On March 19th, Tim got his tractor stuck. It has been stuck all this time. We've been waiting for it to dry out. I mean, that baby is buried up to its hubs on the big back wheels. He's walked back a couple of times to try to get it unstuck, but it's well and truly bogged down.
Last week, he watched a fellow on lawn tractor mowing a lawn and he laughed about it. "The grass isn't even high enough to NEED mowing!" he said.
I said, "And you're not the man that got a full sized tractor stuck brush hogging an area that surely didn't require brush hogging..."
He laughed.
Yesterday, we heard the weather forecast, which calls for rain for most of the week. I groaned and said, "Honestly, Tim, we're never going to get that tractor out..."
Today, TADA!!!!! He got the tractor unstuck and back up to the garage! Hallelujah!
I had a nice video conversation with my daughter in England today. I'm grateful for that technology. Otherwise, missing her would be unbearable.
My sister asked me to take the two ham bones home with me from our Easter dinner yesterday. (43 of us gathered. I think it was the best turnout she's had.) Today, I made a nice pot of soup using them and the left over celery, carrots, and zucchini from my relish tray. I chopped up four potatoes to toss in, and there was supper.
The kids are coming home for the eclipse. We are in the zone of totality for 47 seconds, but if we head west for Erie, we will be in totality for 3 minutes and 46 seconds. It will be a cool experience to be with all the grands on such a memorable day!
At the end of the month, we will be heading east. My oldest grandaughter will be doing her first dance recital and she is quite excited about this. I can't wait to see her.
In between there are the appointments, and the house building, and the issue with the city, but it is nice to know that April will begin on such a fine note and end on such a fine note. It eclipses the crap in between!
For all you people who recommended 'The Detectorists', I am sad to report that we cannot get it on this side of the pond.
Finished Puckoon, and it was disappointing. It was hilarious and ridiculous all the way through, but by the end, it had gotten so ridiculous, it started to seem silly. It was definitely a funny book though.
I began reading Lamb and got to Chapter 4 before deciding that this was a book to be read and thought about. It is a funny book, but I like that the author has Jesus 'staying in character', so to speak. He's a kid grappling with the idea of who he is, and who he is meant to be, and what he is meant to do. All reported from the perspective of his childhood friend, Biff. It IS funny.
But I decided that it was not a book that I'd be comfortable discussing in a book group with people that I do not know. This loss of faith thing is new to me, and I'm navigating my way through it. I know what I believe, and I'm shocked to that I have come to believe this at this point in my life, but what I know for a fact is that I never want to be the person that destroys another's faith. I will never argue with someone about it. I think that it is just wrong to criticize anyone for their belief/faith/religion. There is no reason to measure their belief against my unbelief. Live and let live. So I sure don't want to tromp on in there to be discussing a book like that with people I don't know well. What I believe is my own business. What they believe is theirs. As it is said, "Go in peace." So I have set Lamb aside.
Then of course, I got side tracked by my new history book. I read some aloud to Tim Sunday night. He was so riveted, he fell asleep on the couch. I was so riveted, I didn't notice until he snored.
My sister and brother-in-law were really interested in that book. In skimming through the information on their township, they recognized names from the cemetery across the road from our new build. We needed to leave, and my sister reluctantly gave me my book back. Today, I found a 2023 reprint of it, 1000 pages long (it must be a larger print). It is old enough that it is 'public domain' and an historical printing company has reprinted it. I ordered it for them today, to be shipped to their house. It's a surprise. Shhhh! Don't any of you say a word.
In the meantime, let me get back to my 'assignment'. I need to pick a book and get reading!
Hope a family historian took pics of the stuck tractor. Linda in Kansas
ReplyDeleteThe family historian was much too aggravated to take pictures. Honestly. Every. Single. Spring. And it is always due to the fact that we have been able to remove beavers and reclaim land that was formerly underwater. The land has a high water table. It may look dry on top, but underneath, it is still wet and spongey. There really is no reason to brush hog that far back so early in the spring, but every spring, there's a man on a tractor saying, "Well...it looks pretty dry..." I told him that next year, I am going to chain the tractor up. I try to be a patient woman but this is a major aggravation to me because people get killed doing stupid shit like this. Tractors roll over, or rear up... Why take unnecessary risks? Are all men like this or is it just mine????
DeleteAnswer: all men are like this
DeleteI was afraid someone would say that.
DeleteSome men don't even see common sense in the older age and tragedies happen. I wonder how the cost of the reprinted book compares to what you paid for your original. More? Much more? Similar or cheaper?
ReplyDeleteIt was $1.76 more than my book.
DeleteYour sister is going to love that book, a lovely thoughtful gift.
ReplyDeleteOh she will be tickled. So will her husband.
Delete43 people to lunch? Great fun, and exhausting, too. We were just 9 at lunch on Sunday but all wiped out on Monday, especially the dogs!
ReplyDeleteI'm pleased for you that the tractor has been freed from its imprisonment. Chaining it up next year sounds like a good idea.
It isn't. No one person does all the cooking. Many hands make light work.
DeleteYou can currently stream The Detectorists in US on plex.tv. With ads. I believe on Amazon too but I know you don't do Amazon.
ReplyDeleteI am relatively new to streaming. Nothing came up. I will look again.
DeleteOh, and it's still on Acorn.tv. $6.99 for a one-month sub. But checking the library as someone suggested is a great idea.
DeleteI don't have either of those, but they are worth exploring.
DeleteYou're speaking to the man who got a tractor stuck at the age of fifteen and has never been allowed to forget it.
ReplyDeleteI am trying to make sure Tim never forgets it. He always does. Any tips? Good to see you here, John.
DeleteI will have to see what we watched it in with mil - she is on your land mass.
