Thursday, November 9, 2017

Hick Probably Sees the Glass as Half FULL, Too

When I opened up the shades Tuesday morning, I found a surprise.

Monday night, I heard the dogs going crazy. They do that a lot. I'm pretty sure they sleep all day, then go looking for trouble at night. I used to fear that somebody was breaking into the garage to steal my loose change out of T-Hoe. Or walking around on the porch trying to look in the house. Or stealing Hick's tools out of the BARn.

After many restless nights of getting out of bed to look outside, I gave up on my wolf-crying mutts. They rarely bark when strangers come up the driveway. So it seems odd that they would be so protective once the sun goes down. I figured maybe there was some kind of animal roaming around that got them stirred up.

When I saw this out front beside the driveway, I thought Hick had something to do with it.


Last week, Hick had mentioned taking a bunch of stuff up to the auction to sell. I thought he took his trailer, and had unhitched it along the driveway sometime on Monday. There's never any rhyme nor reason to Hick's junking timetable. For all I knew, he had been gathering other stuff, or had taken it to his storage shed, and had just decided to unhook that trailer. Sure, it's usually in the BAR field. But maybe it was getting late, and he didn't want to go over there with it being pretty dark.

Hick sent me a text mid-morning to say that his trailer was along the driveway. I meant to take a picture of it sitting there, but by the time I left home, Hick had already hitched it up to the tractor and driven it back over to the BARn. He said HE didn't put it there, and didn't even know it was there until he got up and went outside Tuesday morning.

Further questioning revealed that Hick had loaned his trailer to a relative of a relative. The guy had been there and hooked it up, over by the BARn, so he knew where it came from and how to get there. He had brought it back without warning, and left it by the driveway after dark. I don't know if I was more surprised by that "loaning" situation, or the fact that Hick had moved the trailer back to the field in such a timely manner that I didn't even get my picture.

Hick didn't see anything wrong with that scenario. I probably would have asked for some collateral if I was loaning MY trailer. Which I don't have. Hick is more lax in his standards. More trusting.

Heck. I even asked for a shoe when I loaned a student a pencil.

15 comments:

  1. Some people are just trusting, like when I contracted a new roof, I asked the guy if he needed any money down, he said, "No need, I know where you live." I paid on time.

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    1. I guess that's the way to do it in Jersey!

      My grandma had a habit of hiring people, and giving them the money up front, and then they never came back.

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  2. I wonder why such the great need for that pencil, when that person realized the consequence.

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    1. They soon realized it was easier to bring a pencil, or borrow one from a kid in class, rather than give up a shoe and have it sitting on my desk.

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  3. Asked for a shoe as collateral for a pencil? You must have been one bad ass teacher.

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    1. No. Just one tired of buying pencils, "loaning" them out to irresponsible youth, and losing five or six a day, or finding them broken on the floor from playing that pencil-bashing game. Let the record show that the kid who brought a carpenter's pencil was a champion of that game.

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  4. Hick does seem to be a really trusting soul, at least his trailer found it's way back home without you having to take a shoe to the borrower. I just made that last part up ha ha

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    1. I didn't even know it was loaned! Or I might have told Hick to demand a shoe as collateral.

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  5. I have pens with silk flowers taped to them. The kids cannot steal them when they need to borrow one, and the boys sure don't want to steal them...

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    1. Around here, that would have put the pens in high demand. "Hey! Free flower!"

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  6. That's a nice looking trailer. Good idea to ask for collateral, I remember loaning pens, scissors etc to a supervisor and never seeing them again, even with my name tags on them they disappeared. She borrowed from everyone else too, so I stopped lending and even told her why.

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    1. My colleagues had sticky fingers. Even a lock on the door of my classroom wasn't good enough. I had the good fortune (closest to the bathroom and copier) of having the first classroom down the hall. It was also bad fortune, because anybody who wanted something used a master key, or asked the custodian to let them into my room.

      I lost a teacher chair, a TV on a stand, a three-hole paper punch, a stapler, several student chairs, and many pens. All were recovered except the pens. Even I didn't stoop to looking up a substitute's address and going to knock on their door to get my pens back.

      The secret was to put my name on items somewhere hidden, so there was no argument to hinder the repossession.

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  7. Just curious, why do you spell it BARn?

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    1. When Hick built the BARn, he put a BAR in the loft. I don't remember if I wrote about it here, or on my supersecret blog. Here's a post with a picture showing part of Hick's bar.

      http://unbaggingthecats.blogspot.com/2013/10/two-for-youone-more-of-1423-for-me.html

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  8. It will come as no surprise to you that many things are loaned out around here. He loaned the paint sprayer to a nice preacher man .... came back in really bad shape, never to be used again. He just went out and purchased another, all the while lamenting about the actions of a preacher. Did not stop him from lending again, though.

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