It's a Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

Let me paint a picture for you. 

It's a beautiful fall (when did THAT happen?) day, the sun is shining, there's a nice breeze.  I've just been to the library and picked up 4 new books.  I'm driving home, Bella's riding shotgun, and I'm thinking how happy I am and how great my life is.

The seat belt alarm goes off because Bella is clearly not wearing her seat belt.  She hates this sound, so she moves to the back seat.  No big deal.

I continue driving, checking out how far all the farmers have gotten in their fields.  As I turn back to the road, I happen to look at the seat Bella just vacated.

Apparently Bella has yet to learn Skid's Greatest Life Lesson: Never Trust a Fart.  There on the seat are the remnants of a shart.

Reason #213 why I am glad to have leather seats.

Is it a Full Moon? Nope, Just Harvest!

Yesterday was just one of those days.  I should have known it was going to be one of those days as soon as I woke up, for one reason.

It's the first day of (custom) harvest.  That always brings challenges no matter how prepared you THINK you are.

First, Adam calls before I'm even out of bed.  Not a good sign.  He informs me that in all the excitement of getting started with harvest, he forgot to take the car to Havana to get fixed.  So I need to drive out to the field, pick up our farm hand and the car, and make sure everything gets taken care of.  No big deal, right?  That's my "job" since I work for him. 

In case the mere fact that it's the first day of harvest was not indicative enough that something would go wrong, I make it 10 feet out of the driveway and immediately have to pull over because there is a HORSE DRAWN CARRIAGE taking up the entire road. 

WHERE THE HELL AM I?!?! 

This isn't even one of those nice, pretty, white horse drawn carriages like you see in downtown St. Louis.  No.  This is a one bench-er, driven by two women who, at first glance, I thought were Amish.  That would explain their desperate need for "Pimp My Ride" and their long hair.  But they weren't wearing skirts.  And upon further inspection, I realized they were most likely just "ridge rich." 

I'm also beginning to wonder if they are the owners of this "vehicle" I spotted last week at Larry's. 

For my city friends, imagine if the "carriage" in the first picture was tipped forwards.  Now can you see where the horse would be tied, and the bench where the owners would sit?  Notice the cooler.  CLASSY!  The second photo is the horse that pulls said "carriage." 

The "day o' fun" was not over, though.  When I went to pick up the car, I found out our other farm hand was stuck at the popcorn plant because the plant broke down, and the trucker who was supposed to be helping us out since our Penske semi wasn't available yet, brought one truck instead of two.  Awesome.

By the time I got back home, Adam's calling again saying now our semi is available, so come back to the field, pick up our driver, go to the insurance agent's office to pick up the paperwork and head to East Peoria to pick up the truck.  Again, this shouldn't be a big deal.  We've done it before and will do it again every year.  It's part of harvest.

Wrong.  We get to the agent's office and not only is she not there, but she has a new secretary who has never been through harvest before.  So the agent left her secretary to do the dirty work which, in this case, meant dealing with the paperwork and informing us that for the first time ever, they are requiring us to drive the semi back from East Peoria to their office so they can take a picture of it.  Um...what?  I asked if I could just take a picture on my Blackberry and send it to the agent directly, either by text or email.  I even asked if I could just take a photo on my digital camera and send it to the agent directly.  No.  Why?  Because she has to download it directly from HER camera.  Ooook.  Remind me again HOW they think a semi is going to park in a parking lot that has exactly 4 spaces and nowhere to turn around? 

We arrive at the Penske office and walk in, joking about how smoothly things had gone so far, and wondering what we were walking into this year.  God bless the man working the main desk at Penske.  That phone did not stop ringing long enough for him to hang up with one person and walk 3 steps to the fax machine.  When it finally did stop ringing, what do you know?  Our agent sent the wrong paperwork.  AGAIN.  Last year, Adam and I both had to argue with her before finally Penske got on the phone and convinced her that she was wrong.  This year, I just let the Penske man handle it himself. 

*NOTE TO ALL FARMERS: If you are renting a truck, please make sure your insurance agent knows the difference between "proof of insurance" and "certificate of insurance."  They are NOT the same thing. *

Our driver and I waited for 2 hours.  Nothing.  No fax, no phone call, nothing.  Finally, I called the agent's office only to find that she was in a meeting and her poor secretary had no idea what to do without talking to the agent.  So we continued to wait.  At 3:56, the fax finally comes in with our correct paperwork.  The office closes at 4:00.  I didn't know whether to call and scream at the agent for being such a moron, or get down on my knees and praise Jesus that we got the paperwork at all.

As far as I know, they still haven't gotten their precious picture of the semi.  Hope that's not too important.  I wonder if people realize that every time they jerk us around, every unnecessary phone call we have to make, every time we have to wait around for someone else to DO THEIR JOB, it's costing us money.  R-E-S-P-E-C-T, yo.

As Promised...

I told you it was coming.  The Sheriff's Report, at long last, is about to make it's triumphant return to Growing on Goofy.  It will not disappoint.

5 accidents involving a person hitting a deer, and 1 involving a person swerving to miss a deer and hitting a tree instead.

Complaints:
-8-3 @ 10:53 AM, Havana: Check on the welfare of a man in pickup truck slumped over
-8-3 @ 1:24 PM, Cell Phone: Complaint about tire on the roadway
-8-3 @ 9:33 PM, Rural Havana: Complaint about person burning wire 
As you can see, that was an eventful day in Havana...

