INDIANOLA, Neb. — I’ve always told our kids that I should write a book someday because it seems that things happen to us that never happen to anyone else.  I attribute this to not ever having the correct equipment or supplies needed to do the things that we need to do every day. ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — During wheat harvest one year, I was driving a wheat-colored Thunderbird to town when a gal pulled out in front of me and totaled our car. Two of our kiddos and I were fine, but it was very hard on our bank account.   A year or so later was when I had the accident while hauling hogs to town. ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — In my early 50s I got the chance to go on an Elk hunt near Walden, Colo.  I thought I was in pretty good shape, but I hadn’t accounted for the change in altitude.  I drove my Explorer up a mountain covered in snow after I had left work that morning.  I remember seeing so many hunters on the interstate passing me with their camo clothes on and their vehicles packed with hunting supplies.  I had on a pink sweater with some jeans that had pink plaid with my normal jewelry and pump shoes that I had worn to work.  . ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - One of the downfalls of living in the country is the distance involved in driving to town. One must spend more money on fuel just to go to church, school, or the grocery store. Then of course there is the time involved in planning one’s trip, making all the errand stops and getting everything done before driving home...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — Wheat harvest is currently delayed due to a combination of moisture and the berries in each head not being ripe yet. Rain this late in the wheat growing season tends to drop the test weight and the weeds are going to slug up the combines if we try to cut too fast. Farmer Tom says he doesn't remember a time in his life when we were this late getting started...

INIANOLA, Neb. — One of our Holstein milk cows had to be put across the road into our pasture that had the bulls so she could get bred. This, of course, was a major pain because she had a calf, and we were also milking her so this chore of rounding her up had to be done every afternoon until she no longer showed signs of heat. This was before we learned how to artificially inseminate cattle and that process didn't last too long on our farm either...

\INDIANOLA, Neb. - I mentioned in an earlier column that I try to refrain from yelling at referees. I actually have some friends that still ref and my kids reffed in their school days, so the story is that referees are NOT supposed to care who wins a game...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — A shout-out to the honest folks at the ballpark who returned my purse. Evidence there are still good people in the world. Listening to the news has once again set my teeth on edge. I realize that folks who only watch the liberal media don't believe the left is really planning to do all the disturbing things to cripple our standard of living that they have planned, so I thought I'd give you a hint of some idiotic schemes in their works...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — Speaking of Father’s Day this week, my dad has been gone for over 25 years. He was a great man! Even though he wasn’t wealthy, he would have given the shirt off his back to help someone in need. After he retired from Texaco, after 30 years as an oil well pumper, he bought a camper and traveled south in the winter, then north in the summer. ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - We used to raise hogs on our farm which I’ve detailed before. They were a lot of work but were a great cash flow for a growing family.  Farmer Tom and Larissa had taken a truck full of hogs and the two younger kids and I had driven a pickup trailer full that we delivered to a sale barn in Curtis. ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - I want to make a heartfelt shout out to our first granddaughter, Ashlin Broz, who is graduating from Hayes Center High School this year.  This darling is sweet, smart, beautiful, athletic, and the nicest person one could ever meet.  Grandma is apprehensive about her going off to a socialistic college campus like so many across the nation today, but I’m confident that she has been instilled with the right stuff to guarantee a successful future.  Good luck to all the graduates and may they find what they are looking for.  . ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — Farmer Tom and I have a pasture that we keep cows in that had a huge cement silo.  For years we would put boards and stuff down there to fill the deep hole.  One particular winter, I had all the kids bundled up while I put a few things down the hole and when I turned around one of our girls was no longer in sight. ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - It is a mystery to me how the weather has changed over the years just in my lifetime. I personally don't believe the climate alarmists theory; I just think the world comes around and goes around and it will be what it will be. I can remember as a child getting much more snow in this area, at least more than we have in recent years. ...

