Friday night high school football.
The cooler temps and shorter days can only mean one thing – a new season is about to “fall” upon us. The days begin with much cooler temps but still warm up quite nicely. It’s the season when our days begin with three layers of clothing – tank top, t-shirt and sweatshirt – ending with the tank top. By the time early evening arrives, the tank top is eventually replaced with the sweatshirt.
The flags can attest to the strong winds as we entered. As it was, this was calm compared to what we endured later in the day.
The plan on Friday was for Jim and The Yellow Beast to get back to picking corn AFTER the trip to Husker Harvest Days on Wednesday. That plan was spoiled by the hot temps that made their way back into the region. It was 96 degrees on Tuesday. I tried to justify to him why it would be ok for his taking Wednesday off to make the trip to Grand Island. “It’s still so early in the fall”. “What? Is it going to start raining now?” “It’s not like the weather’s going to drastically change”. However, because of his strong work ethic all my attempts were met with a strong NO! I wanted to go. Mark, Candi and Jenna were still planning on the trip, so I decided what the heck?! (One more day to pretend like I have nothing better to do.)
The flag I immediately hung outside my front door. You can tell it was there quite a long time – ragged and bleached.
The day began like any other and ended with confusion, fear and…a sense of being united.
9/11/01 will forever be a memory in my brain. A day in which the events will never be questioned by what I was doing and where I was at.
While sitting at an intersection waiting for a vehicle, I HAD to try to record the sun as it was coming up over the east horizon. Unfortunately, this doesn’t do justice for the beauty of the moment – especially through a dirty bus window.
The weekend started for me on Friday morning. Jim was caught up with dry corn and had been spending some much-needed time on combine and corn head maintenance. On Friday morning, he asked me if I wanted to ride along to Cornlea (Nebraska) to get parts for the corn head. Jenna thought that was quite funny…going to Cornlea for the corn head – appropriate. Cornlea was about 2 ½ hours from home. I thought…what the heck?! Before we could go, though, I had to sub for a driver on the morning bus route.
This picture shows just a portion of what I’ve been hauling in from the Cottage (on wheels) since Saturday. Yes, I got started doing SOMETHING after my day of denying the fact on Friday. I definitely wasted Friday away trying to get my brain transitioned from the wheat field to being “home, home”.
I’m sure they’re eating something but it’s not GREEN grass.
We’re home, home! The final miles were driven yesterday. It’s been quite a long 5 days! And so very HOT – 110 degrees on Wednesday and 105 yesterday. The Pete kept running hot all day on Wednesday – to the point it shut itself off going up a hill. That has never happened before. I asked Jim why it had decided to do it at that particular time and he said it was because of the intense heat and the four mile hills we were climbing. This heat and no rain is really taking a toll on our country. The Midwest is very, very sick right now!
My last blog posed questions from a reader regarding the information Trent mentioned that he had in his hands while interviewing Secretary of Ag Tom Vilsack. I thought it may be of interest to others, as well, so I asked Trent if he could provide me with copies of the information. He was on the ball with his reply – THANK YOU, Trent!!
The paper Trent was referring to having in his hands was included in the final rule published in the Federal Register on January 26, 2012.
I had the opportunity to meet Trent Loos at the U.S. Custom Harvesters, Inc. convention last March. Trent is a true American, a cowboy and a fellow Nebraskan. The school lunch program and its requirements have been in the news lately. Trent’s interview with Secretary Of Ag, Tom Vilsack, was very interesting to me. Thank you, Trent, for asking the hard questions and challenging the Secretary with the USDA’s requirements and nonsense regulations! The recorded conversation can be found here: http://www.rodeoattitude.com/facesofag/2012/08/20/vegan-culture-alive-and-well-at-usda-secretary-vilsack-answers-question/
She wasn’t “home” when we left the driveway. “Home” was in Texas with another family. I sold the trailer house that had been home to us during the summer months last fall. What we left “home, home” with in May was an RV full of our belongings.
U.S. Custom Harvesters, Inc. is one of 105 partners with the Alliance to Feed the Future. The following description of the organization was found on their website -:http://www.alliancetofeedthefuture.org/