Forty-Four Years and Counting

 

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The Selfie Culture

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  It never ceases to amaze me, whether in the supermarket, sporting events, on the street, during worship or even at funeral services, people seem driven to take pictures of themselves at every given opportunity. 'Selfies', as they are known, permeate the airwaves and digital footprint of media, including television stations, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and so many more. It is as though a picture of a sunset alone is never going to be enough, it can only be made better if our faces frame the picture! Oy! On the one hand, a selfie is a step higher on the palatability scale than a picture of a plate of food yet, on the other hand, most folk do not have the required equipment for a 'good' selfie, a 'selfie-stick', which extends the cell phone farther from those being photographed, thus making the 'un-sticked' selfies almost exclusively close-ups. No one wants to be that close to me, not even my wife and kids.  Is it subliminal narcissism which drives us ...
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Fall Tillage and Farmers

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Just the sight of Fall tillage makes me smile. Anyone connected with farming smells a picture like this as much as we view it, maybe more than we want to admit. There is something about ground being opened in the Fall, something about the manner in which soil rolls around the tillage tool, something in the sound of the tractor pulling the tool and something in the sound of dirt opening and closing behind you which makes a farmer's heart happy . . . and the smell, the smell of Fall time tillage is luxuriant.  Fall tillage is essential for the coming crop year. Though not every acre of soil can be tilled in the Fall, due to erosion risk and crop history, those acres which can be tilled, weather permitting, are often done at something of an angle to the planting direction to facilitate cutting through layers of compaction. Yet, more than that, deep Fall tillage buries some of the refuse from the previous years crop, allowing for a more rapid rotting of the plant into needed hum...
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Farmers Talking About Rain

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Storms swept through the area a little while ago and, as I went out to check the rain gauge, a wry smile crossed my face as I wondered how this would be reported by the area farmers. Looking at the gauge I mused: The realist would report that we had eight tenths of an inch of rain; The optimist would report that we had eight tenths of an inch, yet the way the ditches were running we probably had a bit more than that, but the gauge just couldn't get an accurate measurement; and, The pessimist would report that we received less than an inch of rain, even though God knew we needed more in anticipation of Spring planting. It is all a matter of perspective, mixed with a sense of relationship to the dynamic world in which we live, and liberally side-dressed with enough 'one-ups-man-ship' so as to appear sufficiently knowledgeable without giving away an unspoken bias. How much rain a farmer either receives or needs at any one moment on the farm is generally directly related t...
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