1000th Post and Merry Christmas!!!

This has been the view for the past two weeks...the hoarfrost has been spectacular and is most amazing when we actually get to see the sun.

Since November 4, when the 999th post was made, Marilyn was thinking about what the 1000 post would be.  This was, after all a milestone in the six years of harvesting posts and would have to be something special.  This turned out to be six weeks of procrastination, because nothing seemed..."special" enough.  Of course, it might have had something to do with the utter chaos of the past six weeks.

We got the camper winterized and tucked away along with everything else...Al even got the combine into the dealership in town to have the "Uptime Inspection" done before the warranty runs out.  We are still waiting for it to come home...they are waiting for another new straw chopper to install...hopefully that is the only major thing we need.  No time to worry about that now.

Marilyn was back at work at Staples full time while trying to prepare for the annual Paper Bag Players dinner theatre.  Originally, she was just going to be the Producer and delegate duties, but as people kept backing out, that job included, set design and construction...thankfully we went with a simple set...costuming, which always looks "good from far, but far from good"...and then throw in some sound and lights...pretty much everything but acting.

Her friend Brenda, who had helped us move, was getting a lot of work done...until she went and got a job as General Manager of Liquidation World(LW).  Now we had two schedules to work around and time was ticking away.  Why does it always seem like we have so much time to get things done, but it is always the last minute panic that gets them done?

Brenda was needing some help getting things organized at LW...there hadn't been a manager there for six weeks and the Christmas stock was piling up...so Marilyn applied for a job to work after store hours to help with the organizing.  Now, this is a dream job for Marilyn...stocking shelves with no customers to sidetrack her.  The first shift was a biggie, going from 6:30pm to 8:30am...there were a lot of pallets unloaded that night!

Al, on the other hand, was back in the swing of all things farm toys.  He took in a one day toy show at Tisdale, 158 miles NW of Yorkton.  His buddy, Roger, went along with him and it turned out to be a pretty good show...likely penciled in for next year.  He was also heavy into getting the toy auction rolling...here was someone who was not going to have the last minute panic. Yet.

So, the dinner theatre was to be Dec. 7 & 8 at the Painted Hand Casino and December 14 & 15 at the Ukrainian Orthodox Auditorium.  The only problem was, we were also in the process of getting ready for our Association of Canadian Custom Harvesters(ACCHI) annual meeting in Saskatoon...which ran Dec. 5, 6 & 7...Marilyn would be missing the first performance.  The major problem would be that Brenda would have to be in charge of getting everything loaded in and set up on her own...not that she didn't already have a load of crap going on.

This year marked the 30th anniversary of the ACCHI for an overview of the beginnings of the organization, check out page 5 of the May issue of our magazine, The Cutter's Edge".  

While the relationship with the US Custom Harvesters didn't start out too well, it has changed greatly and this year we were thrilled to have several members of their board attend our convention.  President, Tracy Zeorian(check out her review of the convention on her blog NebraskaWheatie) and her husband Jim, Vice President, Kent Braathen and board member Jon Orr and his wife.

There were three days of machinery, trade show booths, speakers, meetings, food and fun, fun, fun!  It is really great to be able to see all our harvesting friends in one place to compare notes and just unwind from the year's activities.  And of course, there is the fundraising auction.  


One of the speakers was Greg Johnson, tornado hunter...what an entertaining man.  He had stories to tell, beautiful photos...and a book to sell, which we pretty much cleaned him out of.  He has live online streaming of his tornado chases, which are pretty cool to watch as you can see on a map exactly where they are moving and a stream from their dash cams.  Probably the best way to view some of these storms.

This year we did not come back with a new Dodge for our miniature fleet, but we did manage to get a wireless weather station(that Marilyn is still trying to get to work) and Al bought, yet another, CaseIH shirt of the back of one of their representatives at the convention.  And as with the others...it was overpriced and too small.  Marilyn, on the other hand, came home with a set of CaseIH coveralls, that do fit...but she is not sure about that black in the Oklahoma heat.

