my day did not go as planned but so be it.
could not get the new LP finishing mower to hook up to the Quick Hitch. And it was on it before...
Over and over and over I tried.
I spent more than an hour on it and finally took the quick hitch off and the "quick hitch compatible" mower went on
just fine. Until the very last step. I could not, after more than 20 attempts, get the pto shaft collar on. I raised the mower, I lowered the mower, I moved it side to side, I turned the pto on four times to revolve the shaft, and finally covered in grease, I gave up. Carpenters are coming in tomorrow to finally put the rear sliding door on the barn and one of them has a tractor. I'll ask him to do it and it will probably slide on slicker than goose poop. Seriously aggravating but I've lost a lot of strength in my right hand and that is part of the problem.
So then I took the tractor up to the garage and gave it a good bath. And when the faded orangey Kubota paint looked rather poor, out came the cleaner wax and three coats of that later the paint looked much better. That oem Kubota paint really does oxidize, but at least it is all one color now. The hood and loader arms were the worst. I'm just not fanatical enough to get a ladder out and wax the roof...
checked on that fruit tree bloom. The one in the picture was not a gala apple but rather a Centurion crabapple. I planted two crabapple trees among the apple trees, which are supposed to act as super pollinators. And the flowers sure look pretty doing it... What I thought was a gala was in fact an Anna, a green apple, with white blooms after pink/red/white flowers.
at around 6pm last night, Easter, I hear a banging on my back door and my neighbor is there. Not the fireman neighbor but the seriously crocked farmer with the run down farm next to mine. The man is drunk most of the time, and he came over with a well worn Dixie cup into which he was extolling the virtues of a half gallon of cheap blended whiskey he got for under 20 bucks. Yummy.
He had gotten his John Deere tractor going, a very unloved poor thing, no hood, diesel, about 45hp, and with my telephoto, I scored a shot of him jump starting it with another ancient tractor. Real tobacco road stuff; hey, he raised tobacco plants so the saying fits. Most of his greenhouses were knocked down in the hurricane of about 7 years ago, and there is still junk strewn all over his farm. This guy is one of the reasons I am planting so many property line sight barrier trees. I don't want to look at his junky back yard, truly the rear end of his farm.
The man is living on 700 a month SS, and apparently is broke, likely consumed one half gallon at a time.
He then mentioned he'd like to sell me an acre of land next to mine. Not more, but an acre would be nice and no he didn't know what it was worth. I think he is broke and desperate. I don't want to take advantage of him, but I sure will buy an acre of land from him if it's reasonable. It's a farm field, not sure what to do with it. I'll go over and see him around lunchtime in a few days; that apparently is his golden sober hour and I'll see if he's still serious.
...which mean dinner will be as the sunsets or rain delay for the next month or until everything to my liking.