McCOOK, Neb. — On our farm, we raise Angus cattle to sell commercial beef. Some buyers have bought our heifers for potential breeding, and we do keep back heifers to replace old cows. Our family are beef eaters. We love our own beef. A funny story — we went on a cruise once and they were advertising on their menu Nebraska Black Angus steak. Some folks praised the meat as some of the best they ever had. In our opinion, it didn't even come close to our home-grown beef...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — I have quite a few rattlesnake episodes from over the years to tell.  Most folks that don’t spend a lot of time in our local pastures probably don’t realize just how many venomous snakes we have around here.  If one has seen the pain inflicted on cattle, horses, dogs, and cats, they would understand why I make a point to dispatch them if I have a safe opportunity.  ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — I have quite a few rattlesnake episodes from over the years to tell.  Most folks that don’t spend a lot of time in our local pastures probably don’t realize just how many venomous snakes we have around here.  If one has seen the pain inflicted on cattle, horses, dogs, and cats, they would understand why I make a point to dispatch them if I have a safe opportunity.  ...

Have you ever had a parent or grandparent tell you stories about how they had to walk five miles uphill both ways to school in the snow? Well, I didn't have it quite that bad but in kindergarten, I still had to walk clear across town in the rain, sleet, or snow without the possibility of a ride to or from school. My biggest fear was making it to my destination without peeing my pants. I learned to time that function rather quickly...

When adults are used to riding horses, they sometimes don't think about what might be scary to a child. The kids and I were visiting friends in South Dakota. We were used to riding in Nebraska, which is mostly flat, hilly land. We were in an area that had very steep rocky buttes with many trees seeming to grow up out of the rocks. Britni, age six, was the youngest child at the time...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - One summer, I took our two oldest daughters on a one-hundred-mile trail ride from McCook, Neb. to Phillipsburg, Kan. This ride was scheduled to take approximately one week, and we were to appear in the Grand Entry of the Phillipsburg Rodeo...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — When I was young, I considered becoming a patrolman. Of course, that was when I felt ten feet tall and bulletproof. After some years of maturity, I didn't think being in law enforcement was for me. Now there are days I'm pretty sure I couldn't whip my way out of a wet paper sack. I'm glad we have people willing to do a job like that, although it seems very dangerous and sometimes our laws appear to allow criminals more rights than the victims have...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - There is a Democratic politician named Sheila Jackson Lee from Texas who has been in politics for 30 years.  Recently she has introduced a bill that broadly states if anyone says anything disagreeable about the current administration’s policies, you can be federally prosecuted as a terrorist. And if one is white, then you would also be labeled a white supremacist which is also a felony. ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — I was watching late-night news and saw parents getting into a brawl at a youth game. It was hard to tell who started what and whether any officials were even involved on this video, but often one doesn’t always see what exacerbated the altercation — only what the results were...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - Recently the Biden administration repealed a Trump-era action regarding how natural water sources in the United States are protected.   American farmer groups argue that this rule will lead to increased federal scrutiny of how farmers and other landowners treat water sources on their property such as ravines and creeks...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - A long time ago, before I started working full time in nursing, I used to run the tri-flex or a disc depending on what Farmer Tom’s plan was for the eco-fallow.  We have one field in particular that has very long terraces that go one direction southeast and then you follow around and go northwest on the other side.  Needless to say, I thought all that driving was soooo boring, especially since Farmer Tom always insisted that one could only drive 4 miles per hour when working the soil.  . ...

Preg-checking cows became an important managerial process for us several years after Farmer Tom and I were married. His father never wanted to spend any money on the cow herd saying that they had to pay for themselves. We decided that knowing if and when the cows were going to calve was vital in many aspects like not feeding cows that weren't going to calve and not keeping cows that weren't to calve on a timely basis. ...

