Re-entry @ Cranky Girls' Farm

Meta Cranky and C2 have landed. MC got the distinct impression that fingers were drumming impatiently as the Crankies drove up the driveway: Combine and two grain trucks parked in the driveway. Field of dead-ripe wheat on the left side of the road. Rows of swathed alfalfa, ready to bale, on the right. A turkey added to the sense of frantic activity, flapping and squawking over the car and into the walnut tree. There was a general impression of where have you been already? In the time it took C2 to get on her hat and sunscreen, Uncles Sid and Michael cut a wheat sample and took it to the elevator (57 pounds/bushel; that's grade 2; not bad). The Crankies were good to go.

It was a perfect day to cut wheat: a steadily blowing wind and a temp of 102. Miserable for anything except drying grain and getting it into a bin. C2 rode on the combine until its bin filled for the first time and it stopped to empty into a truck. Then she took a Fancy Nancy approach to wheat harvest, setting herself a schedule of bath, nap, and tea party for the rest of the afternoon. C2 figured the combine would still be going when the sun went down, and she was right. She got a second trip around the field in the cool of the evening, wearing a tea party dress never before seen in an Allis Chambers Gleaner. Tres fancy!

Uncles Sidney and Michael were decidedly less fancy, since they had to crawl under combines when wheat straw got stuck,  and shlep the wheat to the elevator in the large, reliable, but not-air conditioned truck. At the end of the day, though, their Significant Others had a lovely dinner waiting for them; we think the combination of successfully cut wheat, air conditioning, and grilled meat products  was a satisfying one.

MC's Ancient O'Hern great-grandfather famously went berserk at harvest time; apparently the variables of machinery, weather, and human error were too much for him to synthesize as he watched his grain (read: money) being gathered into piles. One of his 10 sons apparently threatened to hit him with a shovel during a grain harvest if he didn't back off. MC is a little fuzzy on this story. She's not sure 1)which of the 10 sons made this threat or 2)If the shovel actually connected with the Ancient O'Hern. Contrast this with the Crankies' harvest experience, where Gardening Friend makes margaritas in fancy glasses, which Significant Others sip as they watch a combine move in smooth circles around a field. MC is thinking that estrogen improves the wheat harvest experience. Not that she can set the header on a combine, operate the dumping mechanism on a truck, or perform any useful labor. But as C2 slathered the assembled females with her Mary Kay perfume samples,  MC couldn't help but observe that a Fancy Nancy wheat harvest has a certain je ne sais quoi.
--MC