The "Throes of Deep Depression"

Kris just got up, went to the bathroom (figuratively speaking, we don't really have a bathroom), weighed herself, sighed heavily, crawled back into bed and announced she was in "the throes of deep depression". From that, I assume things didn't go very well. Maybe her day will perk up after she gets up and does some dishes.

I believe I will try to be outside and out of sight when she rises. I like to err on the side of caution. If I were to make a perky remark without thinking...well, things might get out of control. I better type quickly.

Yesterday, Alex (grandson) was out for a visit. He is eight and the farm is a great place for him. He was antsy to meet the new pup and after a bit of advice on how to interact with the dog, we all went down to the goat pen to take the goats and their new guardian dog for a walk. Anatolian shepherds love kids and they hit it off immediately. Eight year old boys and dogs were made for each other and it is fun to watch. I am sure we made quite a sight--six adult goats, two goat kids, one human kid, two dogs, and two adult humans-- all out for a morning stroll on a cold, but pleasantly sunny day. It was great fun.

Goats tend to clump and surge as their need to eat gives way to general jumpiness and fear of being eaten by predators. When they surge back for protection, they get under foot and make walking impossible. Alex weighs a lot less than some of the does and takes a bit of a buffeting as they brush by. It makes it a contact sport for him and is part of the fun. He tends to walk ahead with one dog or another beating rocks or ice or whatever with a stick he carries. The dogs and goats both give him enough room to flail away as we troop along slowly. The object, ostensibly, is to let the goats browse on anything they deem edible. Yesterday, the real object was to get Alex outside with his stick, the dogs and his imagination. Normally, like most kids, he would be inside most of the day at this temperature.

Kris and I try to stop where the available browse looks good for the goats. Alex moves along until something captures his interest or requires beating and is often out of sight for short spells. So it was a surprise to find him sitting triumphantly up on top our former summer shower enclosure, a framework of logs with a platform to shower on and another platform above to hold the water barrel. We had hauled it out to the woods with the tractor seeing a potential to use it as a deer blind. It was laying on its side and Alex was astride one log support, sitting on one the edge of the platform. He was looking down at us from his perch, pleased with himself for climbing on top of the structure.

It is hard for kids to get out of an adults sight these days. Living in cities with traffic and strangers every where, there isn't much opportunity to be free and use their imaginations. This simple thing struck me as a reminder how important it is for kids to be left on their own some. His proud smile caught Kris's eye too and we exchanged knowing looks. This was one of the reasons we wanted a farm. It could be a safe place where the grand kids could have unstructured play with lots of interesting things and places. Each kid's different and some need constant supervision longer, but when the time is right and they can be trusted, it's important for them to test their wings.

We lingered at Alex's conquest until he had exhausted his conquests possibilities for that particular day and moved on. It was a delightful time on a delightful day and it didn't last long enough. We went in for lunch and I read him a bit of Tom Sawyer. The story of a boy who is naughty--perfect for a boy who can appreciate the finer points of naughtiness. It was a good visit all around.

Today, the weather is supposed to be gray and bleak, Alex is home, and Kris is "the throes of depression". I better go check on the goats.

Working Dog!

If you were on the email list of blog recipients, (I am allowed 10 people to spam) once again I hit some button that sent the email of the blog out, before it was completed. I never seem to tire of this. If you have the time and technical expertise to find it, it is worth the read and explains how we ended up the proud owners of our Anatolian Shepherd "Rosie". She is of course a dog and not an undocumented shepherd girl from the Anatolian plateau in Turkey.

The dog breed, however, did originate there perhaps as long as 4000 years ago. She is a "guard" breed and has all the instincts necessary for her particular job bred into her. She doesn't round sheep or goats up like an Australian Shepherd or similar breeds. No, she is in the protection racket and will stand up to whatever seems to be threatening the herd. So, it is important to use her accordingly. This breed of dog is not meant to be kept in the house or on the end of a chain or out in a dog run. Eventually its lack of purpose would cause problems.

So, unless you have a herd of goats or a flock of sheep that you are interested in protecting, don't run out and buy one.

We moved Rosie directly into the goat barn. When we picked her up, she was being kept in a very small pen with a few goats. She wanted to come to our barn and guard us. She is very friendly and at first appearance is just another friendly dog. The breed matures slowly, as it turns out, and gets more dominant and protective for awhile. All the websites that talked of training Anatolians emphasized the need to socialize them and due constant training to keep them lower on the pecking order than you are.

As I was reading the training tips the night we got her, I was thinking that perhaps the reason we ended up with Rosie was she was too sweet to be good at protection. Well, the first day proved that wrong. In the morning, we went down and let the goats out at first light and studiously ignored Rosie. Ignoring her, lets her know that you are not down there to see her and your world does not revolve around her. Her world must revolve around you. This is hard since you want to make over her. After a bit we acknowledged her presence and did make over her. After the goats had hay and water, we filled a bowl with dog food, made her sit and put the food down. After she had eaten a bit, I picked the bowl up and moved to a different location and repeated the process. She was cool with it and I was beginning to think that some of these dominance games would be unnecessary. Well, I can be wrong. While I'm watching her eat, one of the goats came over to see if Rosie's menu was something she might want. When she approached the bowl, Rosie snapped at her, careful not to actually bite her, but, surprising both the goat and myself.

I waited a while after the goat had tried a couple of more times with the same results, lost interest and move on and picked the bowl up again and made Rosie sit while I put it back down. She was accepting me as somewhere above her in the pack. So far, so good, but I will have to make all the dominant tips into habits.

My training will be much harder than the dogs. I am inconsistent. Fortunately Kris is pretty patient with me. We're going on ten years of trying to train me. In comparison Kestrel was trained in a few months. The dog commands are simple there are a dozen or so to keep straight. Unfortunately, I just tell the dog what I want instead of using the proper command. It would be easier to get results if I were to stick to the twelve commands instead of expecting the dog to learn the entire English language. Well, we all have our foibles.