Fond memories of horses we had known INDIANOLA, Neb. — One of our daughters had a four-year-old gelding named Howard that was pretty gentle and had a lot of “try” but didn’t have a zillion training miles.  Farmer Tom had a bull out in the neighbor’s pasture, and he took a couple of buddies with horses over to try and get him in.  ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — I was watching the news today and there was a student caught on video assaulting another, then later that student claimed it was a racial crime.  My thought is the color of one’s skin doesn’t amplify the cases of bullying in our country. ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — I was watching the news today and there was a student caught on video assaulting another, then later that student claimed it was a racial crime.  My thought is the color of one’s skin doesn’t amplify the cases of bullying in our country. ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — We got a call one evening from our friend Art who has ground by ours, so I assumed we had cows out. He laughed and said, “not that he knew of,” but that a gal from the Washington Post wanted to speak to us about the drought. I told him we had some oceanfront property that we could sell him too!...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - Drama! Drama! Drama! OMG! I just read an article that the USDA is wanting farmers to plant two crops in a season on the same ground, thereby helping to relieve food shortages. If that isn’t a bunch of hogwash, they’ve got a lot of people fooled...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - I have written before how we have had quite a few good horses over the years. I loved riding and taking the kids out in the pasture to check cows. Indianola used to have “Fun Days” where we did numerous equine events. Very fun memories for our family...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — I’m sure you’ve heard the expression “Cowboy vs Cowboy Wannabe.” In my mind, a true cowboy can ride just about any horse. Rodeo Queen contestants and horsemanship riders can usually ride their own or a leased horse, but not necessarily another contestant’s horse, so I’ve always thought the trading of horses is a way to tell which person is a good rider...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - Back in the day, Farmer Tom and I enjoyed “Cattle Penning” at the Red Willow Arena and sometimes a few other town events.  We had one horse named Red that wasn’t anything to look at, but he was another favorite ride.  This guy not only excelled at barrels and poles, but he was also excellent at working cattle.  He was the type of animal that would shift his weight when he felt me losing my seat and that›s a fact.  ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — You know it’s dry when the pigweeds won’t even grow in the wheat stubble. When driving around rural areas, you can see how the moisture must have fallen in very sporadic spots. As I’ve mentioned before, a couple of our pastures west of our house are so dry we have been feeding cows for about a month, but closer to home the grass so far is holding out for more rain. We would sure like to get some soon, but the dryland corn may already be taking the trip...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — On July 25, we got about .35 inches of rain and I had marked on my calendar that we also got .25 on the 24th of June. Needless to say, a half-inch in one month’s time must mean we aren’t living right, or as the world evolves naturally over centuries, that’s just the way it’s going to be...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - County fair and 4-H season is back again already. For the most part, I believe it’s another good tool to teach any number of skills that children can use now and in the future. One year, our youngest daughter didn’t make it to many actual horse 4-H meetings due to us parents having too much work to do and her not being allowed to drive a truck /trailer full of horses to McCook. ...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - How smart are our “IT” people in the United States? I’d say pretty darn intelligent. Farmer Tom has a cool monitor in his tractor when he plants and when he combines his crops. Although they may not be the newest or the best available, they are still pretty smart...

INDIANOLA, Neb. — Living on a farm and having horses was always something that I thought I wanted growing up. My dad never let me have a horse because he thought my interest would wane. The first horse we ever brought home was named “Brownie.” He was a proud cut gelding which Tom really liked but he was too much horse for me at the time. He pranced and danced a lot, but Farmer Tom could get him to do almost anything with cattle...

INDIANOLA, Neb. - OMG! The first round of spraying noxious weeds has started! Nebraska has a mandate that landowners/ renters are required to spray the musk thistle, among other nasty weeds, on pasture and non-fenced pockets. Apparently, cropland is just supposed to be taken care of with regular farming practices...

When raising a commercial herd where we can save maternal heifers, we need to buy bulls that have PPD numbers for high maternal milk, among other numbers.  After starting there, we need to also pick heifers from cows that we know were good mothers and document how the cow behaved after calving and how her udder weathered raising a calf.  ...

INDIANOLA, Neb - The grandkids have always loved to go with Papa Tom to check the cows. From the time they were little, they liked riding in the Ranger and watching the baby calves run and jump with their tails standing up, occasionally knocking each other over in their exuberance...