Irrigation 101

I got my first real lesson on farm irrigation recently. Oh sure, I've seen the center pivot machines cranking out the water, but my recent experience was with a bit older technology... gravity.

It all started one dark and stormy night a few weeks ago... well it was dark anyway. At 10:30PM a mystery tractor with what appeared to be a corn planter showed up and did some work just west of the barn. Now ordinarily, a tractor working in your yard well after dark would be cause for concern if we were city dwellers, but we've learned farmers can work some pretty crazy hours now and then out here. We also knew our farming neighbor had been busy planting his field corn and just figured he was involved... not so!

OK, so maybe he was a little involved as it was his tractor, but not him at the controls. The operator, who will remain nameless, I understand planted around 5 acres of sweet corn in three different plots... one of those being 50 rows west of our barn. Well shortly after the corn was planted, farm protocol seems to dictate that each row needs to be "hilled" for irrigation purposes, and I've learned that works pretty good!

Since I'm not a farmer, and my thumb isn't even the lightest shade of green, I try and pay attention to what the professional experts around me have said about water requirements and corn. Well as soon as I noticed that sweet corn was starting to tassel, I started watering. And I watered, and watered, and watered. After about 8 hours of gravity feed from a garden hose, I had 5 rows of sweet corn adequately watered.

Lesson number 1... Don't plant more stuff than you can water and care for. This may come into play a lot more later on in the season as we're trying to water most of the plot with some success, but when that corn is ready, I wonder what we're gonna do with it all at the moment. I have some ideas but I digress...

Until the last couple weeks, I just figured that farmers fired up the irrigation pump and water poured into the fields with little further effort by the farmer. I suppose that is mostly true for those with center pivot machines, but the gravity feed irrigation it turns out is pretty labor intensive. I had no idea that those pipes had numerous shutoffs that had to be opened and closed manually. It's one of those things a city slicker never thinks about I guess, at least not this one.

To shorten the story a bit, I've helped open and close those irrigation spigots, found out wet soft dirt supports absolutely no weight... I sank in a good 10 inches in places, and worked the dumb end of a hoe quite a bit opening up waterways in my little experimental field.

Final note... neighbors stopped by with cucumbers already this summer. The green thumbs are at it again!

Throwbacks

In the last few years, National Football League teams have started wearing replica uniforms from their early years. My favorite Denver Bronco's wore their vertical stripped socks for a game. Yikes! You folks that go fishing probably brag about your last fishing trip... including the throwbacks that were over 2 pounds. But today I want to talk more about going back in time... my time to be specifically.

It was just a few weeks ago that I was reading the Denver Post online when I came across an article about a local Denver performer and the 5 year success of her business venture. Lannie Garrett is the performers name, and her Clocktower Cabaret located in downtown Denver. Ordinarily I don't pay any attention to Denver's entertainment scene, but Lannie Garrett has a special place in Margie and my lives.

It was the night of Oct 5, 1991. Margie and I were going out on our first Date. My life had changed in more ways than I every could have imagined. I'd gone through cancer and its treatment, with pretty significant consequences. During the course of the treatment I lost 110 pounds taking me to my low of 97. Okay, so it's a good thing I started out fat, but I don't recommend that sort of diet. Like many, my ex couldn't take the changes I went through, and I just figured I'd be a loner for the most part going forward but I digress...

Lannie Garrett was performing with the Denver Symphony Orchestra that night, and to shorten this story to a reasonable length, it must have been a great concert as Margie and I fell in love and are living happily ever after out here on the farm(stead).

What brings the above to mind is that the article in the Denver Post I mentioned compelled me to write Ms. Garrett an email thank you. I had never considered writing to thank her, but Margie and I often speak of that night and the concert, and I felt compelled to write so I did. Imagine my surprise when I got a reply from her, offering free tickets to one of her shows as her guest.

We took the short notice opportunity to go to Denver and accepted the invite to Ms Garretts sold out show. Margie and I have not been in downtown Denver in many years and I admit the downtown area has all kinds of things going on with big crowds of people seemingly everywhere. All I want to say about that is I'm so glad we live on the farm(stead).