I figured we would give Rosie a few days to settle down and accept this as home before we took her and the goats out. Seemed reasonable. Kris ignored me and opened the pen and brought the goats and the dog out.
"Lets see what she'll do."
I was thinking she is probably going to head to Augusta and after a few months lost in the woods, show up at the farm where we got her and become a Disney movie a few months after that.
"What if she runs? I asked.
"Gotta find out sometime," she replied and the added, "You have to trust your dog."
So out came the goats and off went the dog. I envisioned hours of fruitless searching and calling. After a bit, Rosie reappeared up ahead and then disappeared again.
As we marched the goats past main barn and out to the woods road, Rosie returned and scared the goats who all tried jump in our pockets. "Easy girls, just Rosie." Seeing the havoc she was causing she slowed and approached more tentatively.
"Good girl Rosie," Kris patted her head and gave Rosie a treat. She liked the attention, but was not crazy about the treats.

This pattern went on as we grazed our way through the woods. It became apparent that Rosie was working the woods the way a hunting dog does only peeing and marking alot. It occurred to us she was communicating her presence to possible predators. She did not stay in amongst the goats but worked the surrounding woods and then returned. Calling to her was unnecessary and we finally figured that out and relaxed a bit and just let the goats graze their way around the woods roads for an hour or so. We went back to the goat pen, put the goats in and fed them grain. We put food down for Rosie just outside the pen, so it wouldn't seem we were catching her. After awhile, I picked up the food bowl and carried it into the goat pen and Rosie followed me in without hesitation.

We were very pleased with Rosie and took the entire group out again later. This time, when we passed the woods road that the equipment sets on she began barking aggressively at the wood chipper. She got between the goat herd and the machine and moved in menacingly towards it. Kris told me to go over with her. Bravely, I approached the wood chipper with her. When we were close enough for her to see it was just equipment, she relaxed, stopped barking and went back to ranging around the herd without looking back. This is the behavior that Anatolians are bred for and we are thrilled.

Rosie has been a remarkable success which could have gone the other way. Using her for the purpose four thousand years of breeding helps a lot I am sure. She is a working dog, doing what she loves and indeed must do by her instincts. We still have to introduce Rosie to the chickens but, I am sure that Kris will have her trained way before I learn to keep the commands straight.

Anatolian Shepherd

Well, I alluded to how rather unassuming days turn into momentous occasions in a recent blog. So, yesterday I was scooping horse manure without a care other than hitting the tractor bucket from the top of the key and scoring three pointers from the outside. Kris was down at the goat barn or out at the chicken coop doing something urgent which required her immediate attention so she was not scooping manure. We had both been headed out to scoop poop, but things come up and we went our separated ways. Before she disappeared, she mentioned that with the warm temperature, it would be a good day to haul "Dick", the goat buck, back to Curtis's farm down in Augusta. The does had all been bred and appeared to be "settled." Settled is a term we goat breeders use instead of pregnant. Kris learned the term yesterday and we have been using it like the old goat hands we are, every chance we get.
"You know" she was saying, "now that the girls are all "settled", this would be a nice warm day to take Dick back to Augusta."
"I know, but we should wait a couple more days to see if any of them are just late at coming back into heat," and added quickly, "they are just barely "settled"."
I had things I wanted to do while the temperature was warm like get the corral mucked out.
"We can take him back in a week or the next warm spell, if everyone really is "settled"."
"Okay, but this is a great day for doing it. We're not likely to get any more fifty degree days until March, if then."
"Better to have the goats "settled" for sure and wait a week."
We left it at that and I went back to scooping manure. It was wet from the rain and frozen to the ground in the center so scooping was slow going. After a couple of hours, it dawned on me that Kris's work with the chickens or goats was probably going to last about as long as it took for me to do the manure. Just before I was done she arrived with her new pink manure scoop (Merry Christmas) to do her half. It was around eleven and scooping in solitude had given me a chance to consider hauling Dick back to Curtis. Chances are, the goats really had "settled" and Kris was right about the weather.
"I been thinking about hauling Dick. You're probably r.... , well anyway, I think if we hurry, we could get Dick to Augusta by 2:30 and be back by 6:00."

So in a scramble, we set off for Augusta with Dick bouncing around in the horse trailer behind us. I had put hay down for him to lay in and nibble on. He is a good traveler and just lays down till the truck stops or keeps getting thrown down until he learns not to get up, it is hard to know. Anyway, when we check, he is down and looks comfy and our consciences are clear.

I called Curtis to make sure he was home and he sounded a bit disappointed to hear Dick was coming back so soon. Dick eats a lot and is a bit expensive to keep and it was better to have him back to Curtis's from our stand point. From Curtis's view point the opposite was true. We haven't been able to let our small doe out or go for walks with the goats since Dicks arrival. We needed him to be returned.

The horse trailer pulls nicely and we blasted down the interstate at the speed limit. After a while, Kris said we ought to get Curtis and Linda something for all the help they have been. The use of the enobled buck was free, they kept our goats for two weeks after we bought them and they delivered them for free. We needed to do something and soon. Kris suggested a gas card from the Irving at the Augusta exit. That seemed perfect. Curtis and Linda spend a lot of time on the road delivering and picking up livestock. It would be a good useful and thoughtful gift.

We arrived a little earlier than I had told Curtis and they were inside the house. I backed up to the barn and called. It is easier and less invasive to call, a twenty first century update on etiquette. Linda is more agile and arrived at the horse trailer almost immediately. I went in and put a rope around Dick and led him into the barn and his stall.

We looked at some new goat kids and chatted a bit and when the time seemed right, Kris pulled out the Gas Card and gave it to Linda. Curtis's health has been a problem for over a year and you could read the gratitude in her face and she gave us each a hug. It felt good to have done the right thing at the right time for once and have a gift be honestly and gratefully accepted.

Curtis arrived and we talked goats for awhile. In one of the pens, was a young
Anatolian shepherd pup. "You don't want a dog do you," Linda asked. We had looked up prices for these pups and they were the better part of a thousand dollars. They are used to guard your flock. They are an old breed and have been used for thousands of years as livestock guards. They are big dogs (males can reach a 150 pounds) and will defend a flock from wolves, coyotes, and bears. Well, it doesn't hurt to ask the price does it? So, I did.
"How much do you want for her?"
"No, I mean if you can use her, we'll give her to you." The dog had been given to them, by a daughter that didn't have time to train her. Their farm is right on a busy road and the fencing is just a few strands of electric. Using her there, might be the death of her. Linda had been to our place knew we are a half a mile from traffic on a dead end road.

