Store shelves empty?

[Deberosa]

Now, I don't get out much anymore but we went to a couple of stores (grocery and feed stores) over the weekend and I noticed a distinct emptyness in the shelves. Anyone else notice this?

Didn't seem to be any rhyme or reason but I don't think I've ever seen so many items out of stock as now...

The feed store also was dumping alot of stuff half price but I think that is because they discovered their yuppie clothes were not what people came to the feed store for!

[nancy1340]

Deb, do you think part of it may have been because of the long weekend? I have noticed that seems to happen now and then.

[sethwyo]

Food is getting short, some brands of a product are not available now when thay wore last year, because there isnt enough available for the people who process it, like rice, and things containing rice, and wheat products, for about eight years now the world has been consuming more grain than it has been producing. The stocks of grain have been getting smaller and disipearing. Thay cannot replenish them year after year. A resturant here stopped making doughnuts because the price of the flower was so high that no one could afford the doughnuts, even at cost. The same thing is happening every where.

[msta999]

Haven't noticed anything around here. I was in both Albertsons and Safeway this weekend and all the shelves were full, lots of precooked food available, sandwiches, chicken......no shortages on this side.

[MNMOM]

I've noticed this a few times myself, I thought that maybe it was the time of day for re-stocking. I'm going to keep a closer watch on this.

[pinetreefarm]

I haven't noticed any, in fact the specials this week have been excellent. Produce is another issue however. Prices up there and some things this year are not available. I'll bet tomatoes will be better prices now.

Pine

[walls0stone]

No store shelves empty here. actualy talked with a friend last week about re-opening a small general store in our town. one stop shopping for the small town.

[OzarksJohn]

Howdy.

No empty shelves here in MO. Probably they were waiting on a truck. I've seen Wal-Mart go from stripped of popular products to stuffed in the same 24 hour period simply because of a run on certain items for whatever reason. What everyone must remember, is that the transportation industry IS the warehouse for most big stores.OzarksJohn

[leera]

Some stores/companies are cutting down on how often they get new stock in to save on fuel charges......that may be one reason.

As an example,the company my store gets ice from wants to put a second freezer in the stockroom so they don't have to make as many trips per week.......the guy also wants to put a bigger freezer on the sales floor.

Many stores that were getting three or more trucks(shipments) per week are now cutting down to one or two.....

My store now gets it regular stock in on the same truck as our promo/seasonal stock........once a week,rather than twice......

[CarolAnn]

I've noticed more than a few here in Wisconsin.

Some of it is because we have so many roads and bridges out around this state and in Iowa - it's making transportation of goods a real nightmare.

"Just in time" was a concept started about 20 years ago when business stopped warehousing so much and relied on shipping "just in time" for when they needed it either for manufacturing or for sales. They saved a lot of money on overhead, but this kind of disaster makes that practice come back and bite them in the hind end.

[CatherineID]

Profit margins are so tight for grocery stores, they have become much more selective on where they put their inventory money. Sometimes that means the shelves won't be restocked as quickly.

Also, remember suppliers are re-marketing their products all the time (they basically 'rent' the grocery store shelf space). I have noticed a lot of products becoming smaller and lighter. For instance, a "half-gallon" container of ice cream became 1.75 pints a few years ago. Now it is 1.5 pints Suppliers like to have the old product and package size sold out so consumers don't easily recognize the switch.

[MNMOM]

I had e-mailed the company about the size of Edy's ice cream just going down to 1.5 quarts, here is the answer that I received today.

My name is Tim Kahn and I'm the Chief Executive Officer (translation: head ice cream guy) of Dreyer's Grand Ice Cream. Thank you for taking the time to contact our company about our new 1.5 quart carton.

I can understand why you may not be pleased with us right now. Our new carton is smaller and no one wants less for the same money.

Since the buck stops with me, let me tell you why we made the difficult decision to change the size of our carton. The cost of all dairy products has increased enormously over the past few years, as have the costs of the sweeteners, nuts, fruits and energy used to make our ice cream. Our ingredient costs have risen by 30 to 60% over this time, but the average price of ice cream has not really changed much.

We looked at raising our prices to cover these costs, but at some point, it just doesn't make sense to raise prices too high. I suspect very few families would want to pay $7 or $8 for a carton of ice cream. So as you know, we opted to drop the size of our carton from 1.75 quarts to 1.5 quarts.

Dreyer's has been making ice cream since 1928. We hope we've earned your trust over the years. Thank you for being so passionate about our ice cream and for taking the time to contact us. We hope you'll continue to invite our products into your home.



