Taking a Calculated Risk

Last fall, I saw the handwriting on the wall and proactively installed a hitch onto the family minivan. At the same time, I neglected to install wiring that would run the lights of any cable I may pull behind said minivan. The reason for that was because it requires a wire to be run from the rear taillights, all the way underneath the minivan and up through the engine compartment. It would be a fairly easy task with a vehicle lifts and not one that I can accomplish without one. I told myself at the time that I might try to find someone who does such things to finish but never did. I also told myself that one of the advantages of living in very rural America, is that I rarely have a car overtake me or I overtake another car in my drive from my house to the farm. In other words, it is unlikely to be a safety hazard.

Two years ago, I bought enough clean rye straw to last several years and stored it in an outbuilding down on the farm. We use it to mulch our gardens to preserve moisture and to prevent blight in our tomatoes. But it is now 40 miles away from our current garden. 

My plan had been to rent a U-haul trailer when the time was right and bring back the rest of the straw to behind our house and indeed, I reserved one and showed up to collect it. We did all the paperwork and the man hooked it to the back of my van and then asked where my trailer lights were. I told him I didn't have any but I was willing to take the legal risk of using it without trailer lights. The U-haul man told me that they couldn't complete the transaction without a picture showing the running lights hooked up, presumably for liability reasons. We were at a stalemate and so my reservation was cancelled and the trailer unhooked before I even left the parking lot.

I explored my options but none were really attractive. I could rent a box truck from U-haul but at a price 5 times the cost of a small trailer. I could haul a few bales back at a time in the back of the van and contaminate it with mice, snakes, ants or a multitude of bugs that like to call straw home or I could ask around for a trailer I could borrow. I had no idea who I might ask to do the latter. 

An opportunity presented itself the very next day and I asked a knowledgeable person and they actually had one themselves that they would be willing to loan me. I made sure to bring them up to speed on my taillight situation and they weren't concerned. Probably because like me, they know that 75% of the trailer lights out there, even wired up ones, still don't work. Roads, salt and other things quickly do a number on keeping them functioning correctly.

So I borrowed the trailer and made it down to the farm to get the rest of the straw bales only to find out there were twice as many there as I remembered. I put half of them on the trailer, what I thought I could safely haul back, and made it back home with nary a problem or a ticket. I now have enough straw to hopefully much most if not all of our current garden. The rest of the bales will just stay put for the time being.