While I was thinking, Kris said, "we'd love to have her." And that, as the say, was that.
"Rosy", was hooked on the lead we brought Dick with and brought outside to meet Kesteral. The two sniffed and didn't growl or put hair up and Rosy jumped in the car as though she had been waiting for us to come get her.

She road quietly home and Kris put her in the goat barn to meet her new charges.
Knowing Kris, I called "Don't take her collar off." If she got loose, she might be hard to catch.
"Too late, the collar is already off," Kris replied triumphantly.
Seeing I was going to be more useful at the other barn, I went and fed the horses who listen actually listen to me.

I got on the Internet to check out Anatolians a bit further. As I had suspicioned, if let them sleep in the house, they will protect you as part of their pack or herd, but your goats will be on their own. It is imperative to keep them in the barn with the goats. This was the ammunition I would need.

I started back down to the goat barn. Kris hollered that Rosy had pushed by her and was now loose. Rosy and Kesteral came down to greet me. Rosy was not sure about me and barked when she noticed I was walking towards her. I called to her several times and she stopped barking and wandered around with Kesteral smelling the farm over. Kris was able to slip a rope around her easily and the question of running off is now probably answered.

So, she is here and Kris is in heaven with another animal to train. Our farm seems to take on a mind of it's own at times and maybe that's for the best.

Winters Perfection

Kris and I are probably prejudiced, but it is a strange day around here when we don't comment on how beautiful it is. Christmas night's peaceful snowfall left an almost painfully beautiful wonderland in its wake. The sparkling snow covered every branch and twig. Each tree was a study in perfection and no matter which direction your eye wandered, the landscapes were a humbling visual treat. We stood in the various barn doors and looked out in different directions. On these winter mornings where the beauty seems to be so painstakingly created just for us, we delay stepping out in the snow as long as possible. Making footsteps in such perfection is not something to be done lightly. Being older now, we realize these days are few and each is to be savored and slowly enjoyed. Your memory cannot recreate this beauty and pictures can only capture a small part. You must see and enjoy it right now. As the sun comes up and the sparkles change colors with the sky, you snap pictures and bundle up in preparation for the cold. You remind yourself that the sun is going to eat the snow and your footsteps are going to be necessary if you are going to see the other sights around the farm before they are gone.
The trees overhang our road and it is gorgeous- straight out of Currier and Ives. The firs out back droop over our narrow woods roads which become snow tunnels that change colors as the clouds change whimsically in the early morning light. The brook at the bottom of the hill is traversed by downed trees and punctuated with rocks and small islands. Some bright green moss will be visible next to the water rushing by. To view these wonders, you have to make footprints and begin the destruction of perfection. So it is sad and wondrous all at the same time. We wander and marvel at the marvelous, until chores nag at our conscience and we caste off the spell the beauty as over us and become our usual practical selves. We lug and haul and desecrate perfect scenes without a thought- except the feeling of being truly blessed and so lucky to be right here and doing what we are.

Christmas Night

Ahhhhhh, we're home.

We were up early doing chores in a frantic blur of activity on a very cold Christmas morning. The ice stubbornly refused to break or melt out of the various goat's water buckets until I brought a bucket of boiling water down and that required more time than usual, so, I wore my "chore" clothes" to see the grand kids open presents.

Like most Grandparents with pockets of small grand kids nestled nearby we try to catch some of each households present openings and general melee. Even if the presents are mostly unwrapped, we provide an opportunity for the kids to show off their new toys and clothes. Actually, the kids are still too young to show us new clothes without parental prompting. Opening a package of clothes is still a disappointment and it is fun to watch the kids put brave faces on what was clearly not on their Christmas list. No amount of Oohing and Aahing over a shirt or sweater is going to take the out the sting. Grandparents are supposed to be supportive and go Oooh that looks nice on you. I let Kris do that. I never forgot that feeling (just dreadful) and have a hard time faking excitement over a tiny pair of socks. I want to grab the new dart guns and shoot at the parents who thought socks were a good idea.

Anyway, it is always fun. Our gifts are small and usually anti-climatic. After you get your first bike and you taste the new freedom and expanded world it implies, no small gift is going to make much impression. Still, if a gift has enough moving parts, or can be misused in a mildly dangerous way, it might make the list of toys they show their friends when they come over to compare loot.

Because of the animals and the cold temps, we had to return to the farm between visits and spent more time coming and going than stirring up trouble with the grand kids and their new toys. Still, it was great fun and excitement was pretty close to squirting out each kid. Good job, moms and dads!

After returning home to the farm and doing mid-day chores, we were off for a large family dinner, these are always fun and loaded with more good food than any should be allowed to even smell, let alone eat. A bite of this, a taste of that, and soon, it is painful to breathe. Conversation is reduced to grunts as digestive and cardiovascular systems both fight for oxygen. When it appears you may live through it, the dessert table catches your eye. Just a taste and you promise your stomach you will quit. Your stomach knows better but finds a little more room anyway.

So, after being up early, sharing everyone's excitement, running hard all day to make it just in time to be late every where we went, we arrived home to the peaceful quiet of the farm. There are times when its peacefulness just washes over you. This was one of them. It was snowing gently. We did chores together without talking-enjoying the quiet. There was no need to hurry. The bitter cold of the morning had passed and it was a winter wonderland to be savored. It was getting dark and after awhile we could think no other chores to keep us outside and we went in and sat down next to the fire. The chickens get the extension cord from 4 to 6:00 each evening to light the chicken coop and keep egg production up. It was still snowing big flakes at a few minutes before six when we unplugged them and fished the cord out of the coop, through the blackberry patch behind it, and across the driveway to the Christmas tree. I found the cord under the snow on my first grab and plugged it in. The snow covered tree was dazzling. We moved back a ways to be able to take it all in and stood in rapt silence. Off, way in the distance, a truck was laboring up a hill going somewhere on this peaceful Christmas evening. We stood for a long time and it occurred to us to take a picture of this magnificent tree and try to capture some this peace for a later time.

Christmas Crunch Time!

We are making Christmas presents again this year. Once again, despite an early start, we are still working on them. We limit our gift giving to grand kids which makes our productions smaller and easier. Yet, here we are, on the Eve of Christmas Eve, putting things together. The truth is it is hard to get anything to the top of the "to do" the list around here until it is urgent. Well, Christmas gifts became urgent a couple of days ago, and we are now at the point where they have reached our highest level of critical, life threatening urgency, which means we will finally work on them today.