Sincerely,

Tim Kahn
Chief Executive Officer
Dreyer's Grand Ice Cream

So in effect, he's saying, we'll just keep making the size smaller, and keep the price pretty much the same. But, at what point will people stop buying, when it get's down to a pint size and they are still paying the same thing?

[walls0stone]

J.I.T is also connected to those who want fresher foods. You can't bring in fruit, keep them for 3 weeks, call the fresh. I was told J.I.T was smarter because you didn't spend your own money to soon, or use credit to supply a business.

Didn't anyone ever notice the bump inside a bottle of any sports drink? it changes were you can't see it.

Would you rather pay more for ice cream?
Just get a hand crank.

[Drawbar]

I had e-mailed the company about the size of Edy's ice cream just going down to 1.5 quarts, here is the answer that I received today.

My name is Tim Kahn and I'm the Chief Executive Officer (translation: head ice cream guy) of Dreyer's Grand Ice Cream. Thank you for taking the time to contact our company about our new 1.5 quart carton.

I can understand why you may not be pleased with us right now. Our new carton is smaller and no one wants less for the same money.

Since the buck stops with me, let me tell you why we made the difficult decision to change the size of our carton. The cost of all dairy products has increased enormously over the past few years, as have the costs of the sweeteners, nuts, fruits and energy used to make our ice cream. Our ingredient costs have risen by 30 to 60% over this time, but the average price of ice cream has not really changed much.

We looked at raising our prices to cover these costs, but at some point, it just doesn't make sense to raise prices too high. I suspect very few families would want to pay $7 or $8 for a carton of ice cream. So as you know, we opted to drop the size of our carton from 1.75 quarts to 1.5 quarts.

Dreyer's has been making ice cream since 1928. We hope we've earned your trust over the years. Thank you for being so passionate about our ice cream and for taking the time to contact us. We hope you'll continue to invite our products into your home.



Sincerely,

Tim Kahn
Chief Executive Officer
Dreyer's Grand Ice Cream

So in effect, he's saying, we'll just keep making the size smaller, and keep the price pretty much the same. But, at what point will people stop buying, when it get's down to a pint size and they are still paying the same thing?

First off, what a crock of BS...

We are dairy farmers and I can tell you, the price of milk is still pretty darn low on our end despite our production costs going through the roof (vet bills, meds, grain, feed, diesel fuel, etc all going up). A lot of companies are jumping on the "food is up" band wagon, but milk is not one of them like grain and other commodities. Hell or the first time in history, a gallon of milk is cheaper then a gallon of gasoline...

Milk prices have remained flat for a long time, and just this month started to go DOWN. This is dictated by the government. They SET the milk price...

Now tell that shmuck that is fleecing you and the rest of his customers how nice it must be to cut the size of the container back and charge the same price. As dairy farmers we can't do that. We sell our milk by the gallon, which pays us about $1.73 a gallon right now. Grain has doubled in one year...diesel fuel has doubled in two years...and good luck finding anyone that wants to work 10 hour days, let alone 18 hour days, 7 days a week. Yet despite all these we can not charge more for our product, nor change how milk is sold. (Its actually sold by the pound and not by the gallon). We reduce what we can, but there is only so much you can do.

I really am not whining about farming. My family has been doing this since 1620 here in New England, so farming is a way of life. Its tough, that's all there is to it. It just irks me that other companies can fleece its customers, blame imaginary higher milk prices while we are powerless to raise our prices, which we are being accused of raising anyway.

Mr. Kahn, you can kiss my Holstein's hiney...you have 555 milking Holsteins to pick from :(

http://www.railroadmachinist.com/images/After_Milking-small.JPG

[Buck]

J.I.T. inventory methods and price point are big drivers
of the econimic engine worldwide in the Global Economy.

That said, there has been a decline in store shelf inventoy
due to store holding cost, fuel surcharges for delivery, and
product availablity that consort to make the perfect storm
for many chains and small merchants, especially small out
of the city mechants.

IMO, we are just seeing the tip of the iceberg that is about
to bang solidily into the ship "Titanic" of the American way
of life which will be forced to change to less for everybody
like it or not. :(

[Buck]

First off, what a crock of BS...

We are dairy farmers and I can tell you, the price of milk is still pretty darn low on our end despite our production costs going through the roof (vet bills, meds, grain, feed, diesel fuel, etc all going up). A lot of companies are jumping on the "food is up" band wagon, but milk is not one of them like grain and other commodities. Hell or the first time in history, a gallon of milk is cheaper then a gallon of gasoline...

