eaten up by the second auger.  In the process, the belt got cut in two.

     That was how the rest of the day went.  Though I had brought a bunch of belts, none worked.  Eventually, we pulled that pit auger out and replaced it with one run by an electric motor.  The electric motor is powered by a generator.  We had trouble getting the depth of the auger set so the electric motor could turn it.

      When we finally got it turning out a good-sized stream of grain, it overheated and shut itself off.  By that time, we had one truck loaded and on its way, and another truck less than a fourth full.  Attempts to find another motor failed.  Finally, about 8:30, we resolved to find a different motor the first thing in the morning and two truckers spent the night in Jack’s yard.

    Wednesday morning, one truck left empty to meet other commitments and Dave, the head driver, satyed to help us get the job done.  Failing to find another motor, we pulled the pit auger up a bit so it was barely in the wheat.  The electric motor’s overload protector had failed to reset, so we bypassed it.  The lighter load was to prevent the motor from burning up.

     It worked, but it took five hours to load the truck.  After the truck left, I returned home to try to finish chiseling CRP grass that will now be grain-producing again.  I was within three or four hours of finishing when the bolts on the chisel frame sheered off, letting one I-beam fall and twisting the remaining I-beam pretty badly.  My chiseling was done. 

     I went back to the farmyard sans chisel and hooked up to the disk.  By the time I got the disk ready to go, it was quitting time.  Thus ended Wednesday.

     On Thursday, Dave the trucker called saying he had ruined two tires on his trailer and he would be a little late.  So I set out to disk.  Things went well for three hours.

      Then I saw that the right rear outside dual tire was totally flat. Once again, I was nearing completion, but, no, fate denied me.

     As I was mulling this over, Dave called to say he was five miles out.  I parked tractor and disk and hurried down to Jack’s.  Where we sat for another five hours, letting the truck slowly fill.  It was past 8 o’clock when I got home.  And that was Thursday.

      On Friday morning, I debated whether to risk disking with one flat dual.  I opted to mow the yard instead.

     About noon, Dave-the-brother arrived with a spare motor and an ammeter.  With a spare waiting in the wings, we could be a little more aggressive with the original motor.  Dave attached the ammeter and we slowly lowered the auger deeper into the pit until the motor was pulling 10 amps.  This time, the truck got loaded in about two hours.  

     The bin still had wheat left in it.  Good news when it comes to getting a check for the wheat.  But not such good news for those weary of the struggle.  Dave-the-trucker thought there might be more than he could haul, too.

     So, Saturday morning, Dave-the-brother and I got out the big Dodge truck, aired its tires and headed for Jack’s place.  Dave-the-trucker was there by nine, a little ahead of us.  After about an hour, the bin bottom began to appear beneath the slowly sliding wheat.  It was a sight we sorely needed to see. 

     We went through the usual ritual of finishing off a grain bin, shoveling, sweeping, getting the last shovelful out.  We moved the wheeled auger out of the way, fired up the 4010 and pulled the pit auger out.  Dave-the-trucker was soon on his way back to Nebraska.

      Dave-the-brother and I ferried augers, tractor, and truck home.  After a lunch break, we returned to Jack’s with a shop vac and finished cleaning up the bin.  It was past five when we got back from that job. 

     The job that should have taken two days stretched to five days.  But at last, it was done.    

Spring Flowers

     Fixin’ fence was a spring ritual.  Actually, it was more of a year-around chore as long as we had a cow-calf operation.  It wasn’t called that in those days .

     We had a herd of cattle.  Dad kept 20-30 cows and sold off steers and heifers every fall.  Sometimes he kept some of the heifers if they had decent mothers (decent meaning they weren’t “fence-crawlers” or obnoxious in some other way), and sold off some of the older cows.

     He would change bulls when the heifers were old enough to be bred by their father.  Having heifers graduate into cow-hood wasn’t always pleasant.  Heifers could have trouble having their first calf and had to be watched closely as they approached calving time.  They could also abandon their calf and refuse to suckle it.  Calving heifers was a pain.

      No matter. As long as there were cattle on the place, there were fences to fix.

      Every spring as the pastures greened up, it was time to go fix fence.  We would load up in the old pickup along with some posts, barb wire, wire stretcher, hammer, staples, spade and tamping bar.  We were along to help Dad.  Looking back on it now, I think Dad was helping Mom by getting us out of  her way for a day.

     We would replace broken posts, splice broken wire, stretch the wires, and replace missing staples. As we aged, we were trusted to drive the pickup along side of the fence to save Dad the trouble of walking back and forth along the fence line to replenish his supplies of staples or grab a replacement post.

