Everyone has those really fit crazy friends that are all about how strong and healthy they are. I have noticed that these peole usually work in an office all day. And I think that the sitting and using all there brian power all day would make you physically jumpy, so you would want to go to the gym, run for kilometers, or do those crazy Tough Mudda competitions.
At the moment I have a group of wonderful crazy friends who are going into a similar competition in the Numinbah Valley. It has all the great events like running through the mud, crawling through the mud, lifting heavy wet muddy things, and all those great adventures. And my great friends, who I love very much, and I must admit only really see me after I have showered after a day on the farm, asked if I would like to join them. I’m not sure if my face really conveyed what I was truely feeling.
I think my face said, “oh thats really funny you guys are joking with me.” And my head was thinking- “what are they crazy? This is what I did last Tuesday, and I didnt do it for fun.” I did it beacuse someone needed turf for a bank that was eroding away. We cut turf with the old hand stacker in the rain and the mud. I ran through the muddy wet padocks. I lifted the very heavy turf slabs (in the wet the slabs can reach up to 15 kilos each. In the dry, each slab is roughly 8-12 kilos each. Always remember to use your knees to lift when you are unstacking turf to install it at your house. They are heavy. ) onto the pallet and covered myself in all sorts of muddy goodness. I then, actually quite accidently, went to walk over to my tractor and sliped over in one of the numerous slippery muddy puddles and ended up crawling through the muddy puddle to get the the tractor.
Although this was different than at the Tough Mudda things I guess. I did have my dog licking my face to to encourage me the move faster to the tractor. I then scaled my way up our tractor into the seat and wipped my glasses clean so I could pull in the pallets from the paddock to place them on the truck so that our wonderful driver could get the pallets on site as quickly as possible to save his soil leaving his bank.
On a side note, that day we found a leak in my tractor tyre, that may or may not have been cause by me clawing my way up it in the wet muddy state I was in. So we had to change the type. Which meant taking a tyre from the tractor shed and moving it by hand all the way over to the tractor. About half a k. As I was moving it, I must admit I did think, well at least I don’t have to join a gym.
When we arrived at the lovely mans house, Tony the Turfman, his boys and I installed 200sqm of green couch on his bank to stop the erosion. As I carired the heavy slabs one at a time, I remebered why I hate laying turf in the rain. Its heavy, you get muddy, and you tend to slip on sloping blocks. But, then I looked back on what we had done. We went from seeing brown yucky mud everywhere to seeing beautiful green lining the bank. We really had a sense of accomplishment and pride that we could help so quickly, and that had helped a person turn thier dirt pile into a thing of beautiful green. The gentleman was very appricative as well. I think mostly because he didnt have to install the turf himself, and partly becuase we have ensured the entegrity of his bank.
So if you too have wonderful crazy friends who want you to do Fun things like Tough Mudda, ask them to come over to your place this weekend instead. Order a few hundred meters of turf, turn on the sprinkler, and get them to install your new lawn. Tell them they wont even have to pay a registration fee. You might even give them a sausgage at the end.
Chat soon
Sare