Milk prices have remained flat for a long time, and just this month started to go DOWN. This is dictated by the government. They SET the milk price...

Now tell that shmuck that is fleecing you and the rest of his customers how nice it must be to cut the size of the container back and charge the same price. As dairy farmers we can't do that. We sell our milk by the gallon, which pays *us about $1.73 a gallon right now. Grain has doubled in one year...diesel fuel has doubled in two years...and good luck finding anyone that wants to work 10 hour days, let alone 18 hour days, 7 days a week. Yet despite all these we can not charge more for our product, nor change how milk is sold. (Its actually sold by the pound and not by the gallon). We reduce what we can, but there is only so much you can do.

I really am not whining about farming. My family has been doing this since 1620 here in New England, so farming is a way of life. Its tough, that's all there is to it. It just irks me that other companies can fleece its customers, blame imaginary higher milk prices while we are powerless to raise our prices, which we are being accused of raising anyway.

Mr. Kahn, you can kiss my Holstein's hiney...you have 555 milking Holsteins to pick from :(

Our local farm co-op published that farmers get 13 cents profit from
each bushel of corn with the other 87 cents going to middle men and
energy cost. That figure used to be .32 for the farmer and .68 to middle
men etc. Like it or not energy cost is ripping the heart out of the
"good ol'days" . The farmer/dairyman is on the bottom of the profit
pile and the first to get pounded with cost/price increases they can't
pass along.

[walls0stone]

Draw,
If people had any idea what wet tail to the face, busted legs from fly'n hooves and 7 day a week no day off, farming was like, they'd kiss our work boots..

Forgive me if I offend anyone...but at this point, I'm looking to cut the middle man, and make money. If ground meat hit $12 a pound.. Pucker up cuz we've been over a barrel for years.

[Drawbar]

I probably should not have gone on my rant, but it does make me angry.

To put "work" and farming in perspective, last year I was talking to my Uncle when milk hit an all time high, 27 dollars for 100 pounds, or roughly $1.92 a gallon. (Still not much)

As we rode along in his new tractor, a machine his brother typically drives he said "I can see why my brother likes driving these things, I have been in the barn too long. You know up until my back surgery I milked cows for 38 straight years."

Now that 38 years meant milking cows twice a day, 7 days a week for 38 straight years. That's not counting the years he was in high school, or just growing up on the farm as a kid. In a real job, people get gold watches after 25 years of working 9-5, 5 days a week with several weeks off a year for vacation. (That equals 2,448 400 farmer hours versus the average workers 49,000 hours)

Still this man had perspective. He told me this..."When all is said and done, and that casket goes into the ground, its the farmer that ends up being the richest after all."

Between land values, equipment resale value, herd values...he might be right on a financial aspect, but I don't think he was talking about that. Here is a picture of him as he gave my daughter her first ride in a tractor. Look at the way he looked at Alyson, he was NOT talking about money.

http://www.railroadmachinist.com/images/Inside_Tractor-small.JPG

[HockeyFan]

Our local farm co-op published that farmers get 13 cents profit from
each bushel of corn with the other 87 cents going to middle men and
energy cost. That figure used to be .32 for the farmer and .68 to middle
men etc. Like it or not energy cost is ripping the heart out of the
"good ol'days" . The farmer/dairyman is on the bottom of the profit
pile and the first to get pounded with cost/price increases they can't
pass along.

No kidding. Why is it that the law (must not really be a law, or if there is there must be a law for the rich and a law for the poor) of supply and demand doesn't apply if you're a farmer?
Think about it. If crops go bad and the supply is down, the speculators see demand as up and they make sure to raise the prices. They make their money. However, the farmer still only gets pennies for all of his work.
If the farmer does well, the supply is up, but the speculators still make more, and the farmer still only gets pennies for his work.
If fuel costs are up, the farmer gets to suck up the cost. He doesn't get to pass it on to the next guy. He doesn't get to pass on the cost, but the warehouses, the truckers, and the speculators will all pass their costs on to the customer (you). The farmer still gets the shaft.
My brother-in-law is a farmer. I spoke with him about this more than once over the years, and I mentioned (more than once) that the farmers might eventually have to "go on strike" to get better conditions. He said that it would never work because the farmers aren't organized, and that there'd always be some jerk out there that would start selling his crops when the supply was down, hoping to get the quick good prices. He said that it would steamroll, and the masses of farmers that would try to hold out would eventually have to join in and sell, and probably sell for even less than they would have originally.
He said that a farmer strike would never work. He's probably right, but it's frustrating.
And there's so much food being brought in from South America from the big corporate farms (many owned by American companies). Those corporate farms get the cheap labor that the US farmers can't compete with.
So the US farmer gets downsized more and more, but he still has to pay for his fuel, his electric bill, and groceries for his own family. Yet the corporate farm doesn't suffer much from this.
I'm not sure I see how this can be fixed. It doesn't appear that anyone really wants to fix it. And the average American likes to get his groceries at a cheap price in the store, and doesn't really care about the farmer that grew the food. So without the average guy chiming in, I don't see any change, but I do see our food supply more and more in the control of a few corporations as well as other countries.
Isn't it stupid for the supposed richest country in the world to be dependent on food from elsewhere?