     It wasn’t all work, however.  Many years, there would be flowers in bloom on the prairie.  Especially attractive were the yellow sweet peas that flourished in the sandy creek bottom.  They were easy to pick and they smelled wonderful. 

     Not only did our mother get a break from us noisy boys all morning.  She ended up with a bouquet of sweet peas when we returned at noon, promptly at noon, for our dinner.  The yellow flowers would wilt and fade, and their fragrance would dimmish in a day or two, and out they would go.  They were pretty as long as they lasted.

      Many times, we had more than enough flowers for two bouquets.  So our elderly neighbor lady got treated to a bouquet, too.  “Pratsy” would always make a big deal out of getting pretty flowers.  Hard to say who got the biggest kick out of it, Pratsy from the bouquet, or us over Pratsy’s reaction. 

      For many years, the sweet peas failed to appear.  Just the dry weather?  Or did something find the plants so delectable that they gobbled them up.

      This year, we repeated the old fencing ritual as we prepared the “little” pasture to host a small herd consisting of a cow, a steer, and a heifer.  There were plenty of yellow blooms in the creek.  Just dandelions, I thought.  But upon closer examination, many of those yellow blooms were sweet peas in full bloom.

     Nothing would do but we pluck a handful  and tend them carefully as we returned to the house where we could put them in a vase of water.  These blooms weren’t as fragrant as in olden times.  Or is it that my nose doesn’t work as well as in days of yore?

      Sweet peas weren’t the only blooming flowers this spring.  The tulips did quite well, too.

 

      Everything is in bloom with the wettest spring we have had in years.  Viva springtime!

The Quest

       It wasn’t exactly the Holy Grail.

     Nor was there a damsel in distress.

     No fire-belching dragon, other than the internal ones which do not require an excursion to confront.

     I did not rename the Ford Ranger Rocinante.  I tugged along a faithful servant, the Goodwife, not one named Sancho Panza.

     My lampshade helmet?  A yellow Jegs cap and my “old-people” colored glasses that have side lenses to block blinding light coming in from the sides.

     This quest actually began more than thirty years ago when I reluctantly gave up finding a job anywhere in Eastern Colorado.  The farm was enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program, CRP.

      Cover crops, weeds, and eventually a good stand of grass replaced  a two-year rotation of summer fallow followed by wheat.  I renewed ten-year contracts twice.  Thirty years of grass that got hayed once and grazed once in all that time.

      Ten years ago, I reenrolled about half of the acreage and began farming the other half using the old two-cylinder John Deere’s that had rested comfortably in the shed.  Finding parts for the old horses has become increasingly difficult. 

       Then there is one other detail:  I can’t spend eight hours a day riding a tractor any more, at least not the old hammering two-cylinders.  Age catching up with me.  Maybe I am Don Quixote after all. 

 

     An ad in the Miles Saver was the first step in the journey.  It said, “Wanted:  A versatile 750 tractor, or something similar.”  I got six responses. One of them was actually for a Versatile.  Otherwise, I got two John Deere responses, two Steiger offers, and one Allis Chalmers.

      I rejected one out of hand, as the tractor wasn’t in running condition.  The Goodwife and I set out on a sunny day in March and journeyed to Watkins where we looked at one of the John Deere’s.  I tried to drive it, but when I was trying to figure out how to shift the dang thing, the motor died. 

     The owner, an old guy from Haxtun, spent the next fifteen minutes hooking up an electric fuel pump to help prime the motor.  He got it started again and this time he drove it around the old farm house. New fuel filters were required.  It didn’t seem a prime candidate at that point.

       We returned to Loveland via Prospect Valley with a little side trip to Hoyt, Colorado.  Look that one up if you don’t know where Hoyt is!  There we viewed a 1974 Allis Chalmers 440.

     The Allis had a Cummins V-8 diesel motor and a Ford truck transmission.  With a stick coming up through the floor board front and center, figuring out how to shift it was no problem.  The biggest drawbacks, “only” 165 horse power, and two of the eight tires in not-so-good condition.

      Cold weather forced me back into hibernation.  On a warm March day, Sancho--er the Goodwife--and I took off for Otis, Colorado.  About fifteen miles north of the metropolis, we viewed a Steiger, a 1990’s model.  It was in great shape, with over 200 horse power and good tires.  The price tag was pretty good, too, about twice that of the Allis.  The shift levers and the two-page instructions on how to properly use them were a bit of a turnoff.

     That left one to go, the only Versatile on my list.  It was within ten miles of the farm, too.  Because it was so close and it was actually a Versatile, it seemed my odds-on favorite.  Except when I called to make an appointment to see it, the former owner informed me that he had sold it two weeks ago.  Ouch!

       He have a John Deere he would sell me.  I said I would go take a look, it being so close.  Thus, my adventure took me to the Les David place south of Genoa.

