Well, as a kid - or even later I never farmed a day in my life.
Now - there's other kinds of work.
When I was 13 my dad lost his job as outside sales for General tire in San Diego. He started his own tire sales business that summer. Since I was mechanically handy, I got to 'help out' around the shop. My older brother was in Vietnam, driving a helicopter around getting shot at. By Sept when I started 9th grade(started school ahead a little), I was a part time tire changer in Escondido. Plenty of days over 90, some into 100s. Hot, sweaty, heavy, noisy work. From 8-5:30 every day all summer. School was a bit of a relief, but I had early access classes and got out of school around 2:30 and put in a couple hours in the afternoon each day. Oh - since I was family, no I didn't get paid, except for the occasional 10 bucks for some food, or movie or something.
Next summer at 14, same thing. Every summer day, 6 days a week, no vacation, no time off, all day every day changing tires, shocks, brakes. Sept comes around and I'm yearning to go back to school. Dad comes to school and they arrange a 'work/study' program for my last two periods. So now I get out at noon(yea) so I can now work half days. All summer, all day, I got 4th of July long weekend off and celebrated with a trip to Lake Havasu. Dad then bought a tire recap plant in La Mesa. Ever work in a recap plant? I did. Javier was my boss. He was not a friendly guy. Back to work until Sept, same thing, half day school, half day work, all year, all summer. Next year senior year I had enough credits to graduate mid-term. I was looking at another winter, spring, summer of recapping tires, changing tires, shocks, brakes in a hot noisy smelly shop for dirt pay. The day I graduated HS; Dec 21st I went down to the recruiter and joined the Army. They needed my parents signature, and I forged my dads name. Weird - the army was an easy paradise coming from what I was doing for the past 4 years.
Go on, tell me about farming. I'm listening. No - really.
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Today's Featured Article - Restoration Story: 1964 JD 2010 Dsl - Part 2 - by Jim Nielsen. Despite having to disassemble the majority of my John Deere 2010's diesel engine, I was still hopeful I could leave the engine-complete with crankshaft and camshaft-in the tractor. This would make the whole engine rebuild job much easier-and much less expensive! I soon found however, that the #4 conrod bearing had disintegrated, taking with it chunks of the crankshaft journal. As a resul
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