[bookwormom]

drawbar, I always appreciate your posts straight from someone who knows from doing. we just have eight little head of cattle and a few goats. we want to drastically reduce, the cost of feed has just about doubled, same for hay. that makes it an expensive hobby. If you have time to read see if you can find Wendell Berry, 'The Unsettling of America, Cultur and Agriculture.' Jayber Crow is a good one to read, too.
My husband and I have talked about that many times. we figured the moment that the 'big' guys have squeezed all the real farmers out and they control it all, prices will go up. I guess there are still too many family dairy farms or what

the way I see it, in the United States they went about it by stealth, first they said, get big or get out, kept prices low and overhead going up so the formerly prosperous family farms ( just look at the old farm houses) were forced out. Now I feel even the squeeze on small self sufficient minded people.
well, Stalin was a little less subtil, but the effect was similar. so the state owned all the farms compared to big corporations (who use slave labor for all it is worth) , big difference, if there is any. first they sock it to the farmer and then to the consumer. Mark my words.

[pinetreefarm]

Frankly, Book I agree with you. We own a 320 acre farm in Southern Minnesota that we rent out...not by local farmers but by a large corporation! DH got out of farming in 1961. He had the foresight to realize that farming was changing.

Special interests have of course taken over the elected officials so that farmers are so few in number that they hold no influence anymore. Small towns are drying up. People have to commute farther and farther to jobs. Food is no longer grown locally so everything has to be trucked in. And the sheeple bought into it all.

We are the ones paying the piper.

Pine

[walls0stone]

"I probably should not have gone on my rant, but it does make me angry." Draw

Hey guess what you do have a right. *How many times has farming tried to kill or harm you Draw? *When I was in the 2nd grade, my Grandfather was working under a Alice 180, hitched to a JD Round bailer. tractor rolled slowly forward, catching his shirt, rolled over his chest, knocking him out. *When he woke back up, the bailer got him.

He was back to farming a month or 2 later. *How many people do you know like that? *How many people would still do it?

Book, you can't squeez real farmers out..we just keep fight'n..but I'm not sure why. *Also, farming and Hobby don't belong in the same breath. *It's an oxymoron. Your a farmer, OR you have pets. *:) *But if you can complain..(to hot..to cold...to wet..to dry)..your on the right path.


It's not our soul income here on our farm..but it's our soul. *I'd never sell this farm for any dollar amount not even an inch.

The trouble is that food is kept as low as possible to keep people happy.

And why did they tell us to go big, then fund all kinds of programs for organic and small? *What is Organic? *It's a rackeet!!! in many cases, they tell you were to get supplies.

I'm having great luck with selling local, so why not take some of your 320 (your one acre biger than us) and grow stuff. My beef is making twice as much as my father's just becouse I'm selling it strait to the end user on the hoof.

I think we've been socked for many many years.
*

[bookwormom]

quote

Book, you can't squeez real farmers out..we just keep fight'n..but I'm not sure why. Also, farming and Hobby don't belong in the same breath. It's an oxymoron. Your a farmer, OR you have pets. Smiley But if you can complain..(to hot..to cold...to wet..to dry)..your on the right path.

you mean all the farmers that quit, that the bank took over, that just saw no way to hang in there, they all were not real farmers? Not too long ago I read an article about farmers committing suicide. I was astonished at the number, did not keep the article.

what I mean about the hobby is, if you can not make it feasable economically it reduces your efforts to a hobby, as you are paying out without it even paying for itself.
Notice how many folks would like to, what a longing people have for some land, to get their hands on some soil.
Notice how it is painted up as progress because 1% of the population is raising the food for the other 99%. As if farming is for yokels, unless it is done industrially. what is the most important job? farming. It also is the best job. important, versatile, challenging, rewarding, it is good work, and every year it has to be done again because it is new again.
People have been hoodwinked and now they have jobs were they are not exposed to sunlight all day and have that gnawing at the center of their being. well, off my soapbox. .