Once we said our farewells on Saturday morning, it was back to Yorkton so Marilyn could get to the Casino...not to play the slots...to help out with day two of the Christmas play.  Once it was over, we had to tear down, but we were lucky that the Ukrainain Orthodox Hall would let us set up the next day so we didn't have to do a bunch of unloading, loading and unloading again.

While all of this was going on, Al was on the push to sell the 2390 and he had actually had quite a few calls.  He finally got one where the guy was impressed with what he saw...he had his own 2390 that was in rought shape...and he wanted it.  Right away.  He went into town and came back with a stack of cash and said he would be back to road the tractor back to Canora later on in the week.

He called Al a couple days later and was asking about rigging up the tractor to put his blade on and when Al told him that we had a 12ft blade that we had used on it and that it was for sale...he said "I'll take it...but you have to put it on for me".  The price was more than right, so Al had the next few days lined up with mounting the blade.

Now, normally this gets done in the fall when we get back, not when there is 3 feet of snow on the ground.  The blade was parked in the back corner of the neighbour, Murray's,  yard against the tree row, so the snow had piled up even deeper.  Al had his work cut out for him and although he didn't get stuck, he had to enlist the help of Murray's tractor and bucket.  He got it mounted and it was ready to go when the guy showed up with his driver.  Marilyn tried to get a picture of it leaving the yard, but the guy was in it and gone before she got to the camera.  We were on our way to town and did manage to get a shot with the cell phone as he headed down the highway.

So now we are still waiting for our new-er tractor to make it up from Minnesota.  The first time, there were broker issues, the second time, there were weight issues...and the tractor ended up even further away.  But they promised us in the new year we will see it, but in the meanwhile, Al is trying to decide between a 3 point hitch snowblower or a new dozer blade.

The second weekend of the dinner theatre had Al inviting Bob and Jean from Balcarres and his boss from H&R, Curtis and his wife Jackie.  Marilyn got to visit with them for a while before going backstage. Our second night crowd was smaller, but they were the best of the four nights and because they were smaller, we were able to tear down and get out before midnight.  Part of the pain of performing in the UK hall is that we have to bring in our own stages to build up their small one.  This means loading in and setting up 20, 4x8 platforms that must weigh 175lbs...and feel more like 500lbs by the time the last one is set.

This year, the cast consisted of three women and Brenda and Marilyn filled out the crew...a lot of manual...or "wo-manual" labor involved.  Al is always "thrilled" when Marilyn volunteers him to drive her to the hall...he knows he will be rooked in to help with the loading.  Fortunately, the theatre group from Kamsack uses the staging and actually has room to store it, so they bring them down for us and pick them up after we are done...unfortunately, it is just a husband and wife that do the transporting, so we end up doing the heavy lifting anyway.

Al had gone back to work at H&R Block...more so to get the year end taxes in order...but he was happy to see they had cleaned up his office.

With the convention and dinner theatres out of the way, we had a week to prepare for our family Christmas...which we were hosting.  Al's family takes turns hosting and this was our year, we even had the date set back in August...this was one thing we were getting on early.  Unfortunately, Al's brother Jeff and his family were leaving for their Arizona home on the 19th, to celebrate Christmas with his wife, Michele's, family...so we were short four at the table.  Marilyn managed to talk Kim and Marg(her sister) into coming up for the day...a good thing too, because she was a big help getting things ready.

We had supper, gift exchange, then went out for the annual ritual of setting off fireworks...they sound so different in the frigid air...or when they go sizzling through the trees due to a malfunction...or maybe it is just in our minds.  They were fabulous, just the same.

So here it is, Christmas Day, and we are relaxing after a hectic month, enjoying the day.  Next month we have two trade shows, two toy shows and two jobs, so it won't be any better...or worse...we should be practiced up for it! 

We hope everyone who follows the blog has a wonderful Christmas and an even better 2013!

Marilyn has decided the 1000th post wasn't any more special than the others...it was just as special as the others!