Had to break the ice

11/17/09 Tuesday
Geese, the month is flying by. There is so much going on and so much to consider that I must make lists to sort out what needs to be done when. Yesterday I carefully drained the farm water system and turned off the valves in preparation for the freeze we had last night. I always figure out how I should have done something after I did it the wrong way. Unfortunately I had installed the valves in the wrong place. As a result there are five water spigots that I’m unable to turn the water off. This is bad because if anything should happen, like a pipe freezing and bursting, or me running it over with the tractor (did that earlier this year) then I must turn the well off and that means there is no water anywhere, including the house. So I carefully wrapped each one with insulation and covered them all over with plastic drums. Today I might install a cut off valve in a better place. I say “might” because there is so much to do that I can’t guarantee getting to it.

I had to break the ice on the dogs water this morning and can tell by how thick it was (one inch) how hard of a freeze we had. Then I had a thought. I never checked the water in the tractor to see if it had anti freeze in it or not. Nuts. If it doesn’t and froze the odds are I have a cracked block on it. So checking that is now first on my agenda. It’s an old beat up tractor but it runs and is all I have so I need to take care of it.

Here are some of the things we are thinking carefully about. I have a few thousand dollars coming as a result of my dad’s death. It’s not money he left me, it’s the inheritance my grandmother on his side left me in 1971 that dad had control of but never released to me. I don’t know if dad had a will or not. No one has mentioned it to me if he did. He did tell me on the phone, during the one conversation we had before his death, that he “Hasn’t forgotten me” and that he would “Take care of me”. I don’t know what he meant by that. He had a hard time talking at all and the conversation was short due to his health. I so much wish and regret that we weren’t able to talk further, that we weren’t able to complete the reconciliation that had started.

But we’ll be getting the money and some stocks I inherited nearly forty years ago. The stocks are with a Canadian oil company and had unfortunately taken a nose dive when Obama became the president. It’s not a lot of cash but it is significant in what it can do for us. But we have to be wise and careful with it for I know how fast money can dissipate into nothingness. So here’s a list of things we are thinking on.

I need a new truck (Not “New” mind you, just one that isn’t as beat up)
We need a new water well.
We are thinking about upgrading my laptop.
A better tractor is a definite need.
Implements and tools for farming.
Would like to build a henhouse and start raising chickens.
Need to build more storage space by adding on to the garage.
Possibly build a greenhouse onto the side of the garage.
Need to put up fencing around various garden plots.
Create a vegetable stand with the old school bus.
Our bathroom needs some serious work. The plumbing is stopped up from mineral deposits, among other things.
I would like to pay for some labor and help around here. There is so much I can’t do by myself and having a little help will make a huge difference.
Buy seeds, fertilizer, and irrigation parts for next year.
Buy and plant windbreak trees, complete with drip irrigation.
Find better internet access.
There are of course many other things but that’s a quick off the top of my head list.

Working on the business plan is something I must refocus on. Today I will take my laptop in and pay to have the information recovered from it. I had hoped to do so myself using the knoppix CD Eric downloaded for me but come to find out it doesn’t work well with Windows XP. Besides that I get lost and confused to easy with that stuff. I called around yesterday and found a place that will back it up for $40, way cheaper than the $100 that Best Buy wanted. That will help me get back going on the business plan.

So we’re off again. Time to quit dilly dallying and get to work. Need to run spysweeper because something called maxbackserviceint keeps trying to connect with the internet and is disrupting things. So it looks like Cherie picked up a virus or something. I've got pictures to post but can't with this thing interrupting every few seconds.
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There weren’t any viruses, at least not that Spysweeper could detect. Seems that the program that was incessant to go online is connected to our Seagate external hard drive. This stuff drives me nuts and will probably be the motivator when it comes to deciding whether or not I get a Mac when we get a new laptop. I can but two pc’s for the price of a Mac but the headaches we’ve been getting from Microsoft products have cost us dear so… I’m frugal but there’s the total cost to consider and what price do you put on frustrations and lost data? I’m leaning towards Mac right now.