The Grey Economy Cult Strikes Back!

Yesterday was Good Friday*, so being the ultra-religious guy that he is, BAH took the afternoon off. ("Is this when the Catholics put the tarp over Jesus?" I asked him. "What?" "You know, they cover the cross in church with a tarp for a few days, so you can't see Jesus, right?" "Oh, um... well, I've never heard it called a 'tarp' before.") The three of us loaded into my car to go get milk. A very leisurely errand. Then we saw this guy in a white pick-up just drive right across our land.

"What's that guy doing?"
"What the?"
"He's driving right across our land!"
"He is!"
"I'll go talk to him."

BAH jumped out of the car and started running after the truck driving right across our pristine tall grass prairie nature preserve stuff!!! Not okay!

The guy in the truck got to the corn field and drove around the edge of it in a square, while BAH was still trying to catch up. A disadvantage to owning a lot of land became immediately apparent: you can't catch people randomly driving over it.

Driving over our land is not a shortcut to anywhere. You just have to turn around and go back the way you came. The guy in the pick-up clearly thought he had business being in our corn field.

Meanwhile, in the car, Little Z totally freaked out, screaming, "Daddy Daddy my Daddy gone!!!" So, pretty soon, I was carrying a two year old, running after my husband, who was running after the guy who was driving around our corn field in a white pick-up truck.

Daddy caught up to him first, of course. I'd give a few dollars to hear what my mild-mannered husband actually said to the guy. When I caught up with them, the guy was writing down some phone numbers, and talking about "Rolf".

Ah, Rolf. It is all clear now. Rolf rented out the corn field last year. Apparently, he didn't think to check if it was still okay to plant corn there. (It isn't!) This guy in the pick-up was surveying the land with a GPS for Rolf. There was definitely some miscommunication going on.

"It's a good thing you caught me today, before the seeder came!" said the guy in the pick-up.

I suddenly had this image in my mind of little me, standing in front of a giant seeder, Tienanmen Square style.

Rolf now has a message from me on his answering machine. I hope he calls back before he sends the seeder. We've got to graze sheep in that old corn field. We've gotta live the dream!



* What's so good about it?