View of the day-A house in Aberdeen, South Dakota is decorated for Halloween. It's amazing how a lot of the yards in the US decorate for every holiday, not just Christmas.
The day started out as a lot of them in the last week, low clouds and fog and then the mist started around 10am and continued off and on for most of the day. Once again everyone in the coffee shop was blaming the Canadians for bringing the rain with them...coincidence...merely, coincidence. Since we knew we wouldn't be cutting any sunflowers, we decided to take a trip down to Aberdeen, SD to check out the great deals at the Dodge dealer on new one ton pickups.
Mike, one of the farmers, decided to go with us to kill the day, so he rode in the front seat with Al while Marilyn rode in the back working on the play they were writing and on the blog on the way home. She knew the conversation would be of farm toys and such stuff, so she decided to stay out of the way. Mike is another of the faithful daily blog readers, so when Al would start to tell him a story from the summer, Mike would cut him off with "read it on the blog". After about three or four such comments, Mike suggested they just sit there and stare out the window since they had nothing new to talk about.
It rained pretty much all the way to Aberdeen, and it looked like there had been a lot more rain there than up north. We went directly to the Dodge dealer and drooled as we drove by all the new one ton trucks...and they had a...well...ton of them. Just to put things in perspective, in 1998 when we bought the pickup we have now, we paid around $47K, that is almost 10 years ago. The truck we were looking at was a 08 one ton, Big Horn and the sticker price...which includes everything but the $50 registration fee...was $38,650! Diesel, 6 speed standard, engine brake, 4X4, 4 door, satellite radio, 17 inch tires (might need to revamp the garage) and quiet running...a real nice truck. At home an 07 one ton was quoted to us at...cough, cough...$53K!
Now before all you KIA's(Know It All's) start in on the "you'll never get it across the border" or "you'll have to pay a whole bunch at the border"(we pay the taxes whether we buy it here or there) or "they can't sell to Canadians". We checked into it at both border crossings when we came down and we have all bases covered. And remember, there is no exchange rate anymore.
We took it for a test drive with the salesman in the back seat telling all the great things about the truck. We parked it back on the street to check out the engine...unbelievable how quiet it runs when idling, although it barks a bit when the engine brake kicks in, a nice addition to the truck. After chatting a bit more with the salesman about a possible purchase after the harvest, he told us he would deliver it for free to Pingree...can you believe it?
We went to the Case and John Deere dealerships to look at the farm toys...less real estate in the back seat for Marilyn on the way home. Marilyn got dropped off at Walmart...no big surprise there...and the guys went to check out the farm toys over at a couple of other stores. Once they picked Marilyn up...with only a half cart full (that's a shock)...it was time to stop for supper before heading back. After stopping for supper at a Chinese buffet, which by the way is going on our list of "never again" restaurants, we were ready to head north to Pingree.
We stopped to get the view of the day that the guys had seen while toy shopping...again, every holiday is like Christmas down here when it comes to decorating...it really puts you in the mood of the season. It rained all the way home and then it got foggy...thank goodness it is still warm out and we didn't have to deal with ice.
More rain tomorrow...what to do, what to do...
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