Mr. Brown #HobbyFarmProblems

We are the proud owners of a beautiful old (possibly antique) tractor.

Meet David Brown - couldn't you just pinch his little metal cheeks?

It is quite the necessity on our farm.

I do feel lucky to have him and admire my husband's driving skills on the little beast. Unfortunately I have no knack for it and hate tractoring, especially snow. Although I usually avoid driving the thing at all costs, a bit of guilt about how much work my husband does mixed with a bit of unexpected spare time had me thinking a bit of snow clearing would be a good idea.

It all started well, but lasted all too briefly when I ran. out. of. diesel.

For educational purposes, don't EVER do this.

I immediately abandoned ship, ran for the house and ate some chocolate. I then convinced myself it would all be fine. I would just get some diesel, and it would magically start - all before my husband got home so he wouldn't have extra work/stress dumped on him at a time I was trying to offload some shit for him.

With diesel poured in the tank I climbed aboard, crossed my fingers, whispered some sweet nothings to Mr. Brown and turned the key.

NOPE.

Still holding onto optimism, I thought maybe he was just too cold and decided to try plugging him in for a bit. Five extension cords later I reached the tractor as he had died quite far from the closest plug in.

Back to the house, more chocolate and delusional positive thoughts that it all would work out just fine and to wait for the tractor's block heater to do its thing.

The next starting attempt was a massive fail. Not only was it not catching, but the turn over sounded quite like a low battery. humph. Time to ask for help from my 18-year-old son because I had never hooked up a battery charger and did not feel lucky enough to make this the day for practicing.

Back to house and looked in cupboard for hard liquor. Googled how to start a diesel tractor after running out of diesel.  Pissed by their pessimism so turned off computer and returned to believing next time it would just start.

With the help of my son hooking and unhooking the charger and a few more attempts/waiting to try again, IT TURNED OVER AND STARTED!

I got the little hunk of metal back in its shed so fast I forgot to unload the snow that was still in the bucket...

Happy New Year!