This years gifts for the Grand kids are trebuchets. If you are not up to date on your medieval war craft, this is a catapult-like siege machine. They were used to hurl large stones at town walls until the walls became rubble. We have down sized these to toy stature, to keep the surrounding houses safe. This is a simple mechanical device. It works on the principle of leverage, angular acceleration, and using a very heavy weight to transfer energy to a much smaller weight which is flung out with a lobbing trajectory that is perfect for destroying stone walls. This toy can be used as an instructional device to introduce physics at a level young children can appeciate. It is wonderfully destructive in an instructive sort of way making it a great gift for grand kids.

As it turns out, it is great for grandparents too. Grandma and I have had a great time perfecting our prototype trebuchet. We launch a few rocks, make adjustments in the sling, and then launch a few more to test the results. Hours slip away as targets are set up and fired upon. So far, we haven't actually hit anything we were aiming at. I think this is pretty good news for the parents although we have had rocks thrown 180 degrees in the wrong direction and straight up in the air. Also, one of the houses these will be going to has a very tiny dog and we wanted to test to make certain with this size trebuchet, a dog launch wasn't possible or that an errant projectile would not be lethal to small pets, children or grandparents.

I believe adult supervision is probably going to be necessary. However, I am not sure male adult supervision is going to be adequate. Even at my age, I have an almost irresistible urge to launch small rocks at the chickens despite the sure knowledge that Grandma would kill me if she caught me. The wooosh of the launch, rocks being flung into the sky, the anticipation of impact, ahhh.... well it is just too tempting.

I am also concerned the toy sized trebuchet could be used as a model to create bigger units. The physics of a trebuchet being what they are, a doubling of size way more than doubles the launch capabilities. If you have been to one of the farms that launches pumpkins, you have seen the results of super sizing. It would be easy to do and again, almost irresistble. Grandma and I have already discussed something large enough to throw water balloons and small pumpkins across the pasture.

For young (and old) siegers alike, the fun is in making minor adjustments to the sling for a good launch trajectory, trying to achieve maximum distance and accuracy, seeing how big of rock you can launch and dodging launches that have gone awry. In the interest of making these look safe, we should go buy harmless balls to be launched, but they would be lost in a day and rocks will end up being the ammunition readily available. I suspect, after seeing a few launches, the parents will wish to send these gifts back with Grandma and Grandpa to be used at the farm where there are open spaces and the educationl nature of our gift can be stressed. That way, when the kids and I have finally succumbed to temptation and send one in the general direction of the chickens, I can point out the perfect logrithmic curve the rope to the sling traced during the launch---just before Grandma starts chasing us around.

Next "Big Thing!"

You never know when life changing events are going to happen. The day you meet your soul mate starts like any other day. So, it was the other morning as I was doing chores and bustling about on the most ordinary of days, expecting and suspecting nothing. BAM! Out of nowhere, a life changing tool appears.

Well it wasn't exactly out of nowhere, Kris said, "Wait till you use this, your going to love it." On her finger was a small colorful kid's ring. It appeared oatmeal was putting prizes in the box and Grandma had beat me to it.
"Very nice ring." I try to be supportive, even when she obviously has flipped out.
"It is not just a ring. It is a ring light and you are going to love it."
It was in fact, a very tiny flashlight on her finger. I snorted. Well, maybe more of a guffaw. (I don't think anyone has guffawed since the 1950s, but it just came right out.)
Grandma was undeterred. "No, really you are going to love it. Here, put one on."
"No thanks, I am headed to the home soon enough. I don't have to give anyone reasons to hurry me along."
"No, really, you have to try this. It's amazing."

After awhile I put one on to keep her happy and felt properly ridiculous. I went outside to check the horse water. It is dark in the mornings when I start on the horses so I usually stick my finger in the buckets to see what the water levels are. It occurred to me I had a light on my finger and turned it on. Huh, I could see in the buckets. I went in and got water and came back out. Usually, I pour the water where the bucket hangs because you can't see it in the dark. I switched on the light again. Mmm. I needed hay so I went out in the woodshed to get some. There is no light in the woodshed. Normally I would have to go look for a flashlight. But since I had the ring on, I just went out and grabbed a bale and brought it back in. We keep the knife to cut the bale on the fridge outside the door. Normally, I find it by groping around in the dark but I was wearing "my" ring.
I fed the horses and went back inside.

Our living space in the barn is lit by small solar garden lights that are the equivalent of a night light. They work pretty well if the day before was sunny and you are right underneath where they shine. The rest of the living area is pretty dark. It was cold so I rummaged through the coat rack by feel to find my fleece. I turned on my finger light and there it was. I had only wore the ring for a few minutes and it was almost indispensable. Kris was ri... , that is to say she was not completely wrong. As the morning went by, the ring became my new favorite thing.

Some time during the day, Walter came over. I couldn't wait to show him the "next big thing."
"Walter wait till you see what I've got. You're gonna love this thing."
Walters eyebrows went up expectantly. I proudly showed Walter the light ring on my finger. "What the hell is that?"
"It's a finger light Walter and I wouldn't trade my pick-up truck for it."
Walter erupted in guffaws.

Frugal? Absolutely!

Everyone, without exception, believes themselves to be frugal. When actor Jack Nicholson uses a hundred dollar bill to light a cigar, he is patting himself on the back for not using two. I am sure he would admit that there might be room for improvement, but he, at least, is pleased by his effort.

We are having great fun at being frugal. I am pretty sure everyone does. I have thought about why and come up with several reasons. One big reason, as Jack illustrates above, each of us gets to set the bar for their own frugality, so everyone can play and be as successful at it as they need to be to feel bit smug.

Smug is such a great feeling, and to feel smug, all you need do is define something as a bargain (actual cost is irrelevant), buy it and feel smug at how cleverly frugal you are. Of course, we all have our limits on just what we are willing to do to be frugal and that creates the difference in levels between Jacks's frugality and mine.

