We have had sun, then cloud and a little spitting rain and a little frost. I think November is really here! The most notable thing is we have had is wind. It's still nice outside but the wind does have a wee bit of bite to it. Now I know that from tracking the weather years ago when we were growing Polish canola, that six months from now we are going to have wind. Polish canola when swathed always tried to lift up and roll to the closest fence line. The first days of May, I predict we are going to have some wind, not Polish rolling wind. Just a little breeze.
Forty-five years ago, in November, Bev and I got married. It was a sunny Saturday and snowed in the night. Hardly anyone got done combining that year, but I was getting married so I wanted to be done combining. I put the stuff through the combine whenever I could. I knew it was tough, so I had it in square wood bins. I had a little feedlot and the grain stood straight up in the bins. I took it out with a steel shovel and put it through a John Deere mix mill I bought from Dennis Wilkinson. It was one of many deals I made with Dennis Wilkinson. I actually made a little money feeding steers that winter.
On the home front, I have all the equipment parked. No diesel is being burned except in my 7.3L environmental polluter and that is just to go to town for the mail and other little errands.
I see some neighbours putting on their fall fertilizer. I think from a logistics standpoint it is the right thing to do. The volume of material to handle is only a quarter or one third of what there is to do in the spring. There are some drawbacks. I have some hilly, lighter land and I know from experience that by doing my fertilizer in the spring I would get a third more for my buck than if I did it in the fall. There is also the money issue. If you are not actively farming you would have no concept of the amount of money it costs to do a fall fertilizer run. The man with a 60-foot outfit putting on a full meal deal is spending in excess of $40,000 per day. This is not for the faint hearted. Going to the casino is chump change! This all has to be done with funds or lines of credit before you can sell last year's crop. It's "run rabbit run."
This farming has really become high risk. One slip on the banana peal and the bankers gun you down. As farmers we are feeding the world. That part I don't mind. It's the feeding of the fertilizer companies and the spray companies that I don't like. They have virtually no risk, set the prices where they feel like and have government regulations in place to protect their cozy little nests. We are coming full circle where once the barons owned everything and the serfs did all the work. The present day farmer is becoming not much more than a serf except maybe the living accommodations are quite a bit better.
In politics, the Senate is now not in session. No more daily tidbits for Duffy for the media to pounce on like piranhas on a feeding frenzy. The Senators are all gone home for now. Some may go to the big Conservative annual meeting in Calgary. I'm sure they will receive an ear full from the rank and file. Stephen Harper is defending his actions strongly and calling for suspension of guilty senators. The media is suggesting that Stephen Harper should resign. I don't follow their thinking! The man caught some people in fraud and is trying to get them fired and he should resign? How is that logical?
Stick to your guns Stephen, the bad apples need to go!!
In Toronto, Mayor Rob Ford has the media all over him He can't even go out of his house without a herd of reporters and cameras accosting him. The cops have bugged his telephone, recording every word he says. They have had helicopters with telephoto lens tracking his every movement. I would wonder if someone hadn't zinged in some one else's corn flakes. Why all the surveillance and cost trying to prove the guy is guilty of something? This has the appearance of a vendetta. Personally I don't know if he is guilty or not but I hope he sticks it out.
Joke from grandson Victor (9) What room can you not go in? A mushroom. Ha ha ha!
Joke of the week: There was a man who comes home from work and says to his wife, "I hear the milk man has seduced every woman on the block except one!" "Huh," says the wife "it must be that stuck up Phyllis down the block!"
As my uncle Harold used to say: Ooooh Boy!
