As I sit here and review my day, the hardest decision that I made on this day, was whether to pull that frozen mug out of the freezer.  I wanted a frozen mug, but that mug was supporting a bag of frozen garlic bread.  Consequences!

On any given year, the hangover after OYE is the hardest.  That marathon can tire a young person with low miles.  Now, I am not young and I am an off-the Kelly Blue Book charts on miles for age.   It is a matter of circumstance(s) but I feel like I just survived another OYE.

We were supposed to have the Shattuck FFA Ag Olympics last Tuesday.  Mother Nature kicked us in the nuts and turned last Tuesday into a 50 degree, WET day.  (of which, we only got .5″ south of Fargo.)  We setup for the county show the next day and then did an Ellis County Fair.  A lot of places squatted to pee and cancelled.  We still held ours.  Livestock #s were down.  Livestock judging contest participants were record high.

Then roll right into a bit of a scare on Sunday morning.  (understatement).  Add to the fact that we were going to shoot video of Duke on Sunday afternoon for his national proficiency finalist video requirement.  POSTPONE that deal.

Monday saw the delivery of Blue & Gold as well as DJ’s.  The local studs at the Shattuck Volunteer Firefighters brought us a reefer truck to store the meat over-night.  (Try using the term “Reefer” truck to high school kids…yeah!)

Tuesday brought the dispensing of said meat products.  That evening, we shot some nice footage of Duke for his proficiency deal.  It is what it is.  Thank goodness, the current Shattuck FFA reporter is a stud at producing videos.

Hypertherm &  AirGas came and demonstrated new features on plasma torches to my older ag mech kids.  Now, it is hard for me to not have the wants.   Real sure that we will sell some stuff to buy some stuff.

Wednesday found us finally holding the Ag Olympics.  I don’t participate.  I just organize, setup the events, gather the food, cook for a couple of hundred and then deal with the clean up.  All I know is this.  The kids tell me that this was the best one yet.  All I really know is that my favorite event is the Hog Calling Contest.  2020 was the best year yet.  These kids brought it!  I need to haul some of these to the midwest state fairs to compete.  Oh wait….I think they all cancelled this year.  This Ag Olympics deal was not an original Kelln idea.  But it has blown up in Shattuck America!

Anytime you have kids hooked up and doing right, people will back it.  The Manske family offered up the location and helped setup, cleanup, WHATEVER it takes.  The Barnes brothers donated watermelons–dang good.  If kids are involved, it ain’t a hard decision to help and do right.  SNB bank let us use their portable traeger.  Daryle Greer was told that we didn’t need a donation for the meal, yet he still paid for part of it.

Today, I cleaned up the aftermath.  Yeah sure. I used some slave labor to pickup after themselves.  And, yet, I am dragging donkey.

I’m wore out.   I need sleep.  It is hard to get things done at home but it won’t be hard to get up and go to work tomorrow.

Duke has not missed a bit of his wind energy classes at High Plains Tech Center this week.  He is sore, trying to learn how to button his pants one-handed and is missing some hair:  yet, he is doing good.  It would be hard for me, but he is young and will heal quick.  It is still hard to think about………yeah;   it’s hard but it could be worse.

I hope that any of you all that read this crap don’t think that my life is hard.  I am married to the Dragon Lady.  We have jobs that we enjoy.  Our kids are Kela and Duke.  That part isn’t hard.  Well, I might make it harder than it needs to be.

In all honesty, the  hard part of my life…is dealing with goats.  I don’t like doe goats.  I don’t like all of the problems that come with goats.  But….here we are.  It’s… shall we say……hard.

The garlic bread is still in it’s place.  This is the way.