       This John Deere had all of the drawbacks of the other John Deere, plus thousands of hours on its hour meter.  All things pointed to the old Allis.

       On a solo voyage, I returned to Hoyt.  The old Allis started right up and I drove it around the farm yard, trying all the gears.  It would do.  At the time, the seller thought he could haul it for me.

      But then came the March blizzard.  As the weather warmed and March threatened to turn into April, Dan decided maybe he couldn’t haul it.  Could I find another trucker? 

      I tried, unsuccessfully.  The other thing that happened in that time, the price of diesel fuel rose about a dollar a gallon. 

       Dan did some research and consulted with a friend who trucks out of Bennet.  He decided he could haul it, but at a higher price than he had first offered.

      On a Saturday morning about 10 o’clock, the truck pulled in with its over-width load and coasted to a stop in the farmyard. 

 

        I wrote the check, and the tractor was ours.  At $10, 000, it was only a thousand more than the 4010 I bought last summer.

     My first official job as a new tractor owner was to remove all the goat heads sticking in the eight tires.  Not a crop I want to raise.

         The quest isn’t yet finished.  Now, there must be equipment worthy of such a work horse.  I have been back in Miles Saver. 

       So far, only three responses this time.  The journey continues.

      

Les David

    Avoid that goose no matter what.  Or was it a gander?

     On a quest, I found myself about two miles south of Genoa.  The place seemed oddly familiar, even though the old house was pretty run down and the yard and outbuildings in a state of disrepair.

      It must be the old Les David place.  (Luster William David died in 1974.)  Then the old memory machine kicked into gear.  It had to have been in the early 1950’s, because Les and Irene’s son Bill was in Korea at the time.

     Les was always a piano player.  He had this marvelous machine that would cut a vinyl record.  It was 78 rpm, I think, even though it is the smaller size, like a “45”.  I still have the record.  But I don’t have a record player that will do 78 rpm records anymore.  

     Since it was the early 50’s, I would have been somewhere between the ages of 3 and 6 or 7.  We all loaded up in the old Chev and trekked down to Les’s place.  It seems like it was a Sunday afternoon.  As I recall, Dad, Uncle Walter, and Les made a record or two to send to Bill in Korea, where he was serving in some branch of the service. 

     We went home with a record, too.  It would be nearly 70 years old now.

     I remember getting bored with the music and venturing outside.  But our outdoor activities were severely limited.  We had to stay inside the yard and keep the gate closed because that goose or gander would attack if we ventured into the farmyard outside of the fence.

 

       Thinking of Bill David caused another set of memories, memories of Syracuse, Kansas where Bill spent some time with Aunty and Uncle, playing music.  Except I don’t think Bill played any instrument.  I think he was a spectator.

      What I do remember is the way he balanced a burning cigarette on his lower lip.  He could carry on a conversation with that cigarette bobbing up and down with his lower lip.

    “No Walt, ‘lack’ I told Bessie. . . “ he would say as an intro to an anecdote or an opinion.   I wonder where Bill picked up his southern accent.

      And thinking of Bill made me think of other “characters” we met in Syracuse, one being a guy named Jack Pepper, I think.  He was a guitar picker with a 6-jack amplifier, a huge old box.  More memorable, he was a hypnotist. 

      He tried to hypnotize Uncle Ricky.  “Concentrate on your hand,” he would say over and over.  “Your hand is rising.  When your hand touches your forehead, you will be asleep.”  Or something like that. 

       Uncle Ricky’s hand did rise and touch his forehead, and he seemed asleep, but when Jack asked him to do something, he came out of the trance.  So Jack hypnotized his wife.

     He tried to get her to play the piano, but she was very shy and only sat at the keyboard shivering.  So he told her that when she came out of the trance, she would go into the bedroom and bring out a chair and invite Jack to sit in it.

      He brought her gently out of her zombie state.  When she was fully awake, she walked into the nearby bedroom, grabbed a chair and brought it out and said, “Have a chair, Jack.”

      He said, “Honey, I’m already sitting down,” and laughed.  She opined that she didn’t care to be hypnotized again.  The “piano” session had worn  her out physically and mentally, apparently, even though she had no recollection of sitting at the piano and refusing to play.

      When she was invited to play after her “spell” was over, she refused.  She wasn’t at all certain of her piano playing skills.  Jack said that a person couldn’t be persuaded to do something under hypnosis, that they wouldn’t ordinarily do.  I guess he proved it, too.  He said the idea that a bad actor hypnotizing an ordinary person and turning them into a murderer was total fiction.  

      All of this stimulated by a wild goose chase south of Genoa.  More on my wild goose chase next time.  Stay tuned.