</font><font color="blue" class="small">( Hi Jim, replaced your new joyfull joystick with a new tractor yet? )</font>
No need, RaT. That new joystick has cured all the problems of the old one. Once I replaced the whole assembly with the new design (see attachment), it works like a champ. ...and I don't have any plans to replace the tractor that I still love. 1050 hours and counting.
But just to honor the "No Joy Joystick," I've written a little poem:
The No Joy Joystick
The sky was less than brilliant on that cloudy mid-March day,
And the mighty TC45 stood fueled, anxious to go and play,
With a day off from job doldrums and maddening deadline rush,
Jim jumped onboard his trusty "steed" and headed for the brush.
A breeze brought on a shudder though the oaks long outstretched boughs,
As they cowered with a loathsome dread when faced with the toothbar's prow,
For the mighty belching roar signaled their complete and quick demise,
And brought a lusty cheer of glee and a twinkle in our hero's eyes.
The roar rose up and echoed though creeks and gullies near,
Flocks of birds rose in the sky and fled the scene in fear,
The sun peeked though as if to note the job was going well,
As brush and briars came to their doom, swept deftly off the trail.
Then it happened swift and sure, the deed that killed the day,
Jim looked down to see in his hand a joystick broken away,
"No, no!" came his cry, "Not possible; how could this be?"
"My brand new tractor is broken. This just can't happen to me."
So reality swiftly displaced disbelief; and attitude took a flip,
Doubt changed to a scowl, and a sneer curled out his lip,
One look at the mangled steel with it's broken jagged tail,
Jim said,"There's no joy in this joystick. It was designed to fail."
With busted joystick in hand, off to the dealer he flew,
"I'll get this replaced under warranty and be as good as new."
And the dealer shook his hand and smiled with all the normal cheer,
"It must have been a bad part. We have another here."
Jim raced back home, a joyful man, with all his confidence in place,
He could not wait to fix his mighty friend and get back into the "race,"
And he swore he saw the TC smile as he approached the shop with glee,
The joy returned; the day was saved; all things were as meant to be.
But mighty Murphy will not be scoffed; he knows he'll always win,
And so it was that few hours passed and tragedy struck again,
For the second joystick, though new, was no better than the first,
It failed again, same way, same place, and with it failed Jim's trust.
So with a firm conviction that the designer was a jerk,
Jim set out with teeth-clenched determination to make this failure work,
And he gathered up his trusty tools, searching far and wide,
Hose clamps, duct tape, and glue, the jury rigger's pride.
And when he finished he stood back in satisfaction,
Two brief words, "It'll work" summed up the contraption,
With a grip on the joystick his joyful attitude soared,
It stood firm and strong unlike what it had been before.
But Mr. Rabbit and Mr. Turtle showed no deference to this task
While laughing and giggling to each other with derision unmasked,
"Did you see what he did with hose clamps down there?"
"What kind of jake leg mind would come up with something so queer?"
But their jeers became subdued as Jim continued to work,
With his TC humming, joystick commanding loader, no quirks,
Earth moved in the wake of this mighty team's whim,
Jim was sure that good fortune smiled down just for them.
Little did he know that a wicked plot was being hatched,
Murphy's loathing was great, some would say unmatched,
And his rage boiled up, frothing, letting go with a snap,
After all warranty was up, Jim's proud joystick just crumbled into scrap.
There was no more fixing, the damage was done,
Only one thing to do. Bite the bullet; order a new one.
So off to the smiling dealer Jim repeated the trip,
And returned home with a complete joystick in his grip.
But what joy arose as he unwrapped his prize,
This joystick had been modified by an engineer wise,
With a stronger backbone it could take all the abuse,
He raced through the installation, quickly putting it to use.
So that is the saga of how this thread came to be,
A true-life story of my tractor and me,
And though my poetic verse the critics may attack,
Never have a doubt, my joyful joystick is back.
