A Day on the Farm

Parental Advisory:  due to the recent wildfires in Colorado, I would advice those folks not to read this.  Also, I am not responsible for any psychological problems associated herein.

The fire is out and there was minimal damage so I’m going to go ahead and tell the story of yesterday's events in my own words. **

It was a dark and stormy night. No, no, no. That was how Snoopy always started his books. Actually it was a sunny and hot day on the farm, situated about ½ way between the Red River of the North and Eden, but still in God’s country. (in case you wanted to look us up on the map). Wheat harvest is in full swing, the combines are spewing clouds of grey dust that look like smoke but it’s just another hot & dusty day making allergy sufferers suffer. Ask me how I know….. But we’re filling those trucks. Yeah! A good wheat harvest means baby gets a new pair of shoes. And except for the dog, I am the youngest in the house so that means shoes for me! Yippee Skippee.

My Mr.’s job (along with his trustee sidekick Baxter) is to unload the trucks into the bins and then he & I (& Baxter of course) drive around looking for more trucks to unload and also drop off the empty ones. Hubs had just finished unloading a truck and came in for a cold Coke when he got a call from one of the guys in the field. The other guy’s combine had a teensy-weensy little fire from a smokin’ belt or burned out bearing or something which he put out immediately, well pretty immediately, because truthfully? We are the kind of people who are very safety conscious, read & follow all the instructions from the government and hold regular “safety meetings” *(see footnote for explanation) and had a fire extinguisher in the combine. OK, there may have been a touch of luck involved in being prepared for a fire but this is my story and I’m telling it my way. (see above**). As a bonus to actually having the fire extinguisher, our driver knew where it was and knew how to use it! And so he did.

Like I said, hubs was in the house grabbing a coke and I was on the computer doing farm work (on Pinterest ) My hubs is a very calm & laid back kind of guy. The kind that would only run if the house was on fire. You know? So he came running into the office and said the field is on fire! Call the fire department! Now this is where it starts getting really good. I reached for the phone book while saying “I don’t know their number”. Oh God.  Did I say that? OK, I said, why don’t I just dial in 911? Ta da! It is hard to stay ahead of this cookie I’m telling you. OK, the switch on the genius button may have pointed to off – but only for a second there. I swear.  I am the go-to gal in any emergency.  Just lock up the chocolate afterwards.

I was explaining to the nice lady at the 911 place (and she was great) while we jumped into the pickup to head out to the scene of the crime fire. Upon our arrival at the field I called my 911 friend back to give her more information – and she said – huh? I don’t know anything about this. Hold on. She switched me to a man (you don’t know how badly I want to change my story here and say the man didn’t know anything but the woman fixed it. But again, I’m nothing if not truthful.)

What happened was that the road alongside our fire-y field is actually the county line so that the west ½ of the road is our county and the east ½ of the road is the neighbor county. Turns out I was now talking to the neighbor county and asked him to switch me back to my county. So the first ones on the scene was the sheriff’s dept. (our county) and we were visiting, another sheriff person came and we were visiting some more. Hmmm, wonder where the fire department is. Sheriff says, we’ll page them again.  We visited some more, checked on the downed combine & decided to drive a ½ mile into the field where the fire was. Hubby said “did you know if you were talking to a man or a woman deputy”? “It was a guy I said. Wasn’t it?” NO, he said. “she was wearing a wedding ring”. “Well, duh.  Men wear wedding rings too.” “NO, he said, she had a diamond in her rings like you have.” I’ll swear on a stack of bibles here but if her rings were like mine, I have no idea how he could see there was a diamond there. I’m just sayin’.

Anyway, a half-mile into the field there is a large grove of trees and the fire was in the wheat of course but mostly in the trees & brush. Our village fire department has now arrived. Praise the Lord and bless the little children.   Now I know you think I say whatever comes out of my mouth without thinking but there are actually things I could say here that I’m NOT going to say. This is a very small village with an all-volunteer fire department. I will say that the fire & rescue truck showed up first but really, there was no one to rescue but they apparently had a small water tank. Then the pumper truck arrived and headed out to the fire – all guns blazing.  But there was a teensy-weensy little issue with the pump on the pumper truck. It wouldn’t start. Damn. Shit ah, stuff happens. So they called in another town’s fire department from 20 miles away. (You cannot believe how glad I was that it wasn’t my house burning.) They arrived quickly with 4 trucks and all the personnel in full fire-fighter gear.  Just like you see on the television set.  They jumped out of their trucks, with a job for everyone and everyone doing it. They put the wheat fire out first – hey, there’s a good idea, but some fire was still inside the trees. Can’t get a truck in there but the guys were carrying hoses in. Then a plane flies over about 3 times and dropped – something. I later asked one of the firemen where the plane came from. He said he didn’t know – he was in the grove and didn’t know the plane was there until it was right above him dropping a load of water. Scared the **** out of him. It was a crop-spraying plane and we still don’t know who it was. How about that?

Just another day on the farm. (yawn)

Seriously, there was not much damage done to our wheat, the combine didn’t burn and is repairable and the driver was shaken, not stirred – or hurt.  It was a potentially bad situation that had a very happy ending.

*Afore-mentioned safety meetings consist of a bunch of farmers who gather in one guy’s shop to discuss safety issues (?). While drinking cold adult beverages. Also, we always have a farm safety director during harvest but it is strictly an honorary title and is meaningless because even if he knew what he was talking about, no one would listen.

I have no pictures of the “excitement “ but I’ll throw in a couple pics that are laying around, ok?  If it’s not ok, don’t look at ‘em.

I guess I’ll show my container flowers:
The back 1/2 of this little truck has orange calibrachoa which aren’t blooming right now.

This started as a cement birdbath but it was too heavy for me to clean so now it’s a flower pot.

An actual wine barrel from a vineyard in Oregon.

Shutters from a demolished building turned into a planter.


This daylily is not in a container, but I couldn’t  resist adding it…..

Oops, how did this little bachelor’s button get in here?

Have a great weekend -------------
Ms. Faye