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Pain :ragejak: (Story) (Huge Drama)

Haven't been very active on here recently, so I figured I'd bless you guys with a story.

This is the story of my personal drama, and how today, Man conquered nature.

For the past three days I've been fighting a stubborn hedge-wood corner post. At least 50 years old, with a few hundred pounds of cement on the bottom.

I made the mistake of hiring an r-slur to clear out a large debris pile, and fill a ditch near the corner post. This strag managed to slam the bulldozer into the post, dislodging it and toppling the fence attached to it. Luckily the fence he damaged connected to fields I already had opened up for cows to move between. My original plan was to take some post hole diggers (manual, not the straggy drills), open it up, pour some more cement down onto the base, and be done with it.

After a few minutes of digging, I hit the cement at the bottom. Turns out the r-slur that hit the post actually cracked it at the very base next to the concrete.

Now here's my dilemma. A lesser, weaker man would give up, cut the top of the post off, and bury the mess. I am not a lesser man. My grandfather instilled a few core values in me. One was to never waste a good hedge post. There may be entire rows of hedge trees on the fence line, but value every single post. There was no way I was going to leave that post in the ground.

So I dug all around the post, and around the cement laid years ago, all under the sweltering Southern heat.

I finally had the whole abomination exposed. I grabbed my digger bar, and I beat the shit out of it. I broke off the cement, and barely managed to yank the post out of the ground. I cut off the splintered end, successfully salvaging the post. Little did I know my work had just begun.

Now I had a few hundred pounds of cement sitting in a 4 foot deep hole. Again, I could have conceded, buried them, and dug a new hole right next to the original. But I'm not a quitter. I extended the hole so I could walk down into it, I broke the blocks into smaller pieces, and I lifted them all out.

These events happened over the course of two days. For some reason, the cows just didn't care about whatever I was doing. On the third day, that changed.

Before I entered the field, I had brought a few buckets filled with water and 400 pounds of cement mix. However, as I pulled into the field, I noticed a calf near the hole. Turns out the fricker had kicked one of the cement chunks back down into the hole. I had to get it out again.

Once I got it out, I started mixing the cement. A crowd of cows formed around me as I mixed. These cows hadn't been sprayed recently, as I was expecting the weather to cool sooner (It's 70 all this week in mid October, that's fricked up). These cows were infested with flies. Horn flies to be specific. The ones that burry themselves in the cow fur and suck their blood. 70 degrees feels like 90 when you're working, so I was wearing shorts rather than jeans.

Did you know that horn flies like human blood? I didn't until today.

My legs are eaten. Each bite has a 1/4 inch circle around it, and parts of my legs are so heavily bitten that the circles overlap in layers, as if they were constellations.

I finally got the cement poured, and I set the old cement chunks on top of the new cement to pack it down more. I sprayed the cows with DeLice. I poured hydrogen peroxide on my legs in a likely-futile and very painful attempt to stop infections.

I still haven't cleaned the cement off of me as I type this post. I'm 22 and I already feel like I'm too old for this shit. At least one of my rentoids paid early today.

What is the moral? Well there's a few. Don't hire r-slurs. Wear jeans when you're near fly infested cows. Hire Mexicans to do heavy manual work. Hedge posts actually aren't that valuable.

inb4 whining about the length of my beautiful story.

47
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You're literally the only cattle farmer I've met that doesn't wear jeans year round. Have you learned your listen about wearing basketball shorts out on the field now? Also hedge apple branches can make excellent attitude adjusters to keep in your vehicle.

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Who TF wears short pants in a field :marseyrage:

I got infested by chiggers just thinking about it

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I've found that chiggers are easily avoided by pure determination and mental fortitude.

The chiggers can sense a Sigma, and refuse to suck (literally and figuratively) in His presence.

Unironically I rarely venture into a field without jeans, but this area was frequently traveled so it had been stomped down into dirt.

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Chiggas

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The chiggers can sense a Sigma

Ok :marseypat:

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Have you learned your listen about wearing basketball shorts out on the field now?

No, I've learned my lesson about not diligently keeping my cattle sprayed. This year I bought into some dogshit you put in their feed that kills flies that land in their shit. Burnt that money, more flies this year than ever.

I'd rather have severe fly bites once a year than discomfort year round. I work my calves and I work my calves. You know darn well I show off both.

I love hedge apple trees so much. The apples themselves are obnoxious, but the wood is lovely.

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It was a real bad year for flies in our neck of the woods too.

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Flies and fleas. It was like a plague. I still got salt in the rugs and I almost darn near salted the yard in frustration. Looked at my cat like why tf you gotta be so darn sensitive to flea spray 😀

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Do you actually work on a farm?

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Yes

The land I work is owned by my grandpa (technically not entirely owned, it's complicated)

He's getting old, so I do most of the work, and I get half the money.

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Lol, gramps some kind of share cropper?

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