To get a handle on my frugality, I try to examine how wasteful I am. This is really painful and absolutely no fun. Taken to extremes, this can lead to despair and wondering what would it be like now if only I had ..... So, I try to examine just the immediate past, where my indiscretions are fewer and smaller. Lets look at a trip to town from last week. We stopped at the KFC-Taco Bell for lunch. (When we eat badly, we don't mess around.) By splitting a special box meal "deal", we spent just over ten dollars. At home, our lunches cost a little less than a dollar each. Many days they are almost free since we eat mostly food we have grown. So, this is a glaring failure to be frugal despite splitting the special. Instead of feeling smug, I got a feeling like I just ate a meal at KFC.

Also last week, we had to go to Bangor. On the way into town, Kris noted the gas prices at each station. On the way back we filled up where gas was cheapest. This time of year, we try to keep the tank full to avoid condensation and if we run out of money before more comes in, we can still get around and be mobilly broke. By shopping where the gas was two cents cheaper, we are now fourteen cents richer. I doubt if Jack Nicholson would take the trouble to save fourteen cents, but you never know, he might have because you can be frugal in one area and tremendously wasteful in another, which you can see by noting that if we keep saving two cents on gas every time we fill up, we will be able to stop at KFC-Taco Bell for another incredible lunch in just seventy more trips to the gas station.

Coffee is another area where there is tremendous potential to be frugal. When I was working out and about, I used to drink two cups a day which I believe averaged about a dollar a cup. I felt that to be pretty frugal at the time- now it pains me to think of it. So it amounted to $10 a week. Annualized that's 520 bucks a year. I have to put in a disclaimer here-- I can't tell the difference between Starbucks and generic coffee. When it is too strong, which it invariably is as the price per cup goes up, it is less enjoyable. I now buy the cheapest coffee Wal-Mart sells and brew it myself (in a French Press). I buy a can every two months, spend six dollars and brew it at an enjoyably weak level. My annualized cost is now $36.
Most of you who have used the word brewista in a sentence would love to have just a $520 annualized cost. If your coffee expenses were in a 401K you could retire twenty years sooner. Still, you may feel frugal if you go to a local gourmet coffee shop and save a fifty cents a cup over the Starbucks price. I used coffee because of the vast variability in costs you can pay. I would suggest not actually doing the math on this one if you have used the word brewista. When your coffee expenses exceed your mortgage, it makes it very hard to feel smug about any of your other frugality's.

I have to mention our breakfasts while musing about frugality. We started eating oatmeal dutifully when we began getting AARP mailings. (If you can't trust Wilford Brimly, who can you trust.) We added flax for omega 3's, bananas for potassium, blueberries for vitamin C and anti-oxidants, and cinnamon to fight off adult onset diabetes. The entire blob of healthy goo costs about a 30 cents a bowl. The annualized cost of our breakfast diet is around a hundred dollars a piece, which makes me feel smug about eating healthy and being frugal. Every morning, we start out with a good diet and feeling doubly smug. I imagine it will make us live to be a hundred and feel smug about that too! A triple smug, it just doesn't get any better! Makes me kind of feel sorry for Jack Nicholson.

Farming and Mud Management

Mud is a big factor in farming. (If I can make this interesting, I want the Pulitzer.) To the casual farm visitor, mud is just avoided. It appears to be kept behind fences that contain it nicely. You stay on your side of the fence and it stays on its side of the fence. Every bodies happy, right.

Well..., contrary to appearances, farmers spend a large part of their time trying to keep mud off the farm entirely with varying degrees of success. In fact, farming success, is inversely proportional to the quantity of mud on your farm. This can be quantified in the equation: PSuc x 1/mud= ASuc where PSuc is potential success, mud is measured in cubic yards and Asuc is actual success.

You have to be careful here because this is similar to the equation for the farm life: LSuc x mud= ALSuc In this case, LSuc is Life sucking, mud is still measured in cubic yards and AL Suc is the actual amount of sucking your life does.
In this case mud is a multiplier.

One would think that animals like mud since they always appear to be standing in it. Well, the same two equations apply to all mammalian life forms on the farm and appearances to the contrary, they hate it too. They really, really hate it. Yes, even pigs. True, pigs will use it to cool off if they don't have a beach or swimming pool, but most mud occurs in the late fall, winter and spring, when the mud is cold. Try this experiment, it will give you the idea. Put your boots on and go stand in the middle of an acre of mud. Now, take your boots off and walk around. Not much fun is it. Most hoofed animals have the equivalent of an unwaterproofed leather shoes on. If they pass through mud quickly, it isn't too bad. Standing in mud however is hard on them. They get hoof rot. Hoof rot is athletes foot on steroids. Now you can see why PSuc x 1/mud= ASuc. If you consider that most farm mud contains a large sucking component, you can see why mud management is so important. (I am leaving manure out of both the equations for simplification.)

The last few days, we have been fighting hoof rot in the goats. They had a small but strategically located mud patch and developed some interesting cases of hoof rot. The solution is trimming away the affected areas until the rot is gone, dipping their hooves in a solution of zinc, or copper sulfates, and eliminate the mud. So this morning, I will go out with a shovel, the tractor and Kris(someone has to run the shovel), and try to eliminate the mud in the doorway to the goat barn.
The goats, I am sure, will appreciate the improvement.

Fireside Christmas Glow

Decorating our barn for Christmas is a challenge since we have limited living space and limited power. Necessity being the mother of invention and an indomitable Christmas spirit makes for some interesting solutions. Better Homes and Gardens won't be beating a path to our barn door for a Christmas cover layout, but in a simpler folksy way, we really enjoy it. Last year we strapped our Christmas tree to one of the poles holding the clothes line and hung bird feeders and suet balls on it. We loved it. The bird feeders looked like small Nativities with Angels fluttering to and fro.

As nice as this was during the day, it left the evenings void of the warmth that a lighted tree imparts. So this year, we added lights. I spent a lot of time looking for the lights upstairs in the barn with no luck while Kris was off in Bangor. I looked everywhere I could think of including where she thought they might be. When she got home she went upstairs and retrieved them in just a few moments. Surprised, I asked where she found them.
"Right where I told you they were," she clucked.
She can be soooo irritating.

We checked the lights to be sure they worked and, surprisingly, with a bit of help from a shake or two, they all twinkled to life. Huh, maybe this was going to go better than I thought.

I had to go to town and when I got back Kris had the lights on. So we lit the tree and half of them didn't work. It was getting late and we left it for the night.

