It may not be as exciting as hunting,
but it’s just about as much fun.
(Headcoot and me decide it’s time to be getting some work done)

Steve M. Moore

 I hadn’t been to the farm since we hunted last, but I was itchin’ to get some farm time in.  Adam Lawson (I needed a spotter for chainsaw work) and I decided to go camp (March 11, 2005), get a little work done and have a little fun. We meet up on Saturday around 1:00 and head to the store for supplies. After scoring some beers, bread, etc…we were set to head out. Once we got there, there was plenty to do just setting up stuff.  Adam had to put up his tent and I needed to set up Lowry’s new tent I scored at Hudson’s for $45.00 bucks (“Oy Vey” such a deal).  But the tank wouldn’t turn over…DULL! I figured it was just gummed up, but who knows…I ain’t no mechanic so after scratching my head for about 5 minutes, I decided to get some gas treatment, and other stuff and come back to fix it later.

Once we get all of the stuff in place for a good nights camping, we head over the Mr. Andersons to start clearing the field.  I put in a few hours of cutting and fixing the chain saw blade whilst Adam focused in on painting the barn with camo-paint.  We stacked a lot of our small cuttings up next to the barn to break up the silhouette of the barn and to add further camo.  After I couldn’t hold my arms up any more, we gathered some of our wood and headed back to camp.

 We cooked an awesome dinner from the young doe killed at Mr. Anderson’s…gourmet meal in the woods…the doe meat was like butter…and then played guitar through the night—another awesome night—great food, good times.  Once morning came, I had planned to do some plowing, but with the tank down, we cleaned up, packed up and left.  I was home before lunch. 

 But THE NEXT week was different. Lowry and I both pulled down from the Internet every manual we could find about the tank, carburetors, etc. and I headed to the farm on Wednesday—If a redneck can do this—so can I! Believe it or not…the tank is RUNNING!  Now we were ready for Headcoot’s arrival. March 19, 2005. So I get all my supplies ready on Friday, take off work early and head on down.  When I get there, I get everything set up for myself for dinner, etc and then head to plow the summer field and to plow fire breaks around the entire perimeter of black widow.  Got a lot of plowing done (all that I set out to do) and the sun was starting it’s descent into horizon…so I headed over to the stick pile gather up a bunch of wood/sticks and headed back to get me a good fire going.  Then I settled in to get a number of small tasks done.  I got Headcoot’s bed and tent completely ready, as I figured he’d be pretty well tired after such a long drive…then got my shitty tent ready for me. (I’m getting a new one—should have kept the one I got for Headcoot, but I’m sure they’ve got more)…just kept getting small stuff done to keep myself from getting bored…I then started to cook…I had a big old steak/roast, etc.  A great night even if I was by myself…then Headcoot came roarin’ in.  You could hear him honking from around the bend on the highway.  We proceeded to get cooted and talk about the plans I had been making for more shelving, hanging paper towels for easy access, and a whole lot more.  I had sat around for a couple of hours just making lists of shit to do and was thinking about how tired I usually was when at the farm and that I wanted stuff to be easy to reach without having to get up *(like I did 10 or more times a night just to hand someone a fucking paper towel).  I want to work smart and not hard!  I’m always tired as hell at the farm, but it always feels REALLY good!  But why waste any energy you don’t have too?

 So Headcoot gets in bed and within five minutes, I had busted my ass. Fell right over the cooler and landed HARD on my knee right on the concrete. I had tears in my eyes, when I climbed into my shitty old tent…but went right to sleep. 

 The next morning, I was stobe up bad!  But that’s OK, Headcoot and I had a long list of shit to do.  We get some coffee and headed into Hardee’s for breakfast.  Then to the coop for corn (no arsenal—Dull! —the day is truly raining on our plans) and then to the Sunflower for groceries…. by the time we got back it had started raining.  Now that sucked!  Put a real damper on our chores, but we decide we can put Headcoot’s new chain/blade to use on his chainsaw and cut some trees. Five minutes in…Headcoot is cutting through this big old tree like butter and then it falls.  He then decides to cut UNDER the break in the tree so that EVERY SINGLE pound of force is pinching the blade…no more cutting…time for a new blade!  5 minutes per blade at $17.00 per and that’s some expensive firewood! 

We’re dulled out and decide to head to Meridian for large quantities and to get other stuff at Lowe’s.  We stock up on shelving as per my notes from the previous evening and get yet another chain saw blade and head on back.  It’s still kind of raining on and off, so we decide to cut some more at Mr. Andersons.  Well it wasn’t long before Headcoot decided to cut a branch that was “under” a tree and damned if he didn’t pinch his NEW blade!  Ain’t torque a bitch?  Perhaps we should cut down the trees and then work from the top end of the tree to allow gravity to work in our favor and NOT pinch the blades…needless to say…no more cutting today.  So we head on back to munch on a few pounds of crawfish, soak our corn and get some other stuff done…we have a good night with Back strap for dinner and end up going to bed EARLY!

I started at 11:00 and worked until 1:00 and just about finished the top...

Just as I am finishing up, the tank starts to lose power, the gas is really low, so I head on back for more petrol.  I treat the new gas really good with HEET (methyl alcohol), STP, and Stabil.  Start back to the field and the engine starts to sputter and almost die…but then it kind of coughed some black stuff and with two very large backfires and a ton of black shit coming out of the exhaust (must have been the last of the old gas and the treatment getting rid of any gummed up fuel) and the tanks has more power than it has in a long time.  I continued to plow up the bottom part of black widow and the top side of the trail coming into the field and just as I’m about done…might have taken one or two more passes, I run out of gas.  DULL!  Now I’m pretty tired, it’s late in the afternoon and I’ve got to walk back to the barn to get more gas and bring back my truck.  As I’m crossing the creek, I devise a plan to clean out a lot of underbrush so that we can see the summer field in green and perhaps hunt it and to also put a walking bridge across the creek.  I find a good spot and clear the creek without any problems.  But my knee is smarting pretty bad by now. 

 But I get to my truck and make it back to the tank, add fuel and then have to drive it half way back, then turn around and walk back to my truck and bring it over the creek and then walk back to the tank.  In the process, I try to cross the creek in the same spot and end up with my leg up to my ass in the water…AND I knocked my knee on a stump…now I’m getting pretty fed up with this whole process…

 But I decided to be a trooper and carry out my plan to knock down some of the brush next to the shooting target so that we can see the summer field (and perhaps hunt it during the day) from the barn.  I haul off into more stickers than you can imagine and by the time I’m done, I’m bleeding from every arm, both hands, and on my neck!  OK, fuck this I’m done.  I go and clean out the tank…and promise to come back and work on it some more…just not anymore today.  I pack it in and head on home!  Another good weekend of work DONE!  Now it’s time to get back to normal work and to nurse my wounds…

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