Whether or Weather

Whether or Weather was Originally Posted on November 10, 2009 by lavarock

I had been wondering whether I would get this contract closed out with the Government for water catchment tanks on my farm, because often things I do go into “single threaded” state. If you are not familiar with the term, we used it a lot in the computer field. It refers to events, which follow one after another. Think of a traffic jam, where the police officer lets one car at a time cross a bridge or bypass an accident.

The other day I was trying to get the mower onto the back of my truck. I turned the tractor around, raised the mower up and tried to back the tractor to the back of the truck. This would allow me to slowly lower the 800-pound mower onto the bed of the truck. Afterwards, I would disconnect the thing and drive the truck away. Well, to do that requires the truck to be on a slight incline so the bed is as low (compared to the tractor). There just is no easy way to lay the thing there unless that happens. When I could not get it in, I decided to lay the mower on the ground and lift it with the front-end loader. This turned out NOT to be the best way. In a perfect world I would take the loader off the front of the tractor and replace it with a fork list attachment; that is, IF I HAD ONE! I don’t, so I wrapped a chain around the loader and attached it to the mower deck. I lifted the load but there was too much slack and I had to lift the deck very high; something you don’t want to do as it makes the tractor very unstable.

As I swung around, I found I was on loose gravel and a slight incline. The tractor started sliding and tipping and at one point I was poised on what felt like 1 wheel! I know I hollered “No” 5 times in a row and my heart was beating very quickly as I realized I was seconds away from tipping the tractor over onto the rocks. Altough there is a bar over my head to protect me in a rollover, it does not give you much protection.

I was stretched out, held by the seatbelt and pushed the lever to lower the load, thus taking much of the unsteadiness out of the situation. Talk about shaking! I came inside fro a while to calm down. I was able to drop the mower off late Friday before they closed, but not in enough time that they could fix it then. They are closed all weekend so Monday night is the earliest I can get it back.

Well when my friend told me she was borrowing a small trailer to take her ATV in for repair, I got on the “bandwagon” so to speak. With the mower repaired, I rolled up Monday afternoon, strapped the mower down and headed home. In just half an hour and with no incidents, I was able to get the mower off the trailer and onto the tractor. In the next hour I was able to get a good start on the growth.

One of the problems I have is there is very tall grass (like bamboo) on the southeast side of many of the rows, right next to the trench. If you remember, the trench was open, willed with pipes and I was unable to drive the tractor over it. Thus I would back the tractor down each row and try to cut this tall grass and backtrack on each row. That did not work well. So when Rusty came last week, he filled most of the trench in and now I am able to drive down each row, cross over the pipes in safety and drive down another row.

The single thread theme for this was is to get paid for the last part of my conservaton program. I have to have the property inspected. That means I have to have the trench filled in, which required me to get the mower fixed. Some projects can be simultaneously running, but with only me doing most projects, and considering that I can only do one task at any given moment, I tend to switch tasks, work on a new one for a while and switch again. In early windows versions, that is exactly the way the computer worked, you were not multi-tasking, you were task switching. Only one thing happened at a time, then all the work was suspended, new work brought out and some time was spent on that task, then it was put away, etc.

So today I will cut more of the tall grass, then gather my paperwork and receipts and sit down with the agent about my progress and payments. Then I take the trailer up into town and get the ATV and take it up to be repaired. Then, if the thing will be days to repair, I’ll take the trailer back to its owner and head back to the farm

I am trying to work quickly today because of the other part of the blog total; the weather. We are expecting heavy rains and possible flooding. Because of cooler air, we may also get thunder and lightning. THAT always indicates very cool air at the summits, so, here is out weather forecast for the Big Island today. It almost makes you think you live i n the northeast mainland

The National Weather Service this morning updated its statewide flash-flood watch to include Hawaii County starting this afternoon, which could begin to see heavy shower activity this afternoon, creating the potential for flash flooding.

Craig said today is likely to be a mostly trade-wind day, but the rest of the state will encounter increasing rain as the evening progresses. The heaviest showers probably will come after midnight, he said.

The weather service says the upper level low will also bring much colder air to higher elevations and has issued a winter storm watch for the summits of Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa.

The weather service says there is the chance for heavy snowfall, lightning and strong winds with drifting snow.

A flash-flood watch means conditions may develop that lead to flash flooding.

Residents in low-lying areas, or areas near streams, should be prepared to evacuate in the event of flooding.

Flash floods AND heavy snowfall; gotta love these Hawaii forecasts! If we do get snow, you will be able to see it here: www.jach.hawaii.edu/weather/

So there you have it, whether or not I get the grass all cut today, the weather will definitely be a factor.

On another ongoing note, I saw “Mac” yesterday as I drove the tractor back. Mac is the name I gave the guy who walks along the road and looks like the guy from the MacDonald’s “What can I get for a dollar” ads.