Next day grandson Ethan and I took those lights off and put on different lights and then went on to scoop poop in the horse paddock. Kris came home and pointed out that we had left holes in the lighting coverage. Well, we had one strand of lights about 16 feet long and tree about 12' tall. Some people are just way too picky.

The next day, Kris put the tree under her wing and put two sets of lights on the tree. The set that had not worked was miraculously working again. We were kind of excited to see the tree lit. Nightfall, which lately seems to come just after lunch was taking it's sweet time in arriving.

We don't have enough extension cords to run the chicken coop light and the tree at the same time, so we waited until it was time to unplug the chickens and then we both went outside to enjoy the first annual tree lighting. I pushed the two plugs together and stood back to enjoy the spectacle. "Wow, it's beautiful" I said. It lit up the dooryard with a warm glow. It really was spectacular. I went over to the corral and called the horses over and we all stood in rapt silence.

After a while, Kris and I went inside and pulled chairs up to the window, sat next to the wood stove and put our feet up. I was basking in the Christmas glow. After a few minutes, Kris broke the silence. "There's a hole."
"I don't see any hole, it looks great."
"It looks nice, but there is a hole, I need to fix it."
"A little irregularity gives it character. Things can be too perfect you know."

Yesterday, Kris re-did the lights. Last night we, made hot chocolate to go with the Christmas tree viewing. We lit the lights and came inside, put our feet up by the fire and sipped hot chocolate as we observed our tree. "Looks wonderful," I said.
"There's a hole on the left," she replied.

We sat quietly for a while. "If you squint your eyes, it looks like a dancing bear with a hat. You see it?" I asked.
"Yeah, she's wearing dress."
"I like it. It's festive. Let's leave it like it is, okay?"
"Okay, well, maybe."

What Goes Around Comes Around!

When we moved here and began clearing and working on the land, we didn't have much time to spare. It was a sprint to get shelter over our heads. The neighbors showed up one at a time to see what we were up to and began dropping off a few things we might need or could use to help make things faster or easier. Gifts of food or a tool were just dropped off without much fanfare. When we started to make jams or baked something in our tiny camper kitchen, we would drop off a few things and as the garden came on line we took surplus around and dropped it off.

I think some of the neighbors were fascinated by our adventure. Most understood it and could identify with it. If we were to dream up good neighbors, I am not sure we would have dreamt up neighbors this good.

What brings this to mind is the season and our menu. We raise chickens and goats but we have as yet to harvest any goats. Next fall will be the first. I went on a unbelievable trip to Alaska and came home with the incredible gift of a winter supply of Alaskan Salmon (eat your hearts out, I smile every time I think of it). If that is what our diet consisted of this year, it would have been pretty darn good. Well, last night, we had lamb chops from Gary who raises sheep. The night before, we had pork chops from Walters pigs. We we driving home this afternoon and met Billy at the end of the road. He said he had a Christmas present for us and followed us home, where he dropped of a deer roast, a bear loin and a plate full of goodies. Last spring he brought brook trout almost weekly and four or five times a year we get deer meat from Billy one of the neighbors that hunt a lot better than we do. The last two springs we received wild turkey breasts. Two of our neighbors allow us to pick blueberries in their fields. Virgil, Walter and Allen and Barbra have done so many things for us it is hard to bring them all to mind. The list goes on and on and on.

Living here is satisfying on so many levels and being surrounded by people that help and care about you is one of the best. Many, many times, one of the neighbors have seen a need we have and shown up later with something we would have had to buy or build and that is helpful at just the right moment. We try to do the same.

The point is, what goes around comes around good or bad. I like the good personally. Merry Christmas and thanks to all.

Dec. 8, Last Garden Greens Harvested

Even though the garden has been buried by two big snow storms and chilled by temps in the low twenties, we are still harvesting fresh spinach, chard, and broccoli. Our parsnips can be dug any time the ground is soft enough. After the winter snow melts and the ground thaws, parsnips will be our first harvest from the garden.

Most people till their garden at the end September to make it look neater in their yard. We have no yard and spend all fall and early winter scrounging fresh greens and herbs. Many times during this period one of us will announce this "is probably the last harvest," only to have the garden prove us wrong. October used to be the month we would start to doubt the gardens ability to squeeze out another bit of food. Now, we are less apt to start this until late November.

We had a ten inch snow storm in October and as it melted away, Kris was harvesting broccoli. When enough was melted, she harvested chard and spinach. The same was true after the large storm at the end of November. It really is amazing.

Part of the success has to do with her harvesting technique. She never pulls a plant or cuts it completely off. Instead, she goes from plant to plant, taking leaves and leaving the plant to keep growing. Being a bit of a gardening know-it-all, I thought this to be a waste of time and, of course, said so. Now that we are eating greens in December, I have quietly re-evaluated my original position. Now, I leave harvesting decisions to Kris who has a lot more faith in a plants will to produce and seems to be able to coax harvest after harvest out of a plant that clearly should have been dead along time ago.

The latest growing technique in the northland is to grow greens in unheated green houses all winter. I can see that plants like chard and spinach which can be frozen so hard the leaves snap, only to return to lush green growth after the sun thaws their leaves, can provide greens all winter. I really need to find the time to get a small green house up. The hold up has been a lack of lumber of the right dimension. It has to be milled thin enough to bend and then be made into curved trusses. I need to get an old stove for heat in the late spring when we can use it for starting seedlings. Late march is soon enough to start most plants and that leaves only a month of heating on a few nights to keep the temps from freezing. Peppers and Tomatoes can come inside at night. Everything else will do very nicely outside in the green house. Maybe next fall I'll get one up. I hesitate to predict when anything will be built now. The more we get going, the less time we have to make improvements. Still, it is on the list and near the top.

Rendering..... Lard?

