A Really Green Day

Today was a long day but an interesting one. This is the largest new equipment launch in the 174 year history of John Deere and the launch is taking place in Indianapolis, Indiana.
The morning started out with us being bused out of Indianapolis to a very large farm and of course the host farmer had plenty of John Deere equipment in his every day operation. In addition to that there were several hundred pieces of brand new equipment being unveiled. Those included three lines of tractors, a new combine introduction, s new Gator launch including a sport model
and what was very interesting a new tracking system that allows a combine and a tractor and grain cart to operate simitaineously
in the field with the tractor cart operator able to go hands free and still keep pace with the unloading combine. I won't even begin to try to explain all the ins and outs of how that is done. Gets just a little bit technical for me.
I was able to take one of the brand new large four wheel drive tractors for a drive around that field and that was a first for me.
Have never operated equipment quite that large before and it was amazing how easily it handled despite its massive size.
We were paired up with a John Deere rep so there wouldn't be any run away tractors heading into Indianapolis. My drive buddy was a young lady (pictured by the tractor) from Germany employed with John Deere but brought over to help with this massive
equipment launch.
In the evening John Deere staged a light and sound show at the Indianapolis Convention Centre featuring all the new equipment.
It was very good and the Convention Centre was completed packed with hundreds and hundreds of John Deere dealers and a very large media contingent from all over North America. I got some really good pictures but for some reason my camera is refusing to download them for me. Remember earlier in this post what i said about technology and technical things,
After the show they served a supper with more food than you good imagine.
In the evening I walked down to the Indiana War Memorial and also the state capital buildings. Very impressive.
It got up to about 94 degrees today and now there is another large storm rumbling through. I have my curtains open and there are some spectacular bolts of lightning happeining.
Indianapolis is an interesting city. They tell me it is very much a sports town with NFL football being the biggest game in town but it is also the home and head of the NCAA. And anyone who has followed American college sports will know just how huge the NCAA is. There is a NCAA museum here that I am hoping to get a chance to see tomorrow. And then there are malls, malls and more malls. I am staying at the Omni right downtown and it is connected to the largest mall.
An interesting day and it all wraps up tomorrow.