A Tin Roof and Flat Tires

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Today is the catch-all for all the news too small to warrant separate posts. I don't have photos of any of these items so I am including two unrelated photos to appease the visually focused among us.

Saturday: Our gas field friend Earl limped his truck over to the Rat with a VERY flat tire after Mark had departed for 'up top' to help Slim feed his cattle. That tire was more than a little flat, it was painfully scrunched and bunched to one side of the rim and Earl was hoping that we had a hydraulic jack . His jack would not have been as safe in this snow pack. I painfully remembered that our big hydraulic jack was one of the many useful things that had to be left behind to completely unappreciative recipients in the big move. What we had was even less suitable than what Earl had brought with him. But at least he had ample sympathetic company, including Brou who remembers and adores him.

He eventually chipped out his jack from the deep crusted snow in his truck bed. As he had predicted, the bumper on his Ford proceeded to lever upwards long before he achieved any space between the flat tire and the ground. It took him a bit to wrestle the spare wheel off it's roof-level mount and I thought about his very recent hernia operation with discomfort and concern. But these guys are tough. He chipped and dug a hollow to fit in the spare, got it in place with lug nuts in situ and began to back off the jack. It must have been something about the way I said "Ohhhhhhh m-a-a-a-n!" that had him stop and return to inspect the spare which was flattening out nicely on the bottom with every new drop of the jack. We just kind of looked at each other with that knowing acknowledgment about that poop sandwich factor in life. He said "I don't suppose you guys have a compressor, do ya?" Another bad memory ensued of my shop compressor being hauled away gratis at moving time. It had taken 30 years to become reasonably independent and now all that was gone. I feel like an apartment dweller with a bread knife as my only tool.

A call to Mark located his cheesy 12V inflater picked up since. As I had warned Earl, he would have plenty of time to join me in a cup of Mark's coffee. And then some. That was a shame since he was working both Saturday and Sunday to make a dent in the maintenance of these neglected gas wells. An hour later, and after jumping up and down on the bumper to settle it back down to allow tailgate clearance, he was back on the road but I made sure that he took the cheesy inflater with him - it certainly beat the options of having that tire go flat again even further into the middle of nowhere.
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Mark and Slim finished the feed run by 4PM and Slim joined us for supper around 7PM. I got a late start on my spaghetti sauce but it seemed to go over well anyway. I like to simmer the base for the better part of the day normally. We sat and ate, drank and gabbed as usual; great plans made to conquer the world, or at least this small part of it. And we behaved, as he made us promise, throwing him out before 10PM so that he wouldn't sleep in too long the next morning. It was an unusually early 'lights out' for us, too.
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I love tin roofing! I found an extra reason to love corrugated tin when I saw this thin layer of snow easing its way off the edge and slowly forming a large curl in the thaw.
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Here is what remained of that snow curl yesterday! The sun ate away at the snow until only a lace frame remained but still channeling water down to the original icicles. It was such a delicate structure that I dared not shut the door too firmly.

I was going to write a follow-up entry on hiking with cats and encountering an even more unlikely avian guardian but I am just plain typed out for now.
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