Walter called the other day and asked if I wanted something. I didn't quite catch what. He is quiet spoken and a minimalist in lip movement. Phones aren't his medium. It sounded like something to do with his pigs and lathes. He wasn't going to use them and wanted to know if I wanted them. We were putting plastic in the goat barn and lathes might come in handy if they didn't stink too bad from being used on Walter's pig pen. Kris wasn't home and I was making banana bread to surprise her so I told Walter what I was up to and Walter said he'd bring whatever it was we were discussing right over.
I was still adding things to the mixing bowl when Walter showed up. He had bacon, sausage, pork chops, pork liver and ... a large bag of fat that turned out to be the topic of our earlier conversation. "This is what you render into lard," he said proudly and handed me the bag."
Walter was smiling ear to ear and I was pretty much speechless. I offered Walter a seat at the table and sat the fat over on the side board next to the window. I added the last few ingredients to the banana bread and turned on the mixer. "You ever render lard Walter?"
"Oh God, Yes. There's nothing to it. You just 'junk' up the pork real small and cook it over real low heat. The off side of that wood stove'll be just perfect."
As it turns out, we had been using lard in our biscuits and I was actually tickled to get the chance to render our own. I finished the Banana bread batter and asked Walter if he wanted to lick the bowl. "Sure," he beamed. I poured most of the batter into a big bread pan, left a good dollop in the bottom and handed the bowl, beater and spoon to Walter.
"What do you think Walter?"
"It's pretty good."
Walter was, I am sure a good eater as a baby, and at seventy six, is still a good eater. If there is something he doesn't like, we haven't found it. We chatted while the banana bread baked and I remembered to give Walter a dozen eggs. (He brings us broken chicken feed bags from the feed store.) Kris showed up just before the banana bread came out. I told her about all the goodies Walter brought."
"How are your pickles holding out Walter?
"Well, I don't have left," he admitted. He loves pickles, but pickling season runs with haying season so he can never get to making his own. We make tons of pickles and enjoy keeping Walter supplied. He won't ask so you have to remember to offer.
"I think we still got varieties you haven't tried yet. I'll be right back," Kris said, and ran upstairs to get some.
The banana bread came out and we sat and chatted until most of the loaf had disappeared. Seeing the food supply was dwindling, Walter supposed he should get going and "actually do something today." We helped him take out his eggs and pickles and Walter said his good byes and we exchanged thank yous and he headed off.

Kris and I looked up rendering lard on the Internet. Surprisingly, we found a website that told us how and extolled the virtues of home rendered lard. Saturated fat it turns out is necessary for Vitamins D, E, and A to be absorbed. Home rendered lard from pigs that can get sunlight contain way more mono saturated fat than they do saturated fat. Mono saturated fat is the fat you eat olive oil to get. It supplies omega 3 fatty acid. Commercial lard is hydrogenated and has some preservatives in it and has given lard a bad name. Home rendered lard is actually good for you. It is stable, even in the high cooking heats and is the ultimate in pie crust, biscuit, and frying oil. The leaf fat that Walter dropped off is the internal fat around the Kidneys. It is pure white when rendered properly and is the creme de la creme of fat.
So we rendered the fat for most of a day and we now have our own lard. I believe we have most of a years supply, maybe four or five pounds. I can't wait to make biscuits from it.
We really enjoy these things that put us in touch with a simpler time where what you did, directly determines what you have. We have lard because we rendered it, we have pickles because we made them, we have canned goods because we grew the vegetables and canned them, etc. There is something very satisfying in it. It is time consuming and you can understand why people had large families. They needed them to get everything done. Families and neighbors depended on each other out of necessity. There is a richness from that which is now pretty much lost. It is, however, making a small comeback here at the farm.

Gene and Gabby Ride Again!

For those of you who missed the 1950s, Gene is of course Gene Autry and Gabby is Gabby Hayes. Gabby you would be able to recall if you were around then, had a scruffy beard and no teeth. His favorite perjorative phrase was "Why you young whippersnapper, I'll....." his voice would trail off in strangled rage as just what he would do to the offending young person was always left to the imagination. He was a lovable, somewhat inept, irrascible, grandfatherly type and a fixture in the singing cowboy films for many years. (All of these movies were made in the thirties and were shown Saturday afternoons on TV)

Yesterday, I was saddling up our mare Ebony for Ethan, our three year old grandson, and it occurred to me that I was probably teaching him to ride and in a few years I might be unable to ride and he will be dashing around on this same mare having all the fun, the "young whippersnapper". (It turns out you can be jealous of something that hasn't happened. Darn, another personal shortcoming to try resist.)

As it turns out Ethan has good balance and his short legs dangle in a very stable position so you don't have to hold on to him. Ebony is very good with kids and up until yesterday, the rides consisted of leading Ebony around while Ethan hung on to the loop ontop the bareback pad. Yesterday, Ethan learned how to make her stop and how to make her turn. Ebony will follow you with out a lead rope and I just walked beside the young cowboy and is trusty steed, stopping when Ethan said "whoa" and turning when I saw his hands move. Ebony moved appropriately and just like that Ethan was riding without help. (Wait till his mom reads this. I may screen my calls today.) As his arms get longer, he will be able to give better cues and Grandpa will only have to saddle and keep the red mare out of his way. I imagine next year or the year after. It depends on his growth spurts. He loves the horses and I envy him. As I was watching Gene and Gabby those many years ago, I ached to ride a horse and had to settle for riding the back of the couch.

Consequently, it is a great satisfaction to me to be able to get the interested grandkids up on a horse. It's hard to say what kids will remember. I hope some of these things will be good memories they will carry around for a lifetime. (Unlike the universally and collectively forgotten sleigh ride to get a Christimas tree I worked for days to make happen (I actually built the sleigh) and only lives on as a story I tell to illustrate the vagaries of childhood interests and memories.) "The young whippersnappers...."

Tis the Season to...Decorate the Chicken Coop!

Well, there are spoiled chickens and then there are really spoiled chickens. Yes, we are going to go put Christmas lights up in the hen house. Grandson Ethan is coming over and it should be great fun. Before you send people in white coats out here to take me away, let me explain. Last year we purchased LED Christmas lights. These are the white ones and the light spectrum is so ugly we took them down. They are, however, very low electricity users and should take less power than the compact florescent light we have out there. Thus the Christmas lights in the hen house. (You don't have to send an apology for what you were thinking, I will assume you are feeling the proper amount of contrition for jumping to conclusions. )

While Ethan's here, we will go out back with the tractor and get a Christmas Tree to lash to one of the clothes line poles and set up the bird feeders for winter. I think I blogged last year how the bird feeder looks like a Nativity and the birds flutter around like Angels adding real life to the Christmas tree. We really enjoyed that and can't wait to get it up. We have a old wagon wheel that we can turn into a wreath if we have time. It is about four feet across and will weigh a ton when we get brush on it so we are still thinking about how to fasten it to the wall or maybe one of the big fence posts.

