Farm Story Friday

Roger standing in the garden… get back to work! Harvest Time (27 September 2019) Did you know that dates grow on palm trees? I learned that today when I decided to walk the long way back from breakfast. The Embassy is a small compound and I’ve probably stepped on thousands of dates while running around it. When I first arrived and dates were available in the dining facility, I ate dates on Friday nights in an attempt to recognize “date-night Friday” (a far cry from my idea of a real date!). However, not until today (my 170th day in country) did I open my eyes to really see the dates lying on the ground. Dates from the Baghdad Embassy Complex (BEC). Iraq is actually quite famous for dates and used to supply about three-quarters of the world’s supply. War and a focus on oil has reduced that number to about five percent, but a foundation in Iraq is planting thousands of date palms in order to get back in the date industry. I hope this and Iraq’s other agricultural endeavor...

Wayne, Keith, Roger, and Keith with animals Too Many Bozos (20 September 2019) Since April is now officially a college student, today’s post is about Bozos... April on her first day of school Too Many Bozos , written by Lilian Moore and illustrated by Susan Perl is a story about a young boy that really wants a dog, because he knows the perfect name for a pet dog, Bozo! Over time and using various means this young boy brings home a frog, ants, mice, and other “pets”, each of which he names Bozo, and each of which his mother makes him get rid of after it causes sufficient nuisance in the house. Apparently his efforts were more heroic than your efforts, because unlike your parents, his mother eventually gives her son a dog, which he promptly names Bozo! Today I will introduce you to some of the animals from the farm, most of which weren’t named, so I will call each one Bozo... Brian, Eugene, Wayne, Keith, Scott, and Ronald with a dog and four cats Meet Bozo the Cat...

Lyle, Eugene, Roger (behind Scott), Scott, and Keith’s elbow at the kitchen table. My Spot at the Table (13 September 2019) Every position in a family, from the oldest to the youngest, comes with a unique set of challenges, but we all play an important role. We all have a spot at the table! As you can see, my spot was between Scott and Eugene... My older brothers probably had a lot more expected of them in the initial years on the farm as they helped my dad get the farm operations going. Eldon was just twelve when we moved to Idaho, yet he was expected to move a lot of pipe in those first years. I don’t know how much each pipe weighs, but I remember being surprised at how heavy they are when I started moving the hand-lines. It never seemed hard to watch my brothers move them... They were also there when dairy cows entered the picture and when we tried doing 3-a-day milkings in order to increase milk production. I still remember picking Brian up from the airport after his...

Greenwood Family picture on our front lawn (cerca Fall 1978). The “green circles” were in the field immediately behind us. Green Circles (6 September 2019) Today’s story about green circles should be understood even by those who are color blind (let me know if that’s not the case Caleb) and is appropriate for retelling in most settings, except maybe the dinner table and sacrament meeting... Oh, and I couldn’t find a good song to fit the theme, I guess there aren’t a lot of songs about manure... Upon our return from the North Gem High School choir trip to Washington DC in 1991 I came upon an unexpected discovery… farms smell different than cities! Now, don’t get me wrong, I knew from early on that manure had a stinky reputation, and I definitely didn’t go around sniffing it, but this may have been the first time that I realized the cow manure smell extended beyond the limits of the dairy. As we pulled within a mile or two of the Weaver and Greenwood dairy farms I started to n...