Wow, where have I been?

It's rare for me to miss two days of blogging; I didn't even realize it had happened until I peeked in this morning.  Here's the deal:  Cliff's St. Louis sister and her husband came for the weekend to spend time working on their farm nearby; Cliff went to help them out Saturday, and I stayed home and fixed everybody a big, garden supper with a roast from the freezer.  I didn't even think about my blog.  
Yesterday I went with Cliff to the Wichita, Kansas, area to get the Oliver 550 tractor he's been pursuing.  That's two hundred miles, one way.  I had no blogging energy left, after that trip.  

 We found several 550 Olivers for sale closer to home, but guys who owned the ones that were mechanically sound wanted twice the price of this one.  If you're not a tractor aficionado, you probably look at this picture and see here is an old rust-bucket of a tractor.  The starter doesn't even work; right now you have to string a wire from somewhere in its innards up to the starter to get it going!  However, it does start right up on command (using the silly wire) and purrs like a kitten.  There are virtually no dents anywhere on it.  That's good, because when you're restoring an old tractor, it can be very expensive to replace sheet metal.  
So what it has going for it is a sound motor and straight sheet metal, two of the most important things to look for in an old tractor.
It has power steering, something Cliff really wanted... although it leaks fluid like crazy; that's just another challenge for Cliff.  
We now have that huge 1855 Oliver, the Super 55 we bought not so long ago, and this 550.  I imagine these projects will keep Cliff busy into retirement and beyond.  Eventually the Super 55 will likely be sold, but not until Cliff has some fun fixing some of its flaws.
Oh, and Cliff now has only $12 left in his tractor fund; I think he's going to need the extra money from that overtime they've decided to require from him at work, because tractor parts aren't cheap.