[Drawbar]

Let me say this about farming, I really don't see food as being scarce at this point and time. What I might see is organic food becoming scarce.

Its the way the organic rules are drawn up. Its neither right nor wrong, but because you cannot use antibiotics in the cows, and the rules dictate that antibiotics be used to save the cows life if stricken with an illness...you have only one choice.

Inject the cow with antibiotics to save its life, and then FOREVER take that cow out of the organic milking lineup. That's not a bad thing, but it takes a cow that is worth 2000 bucks and makes it utterly useless for your farm./ So after raising this calf, feeding it, breeding it and then waiting 1½ years for it to be big enough to milk, its all lost because it got sick. That is a tremendous blow to production, cash flow and economics of the farm...even worse so for the smaller farms which many organic dairy farms are in order to stay profitable at a smaller size.

That is a very expensive sickness. Add in organic grain that is 120 dollars higher then what our conventional grain costs a ton, and the organic farmers around here are going back to conventional dairy farming in DROVES! The thing is NO ONE is talking about this mass pilgrimage back to conventional farming. No one. Its like its not even happening...

In the mean time, the demand for organic milk is rising, so I can someday see a a shortage of organic milk.

As for organic food being a racket, I 100% agree with you. Not because I am anti-organic (its all my 2 year old daughter gets for food) but because its a 900 page USDA bureaucracy. Now I say that as a farmer. Someone that fully understands that farming is a heavily regulated industry and doesn't use the word bureaucracy very lightly.

I have not read the entire 900 page USDA rule book, but I have down loaded the organic livestock application and it gets pretty goofy. You can not use a pressure treated fence post here, but you can use one there, and if you replace one it cannot be treated, etc, etc, etc. And then when you get into the lower production levels of the farm, then the standards kind of waffle, but only if you are an established organic farm. In other words, some of those stringent rules are dropped if the farm is not producing what it should. It was a stipulation injected by the mega-corps that wanted in on the organic food craze. Its just plain wrong....

And then here is the kicker. To become certified organic you pay a annual organic certification fee based on what you have for income. Since we are a bigger farm we would have to pay the max...even though the rules are supposed to even the playing field. The whole thing is just wishy washy... If anyone is confused by all this...well so are the rest of us.

There is a movement now to get a Naturally Grown Certification in place. This is seen as an alternative to the expensive and often ludicrous rules of organic farming, but better then the conventional farming methods (herbicides and pesticides). I think this will really be good for the consumer, and just may save the organic dairy farm niche market. It will probably never pass however...its about the food chain and makes sense.

[Drawbar]

Actually I apologize for that last line. I really try to be upbeat and positive, but sometimes it seems as producers of food our hands are tied and its the consumer that loses out.

Let me say that I apologize to America for the high food prices. I know it hurts, and it hurts us to see fellow American's suffer. Its just frustrating for us to be blamed when we are not making a lot of money at this right now.

For the people on here like me who have two year olds and want clean, quality milk, we don't want you to pay through the nose, but we have to make a living too. Fuel and grain are killing us. I assure you, we get the federally set price of $1.63 a gallon. (or whatever it is this week) For the work that goes into that gallon of milk, its really not enough.

Property Taxes
Vet Bills
Breeding Bills
Electricity (1600 a month for our farm)
Diesel fuel
Seed costs
Feed (or the cost of producing hay,corn,etc)
Grain (doubled in 1 year)
Machinery
Chemicals (to clean milking system)
Equipment repairs
Income (we have family's too)
Labor (hired help)
Replacement animals
Livestock transportation

There is probably more, but that all comes out of the "profit" from milking cows. No matter if one of those things goes up, or all of them, we still get the same price for our milk. So please don't feel too sorry for Mr Kahn. :(

[walls0stone]

yes book, in my experence, that's what I ment...and though I only know of one farmer who did himself in, should I be the one to loose this place I will do the same. I could not look myself in the face each day knowing that I lost 108+years of history. I'm sorry book but if you don't know what I'm talking about, you can't understand it.. no offence..

Book, can you be a hobby parent? A hobby American?

