Blue to Red

My husband on the little Ford clearing the driveway last winter

My husband ended up buying another tractor. He likes to say that we "switched from red to blue." But we haven't switched yet. We simply have two tractors now. But the old one IS a Ford, and the new one IS Massey Ferguson. Actually, there's no "we" about it either. I've never driven the old tractor or the "new" one. The one time my husband suggested that I learn how to drive the Ford, I couldn't fit behind the steering wheel because I was an obscenely pregnant woman. And I never even saw the new one until it was parked in front of my house.

But back to the story. In order to get the tractor to our place, he had to figure out how to haul it here. Being the schmoozer that he is, he somehow got a real estate agent who also has an office in his building, to loan him her husband's trailer. It turned out that her spouse was part owner of a used car lot. He also found out from her that the folks from whom he was going to buy the tractor had been convicted of animal cruelty last year for having starving horses. They had 34 of them, and were in the process of buying more when they were indicted! Lovely.

Anyway, despite my protestations, he drove to another small town with my oldest and picked up the trailer. His light connector couldn't be adapted to work, so the trailer had no lights. Even better. Luckily it was close to the location from which he purchased the tractor. Unfortunately, neither were close to our home!

He found out the hard way that the trailer and tractor together were heavier than the truck, for the truck started rolling away upon his first attempt at loading. He had to chock the wheels. But despite all the risks he was taking, he managed to get home safe, much to my relief and much to my children's delight. He was the hero of the day for my tractor loving boys. In fact, our youngest sat for a very long time blissfully "loading" his siblings and monkeying with the controls as his doting oldest brother kept him from tumbling off.

Unloading the tractor was a bit dicey, and I think that the ramps were a little more bent than they were to start with. Upon the first usage of the tractor, it wouldn't start. This led to several frustrated hours until my husband finally figured out that the battery terminals had corroded and he was losing connection to the battery. Phew! His next step was to get a seat belt and install it. Of course,  the seatbelt kit didn't arrive with bolts, so after he tracked some down, he was good to go. Now the tires just have to last for a bit. They're in terrible shape.