We usually refer to stuff by brand or description (Farmall, Kubota, chipper, etc.) However, my dad is impossible to get any consistency from. Sometimes I can’t even figure out what he’s talking about. Example: “Do you have time to hook the blade to the tractor after work? The ditch on the road to the pond needs cleaning out.” Me: “Sure. We have three tractors, a box blade, and a backblade so what do you want hooked to what?” Him: “I don’t know; whatever you think.” Me: “I’m not thinking. If you’re doing it, I just need to know what blade you want on what tractor.” Him: “If it doesn’t matter to you, can you hook the orange thing to the orange thing?” Me: “No problem.”
The worst is his Ford tractor he’s had since the mid-60’s. He refers to it as the 2N, 8N, or 9N like they’re all the same thing (and they are all similar but not the same). He’s rebuilt or replaced everything on it at some point so it isn’t like he doesn’t know which it is. We were working on a leaky valve stem on one of the calcium chloride loaded rears about a month ago and he referred to as a 2N and 9N in the same sentence so after 50 years of this nonsense I finally asked him, since you refer to this thing as three different models and you obviously know which it is, what the hell is this thing exactly? He said when he bought it, it was worn out, had engine, transmission, and lift problems, didn’t run, and had numerous broken parts. He didn’t have the money to fix it with new parts so as he fixed it with used parts it turned into a combination of all three plus a Ferguson hood fitted with a sledgehammer and one back wheel from an Oliver something. He couldn’t recall what model it was when he started working on it. Asked him if we could agree to just call it the Ford or the little tractor since it’s the smallest of the three. He said sure, Ford sounded reasonable. Of course he still calls it the 2N/8N/9N interchangeably. At least I know what tractor he’s referring to. And if he’s getting under my skin at the moment sometimes I now refer to it as the FrankenFord, which he doesn’t like.
BTW, he has an engineering degree from a well regarded engineering school and is way smarter than I’ll ever be. Maybe we should start naming stuff to clear up communication.
