They Call The Wind Maria Really I Call It Something Else

In the movie "Paint Your Wagon" they have the song "They Call the Wind Maria",  It's beautifully haunting and almost makes wind romantic...Yeah, right.

They Call the Wind Maria from Paint Your Wagon

Anyone who has lived in southeast Wyoming or Mountain Home look at wind with a much less romantic eye. When you wake up in the morning walk outside, grab a handful of dirt and gravel, then throw it in your face and then go to work, you learn to hate wind.

Last Saturday night we had a system roll through with rain and wind gusts up to 55mph. I had my canopy held down with 110lb bales of hay on each of the 6 poles.  The middle of the canopy was held down with 200lbs of weights from my tractor. Here are pictures of what happened when 50+mph winds rolled through our place.

Picture time with the horse that is deathly afraid of white things, especially ones that crinkle.

The only thing the weight did was keep the tent from flying off.  I left the tent in place minus the hay bales and weights.  Even with all the twisting there were only three joints that were damaged.  With some elbow grease, duct tape, French translation dictionary and a few pieces of pipe that every ranch has tucked away somewhere, this is what it looks like now....Until the next wind storm.

This time I have the thing spiked down and in between our shed, the fence from the development going in behind us and our friend's camper.  It's really nice when put together and cost me less than $100.00 new.

Kevin Mee