Astronaut Farmer

[ Mood: Sleepy ]
A buddy of mine called me up the other day, asked me if I could give him a hand.

"No problem", says I.

Turns out he had a domed barn built. 200 ft. long and about 30 feet high in the middle. We were going to pull the canvas roof over the top.

First time I’ve ever done such a thing. And I was surprised at how much manual labor was involved. The framework and rafters were all up, "all" we had to do was drag the canvas up and over. The roof was in 2 section, each 100 feet long, and probably about that wide. And there were seven of us on the end of ropes. Somehow, your’s truly ended up having to pull two ropes. How’d the rookie end up with two ropes to pull? I think rookies ALWAYS end up with two ropes to pull. It sucks to be big.

Anyway….1…2…3PULL!! And we’re making like mules. It went pretty well for a bit, then we started getting lopsided…one side was higher up than the other. So one side would hold still while the other side would pull…guess who doesn’t get a break. That right, the guy in the center, especially if he’s got two ropes. Da bastiches. So, of course, I delibrately take the center for the second half of the roof…a point of pride thing. Or stupidity…I haven’t quite figured that out yet.

All said and done, it was an fun day. It’s fun to help friends, and it’s neat to see new technology at work. My hands have got some pretty good rope burns on them (even thru the gloves), but during this time of year, it’s nice to be out in the almost-spring air with a bunch of the guys, and the hands will be alright tomorrow. Once the roof was up and over, they didn’t need me anymore…so I look forward to getting the grand tour when it’s finished.

But I still don’t know why we couldn’t have used pulleys and a tractor to pull the damn thing up with.