I’ve got a pretty good job working for a real good company. Better yet, I have got some really good employees. I wasn’t able to get out until this morning, but I’ve had employees make it to the store, to do what they could, clean a path into the lot and help people even though our computers were down. Our truck driver loaded at the factory in Waterloo, Iowa on Monday morning, then picked up a baler at Ottumwa, IA and made it back to Kearny, MO by Monday night. He is still at that same truckstop tonight and will finally get to roll in the morning. His attitude has been good on the phone, but I can tell that he is tired of reading books, watching DVDs and wishes there was something other than a Taco Bell nearby. I’m ready for him to get home, so he can be with his family.
On a down note, a blizzard makes you NOT want to answer your phone. People wanting to rent a tractor to clean their drive. Should have thought about that before! I only have two tractors with loaders on the lot. One is a 1979 4440 and the other a 1985 4450. Both very good tractors, but I’m not going to rent a 30 year old tractor to somebody that doesn’t usually operate a tractor. Common sense–$250 to rent the tractor to somebody that might cause $5,000 worth of problems. The ones with warranty are already rented out to good customers and I won’t rent a brand new one. I’d sell them a new one, but I’m not renting an older one. We are in the business to sell equipment. It amazes me that they want to get pissy when I tell them I won’t rent them one, but to call a couple of rental places. Hhmm? They didn’t have anything either and that is their business. I’m probably stupid for not using employees/myself and our equipment to go clean drives and parking lots, but we had enough of our own problems to deal with.
On a positive note, when it snows, it means I get to spend a lot of time in a new Deere track skid steer clearing the lot and loading dock. Those things are way FUN to operate. It’s kind of like being a kid playing with really cool toys. Plus, while I’m in one of those, I don’t answer the phone. AWESOME!!
Throw in some really good customers to go along with the cool equipment and I enjoy going to work most days. It is different than my previous profession. It doesn’t eat me up mentally. I can either make the sale/trade or I can’t. I don’t have to make a pile of money on the sale or the trade, but I’m not going to lose any.
Ag teaching was like a roller coaster. The highs were unbelievably high. I’m talking Lynyrd Skynyrd “Free Bird” high. And the lows were blown speakers, dead batteries, kind of like a repeated kick in the nuts low. And the lows happen more often than the highs. But like the word of the day on oklahomashowgoats.com–addiction–I still miss the highs. And the highs weren’t winning stock shows.
Speaking of employment, why in the hell would anybody want to be a county commissioner? On a good day, nobody is bitching. During a blizzard, jeeminy, everybody thinks you aren’t doing crap. Who ever tells your county commissioner, “Good Job”? I’ve got no complaints with our local grader/snow plow operater, otherwise I woudn’t have made it to work today.
I did hear a story about a cattle rancher at Shattuck hiring a neighbor with a tractor and a dozer blade to clear several miles into a pasture to check cows/calves. The dozer tractor got stuck. So, they hooked a chain to the 4wd pickup to pull it out. Guess what? Now the pickup was stuck also. So, little brother Daniel roaded a John Deere 5065E front wheel assist tractor about 6 miles to pull the pickup out and then pull the dozer tractor out. Too bad, he wasn’t close to Fargo so he could have pulled me out when I got stuck.
