What was Gideon doing in a winepress when the angel of the Lord visited him?

"The angel of the Lord came and sat down under the oak in Ophrah that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, where his son Gideon was threshing wheat in a winepress to keep it from the Midianites." - Judges 6:11

Gideon was threshing wheat in a winepress! He was doing this to hide from the Midianites. The Midianites had invaded Israel, oppressing them, and stealing and destroying their crops and herds.

Normally, grain would be threshed in a large, open space known as a threshing floor. The thresher would beat or tread on the stalks of grain, sometimes with help of an animal, then toss the grain in the air, letting the wind blow away the chaff. A winepress, on the other hand, was a depression in the ground for treading grapes, a very odd place to thresh grain.

Threshing in a winepress showed how fearful Gideon was of the Midianites. Yet he was willing to let God use him to save Israel.