June 14, 2010

View of the day-Deluge 2 of 8 that hit Cherokee from last night until this morning.

We got to sleep in…we knew with all the rain it would be a super-do-nothing day. We did decide if it wasn’t raining we would at least get the tarp fixed on the General which was down at Carmen, so we gathered our tools and headed south.

We stopped for lunch in Carmen before checking out the General and when we got to the truck, Ron had already taken the bracket off and had called the welder who showed up just after we got there. He said it would take about 45 minutes to redo the bracket on a new pipe, so we used the time to see if we could get out to the combine to change the broken guard on the header. They had gotten 1 ½ inches in town but the gauge on the combine showed 2 ¼ …not counting the chaff in the bottom of the gauge.

We made it out to the farm without any problems then started working on the combine. It had gotten quite clean from the pounding rain and we think the cart might look as good, but it was out in the middle of the field and with the water standing in the stubble, we thought better of checking it out. Once we had the new guard and section on, we went back into town. The new bracket was leaning against the grain truck waiting to be put on…which we did in no time at all…another job off the list.

We left Carmen and carried on to Fairview to visit with the MacDon guys and get a new filter for the header. After having a good chat with them about some of the questions we had come up with after running the header for the last couple of weeks, we went over to see the ProHarvest guys at the CaseIH dealer. After filling him in on the spreader falling off issue and the monitor locking up, he wasn’t able to help but would be checking in with the other guys to see if anyone else had come up with a solution.

We left Fairview and continued on to the bright lights of Enid. We were really surprised on the way down to that there weren’t a lot of fields that had been cut yet. Marilyn needed to return a pair of jeans to Wal-Mart and pick up a couple of things she forgot in Alva yesterday. Al needed to stop in at Atwood’s for a few items…which we never got because the service sucked. Marilyn couldn’t believe that when the cashier asked Al if he found everything he was looking for, he said yes…so unlike Al not to speak his mind.

Once we were done shopping we stopped at the Golden Corral for supper…and the rains hit again…lots of lightning and thunder with a heavy downpour. Not as bad as Oklahoma City with their 9 inches of rain last night…thank goodness. We finished supper and headed back to Cherokee, going through several small towns along the way and checking out the harvest crews that were parked in them to see if we knew anybody. We didn’t see any bodies out and about…everyone must have been shopping or catching up on sleep after the good run we had down south.

We got back home to Cherokee and stopped at the library so Al could check out his favourite sites…he wouldn’t be making the midnight run with Marilyn when she went to upload…and the rain started again. It was a short burst and by the time we got back to the camper it had let up enough for us to get everything unloaded and inside.

Interesting that Al didn’t buy one toy this trip…and Marilyn forgot to return the jeans…