Yay for May! It sure feels good to get outside without all of the heavy winter accoutrements. Tennis shoes and shorts will soon be the normal outerwear but I’m not sure if the world is ready to see my milky white legs just yet. In other news, this month my mother Doris will turn 93. But don’t tell anyone. That will be our little secret.
Commodity volatility seems to be the norm now. Crude oil prices are up and down and all around. If you’re still thinking about locking in a diesel price for your farm, I can’t tell you what the price will be tomorrow but I know what it is today. If you need piece of mind to know what you’re paying for your diesel, lock in a contract. There are a lot of ‘experts’ who are making predictions but they are little more than educated guesses. Supply and demand we can all understand. (Hey, that rhymes!) But geopolitical events make the energy markets impossible to read with any certainty.
Before you plant that new tree, shrub or flowers, or do any excavation for that matter, please call the Digger’s Hotline by dialing 811. According to 1300Locate, in the last 20 years utility hits have resulted in $1.7 billion in property damage, 1,906 injuries and 421 deaths. Please don’t be a statistic. One thing you should know about Digger’s Hotline is that it is a free service but they will only mark the utilities coming into your property. They typically will not mark non-utility installed electric, phone, cable or propane lines. But we’ll mark your propane tank at no charge. All you have to do is call your local Premier energy office. Ask us to mark your propane line or you may have to make that embarrassing call to us to let us know you’ve cut your line. If you cut the line, please shut the tank off before you call.
Since we’re now into warmer weather, our employees will be out installing tanks and propane lines. We’ll also be performing leak tests on propane systems and checking regulator dates. If your propane regulator is over 25 years old, IT NEEDS TO BE REPLACED. For the sake of your family’s safety, if we bring it to your attention, please have us replace it.
In June we’ll be mailing our annual propane contracts out. You should see them hit your mailbox about mid-month and please return them by the due date. Like I tell folks every year, if we offer you a chance to contract your propane, do it. Most years contracting pays off, sometimes quite nicely. And don’t wait to send in your contract after the due date or the price may be higher as has happened the last two years. Plan to add at least another 30% to what you paid for your contract last year.
The Propane Education and Research Council is still offering a $200 rebate on new propane water heaters. We can help you get the rebate and we will also do a free leak check on your propane system to make sure it is safe. You need to let us know every time you replace a propane appliance so that we can do a leak check on your system. It is a requirement in the state of Wisconsin but it is also just plain common sense.
I was at the Joint Forces Headquarters in Madison yesterday getting my Army Retiree ID card. As I was waiting for my appointment in the lobby, my eyes wandered over the bronze plaques with the names and ranks of Wisconsin residents who died in the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars. I recognized several of the names of friends and acquaintances. I thought about how fortunate many of us were to have survived to enjoy our lives and I wondered how theirs would have turned out had theirs not been taken from them. On Memorial Day, please take a moment to respect the sacrifice of the men and women who have fallen in service to this country and to the families they left behind.
