October 21, 2009

View of the day-The cavalry lined up and waiting in the field next to 'Mount Mosaic'...actually it's the 'leavings' pile at the potash mine near the canola field we are working on.

We left town after grabbing a quick breakfast from McDonalds around 10am, as we got to the corner to turn off the highway at Bredenbury, we were 5 minutes late to see an accident. A pickup pulling a trailer full of old tires must have been turning too soon and a semi clipped him, leaving his trailer on one side of the road and his pickup, with the smashed fender on the other side. Everyone must have been okay, because the semi driver was on his cell phone and the other driver was rounding up the tires in the ditch that had fallen off the truck. Marilyn did not stop to take pictures...she has to draw the line somewhere.

We got to the field and started servicing, while the farmer fueled the combine. Jeff and his crew showed up and got their rigs all serviced, then Jeff did a bit of touch up welding on our header after we straightened up the divider that had seen better days.

We got going around 1pm and with both machines running, the productivity had more than doubled...until the big 8010 bit off more than it could chew around a slough and ended up with a plugged rotor. Fortunately it had the hydraulic rotor reverser and after some coaching over the radio, Mike the driver, got it chewing again. Al was kept hopping hauling grain with the General and with Rudy running the grain cart, there was hardly any time to take a break...of any kind.

We got the field finished around 6:30pm, and for reasons known only to Al, he made the call to move back to the wheat field. That was the field we had left half done to move over to the canola and it was about 5 or 6 miles away...and he was going to lead the way with our grain cart...ahh, the road to hell and good intentions. He started out and had to pull over for a tractor and baler, then carried on...and missed the corner. Not to worry, we would just turn at the next mile...he got too far ahead and those of us following, Marilyn in the combine with the 30ft straight head, Rudy with the big 4 wheel drive tractor and 1100 bushel grain cart and Mike bringing up the rear with our pickup, were left in the dust.

First Marilyn had to cross some tracks...apparently they didn't anticipate wide implements crossing when they put the cross bucks up...it took some squeaking to get through...ugly but effective...then we had to drive down a mile or so of tree lined road...Marilyn is in the tree trimming business now. Al decided to wait until Marilyn was maneuvering the last narrow stretch of road before giving the next turn direction, so she turned the 'other' left and ended up having to turn around in a field to get back on the right track. In the end we all got to the field we were supposed to, got parked and went back to drop off Rudy and Mike at their truck.

Let's hope the rain stays away...