I’m almost embarrassed to sit here tonight and say again that NOTHING has gone on in this camp. One more day of staring at each other and wondering what we could do next. Its days like this you wish there was a little more to do than that! We’ve now completed our 12^th day of not being in the field. Our farmer has completed the dry land wheat. He wants us to cut the irrigated because he has a “stripper” head and doesn’t want that much straw left on the field. The Deerfield stop is not going to be one to write home about! Ah…but look at all this great family time! I’ve learned a long time ago that no two summers are EVER the same and weather is not reliable…EVER!

Yesterday, the girls and I decided we “needed” to go to Walmart and the grocery store in Garden City (mostly to leave the confining walls of our cottage on wheels). On our way out of town, I decided I should get a picture of the old Texaco station. Last summer while we were here, they were restoring the building. I did a little “digging” on the internet to see what I could find out about it and I will share with you the 7/6/2011 Hutchinson News article written by Kathy Hanks:

“The building continues to be a reminder of a period in time when the High Plains was experiencing growth during the 1920s. It also serves as an important Tudor Revival style of architecture that was meant to blend with the homes in the neighborhood.

Sitting on old U.S. 50, it was first opened by two Kearny County World War I veterans, John Campbell and James Doyle.

Located 22 miles west of Garden City, the men’s business began to grow, expanding to 14 Texaco stations and offering a bulk delivery service of kerosene, then later gasoline and diesel.

The men had the fuel shipped by rail to Lakin, and at one time had eight 15,000-gallon tanks by the railroad tracks where they unloaded the fuel cars. Their stations flourished in towns like Garden City, Leoti, Holcomb, Pierceville, Ulysses, Johnson, Kendall and Lakin.

This was back when the area was growing agriculturally because of ditch irrigation systems in Kearny and Finney counties and fast-becoming a hub of sugar beet production.

“Texaco was big at the time and very orientated towards service,” Smith said. “It had the first nationwide campaign to clean up filling station restrooms.”

Smith said there was a man who drove a white Ford Coupe and made spot inspections to see if the restrooms around the area were up to standard.

If it passed muster, a 4-foot-by-4-foot “Clean Restroom” sign was placed outside the station. Deerfield’s station proudly displayed the sign back in its day.

The narrow pumps with the 10-gallon glass domes, specifically built that size to accommodate the Model A and T’s fuel tanks have been restored. There was no electricity here in the 1920s. The pump operated by gravity and there was a lever on the side of the pump that was cranked to bring the fuel from the storage tank into the glass dome.”

Today…we did absolutely NOTHING! As a matter of fact, Callie and I didn’t even bother to get out of our pajamas. I worked on emailing a letter to our Senators regarding an amendment that’s in the Farm Bill (SA 2241) that if remains will benefit custom harvesters, farmers, Ag businesses and Co-ops. This is something I’ll have to dedicate as an entire blog post to at a different date. A brief explanation of SA 2241 would simply be that agriculture entities would be allowed to haul up to 1,000 gallons of diesel fuel to our equipment without the hazmat endorsement on the Class A CDL. The current rule allows up to 119 gallons.

Tonight, we watched history in the making…Nik Wallenda walking across the Niagara Falls on a 2” cable. Nik is the 7^th generation of Wallenda’s to walk the tightrope. I remember when his Grandpa fell off the wire as he attempted to walk from one building to the other. In the time we waited for Nik to walk the cable, I learned a lot of facts and history about his famous family. It wasn’t until he was actually walking I found out Nik and his family are believers. I appreciated him giving thanks and praise to God and to Jesus Christ – the same Jesus I know – while taking each step. I’m not sure what happened but after a while, ABC stopped airing what he was saying. And then, I saw this quote on twitter, “We’d like to apologize to anyone offended by the religious language.” This angered me. Seriously? Apologize for something that everyone watching needed to hear? Nik Wallenda had the perfect opportunity to witness to thousands of people. His main objective was to “inspire people around the world”. He certainly was an inspiration to me – an inspiration to take on my Niagara Falls one baby step at a time until I get to the other side.

For your viewing pleasure, I’m going to sign off with another song from Taylor and Callie’s jam session while in Shattuck: