Writing is something I do begrudgingly, I’m not a natural at it. Every sentence is tortuous, but if I write it can be argued that I’m not just talking to myself. This blog has come and gone over the last year or so and I’m sure the former readers have stopped clicking long ago, but if you stumble on this page, welcome back.
That being said, the comrade has mellowed out from OMG fast crash by Tuesday all the way down to “whatever”. Happens every spring when I make it through the winter and have the seed to plant for this year’s garden. I’m also not buried under a project list a mile long – gave up worrying about getting everything that could be done and settling for picking away at “The List” a bit each day. Tearing out the junk paneling in the living room starting tomorrow – tear off down to the studs, rewire, insulate and re-sheetrock. Start tomato seeds in planting flats. Perform mitosis on the worm bin and finish regulating the incubator thermostat and load it up with eggs. Hey – that’ll be plenty for one day… I’ll post a pic tomorrow.
5:30. The Roosters are seeing who can be the loudest. It’s only five minutes until coffee because I had the foresight last night to throw grounds and water in the blue enameled camp pot – a quick twist of the propane stove knob and I’m good to go in a few. I need a shirt for the early morning chill, daybreak mosquitoes and milking stand flies in a little bit, some not too rancid pants (because heading out to the barn for thunder bucket time is potentially dangerous on less than two cups of coffee when there are seriously needy bottle fed kid goats running around), and a bandana to keep the hair back. Shoes aren’t required after April Fool’s Day.
Sit and meditate for awhile and the wave of shit to do attacks with a fury. Beat it back saying I’m only one man, there are only so many hours in a day, and late 48 means I ain’t in my thirties anymore. Discard out of hand the bulk of it as things I really could care less about doing today along with the things that can’t be done before the necessary stars align and the short list is about the same as it was yesterday and the day before – feed chickens, chicks, really little chicks, move, feed, and water rabbits, feed pigs, milk goats, cook down the next batch of pig food, check on broodie hen and then start in on the plant kingdom. Somewhere about this time the Gotta Eat alarm goes off, the attitude goes to shit and I gotta regroup with the mantra that saves my ass on a daily basis – I got Forever.
Some day I’ll feel a mule kick to the chest and I ain’t got no mule. Or maybe just fuzz out in the garden rooting around in the dirt. Possibly just might turn “off” in my bed at night, but until then I got Forever. And since between now and the end of my time there exists in my world nothing more critical that putting this over there, planting this in that, making some gizmo work on an odd thing and hauling some sort of crap to a less crappy location what’s to worry? Okay, I’m probably going to bleed sometime during the day and gain a scrape or a bruise, but the phone isn’t ringing off the hook and most always the things that are bugging me are bugs. Truck’s broke – meh, didn’t want to leave the place today anyway. Truck ain’t broke but the plumbing is? I got a big tackle box fulla plumbing tools and three 5 gallon buckets of every fitting known to man except for the one that sends me to town. What the heck – it’s kinda hot (or cold, or wet or dry) for weeding. I don’t have appointments with lawyers, stockbrokers, bosses, social services or any other gov’t agencies. Biggest hassle is walking down the hill to fetch a pail of water from the spring or find the damn goat at milking time.
But there are some times this whole lotta nothing seems as if I’m spinning my wheels getting nowhere, and that’s when I have to just get a handful of beans and the hoedad and punch them in the ground. That’s my statement – there’s some reality. And in a week they’ll be sprouting next to the ones planted the time before and maybe I get to pick a few from some planted some unknown aggravations ago. Those are the best times. Those are the times that say there is time enough.
I’ve for the most part been offline for weeks now, I’d like to say it’s because I’m so busy planting and milking goats etc to do much of anything but that’s only half the case. Sure, there is about a ten minute window between the time the last of the chickens get locked up in the barn and the dog and cat fed and the time my eyes involuntarily shut, and 7 1/2 hours later stumbling for the coffee pot, but most of the online inactivity comes from just being tired of it all.
The “news” is ridiculous. See Kunstler for deeper analysis of all things popular and trivial. The Big League Cryptogon type stuff is enough to really pucker the asshole when you see all those dots as points on a straight line leading to a true hell on earth. The “leaders” are flat out selling the slave class down the river – talking about food stamp cuts on page 2 and a new half trillion (when all the hidden costs are factored in) dollar weapon system buried in an bill touted as an austerity measure. The pigs have outlawed public review of their behavior and it’s effectively against the law to tell them “no” regardless of how vile, violent and repugnant their behavior is. Got High Justice(s) backing them up, too. And on a closer to home and more personal note, I can’t go pick up a truckload of scrap metal from the tornado that pulverized an 8 block wide swath of destruction from one end of Joplin to the other because it’s been designated a Disaster Area which means nobody gets to do anything unless they are a gov’t approved entity that has slipped the equivalent of a suitcase fulla cash to the appropriate authority figures (read: non-corporate entity need not apply).
