Sometimes life hands you material...

Or at least something to blog.

Yesterday was a typical day, lots to do before the weekend ends (hell I still had round bales in the field to pick up) so I fired up the tractor and went through the routine of switching hay fork for the material bucket ("Hand me that hammer! No! The bigger one! #%^#$#%#! And some oil... and the torches!") hooked up the hay wagon (which for mysterious reasons I'd brought home instead of leaving it at the farm) and headed out. Now it's been snowing recently, but not for a couple of days at least. Last year we had lots of snow, but not the type that forms ice... unlike this year.

So I'm heading up the first hill, not far from our house and about half way up I'm starting to spin... no big deal, I've got lots of power... and ok... slipping a little more.... no problem, I've got newer tires... lots of traction... then I realized I wasn't going forward anymore...

Things tend to happen in slow motion at times like these. There's a point between moving forward that times seems to stand still... until you realize you are no longer not moving forward... but backwards....

Then things speed up real quick.

2 and 1/2 tons of steel and rubber may go up the hill slowly, but it sure goes back down fast!

So here a am... in the middle of the road, pulling a backwards luge run (with a performance worthy of an Olympic medal)...

Did I mention I was pulling a hay wagon?

It's amazing how fast one's mind can work when you are running at a level of near panic as I simultaneously had to steer, brake, look backwards, work the clutch and try to figure out which one of the 16 forward or 8 reverse gears might get me out of this without dying.

Did I mention that my wife had been following behind me in the minivan? She can drive really fast in reverse if required to.

Ok, in addition to: steer, brake, look backwards, work the clutch and try to figure out which one of the 16 forward or 8 reverse gears might get me out of this without dying, I also somehow managed to wave frantically at her to get the ^%$^$%^$ out of the way because gravity waits for no farmer and his tractor.

Somehow, I manage to jack the ass-end of the hay wagon into the snowbank to stop myself...

Or at least in theory...

The wagon did stop, but the tractor didn't...

It kept going and swung around the wagon tongue, so now I'm perpendicular across the road...

Um... I hope nobody comes down the hill.

Luckily I didn't stay that way, as the tractor continued it's parabolic arc around the hay wagon, thoroughly testing the metallurgic properties of the tractor drawbar, the wagon tongue and the hitch pin, along with the stress parameters of my heart valves. I finally did manage to find one of the 16 forward, 8 reverse gears that got me out the situation, however I was a couple of seconds too late, because by then the tractor had come to terms to gravity and worked things out mostly on it's own.

Now all I had to do was turn around... and try to go up the hill again.