Ready, set… stop!

We were so ready to start harvest today. Yep, we were. Yesterday the boss said that he’d be swathing the oats and then start harvesting standing barley… depending on what the moisture was. (Can’t harvest if the moisture inside the grain is too high – it doesn’t store well.)

So, even though we knew there was a forecast for rain and the atmosphere had been threatening all day, we went to bed, thinking the header would probably be going today.

Not so.

The thunder and lightning we had last night, was truly amazing. It was surround-sound thunder; rumbling right over the top of our heads, then away to the north, the sound would almost fade and then come straight back over the top of us!

The lightning was spectacular; I kept thinking; “A little bit of rain would be good. We don’t want any fires!’ And we got a little bit. The gentle beat of rain on a tin roof and thunder as were all snug inside, is a good sound… until someone took the lid off the watering can and emptied it on us, hard and fast! It bucketed down! I don’t think I heard rain like it, all through winter! 17mm in less than 30 minutes!

My first thought was ‘great, no fires,’ as it got louder and heavier I thought: ‘Crap not that much!’

It was so heavy that my roses that looked like this, (above) yesterday, are now all shredded, the  petals embedded in the dirt, where the heavy torrents of water, pushed them.

Anyway, we’re not harvesting today! As I write this, the rain is steadily falling, although it clears up and then comes back again. It’ll probably be gone by tomorrow, leaving in its wake a few farmers that really wish it hadn’t been at all!

The rain will have done wonders on our sorghum crop, it will put harvest back for some time… more writing time, maybe!

Oh, PS: Don’t forget about The Ultimate Getaway and the Christmas phone call!