Just gotta smile and go on

I tell ya what, this hay business is startin to get like being a reds fan. I always find myself thinkin if I just had this or maybe next season an awful lot anymore. I have some decent alfalfa hay and used to use a 7" sickle mower to cut it, a big m.h. rake (with the caster wheels in back), and a 14t JD baler. Last year the baler broke and not too long after that the mower broke too. I have had terrible problems with the hay not drying good so I decided this year I"d find me a haybine. As luck would have it we had one at the dealership I work at. Looked it over as best I knew how and bought it. I finally found a good baler at a local dealer that used to sell JD equip. He knows the family so he lent it to us for the hay this cutting so we could try it out. I had to do a good bit of loosening up tight and rusted parts (just surface rust) and he had to replace both springs on the bale chute. I tried it and it worked good on a test plot. So, after waiting a month and a half after my hay was ready to cut (due to equip. and then our lousy ohio weather) I cut a few rounds yesterday. I was amazed at how much nicer a haybine is compared to my old sicklebar. So I came in for supper (since I have to work around work) and then went to church. Dad did some cutting after I left. I come home to find the tractor setting next to the field in the yard and him mowing the yard. I ask why he didn"t park it in the field and he says, "Because it"s broke." Turns out the arm that holds the pin for the knifehead was wore and all that slop broke the knifehead in two. Just looked up the parts and now I"m going to be out around 200.00 for that little flop. Seems funny, when I"m sellin parts $200 doesn"t seem like a lot but it sure does now. Guess I"m more desensitized than I thought. Add to that the fact that it had to rain on my hay last night too. All week the forecast was for chances of rain and not a drop, as soon as I drop some hay it rains. I still have yet to have a cutting that hasn"t gotten any rain on it. Maybe I"m expecting too much or something but shouldn"t there be a time when you harvest a crop without a mechanical or weather problem each and every day? I don"t know. Maybe the hay will cure enough to bale saturday and with these new parts in maybe the weather will work out next week for me to cut some more. They"re already callin for rain monday and maybe sunday so who knows. God bless.

--old fashioned farmer