New photos of Shamrock Hollow  aka "Green Acres Mississippi-Style"

First order of business today was to dismount the new toy, which we broke in yesterday;

Click any photo to SuperSize It

'tis a PTO-driven 3-point Hitch sprayer. This thing rocks.. Upon seeing it in action, my neighbor Dale said "That thang's like the Armageddon o' Rounduppin..' "  And truth be told, it is! Well.. more like this thing vs. the 2-gallon hand sprayer you get at Lowes would be like comparin' a john boat to the Queen Mary. This thing will lay down a stream 40 feet away.. and that's set at a mere 35 PSI! It's rated for 60 PSI and goodness knows what it'd do cranked up all the way. We hosed down both old barns, laying down 20+ gallons of Roundup, in less than a half-hour,

Rain today, so not much work, but I did take some arty photos of the Homestead...

I know it doesn't look like too much of a hill, but pictures don't do it justice. On the tractor, it's quite a dramatic proposition! Seat belts required here...

Ran into a big patch of 'em about two hours after lunch.. just when I was gettin' a mite peckish.  I picked a mess of 'em, washed 'em off as best I could with a bottle of water (still haven't hooked up the trailer to the water main.. Soon!) and sprinkled on a packet of Splenda found burried in the glovebox of the Miata - a foine dessert! Pam says I'm gonna get Montezuma's Revenge, eatin' blackberries straight out of the pasture like that.. but it never hurt me when I's a lad, and they was Mmmmm MMMM! Good!!

The most unwelcome surprise of the day came from the Jinma, when the actuator cylinder for the Power Steering fell off.. (!)

Well.. it didn't fall all the way off.. and I did kinda bump a stump with the LH front wheel but - Yikes! - the threaded connection to the tie-rod end came loose, allowing the cylinder to drop loose and dangle. Thus leaving me stranded at the bottom of a draw.. with rain coming! $@#&ed tractors!

It wasn't too tough to repair, though, and gave me the opportunity to play He-Man Tractor Mechanic.. The biggest fear was cross-threading the tie-rod knuckle onto the cylinder. But a little judicious clean-up with a file on the cylinder's drive rod, and the knuckle went on fine.

I hope I can put this down to the assembler not threading the knuckle on far enough to begin with. {sigh} It was a pretty disappointing affair, and one you likely wouldn't get on a Mahindra and definitely not on a John Deere or New Holland...

Gots to plug the Honda a little, as it did yeoman service as the Mobile Tractor Repair Unit;

Oh, and it made these pictures (and dessert!) possible.

Finally persuaded Pam to go for a pillion ride on the Rubicon the other day, by the bye. Err.. Thursday I guess it was. While she's ridden it quite a bit solo. she's not nearly proficient enough on rough terrain to get to some of the more remote areas of Shamrock Hollow. She was a bit reluctant, I think, 'cause she sees me zippin' ol' Rubi around the place pretty briskly.. and, oh, she's witnessed me take one Titanic ass-busting on a dirt bike.   But when I went slow and explained that, two-up, my job's the same as when we ride double on the ST1100 - To get us home in one piece! - she relaxed and enjoyed the ride.