Wheat harvest 2012

Wheat harvest this year was freakishly early. We finished cutting on June 6 which is completely unheard of. No one could remember starting as early as June 6, let alone being completely done! Unfortunately, this meant that cutting started on Memorial Day and the guys cut about two and a half days without me since I was in Manhattan working with the State FFA Band. There were a few small rain showers that kept us out of the field but once we got going there were only two days of cutting left. As I was heading back to the field the first night, I noticed that the fuel gauge was wavering between a quarter tank and empty. I radioed my dad to ask if I shod be concerned and he assured me that there was plenty of fuel.

The next morning we were greeted by a crooked combine in the shed. Dad had a flat tire and while we were waiting on the tire guy to fix the problem, Dad told my uncle that I was concerned about the fuel level. We walk over to the semi and he pulls a twig out from behind the driver's seat and sticks it into the tank (highly scientific method I know). "Oh, you can run all day on this," says my Uncle. If he's not worried, I guess I'm not worried.

Now I'm sure you can already guess where this heading. We move to our last field. I take a load or two to town. My aunt comes out and asks if she can ride with me to town, so off we go. As we are heading down the road after about a half mile, I notice that I'm not speeding up. I managed to kind of get the truck off to one side of the road before bells and whistles start going off and the engine dies. I look at my aunt hoping she will volunteer to call my uncle because this is not a phone call I wanted to make. The conversation went something like this:

Me: hey, the truck is out of fuel.
Uncle: What!?! What do you mean it's out of fuel??
Me: I mean it's out of fuel. The truck, it no go no more.
Uncle: Humph! Well, where are you? Did you get it off to the side of the road?
Me: We are about a half mile from the highway and it's not completely to the side.
Uncle: Well there is a truck heading your way. Let me finish this round and figure out what to do.

So we sat, we got the truck past us and Uncle ended up going to town to get fuel and got me going. He ended up just going to town with me in case there was another problem while Dad finished the field.

I am smart enough to know that saying I told you so was not a wise decision. I did ask my uncle what he wanted me to do with the twig.......he said I could throw it in the ditch. I'm guessing that when I drive again I will have a full tank but I left the stick as kind of a reminder.

Never a dull moment!! That's why I love harvest!!