Weather Roulette

It’s that time of the year when all us folks who live in The Fly-Over Nation become involuntary participants in the real-life game of Weather Roulette.

It’s an odds game with winners and, sadly, losers. The majority of folks get lucky and escape bad weather damage. But, every spring and summer we know that some of us are going to get whacked with bad weather, ranging from hail damage, to floods, to microbursts of high winds, to no-holds-barred tornadoes.

Well, last week, the Weather Roulette bullet whizzed by Nevah and I way too close. We had a tornado drop down unexpectedly on the east side of Riley. Two homes less than a quarter-mile away had roof, tree, and small building damage. But, one farmstead about a mile away got pretty much demolished. All the barns were flattened, and the shade trees downed, and the home got the windows blown out and suffered some structural damage. Luckily, no one wuz reported injured.

The tornado wuz so unexpected that the alert sirens in Riley didn’t sound, so Nevah and I sat and ate our supper right through it when our safe room wuz less than 10 steps away. Lucky again!

Our electricity has gone out several times during storms this spring. Happily, our automatic emergency generator worked perfectly each time and gave us uninterrupted electricity. There is more bad weather predicted in the next few days, so we’re hoping Weather Roulette’s odds keep going in our favor.

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Recently it struck me that I’ve seen only one tiny snake in the 2 1/2 years we’ve lived in our new home. And, it wuz a little garter snake. That’s unusual because our former home in Chase County hosted snakes of all kinds including garter snakes, black snakes, bull snakes and the occasional rattlesnake.

That thought of rattlesnakes brought back to my mind a rattlesnake story my maternal grandpappy often told. When it happened, my grandparents were living on a ranch near Fossil, Ore. — where my mom wuz born. They raised cattle, sheep, a few dryland crops, and put up hay. In addition, grandpap drove a mail stage down the John Day River to the Columbia River for supplemental income. 

Well, the rattlesnake story he told happened during haying season. Back in those days, it took a big crew of fellows to put up hay — and many of them were tough, gnarled old ranchers and cowhands.

Gramp said the crew members would gamble or make bets on about anything, including how many prairie rattlesnakes they would kill each day in the hay field. After watching the crew’s susceptibility to gambling, gramp hit upon a novel way to supplement his meager income. 

First, he brought a clear-glass, wide-mouthed gallon water bottle to the field. Then he told the crew he wanted the next rattler to be caught alive. That deed wuz soon done.

Then gramp maneuvered the rattler into the gallon glass jar and screwed the top down. With his gambling trap set, gramp laid out the betting rules. He said he would cover any bet that any crew member wanted to make. 

The gamble wuz that the crew member had to put his hand on the outside of the gallon jug and keep his eyes on the bottled rattler until it struck at his hand. If the bettor could keep his hand on the jug and not flinch when the rattler struck at his hand, he would win the bet. However, if he did jerk his hand back from the jar, gramp won the money.

Gramp said he never lost a single bet, even though a lot of crew members lost the first bet and then wanted double-or-nuthin’ for repeat gambles. He said it wuz impossible for anyone not to jerk his hand away when the rattler struck. It wuz an ingrained reflex reaction that the mind could not overcome.

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I recently got an email from ol’ Wes T. Failya, who lives in western Anderson County, Kan. He had some tales to relate to me, and one of them had to do with baling hay in his youth with an Allis-Chalmers small round hay baler.

Wes said his dad bought the AC baler new and Wes said his dad planned on Wes becoming proficient in running the tractor and baler. Wes learned that a windrow 3 to 4 foot wide made the best small round bale. But, invariably the windrow would get too wide or too narrow and that’s when problems arose.

Wes said his family had a real rocky hay meadow. Every once in a while, a rock would get raked into the windrow and the rock would get stuck in the baler’s roller. Sometimes a beer or pop bottle would do the same. That’s when the roller would heat up and start smoking.

Wes said he could sometimes unstick the roller using the AC tractor’s hand clutch. Other times he would have to shut down before a fire started and manually unwrap the hay from the roller or break the rock free with a lever or a hammer. 

Hauling small round bales also posed a problem for Wes. They were difficult to stack on a wagon. I can attest to that problem, too. I also had problems stacking and hauling small round bales back when I wuz a kid.

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Here’s my words of wisdom for the week: “I’ve discovered that it’s a lot easier and faster to go downhill in old age — in more ways than one.”

Have a good ‘un.