We have to get started on Christmas presents for the grandkids. It is harder to make gifts than it is to buy them and it is hard to compete with all the digital falderall that is available, but most toys turn a child's attention in towards it, instead of turning the imagination loose. When Ethan, Emma, and Alex come here, there are three main attractions: the huge dirt pile, the huge sand pile and sticks. The dirt pile is a climbing adventure, the sand is used to make roadways and piles for a few very old toy trucks (discards from someones toy collection) and the sticks can be swords or guns or can be piled into forts or other useful structures. Sticks can also be used to pound on our abundent supply of big rocks either before, after or during climbing on the rocks.

We don't have TV or video anything available here and they know it. They ask if the can go outside and play. Most parents would kill to get their kids outside and playing by themselves and yet continue to buy videos and video games adnauseum. We simply make it boring inside and interesting outside. When the kids are here, we continue to work at whatever and if the kids find that interesting, we let them help. (Yes, this usually makes things go slower- but not always and we could reap great benefits from this as they get older.) When they get here, we find some chores for them to do, and then only after they accomplish them, we turn them loose outside. We are outside too and can keep an ear or an eye on them occasionally. As they adjust to being in charge of themselves, they are allowed to go to areas of the farm alone. How they handle this freedom determines how much they get. They tend to be very cautious about going out of your sight. It is great when we have two grandkids, because they are more willing to go places without you. Boys can turn most activities dangerous for themselves or one of the smaller farm animals after about twenty minutes and it is best to check often. When we send them home the are usually in a state of exhaustion and completely covered in dirt, head to toe.

It is interesting to watch their universe expand as they learn to take care of themselves independently. The little ones stay close instinctively and around five or six they will make short excursions. At seven, you have to set limits. How much freedom they get, is dependent on how well they stick to their agreements.

Anyway, we think the farm is great for the kids and the kids are great for the farm. Grandparenting is way easier than parenting and I feel sorry for anyone trying to be a parent now. We can get away without a TV and video games and parents really can't and have to do the best they can to balance things. We don't have to balance anything and the chores here are real and useful and the freedom is controlled and as safe as it can be. All very good for kids.

Hens Cause New Markenting Campaign at MSF

Yesterday we collected seven eggs from our eight hen flock. Pretty exciting, huh? (If you're reading this blog, excitement probably isn't high on your list and this news falls into the acceptable range that keeps you from having a heart attack or stroke.) This ramp up of production has created a marketing crisis here at the farm. We need to " get crackin' "and find an outlet for our eggs. I suspect that with a few phone calls where we pressure some of Kris's family to take eggs, we can get production and sales to approximate each other. Thousands and thousands of years ago, I am pretty sure a glut of eggs from a newly domesticated chicken flock forced a primordial grandmother type to con her extended family into buying eggs and thus invented capitalism and agriculture all at once.

Yesterday was also exciting for another reason. I fixed something else mechanical! Hard to believe and yet, it is true. The tractor bucket hydraulics valve part that broke, came in, and it was actually the right part, and I figured out how to take apart the hydraulic controls, and I actually got the new piece in and, amazingly, it worked. Even more amazing was the actual time from start to finish was about fifteen minutes. More amazing still, I put the tools away after I was done, a departure so shocking that Kris had to come outside to see for herself.

I was heartened by my easy success, and had it not been late in the day, I would have tried to get the lights working so we could use the tractor after dark. I have been avoiding that all summer. I also have some crackling noise in the front wheels of the Ford Ranger. The ground is wet and muddy and it is finally getting cold out so it is perfect for more backyard mechanic work. I like to be really miserable when I work on things so I prefer winter or at least late fall or early spring for the really big jobs. Banging your knuckles when your hands are so cold they ache is a feeling you just can't duplicate on a warm summer day. Using bare hands to search for a nut dropped in the snow- priceless. Does make me wonder why garages only charge seventy five to a hundred bucks an hour for winter time mechanics work.

We are headed out to make cookies at my daughters today. It should be fun. I wish I had more time I would make a wreath or some garland to take over. This is what the grandkids memories are made of and it would be a nice touch. It is getting light out and I believe I will stop right here and go gather a bit of brush. How long can it take to make one wreath?

Spring Cleanup Winds Down

I had a disturbing revelation yesterday as I was cleaning up getting ready for winter. A lot of the stuff I was working on is left over from last years fall clean up and this years spring cleanup. Ugh. No, really, Ugh!

I enjoy looking at an nice neat area as much as the most anal neat-nick ever born--yet I find it hard to make it a priority and I work at a project until cleaning up after myself is beyond my limits of self discipline, then, I pick up what the weather will ruin and the next day start on a new project that seems more pressing than cleaning up yesterdays project. So, just before the snow flies, I can be found trying to clean up outside at least enough to make it possible to snow blow the dooryard safely.

We often give directions to our farm this way: Turn off the North Bend road onto Jellison Ridge, Road drive to the end of the pavement. On your right you'll see a nice, neat farm- drive right past- that's not us- continue on the dirt road until you see a place on your left and you think " Boy, I sure am glad I don't live next to those people. Stop there, you have arrived.

The nice neat farm is owned by "farmer Gary" and admittedly anal fellow who spends the greater part of his summer mowing and weed wacking. In the fall, he puts in his wood neatly and chases leaves off of his property. This time of year he decorates for Christmas, tastefully of course, single white candles in each window, nice wreath with ground lighting on the front door, big wreath on the barn. In the spring, the snow is barely gone and he rakes his entire two acre lawn. Everything is neat. I guarantee you that whatever the American Health association says you should weigh for his height, he weighs that amount. I suspect he had 2.7 children. He will, I am sure, live to be a hundred unless some neighbor runs over him on the way by.

It would be nice to think I will someday morph into a neater farmer as I get more of the building done on the farm. Unfortunately, it is more fun to build than clean so I don't have much hope really. Today, I am headed out to clean up some more. I have to focus on things that will be frozen down since last night was cold. If I don't beat it up out the ground today, it may be there until next springs clean up. Ugh!