Our seats in the renovated basement cabaret were great. The show Lannie put on was entitled "Great Women of Song: From Billie to Bette", and was nothing short of wonderful as far as Margie and I were concerned. She is a first class entertainer, and we enjoyed the show as much as the last time we saw her 19 years ago. The last song, Judy Garlands "Somewhere Over the Rainbow", was performed so beautifully that it brought tears to Margie's eyes... one of her all time favorites I learned. Pay attention guys, I don't think we will ever completely know 'em.

To wrap up our weekend, we stopped in to visit an old friend on our way out of town. We related our previous nights excursion into the depths of downtown Denver only to learn that our host knows Ms. Garrett and quite well if I heard correctly. I guess Dave knows or knew Lannies agent... anyway small world.

And my last throwback I want to mention today includes a conversation I had recently where I got to relate my feelings for one of my uncles. I doubt my uncle had any idea how much I looked forward to seeing him and my aunt. He was a big man with big stories, and his work had him in the Pacific Northwest in the timber industry. I loved going into the woods in his 4x4 pickups down logging roads dodging logging trucks and watching the fascinating process of moving trees from upright to the saw mill. His stories kept me entertained almost as much.

We never know what effect we may make on someones life. Lets all try and make it a good effect whoever we deal with.

Free

Free is a pretty powerful word. When we see or hear the word free, we always pay attention. We've all figured that you can get something for nothing, but we also know it isn't necessarily the right thing to do, or that there are "strings attached".

Back in December of 1931, Ted and Dorothy Hustead bought a small town pharmacy after searching Nebraska and South Dakota for their perfect location. They settled in Wall, SD with a depression/dust bowl population of 326. At first they struggled, but a brainstorm came to Dorothy and the rest is history. Free ice water put Wall Drug on the map from the first day they offered it. You can read some of the history at... http://www.walldrug.com/t-history.aspx

We see advertising all the time offering something for "free". Free with the purchase of... you probably have your favorite example, but mine are the TV ads that ALWAYS say... "but wait, if you order now, we'll include another widget absolutely free, just pay shipping and handling" bla, bla, bla!

What got me thinking about free stuff was a story of a boy who made a pretty good income offering free lemonade. His "business plan" was to offer sweet and sour lemonade for free, and having a donation jar be his fee collector. You can read about him here... http://www.parentdish.com/2010/06/30/7-tips-for-a-successful-lemonade-stand/?icid=main|htmlws-main-n|dl5|link1|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.parentdish.com%2F2010%2F06%2F30%2F7-tips-for-a-successful-lemonade-stand%2F

In reality, almost nothing is free anymore. Our atmosphere used to be free, but now it's regulated or taxed for companies and devices that operate within it. Water used to be free, but now it has to be treated before and after it's used, so we pay for these services. Taking a hike in the mountains used to be free, but now you need to pay a fee to park your car and use the facilities. The commons are being taken away from us ever so slowly by privatazation and nobody seems to mind a bit.

Still, we live in a relatively free society, and our freedoms have not come cheaply. As we celebrate the birth of our nation, lets take a moment and reflect on how we got started, what we have been through, where we are, and where we are headed.

Happy Birthday USA!

Sky Kings

Summer is here for sure with crops reaching for the sky with growth I wouldn't believe if I hadn't watched it out my living room picture window. "Knee high by the 4th of July" is a term I've heard most of my life referring to corn growth, but the stuff around here is obviously on steroids. I guess the new term may need to be "Head high by the 4th...".

The lightning bugs entertain us evenings, when we can avoid the mosquitoes, and add a few temporary stars in the night sky. Living in the country has it's advantages when it comes to star gazing, but the last few nights, it's the Moon that commands attention. The clear skies and full Moon nearly turn the night into day.