[Drawbar]

you mean all the farmers that quit, that the bank took over, that just saw no way to hang in there, they all were not real farmers? Not too long ago I read an article about farmers committing suicide. I was astonished at the number, did not keep the article.

Yeah that was something I brought up over the Memorial Day Weekend asking people to be thinking about the 913 farmers that committed suicide from 1980-1988 during the ill-fated 1980's. These people were from the midwest which John Cougar Mellencamp wrote about in his song "Rain on a Scarecrow."

Notice how many folks would like to, what a longing people have for some land, to get their hands on some soil.
Notice how it is painted up as progress because 1% of the population is raising the food for the other 99%. As if farming is for yokels, unless it is done industrially. what is the most important job? farming. It also is the best job. important, versatile, challenging, rewarding, it is good work, and every year it has to be done again because it is new again.

In some ways that is a problem. A few years ago the atmoshere around here was for the government programs to allow these people from away to live out that lifestyle, to buy up these family farms, farm them and everyone is happy. The problem was, these people don't have the stamina.

Its really not their fault. People have this unrealistic dream of farming being the ideal lifestyle with low stress and happy memories. Its anything but. Not just now because the climate for farmers is tough, but its just stressful all the way around.

I am not saying people from away can't be farmers, they can, but its got to the point now that the climate has changed. You will have a hard time moving to our area now and getting government help to buy up a farm. Instead they are looking at keeping the existing farms here. They are doing that by encouraging existing farmers to diversify and are giving out grants and low interest loans to accomplish that.

Now keep in mind this is dairy farm country though, probably one of the toughest farming jobs there is, just because it requires you to be home twice a day to do the milking (3 times a day on some farms). It seems like an idealistic life until you factor in the fact that when your kids want to go play baseball, they have to be home milking cows at that time. No church on Sunday, you got to milk the cows, and its the same for holidays and weddings and other occassions...you got to milk the cows.

You can't really hire someone to help out those days either. First off no one wants to be on the south end of a north bound cow, and even if you can find someone, something will inevitably happen and you will have to come home and fix something. After awhile, you just don't leave home. After 7 years of working 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year, a lot of stress...well it loses its luster. So the government programs are really concentrated on retaining the people that have experience in farming and now what they are in for and still embrace it.

I will admit dairy farming has one HUGE advantage though that no other farm type has, and that is unbelievable cash flow. Every two weeks you get a milk check. Its far easier to pay your bills and budget for the farm when you get money every two weeks instead of a couple of times a year. It still doesn't go very far, but it is nice having a check every two weeks.

[Drawbar]

It's not our soul income here on our farm..but it's our soul. I'd never sell this farm for any dollar amount not even an inch.

I know what you mean, just last month the Amish found our sleepy little town and tried to buy out everyone they could. Only three people sold out.

They asked me twice and both times I told them "no". They kept asking about the tillable ground, but I was shocked when they wanted it all. Tillable, pastures and woodlot. That's 1632 acres in all and they were offering 2 thousand dollars per acre. (3.2 million) I could have retired at 34 years old, but I got no interest in that.

Its not really about me or "my land" because its just land that I have to manage for the next 30-40 years, then its off to Alyson and her husband. That's how it works. The key is, raising Alyson right so that when the time comes, and she gets these type of offers, she does the right thing too.

[walls0stone]

ok, so we are just a few years apart in age and have had the same sorts of stuff happen in life. 2 years ago, after my Grandfather passed away, our family made changes to this farm house. Like I've said... This family has been here for 100 years.

The flowers from the funeral had not yet wilted when people came to the house, right up to the door, asking if we'd sell, sub devide...other curse words.

You got the Stamina point right! I've noticed that a lot of people who farm work with a diffrant kind of Fast....like running a marithon.

Here I've seen farmers help farmers. When one man has trouble, the other's come and do his hay. When I was 3, My Grandfather a cow kicked him, breaking his leg. Farmers came from all around, and put up all our hay in 2 days.

People come here and want to change stuff, like church from 11 am to 8am, but it's done that way so you can get a shower after milking. Sometimes I'll milk Christmass mornings for a very close friend from school. In deer season, I try to help her out before we go to the woods, that means getting up at 2:30 am.

Imagine you have to change your whole life to go to a child's event. Imagine working at midnight and noon.

I'd say that a concervitive life style is the only way to make farm life work. You can't work your tail off and come home to nothing on the table. Family meals mean more... it's the only time you see your family. Suffering weather, and nature will bring people closer. But coming here, buy'n an 8 N Ford, 3 pair of bibs and a straw hat...uh no.