ReplyDeleteI would be interested to know. Thanks Jeanie.
DeleteI love your slice of life blog. It is interesting and comforting to me.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you on your treatment of others who practice religion. When I first lost my faith many many hears ago, I was critical. But slowly I came to respect them and almost envy them. I can not or would not want to talk them out of their faith just as they cannot talk me out of mine,though many have tried.
I know that it bothers Tim that I don't go to church. He goes every Sunday. I can't discuss it without feeling like I am challenging his beliefs. It is a difficult and lonely time right now. Thank goodness for blogs.
DeleteReassure Tim that the church isn't the building.. isn't that what Quakers say?
DeleteI admire Quaker meetings. You sit together in silence. If someone is moved to speak, they do. The idea of recognizing the divine in each other resonates with me.
DeleteMy very conservative religious family still send me emails around every religious holiday which I delete, but there are so few of us remaining that I don't discuss religion with them at all - they know what I am. I am sure I am in their prayers constantly. Oh well, if that makes them feel better.....
ReplyDeleteI don't discuss it with anyone, really. I can't.
DeleteWe watched The Detectorists some years ago and loved it but I have no idea what platform we saw it on and it's probably not there anymore anyway.
ReplyDeleteMen and large equipment. WHY? Go talk amongst yourselves.
Unlike you, I have no qualms in challenging people on their religious faith IF they begin to push it on me. So many religious people believe they not only have the right to proselytize but the duty to do so and I'm just not having it. If that makes me a bad person, so be it. I do, however, understand your hesitancy in introducing that book to a discussion group made up of people who may be offended.
Neatly summed up, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Yes. I have no qualms about defending my unbelief. But defending and offending are two different things. I have never understood people who wield their beliefs like clubs.
DeleteBummer that you can't get the Detectorists! We loved that show. In fact it prompted Dave to buy me a metal detector, which I have used approximately twice.
ReplyDeleteHooray for getting the tractor unstuck! That's got to be a relief.
It definitely is!
DeleteI'll give you a hint. Let him buy a bucket attachment for the front of the tractor. Then he can pull or push his own self out using it whenever he gets stuck. I know, because I've had to do the exact same thing more than once.
ReplyDeleteOh it has a bucket...
DeleteInteresting comments on faith. Some denominations spend too much of their time being picky about most things. It becomes ridiculous. I think that's why many people have left organized religion.
ReplyDeleteI guess for me the first crack in that faith is when people claim that God is unchanging, but in the next breath deride me for my belief that God would never raise up an army to send them into a country to slaughter every man, woman, child and animal. I said I believed that was man trying to justify his unholy ambitions by invoking the name of God. Outrage and disbelief followed. God did ordain that, they insisted. He could not have, not if God is good. Finally one woman said, 'God wanted racial purity.' I was dumbfounded. When you hear the words of Hitler justified by God, well...i felt something shift. And it was just gone. In that moment. Ever since, that argument replays in my mind when I hear Christians claiming God sent us Trump or Israel trying to justify their actions in Gaza. These are people invoking God to justify the most unholy ambitions. And it makes me sick.
DeleteThese people don't have a clue. They are blind. They discuss the bible endlessly and some of them don't know how to read.
DeleteGood to have a family gathering..and a pot luck is less work as well.
ReplyDeleteWe don't have ours as a pot luck, but at a restaurant chain, and I think this time will have a (large!) room just for us...30 to 45 people.
Hopefully Pirate will be fit to travel....
When we were doing gardening for others, there was one that he would always get the ride on stuck the first cut if the season... Is it a man thing?
I can believe that for some men it sure does seem to be. I hope the best for Pirate. The time out will likely do him a world of good if he is up to it.
DeleteI watched The Detectorist here in the USA and just noticed they have some of the episodes on YouTube in case you want to check it out.
ReplyDeleteI was raised Catholic but have no religion anymore. Many of the silly rules and legends I was taught to believe now seem like fantasy and fairy tales to me.
You know, the further out I get, the more I see it that way. A great many of the stories in the old Testament are exactly that: tales that had been retold through the centuries, stories that were already familiar to them.
DeleteRead some of the stories from Gilgamesh and you will see how it began.
DeleteYou pack in so much every day. I do 2 hours gardening and then sleep the rest of the morning. Same in the afternoon.
ReplyDeleteUm...actually this covers more than one day. Yesterday, all I did was talk to my daughter, put together a pot of soup, do some housework, ran an errand, and spent the rest of the day reading. Tim got his truck unstuck all by himself.
Delete*tractor
DeleteYou might find Detectorists seasons1, 2 and 3 on DVD at the library.
ReplyDeleteWell worth searching out. We have watched all episodes many times, always a "feel good" experience.
I enjoy your blog very much. Thank you.
That is very nice of you, Pam! That is also a very good idea about the library! I need to check that out.
DeleteOur library has the set of The Detectorists.
ReplyDeleteI am ashamed to say that this did not occur to me.
DeleteCatching up with you this evening! You have been busy as usual. I like your auction finds, especially that book. Great find there.
ReplyDeleteYou know, I think I saw you on 'spring break: grands gone wild!' Personally, I was shocked. 😉
DeleteThe Hoopla app, which you can download and access with library card has The Detectorists. https://www.hoopladigital.com/
ReplyDeleteThank you.
ReplyDeleteWe got Detectorists on either Acorn (I think) or Briotbox. It was quite wonderful.
ReplyDeleteI think I'll pas on the eclipse although we aren't quite at 100. Got the previous one in '21. I didn't blow out the camera but why tempt fate. Besides, if you've seen one . . .
Dance recitals of the grandkids are quite wonderful.
Ironic, and scary! I’m so worried about this country’s future!😳
ReplyDeleteRigmor