July 25

View of the day-Well hidden cactus and thongs, don't go together.

Al took the Dodge into the shop to get a new slave cylinder put on for the clutch. He got it out of hock at 11 and then we had to find out what to do with the 250 bushels of 15.8% moisture rye that was on the truck from the night before. The farmer decided to just dump it on the ground and use it for feed.

We moved the combine over to the winter wheat and took a test. Because of the weeds the moisture was 16.8%, but after they took the weeds out it was 13.8. Al heard a ticking noise from the engine compartment and after inspection found one of the small jacks holding up the engine cover had lost a bolt and was dangling into the engine fan. It managed to carve some notched into the fan blades, but that was the extent of the damage.

The farmer decided to swath the rest of his wheat so the weeds would dry down and not be so much of a problem. We helped him get his swather hooked up, which is where the cactus was hiding, and he started in on the winter wheat.

We went to get the grain cart from the other field and found the batteries were dead because Marilyn had left the flashers on when she moved from the rye field. We managed to get it boosted and moved over to the combine to empty out the sample. We moved it back to town by the trailers to put the battery charger on to get it back up to charge.

The temperature got up to 104 again and there was a chance of rain in the forecast for tonight. The clouds built up in the west, but cleared off after sunset, so we have our fingers crossed that it doesn't rain. We have to wait a couple of days for the wheat to cure so there might be some cleaning going on. The good news is the cold front is supposed to be coming through so there will be a "cool down".

It might not be too bad to work outside, for a change...