Cloudy Drive

I'm not even sure what to say about today. It went from super boring to wayyy to interesting pretty fast.

The first thing we did this morning was round up dry cows out of the 80 here at home and bring them in to sort and ship out. Merle headed out with the four wheeler while we were saddling up. I hurried up and left Dean and helped get them in. He didn't show up until way later due to his horse spooking at a cat running between his legs and bucking him off. I did all I could not to laugh. For the rest of the morning he was asking if it was bruised and saying he needed aspirin...seriously- man up. Yes, it sucks to be bucked off, but no one saw you (so it's best not to mention it) and life continues on.

Besides the point. As we get them in, then the sorting begins. Either we were slow or the trucker was early (I'm thinking both) because he came way too soon for us to have them sorted. We did some scrambling and messed up a few times, but the three of us got the owners sorted out and I wrote down all of the tag numbers before the trucker headed out. Nothing was too wild and crazy so it worked out alright in the end, the driver just had to wait a bit.

Then, I went and hooked up the horse trailer to my pickup and pulled it up. Dean loaded the horses while I was helping Merle load out some heavy stuff from the house into his pickup before he went to the sale in Phillip. He was trying a new auction barn today and it sounds like it wasn't half bad. He said it wasn't exactly what he expected but there were a few buyers anyway. So, back to the time frame.

As I'm loading stuff he finds out that the baler will have to be brought down to Gordon this morning to have it fixed. So, I got out, unload and unsaddle the horses and unhook the trailer! haha...oh well, that black bull will have to wait until tomorrow. Merle took off for the sale and Dean met me out in the field to help get the baler ready to go. We had to take off the roller bar and stap it on the flatbed and then pull all the loose belts up into the gate before I closed it completely. We got them pulled in there and put the pick-up up as high as it would go. Then, I hooked up and off I went. Dean headed the same way to pick up corn but was way ahead of me. In fact he was loaded up and leaving when I got to town. It was quite a long drive to Gordon going between 35 and 40 the whole way between Martin and Gordon. Hisle road was about 20mph...makes for a long 15 miles! But, non the less I made it.

When I got there there was only one guy in the building...a typical crabby old parts man. I didn't trust him relaying any messages so I came back in an hour and made sure they got started. They gave me some bs about the baler belts being all balled up and taking time to undo that. Well, anyone with a brain knows that there is no way those thick belts just became "wadded up" in that gate on the way down. I think that was one of those "she's a girl and won't know the difference" things. Forget them! So, either way I kept pestering them all afternoon just to make sure they would get it done and I wasn't waiting around for nothing.

So...what is there to do in Gordon, Nebraska all day...not much. I ate at Subway, visited a couple ma and pop clothing stores- I found a favorite pair of jean half off and some capri pants at one! In the next store I found this super nice button up shirt for $8 that I was excited to buy until right before I left the dressing room I realized why it was on clearance. Across the back it ready "sexiest clothing since 1999"....seriously- so that ruined the shirt plan. But all that shopping is pretty good for someone who doesn't like shopping. I also visited the lovely Family Dollar to kill time and crused Gordon. I wanted to watch the sale at the sale barn but by the time I got there it was already done :( So...I just sat around town awkwardly all day because there isn't a whole lot to entertain a person in Gordon. But, I made up for the bordom later. When I came back to John Deere I had to wait about a half hour until they told me to drive to the back and get ready to hook up.

The mechanics were just finishing up when I got there so naturally I had to go investigate. I found out that the belts were not wadded up (the mechanic had no idea that the other guy told me that when I asked him if they were or not), and that they never recieved the list of things to fix. But, luckily the kid was pretty sharp and had it all fixed but a couple little thigns that they did right in front of me. Then, they pulled it out of the shed to see if we could get the rollers to come down and tighten up the belts. So here we all are (it's past quitting time and we all want to leave so there's three of us working on this thing) outside, standing on/around and large metal object with lightning everywhere. I don't know why God chooses to let me out alive sometimes...I'm so dumb! But after multiple tries he finally got the roller to drop and got the gate shut the way it's supposed to. By that time the other guy and I were looking at the weather on his phone. I decided that i thought if I took off going 40mph I could stay on the edge of the storm that was coming in most of the way home.

Yeah...that theory didn't last too long. The storm just moved in aroudn me at about 50mph. The clouds were black and green and nasty all around me and the weather reports were all over the radio for the area I was right in the middle of. I have never looked at the sky more than the road so much in my life. This was one of those hail/heavy rain/ crazy winds/ tornadoes type of storms. Thankfully, I skipped all of it but the heavy rain part- so I did ok, it was just slow and super nerve racking. At one time there were saying to get out of the vehicle and get in the ditch. Screw that! I'm not gettign out until I actually see a tornado or something- I just kept on going! I tried to talk to Merle several tiems before there was enough reception to have a conversation- but we determined that if I kept on moving I could avoid a lot more than if I stopped.

When I turned north at Merriman I thought I would get out fo some of it, but instead it turned into sheet rain and stright line head winds. At least they were head winds so the baler didn't wail around too much. In fact, a car that passed me when I turned was sitting in a field approach when I went by much later. They decided to follow me and let the baler break their wind...how nice/obnoxious. When I got to Martin, I stopped at Ross and Marva's and got hammer for the hitch pin (I somehow left the ranch without one...basically a sin) and then unhooked the poor thing at the fire hall so I didn't have to pull it through the mud.

On the way up Hisle road I had trouble getting the pickup into 4x4 but after doing a near 360, I stopped and manually locked it in and yelled at it..then it worked. I had to go ridiculously slow because there were no tracks and just enough rain to make it gumbo. All the way home they were saying there was a new storm coming from the NW headed straight towards us. So, when I thankfully got to the turnoff I called the other house and told them. Then, I went and picked up Merle and we came and got my car and put it in. The plan was to have him drop me off and then put the pickup in too- but we ran out of time the clouds were flying in. So, we put the pikcup in and shut the big door just in time before it got blown off.

I turned around and saw something so strange I can't even describe it. This cloud that had popped up just a minute earlier that looked like white and black vertical streaks in the sky just litterally rolled in. It was moving sooo fast and was seriously right in front of us and had to have touched the top of the pasture hill. It kinda rolled over and came flying through so we new we had to move. We ran down to teh house and talked about our weird scary cloud adn watched the news and weather. Thankfully we didn't get the hail but we got some wind, that's for sure. It sounds like the town of Kyle got beat pretty good so we'll have to hear in the morning. Eventually, when it died down, I went and got a pickup and headed home. We dont' appear to have any damage, but we'll see in the morning. Somewheres along the line we lost the baler pto shaft in the driveway as well so that'll have to be found tomorrow morning before it gets driven over!

So...what a day. All that crazy weather sure made up for teh boredom this afternoon. We are still under some weather watches so we'll see how this goes. I'm headed to bed.