Farm Sitting Day Three

"Why isn't there a Day 2," you may ask? Basically, I slept. Didn't even have dreams that I remember. It probably had something to do with not having had caffeine since I got here--that and staying up late the night before.

However, Day 3 was feed the sourdough starter day. This I did in the morning. It then requires that I either make bread or throw half the starter away in the evening. I chose to make bread, which will actually be made on Day 4 as it is supposed to rise overnight. The good news is, I just checked and it is doing just that. It probably is doing that so well because it is 80 degrees in the house now.

It almost got up to 90 degrees today and I was out in the heat of it--the afternoon. I went across the creek to weed eat the pasture fence section my Dad hadn't already done. I just started and discovered this:

A tree was down and by being across the corner, was actually on two sections of fence. This meant that I had to go back to the house, find the chainsaw, and then chop it out. The new chainsaw my Dad has is really easy to start and use. My only problem is that I must have difficulty determining the compression side, the side of the log that will get squeezed together. The last time I used the chainsaw, I got the blade stuck really well and it took me almost an hour to hand saw the blade out, moving a log to act as a fulcrum to lever the tree it was stuck in, and finally catching the new chainsaw before it hit the ground.

Fortunately, I was careful and lucky and my cuts didn't bind the chainsaw. I did get even more exercise when it came to moving the resulting logs off the fence. Since I didn't see the spanner when I went back to the garage to get the chainsaw, I had to move the logs by hand. I was able to use possibly the only benefit to weed eating on a hillside, stuff can be rolled downhill.

After all of that tree, the wood post that was flattened by it was fine and no wires were broken. There were two connectors on a post down the hill that were sheared and one anchoring wire not doing its job but they may not have been related to the tree falling.

I finished weed eating that section and decided to do something a little less strenuous and still needed doing: I rode a lawnmower around the triangle. The triangle is a section of the pasture in front of my parents' house outside the yard but visually part of the yard. I didn't want it to grow too high and make it even more difficult to mow. I don't know how large it is but it took me a good hour to mow with the mower in the fourth gear.

Getting cleaned up and making bread dough was truly a perfect ending to a productive day. Tomorrow: bread, more weed eating, and a trip into town to mail wedding invitations!