Speaking of reaching for the sky, our old barn is perfect habitat for barn swallows. We never tire of the aerobatics that go on just outside our window. Of all the birds we see around the farm(stead), the barn swallows can't be beat for aeronautical maneuvering. I must admit that I always hope they don't collide with my head when I open the barn door... there have been numerous close calls.

Something us former city folk have not become completely accustomed with, is the crop dusters take aim at the fields surrounding us. This morning was absolutely perfect for aerial crop spraying I bet, but the sound of a plane flying over our place at low altitude always gets our attention really quickly. Maybe I'll get over it someday, but that first pass always makes me hope it's not a plane about fly in the window.

Embellishing Your Resume

I don't know if many places in Nebraska use a resume or not when screening new job applicants. During my working years, though I had a resume ready to hand out at a moments notice, I never did hand one out. When I got hired on at the phone company, I filled out a job application and was never asked about a resume. I was applying to be a worker bee, not a manager, so perhaps that's the major difference between a job and a career... you have to craft a resume for a career position, and fill out a job application to actually work?

A recent survey of hiring managers found that 57% of the time, applicants lied in their resume or job application, though only 5% of the employment seekers admitted to fudging about the facts of their life. The good news for the embellishers is that though 93% were not considered further, 7% still got hired. I suppose their fib was pretty mild, or the hiring manager had other motives...

If you Google resume embellishment, over 600,000 results are available, with the very first one saying "Embellish your resume without lying". The implication is that it's OK to stretch the truth as long as you don't go over the line... whatever that blurry line may actually be. Wordsmithing is obviously the bomb when it comes to resumes!

How are you doing on your life resume? Not the one about your career accomplishments, but the one where wordsmithing has no value and only your acts and accomplishments are considered. Your resume certainly contains the reputation you develop over a lifetime with family, friends, peers, and God for the believers among us. Why not make a conscious effort to embellish your resume this week by doing something out of the ordinary. Mow your elderly neighbors yard, make a donation to the food pantry, volunteer, try and do something that helps someone, anything.

Risky Business

Colleges have risk management courses listed right along with business ethics. Considering the way some business ventures operate, it seems like the risk management classes are well attended, but the business ethics classes are totally elective. It seems many business majors skipped the ethics classes or passed with a "D".

Goldman Sachs may turn out to be a good example of good risk management, but lousy business ethics. It appears they certainly hedged their bets with derivatives. How about BP in the Gulf of Mexico? Would Toyota with their massive recalls be included? You might think of including Massey Energy and the recent deadly coal mine explosion in West Virgina. Union Carbide and their Bhopal India disaster could likely be included, and of course the Challenger and the death of 7 Astronauts is blamed on poor risk management by allowing a launch in cold weather. Let's not forget Chernobal... billions of ruples down the drain and a dead zone for thousands of years.

There are thousands and thousands of examples available where man made problems have created a nightmare. I suppose the phrase high risk, high reward was ingrained into the business world long ago, but unfortunately it seems some business takes it beyond the limit. The reward of meeting a deadline or selling something new outweighes safely providing products in my opinion.

Considering the BP fiasco in the Gulf, you have to wonder how deep BP's pockets are. Though it seems unlikely, what if they go bankrupt over this deal and the problem persists? It's not unprecidented at all that a business goes bankrupt and you and me end up paying the bills. A while back I blogged about the Summitville Mine in Colorado and the Canadian company that went bankrupt leaving an environmental mess that you and me are paying for to this day.

If you look into engineering disasters over the years, there are several factors that go into these failures. A study of the cause of some 800 engineering failures shows...

Insufficient knowledge ............................... 36%
Underestimation of influence ......................... 16%
Ignorence, carelessness, negligence .................. 14%
Forgetfulness, error ................................. 13%
Relying upon others without sufficient control ....... 9%
Objectively unknown situation ........................ 7%
Unprecise definition of responsibilities ............. 1%
Choice of bad quality ................................ 1%
Other ................................................ 3%

Looking at the major causes, it's quickly obvious that human error one way or the other is the overwhelming cause. OK, so we all make mistakes right? But when your life gets thrown into turmoil because of the actions out of your control caused by someone else, lawyers, government, and who knows who all will get involved.

