Hay hauling, texting don’t mix - Editorial Notebook

First, let me apologize to the Saskatchewan Cattlemen’s Association for the cryptic text message I sent them the other day. It was a long day.

Allow me to explain.

I had taken a day off, and I use that phrase loosely because it was anything BUT a day off, to haul bales for our horses last week.

Thanks to the Western Producer classifieds, I had managed to find a supply of nice brome bales for somewhere less than what it’s going to cost me to put three children through college. Others haven’t been so lucky.

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These bales were only 37 kilometres from my home – a mere hop, skip and a jump when it comes time to haul them, I remember thinking at the time.

On the morning of the appointed hauling day, I left home shortly after 7 a.m. on my way to a local agricultural implement rental business where a five-bale hauler was waiting with my name on it.

The roads were a little icy from a light dusting of snow and I noticed nearly immediately that my half-ton truck, when loaded with five large round bales, had all the manoeuvreability of an aircraft carrier.

Piloting this load over 37 km of icy grid roads required a certain level of focus – a very high level of focus, to be precise.

Somewhere in the midst of all this hauling and focusing I began to receive text messages from my brother-in-law.

I stopped briefly to check my load and dash off a quick reply, but with six round trips of nearly 80 km on my “honey-do” list that day, I didn’t have a lot of time for anything other than hauling and focusing.

After hitting the “send” button on a reply to one of those text messages, I realized what I’d said made little sense.

People who receive frequent text messages from me are likely accustomed to this, but for some reason I felt this particular message required clarification.

I sent the following message in an attempt to clarify the previous one: “Forget last message – hauling bales… Really must focus to stay alive… will text later…”

Almost immediately after I hit the “send” button, I realized I’d sent that message not to my brother-in-law, but to the Saskatchewan Cattlemen’s Association in response to a media release they had sent to the WP.

The group was encouraging SCA members to attend upcoming meetings and cast votes for the directors of this new organization. You can see details about the election on page 65 of the Oct. 15 issue, and on our website at www.producer.com.

Anyway, I just want to say sorry about that and let the good people at the SCA know that I’m not nuts.

It was just a very long day.