Fencing

I really didn't like the fence along the farm lane leading to the house and barn. The old fence was a mish-mosh of patched, rusted, ugly and inept crap. Posts were leaning this way and that and some places there was only a single strand of rusty barbed wire. I am getting sheep and maybe some cattle so I need to have a good fence.

I tore out the old fence took hours of hard, labor intensive work and I was exhausted afterwards. I had talked to a local farmer about him using his tractor and posthole digger to dig the holes for me. Just as I finnished pulling the last post out he shows up with his tractor and auger. No rest for the wicked I guess; so we started drilling the post holes, eighty-eight holes, eight feet apart (mostly), about hole number thirty-eight his auger got stuck on something and he had a very hard time getting it out of the muddy ground. When the auger did come up it was bent and so was the drive shaft that turns it. He tried using the auger for a few more holes but I could see he was getting agravated with the bent equipment. He called it quits for the day and said was taking the rig home to try and fix it and would be back in a few days. We got forty-three holes dug; gee only forty-five more holes to dig (sigh).

Okay so your saying that "whats the big deal the machine is digging the holes!", the big deal is that in order to dig the holes yours truly has to take a board and measure off where the next hole is and in order to keep the holes going in at a more or less straight line, hopefully more, I have to keep walking back and forth to the the previous hole four or so back. So, back and forth, back and forth, slogging through the muddy pasture feeling the water seep over and into my rubber shoes, the sun is hot, the water ucky, the bugs mean, and you can't hear much because of the tractor motor and auger are making such a racket. Ahhh, the country life so sweet and bucolic; ya right, lots of sweat, bugs, aching muscles, stinky shit, heavy lifting, and the sure glow of knowing something is going to go wrong and cost more money than expected. I love this life.

When Mr. Pruit left with his tractor, looking a little glum, I went to the saw mill and looked up the mill owner Mr. Lee. Mr. Lee was busy with some employees and sent me to see his wife who runs a small hardware store, so small that there isn't a sign on the building, and I talked to her about my plans to build a fence. She and I got into a discusion about the posts and then she didn't understand what I ment about rails. Where I grew up the horizontal parts of the farm fence were always referred to as rails; the rails here are to my astonishment, called .....boards! How novel :) So, after figuring this and that and using the handy dandy hand calculator she comes up with a price. As I have said before I get a little weirder than usual when I am about to spend money. Soooo, I tell her I will be back the following day to let her know about the order.

Now we are at the following day, I go back to the un-named hardware store (why name something when everyone knows its there?) and instead of the Mrs., himself is there with coffee cup in hand and he is tending store. He is also engaged in a lengthy tale about a truck he bought years ago that has been giving him trouble which is similar to the problems of the audience a local farmer. The story he tells is actually several stories linked and intertwined with other stories about motors, money, and mis-chance that have happened to all that have come in contact with this offending machine. I tell-you-what; I ain't never buying that damn machine and getting involved in that story....

So, story time is over and we get involved in my problem ordering the fence wood. Of course he has some suggestions to improve the order. Understand I have most of the holes dug, his price is going to be less than the local Co-op's (I'll tell you about Co-ops later) so I better pay attention and act nice or I may not get this lumber for a while and if it extends into hunt'n or fishing season who knows when I'll get the wood. Sooo the tab goes up, just a bit, I am getting my wood maybe Tuesday, certainly by Wednesday or Thursday depending on what they are cutting at the mill on Monday or Tuesday.....sigh

I aslo had a problem that I discussed with Mr. P. my old riding mower broke a cutting blade off and I needed it fixed he sent me to see Mr. B. Mr. B lives a few miles up on the ridge and fixes small motors for a living he has a rather nice place up there and he is busy. My problem is getting my old mower to him. I don't have a trailer or a ramp to load the mower this is going to get interesting hmmmm. Well back to the farm. I spent the rest of the day cultivating the garden planting beans pulling weeds and in general getting sunburned, bit by bugs and tired. Another day passes as I have my dinner listening to the Prairie Home companion on the radio with the cats begging for their food and the littlest dog teasing the cats and me trying to listen to the show over the din. finnaly I threw them all out so I could hear the show. Later I put the Ladies up (chickens) counted them one by one (eleven) counted the eggs for the day (nine), another day is done. Tomorrow I get to go to the big town for some shopping, wow!

This is Wednesday it has been thundering and raining hard off and on all day I figured that it was no sense doing anything outside including checking on the fence wood so I picked one of my projects and got started on it. My project for the day; install the fan/light in the gathering room.
Sounds simple, right? Well, this place has never, ever, been wired for electricity I have to find a way to wire an outlet for the new fixture in a house that is already built. I must have gone up and down those stairs a dozen times trying to get the wire in the right place. I did finnaly after a few choice words escaped my mouth. then I found to my dismay that the wire I was using was ....to short! Arrrrrgh that put me off for a bit. I figured how to over come that situation and started that process.

I started moving thos 4"x6"x8' oak posts..... let me be the first to tell ya' that those tha-ngs are heaveeeey. It is like trying to lift a dead body, not that I lifted that many dead bodies, but you get the picture. I could only carry about twenty or so at a time in the pick up truck. I made two trips and called it quits. I am tired sore, a bit dismayed at the amount of work to do the garden looks like crap, I feel a bit over whelmed with all that has to be done.

I took the weekend off and I got to go to the Amish auction and that was a nice break came home with some goodies. That always helps me feel better for a little while. This being Monday I got back to moving posts, I moved the remaining posts in two trips and went to town for some water seal to use on the posts. When I got to town it began to rain, again, I know one day I will be wishing it would rain, but now I wish it would dry up so I can put my posts in. I did get to put some gravel in about twenty post holes so there is a start.

Another update on the Fence; I had talked to an Amish man about helping me with the fence project and he agreed to help. However he seemed to always have an excuse as to why he couldn't work. So, I started on my own then he comes to help and he was quite helpful and strong, he moved those posts like they were made of balsa wood. Between use in an hour or so we got nine posts set. That was the last I saw of him. I have done all the other posts myself. Some of those posts were real buggers. They wouldn't stay were I put them, they kept slipping out of line, soooo that is were they are-forever. I have been covering the part of the post going into the ground with a black tar like substance to help at a longer life to the posts. Of course me being me and this tar like stuff being tar like, I got it all over me on my arms pants, shirt, glasses, hat, hair, face did I mention all over? I have been cleaning up with Kerosene it is the the only stuff I have that will melt this stuff. So now I smell of kerosene and sweat-let me tell ya that is not the perfume of the day kind of smell, even the dogs snort when they sniff me. I have worn out two pair of leather gloves and almost a third pair my overall are done for they should be burned and there still is lots of rough work to go.

May 27th I finnished the posts except for the posts to hold up the gate, that will take a little help as I want that post to be extra strong to take the strain of the gate moving back and forth. I couldn't resist the tempation to see how the horizontial boards would look and I went to the sawmill and picked up some of my boards. I "try fitted" some boards on the first posts to see how they would look. In my eagerness to see how the real fence will look I was working on the fence boards and I fell very hard down on the boards and landed in the pasture in a lot of pain. I had bruised my chest in several places and in general was felt like I had been kicked by a mule.
I managed to get to the house and put my tools away and called it a day. I have been healing ever since, got a big bruise on my chest and my left hand doesn't feel so good either. Each day I feel a little better so things are coming along I don't think much got damaged, not counting my ego.
I will add to this post as the project goes along and keep you all up to date with my struggles with the big wood fence.