With the reporting of the BP gusher in Gulf, a story about a $500,000 piece of equipment that is required by other countries was not required by the US of A has emerged. Would this piece of half million dollar equipment prevented the current crisis? I'm sure only time will tell, but considering the risk if something goes wrong, wouldn't you think it would have been at least wise? If it was required by regulation, we wouldn't be guessing about it, but many folks are against regulations and think business should govern itself.

So... How's that drilley spilley thingey working out? It's easy to place blame and say that we should ban off shore drilling. It's true that it's a dangerous and risky business extracting oil, but until somebody comes up with a suitable replacement, we're going to be drilling someplace for more oil and offshore is as good a place as any to look.

My whole point is really about rethinking government regulations, or coming up with smart ones at least. If the half mil device were required and staved off this mess, the regulation would be smart. When a business wants to perform dangerous or risky ventures, it would seem wise to me that public safety be considered way above the companies desire to make a buck.

Engineering disasters causing great human sufferage have been and will continue to be a problem. Regulations often can help mitigate the problems. An example is that every oil storage facility in the country has to have a containment wall around it. It's not a matter of if we'll have major engineering disasters, but when the next one will occur.

I must have been asleep in 1986 as I don't recall hearing about this at all. Oil exploration has and will continue to cause some big problmes. I hope you will watch this short Youtube video all the way to the end as the final words ring so true...

Just One Word...

Many of us somewhat older folks remember the 1967 movie "The Graduate". For those that have not seen this flick, it's the story of Benjamin Braddock, a recent college grad and the events that take place after his graduation. Young Ben is the son of a wealthy family, and his graduation party finds Braddock family associates and friends offering valuable information and tips for his future. I'll never forget one of the bits of advice one of the party attendees gave young Ben. The man said "I want to say just one word Ben, just one... Plastics".

Well the movie writers got it right about plastics. What a wonderful invention that has ingrained itself into the very fabric of our lives. Almost everything you can think of uses plastic one way or another. Packaging is one use for plastics. Go into a big box retailer and you won't find much that isn't made of, covered, or coated with plastics. You can't even get your stuff from the store to your car unless you use a plastic bag to haul it out, unless you are one of those folks that uses a reusable shopping bag, which by the way are very often made out of recycled plastic.

Yep, plastic is some really great stuff. Modern medicine wouldn't be very modern without plastics. Your car would weigh a lot more and get a lot less MPG if it wasn't for plastic. Product prices would be higher because plastic is cheap to manufacture and is used to package just about everything... just look at how much of it we throw away.

Plastics durability is something else too. Do you know how long it takes a plastic bag to decompose? I've read it takes 1000 years. Now I don't know if that is really true or not, but we all know that plastic is pretty tough stuff. Recycling of plastic isn't very cost effective compared to most other consumer products like aluminum, and though a lot of plastic gets recycled, it's a drop in the proverbial bucket when compared to the amount manufactured.

Here are a few plastic facts...

Americans use 2.5 million plastic bottles EVERY HOUR! Approximately 3 out of 4 get tossed. Americans throw away 25 billion Styrofoam cups every year. Over 5 trillion plastic bags are manufactured worldwide each year. Just in the US of A, 380 billion plastic bags are used each year. That's about 1200 plastic bags for every man, woman, and child in the country. Of that 380 billion bags, at best only 2% get recycled. The rest end up in a landfill or somewhere else.

Speaking of somewhere else, have you heard of the Pacific Trash Vortex? It's a huge area larger than the state of Texas full of plastic and other crud that has found it's way into the ocean. You can read about it here... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pacific_Garbage_Patch

So today my point is that I hope you will consider what you buy and how you use plastics. While I know we can't get along without plastics, I also know that we could get along with a lot less of the stuff. Try and find products that don't require the single use of plastic. Try and find ways to reuse plastic containers. Do anything you can do to reduce your plastic use and you help us all in the long run.