A boy story

[merryyon]

The boys were hauling round bales on Saturday afternoon.  We had to leave for a bday party at 6, so they needed to be home by 5:30 to clean up.  Spencer was the loader and Cale was the hauler.  All was well when they came home to clean up for the party.  This morning Spencer called frantically to say the he had found the loader tractor RUNNING.....he left it at 5:30pm on Sat evening.  We had filled it up w/diesel before he took it up there, it was quite low but hadn't sputtered out of fuel.  So now he is moping around trying to find the courage to call his Daddy at work and tell him the news. 

[Kay/NC]

Not just boys!!! Daughter left with her husband and Winn about one o'clock from her farm chores and then finishing up behind the vet with horse call. We got back from picking up the new pup about three-thirty, to find her work truck sitting in the yard running. Not as bas a waste of fuel as your case, but if it had been Friday, it would have run all weekend, too.

I vote for telling Dad when he gets home from work. No need to raise his blood pressure over spent diesel....

[Sundae1964]

The boys hauled bales here the other day too, DS drove tractor and rack home with a load of bales, went to take them off this morning and he left the key on.  We did get it started in just a few minutes though...his response..."my bad"

S.

[mike se il]

Daddy has several possible responses, but they all should sound something like this:
(laugh) Well, I bet you learned to turn it of next time

If he yells, hollers, makes fun of the kid, belittles him, or blows up he needs a 2x4 applied side his head to re-educate Dad. Things happen.

[merryyon]

I think the sweating and worry was plenty torture!!  He has a pretty good Dad, so no need in you worrying about abuse.  But he does need to learn that inattentive actions can cause all kinds of pain, physical, financial etc....even death, we all know that farm accidents are all to common. 

[Kay/NC]

My biggest concern with an engine left running is possible carbon monoxide poisoning...hope this was out in the open. Knowing how high diesel,is these days, and letting him look up the specifications on the tractor's fuel tank...doing the math, might be educational. Guilt isn't the main point...knowing consequences in lost money might be.

[manureseller]

This may be where taking some of his calf money or his earnings to pay back might bring the lesson home.  Not the whole tank but enough to make an impression. 

[ndjoe]

Those things are just gonna happen when you do as much as we do in a day around the farm. We would have the pick-up out in the field when we lifted beets all night. Found it running one mornign and have no clue how long it had been. This spring I planted a planter full and got back to the seed tender and the pick-up was running. Two to three hours, I suppose. I'm fifty six. If you're not flubbing up something, then you're not busy enough, maybe.

[Kay/NC]

Actually, that one was a "boy story" after all. SIL had pulled her truck up to that spot, so he could check out her failing brakes.

The " too busy" phenomenon is part and parcel of our farming past. i am hoping to erase it from our farming future, if it kills me...and, it probably will.