OK I'm not that gullable. So what your saying is the japaneeze engine is better than you JD which is probably is beings JD don't make it. By the why does JD make any engines anymore?? OK I frogot the plant in china! Please, all engines have carb problems eventually, even the infamous Kaw's especially if you don't do pre-ventive maintenance. If it an't getting gas it's not going to fire, that's why the starting fluid fires it off, if it had igintion weak enough not to fire off gas I dought it would fire off starting fluid and keep running. Most ingition parts get weak as they warm up or fail all at once. I suspose you JD never needed a battery either cuz it had JD on it. Yep, I sure would spend big bucks ignition parts before I made sure it not a carb. problem!

I have found that there are two kinds of market goers. The "regulars" and the "sight-seers." The first will be there in a thunderstorm in 45 degree weather and will buy a good amount every time. The others hardly ever buy anything. You can here the sight seers say things like "Wow, its the same price as the grocrey store!" I want to wack them and scream "TRY IT! Its a heirloom that tastes fantasitic and it was picked less then 24 hours ago, so all the enzymes and nutrients have not started to die yet!" They carry a bag with mostly baked goods and crafts, a $2 cookie makes more since to them then a $.50 zuccinni or $3/# heirloom toms. But the regulars are always there and they will buy until the last day of market. These are your gold! We actually have diverted a few of these people to our CSA. But these are your late season buyers, so try to get your own regulars as early as possible in the season and it will help you later. (Typically there are also fewer farmers after first frost, you can grab their regulars to, and if you are there early enough the next year, maybe make them your regulars the next year.)

Last night, while attending a meeting of the investment group, I took a good slide, due to freezing drizzle. As we came out of the building, I went to step back up on the sidewalk and my feet went substantially out from under me ... ... but I had a bag of books in my hand, and they swung, so that I was able to catch myself before I hit the ground totally. No bad effect, and a couple of the participants asked if I was O.K. Not even a strained muscle. I often travel part way with a friend, but we didn't meet at his house last night: got together at a store, on the way. There was ice to clear from his car after the meeting and when I got back to my car, ice to clear from it ... and I had inadequate equipment to do the job. I've had some extra coats in the car for a while, and yesterday, aware that I wasn't properly equipped, put my sleeping bag in there. Slipped off of the lane going out, was shovelling, and a guy from the road came in to help, tried to push me, then pulled me out with his truck. Carried a shovel with me all day ... had left the other in the snowbank where I'd been shovelling: it's in the car, now. Need a scooper for shovelling snow, a shallow one for pulling snow out from under the car. This morning it's to be the ice scraper that gets into the car with me. I'm to pick up my custom-made squeezee socks for varicose veins, then attend the ROMEOs (Retired Old Men Eating Out) Coffee Hour (I call it the "Old Farts' Club"). Then deliver native ciggies to my friend and pick up my new cell phone that he's been configuring for me ... that, being an old guy, living alone, I've been ordered to carry with me at all times. (so ... I guess that I'd better get an old bag to carry it in). Good wishes for getting through the bad weather with minimal deleterious result ... and have a really fine New Year, everyone! ole joyful

LOL, Harry and BeeGee have better sense than to be out in this mess. Actually, they aren't allowed in the front yard; they have to stay inside the fence. Harry would take off after something, anything, and never come back or run out in traffic. He has a one track mind when he's on a scent. He wears a shock collar when hunting; he took off after a deer once and narrowly missed a truck. Thankfully we never have to use it now; but just wearing it is a reminder to him that even unrestrained on the prairie, we can still "reach out and touch" him. After Wes described his near fatal run-off; he demonstrated the collar by wearing it and letting me shock him (Wes.) It is not bad, but it does get his attention and has saved Harry's life more than once. If you squint, you can probably see Harry's head on the left side of the big window. He was standing on the arm of the sofa, peering out at us. BeeGee is probably curled up in blanket on the chair. She's an Alabama-born and raised southern lady; she's not at all happy with this cold white stuff. We had real issues the first couple of days after it snowed making her go outside for a potty break.