-8-4 @ 11:24 PM, Rural Havana: Report a male wearing all black riding a bike on the roadway.  (AHHH!  Not a black male riding a bike!  ALERT! ALERT! SECURITY HAS BEEN BREACHED!  Oh, wait...a male wearing black?  Nevermind.)

-8-5 @ 4:52 PM, Rural Kilbourne: Report 2 dogs running loose and growling at people (isn't that what dogs do?  Ruh roh, Ruby!)
-8-5 @ 5:19 PM, Manito: Report a strong smell of either meth or plastic burning (I LOVE this one.  "What does it smell like is burning, ma'am?"  "Well, it could be plastic burning...or it could be meth.  I can't be sure."  Do they really smell that similar?)
 Now we move on to the real crime of the night...
-8-5 @ 8:46 PM, Menard County: Car "setting" along the road for several hours with the windows rolled down and nobody around (annnnnnnnnnnd?)

-8-6 @ 7:10 PM, Rural Manito: Irrigation spraying on the road.  (What do these morons do when it rains?)
-8-6 @ 8:10 PM, Cell Phone: Intoxicated male laying in the middle of the SR 78. (Never been so drunk THAT sounded like a good idea.)

-8-7 @ 2:33 PM, Rural Manito: Checking on two lawn mowers on the Manito Blacktop ("Yes, ma'am, what is your concern today?" "Well...do you think they know there's no grass to mow on the chipped rock?")
-8-7 @ 5:07 PM, Bath, Boat Tavern, public service: see if someone has anything to help with a nosebleed.  (I'd love to be a 911 operator for just one day around here.  WHO calls the sheriff's department for a nosebleed?  "Officer, we've got a report of a runaway...a runaway NOSEBLEED."  WTF?!)
-8-7 @ 11:42 PM, Bath, Brick Tavern: A "mail" and female will not leave--going to start a fight (What's behind door number 3?  Another nosebleed!)

-8-8 @ 12:28 PM, Mason City: Criminal damage to vehicle, male beat car with a gun and a hammer (Not at all premeditated, I'm sure.  I always carry a gun AND a hammer, you know, just in case a car gets in my way.)

-8-9 @ 2:32 AM, Havana: Call complained about being run off the road near McDonald's.  Vehicle headed south towards RT 78 and was stopped.  Person took off on foot. (Dude.  It's 2:30 in the morning.  Everyone in there is either stoned or been up for 3 days...DO NOT GET IN THE WAY OF THEIR FRIES!)

For whatever reason, there were FIVE women charged with battery this week.  Perhaps they punched someone in the nose and stole their Big Mac?

Also, a Mason County lifetime achievement award goes to the woman from Mason City who was ticketed for: no valid driver's license, no valid registration, failure to reduce speed, no insurance, leaving the scene and failure to report.

*All information taken from the Mason County Democrat

Some Things Still Surprise Me

I know you've all missed it.  That's right, the Sheriff's Report. 

But before I get to that, I just have to mention something that caught my eye in a recent issue of the infamous Mason County Democrat newspaper. 

For those of you who don't already know, the big news around here recently was the Redneck Fishing Tournament in Bath, IL.  Basically, Asian Carp are overpopulating in the Illinois River and causing a lot of trouble, so fishermen in their best redneck gear go out all day and catch as many of these slimy little bastards as they can.  Sotally tober, of course.  Whoever catches the most fish is the winner.  Seems pretty simple, right?  Well, this year, ESPN and National Geographic (or Nat Geo, if you prefer their terrible attempt at rebranding themselves into a "cool, hip and man-friendly" channel) came down to Bath, to film the tournament for their respective programming lineups.  This was major. 

So major, apparently, that they decided a tournament winner just wasn't enough.  They put their heads together and came up with another contest, sure to draw attention to rednecks of ALL ages...the Little Miss Redneck contest.  Now, as I was not present for said event (only because I didn't know about it ahead of time...trust me, I would never have voluntarily skipped seeing this level of cluster fuck), I can only imagine what the contest rules include.  A quick scan of google news tells me the organizer informed parents their children/contestants may be dressed as rednecks or "in their Sunday best."  Although, let's be honest, those are basically one and the same in Bath. 

In my mind, Little Miss Redneck events would go something like this:
1. Instead of the swimsuit/evening wear competition, we have the camo competition.  Whoever is the most invisible wins.
2. They would combine the talent and "most photogenic" sections of the evening, with all contestants required to gut a deer.  Points awarded for speed, accuracy and, most of all, how good they look standing next to the deer in their photo.
3. Instead of a synchronized dance number, we have a synchronized decoy setup/goose call competition. First one to get a drunk hillbilly to shoot at their decoy wins.
4. And, last but not least, instead of the question and answer being about world issues, we have the question and answer session sponsored by Ducks Unlimited.  Questions include: Are you for or against hosting a fish fry in the church parking lot?  Should children still be allowed to miss school for deer season?  How do you feel about the regulation of Sudafed in the tri-county area?  Points given for creativity, grammar and pro-hunting stance.

All kidding (or was I?) aside, the girl who won is an adorable 5 year old, complete with camo shirt and hat...and her favorite stuffed kitten (A TOY, not an actual stuffed cat.  Sadly, I feel the need to make that distinction).  I don't know what the prize is for winning the prestigious Little Miss Redneck title, but I bet it involves a gift card to Gander Mountain.  Just sayin'...