We are so done as a people. Or shall I say “they” are so done, because I simply do not identify with my fellow man anymore. I know some pretty likable people but I’m aware of just how much of their lifestyle I have to ignore to keep the meet pleasant. They might say I’m not very sociable because I don’t hold up an end of a conversation – there are only a couple of topics I care to talk about and they aren’t very high on the popularity scale. Food is a good one unless it’s recipe swapping where 90% of the ingredients came from the grocery store. Guns are another, but you run the risk of exciting the ammo and camo crowd. And fuckin’ nobody milks goats, so I’ll just go away now… There’s no need to be nasty but I gotta just smile and extract before some revolutionary drivel comes out of my mouth. Who the hell in the “real world” reads Jensen?
However, I see signs that things are getting ready to become a bit more vicious – on both ends of the spectrum. Hackers are getting pretty damn good at exploiting industry mainframes, and to date the infiltrations have looked sorta silly unless you see it as probing and recon. All the terrist scaremongering may be TPTB getting a bit puckery – their information is a lot better than mine and it could be explained as a last ditch effort to clamp down before the gloves of the underground come off for real. There be war in heaven, friends, and I sure hope I got what it takes to duck and cover.
Sore back, sore feet, shoulder is blown but the finger tip I sheared 3/4 of the way off seems to be gluing itself on okay – enough to fill out a glove at the end of the day anyway. 7 hours until graylight and another 16 1/2 hours of old fashioned peasant style toil ahead. Save money, live better – avoid WalMart.
G’night
My family, friends and peripheral acquaintances in Joplin all came out fine. The rental house didn’t so much as loose a shingle. I’m going up tomorrow to get the Mother in Law and her stuff and bring her to the homestead since her apartment is ready for a dumpster.
Just posting in case anybody wondered if I was still alive. Someday I’ll feel like writing again, for now I’m just yakking on the forum at Silent Country.
Hang loose all.
the comrade
Okay, it adds up. All the comments being “two cents” means over half the cost of this blog is being “funded” by you, dear readers. I’m not crass enough to put up a paypal button but your thoughts have a value to me, and the collective wail from my announcing I’m done can’t be ignored.
I worked out my Fed Paranoia – indifference is not subversive activity. If an individual wants to earn a paycheck by lording over people or cracking heads far be it for me to say far be it. The rest of you just get busy digging up the yard and guerrilla planting Himalayan Blackberries or some other invasive food crop in abandoned and unwanted places. The planter boxes at City Hall should be sprouting cowpeas.
There is no doom – just the here and now. Do with it as thou wilt. I aspire to be like rust. Thanks for your support.
4.6 percent of the world’s population and 33 percent of global consumption. That’s America’s grab at the goodie basket, the cause of all its conflicts, and its ultimate undoing. Remember the old hippie tune – I’d love to change the world, but I don’t know what to do? I know I had some Earth shattering revelations during multiple acid trips in the past – the problem was the next morning all traces of them were long gone. Now that I’m not drug addled the solution is clear - take America out and all’s well.
You can forget about Jevons’ paradox – that somebody will take up the slack from an American exit of the consumer base, we eat so much that the rest of the world would explode trying to force that much crap down their consumption maw. The resources of the world are shrinking rapidly so even if the 300+ million Prime Guzzlers keeled over and wasted away the pie is still a remnant of what it used to be. If it sounds like I’m just ragging on America – you god damn right I am. If the population ever groked the fact that we are gluttonous pigs that need to “about face” and personally march the fuck out of WalMart and turn the entire Military Apparatus into a giant Peace Corps it’s almost impossible to fathom how much human suffering (and non-human as well) would immediately cease.
Example: A half billion dollars worth of missiles sent up Libya’s rectum. That’s about 10,000 new luxury vehicles, or 50,000 kitchen remodels, or 500,000 wardrobe updates, or a lousy two and a half million pizza delivery orders for stupid assed Super Bowl parties. The collective horde of American Teens spend that much per month text messaging their pathetic angst back and forth to each other. I’m sitting in the middle of a nation full of out of control two year olds – you still want me to wave the flag as if America is as wonderful as intermittent windshield wipers?
Why can’t I get a 100# sack of green coffee beans from Juan Valdez and his burro from a railroad siding warehouse for less than the price of 150# of cheap crap in a can at WalMart? Our economic system is fucked up – value is divorced from the reality of production and profit. There is a chicken in the yard heading for her spot in Sparky’s doghouse to lay an egg. She runs loose and eats bugs and grass. Been around for years maintenance free. If I collect 12 of her eggs why would I sell them for two or three times as much money as you pay at the grocery store for eggs produced with incredible amounts of fuel, machinery, financing apparatus, and corporate profits mixed in the deal? I do it because those who are not raising their own eggs are implanted lock stock and barrel into the Machine of Planetary Destruction and deserve to be fleeced, and flat out raped of their money as obviously as possible. Yeah, I want you to know that I view this as a tiny and limited victory for the world’s slave labor the industrial benefactors use as a doormat.
America – you could do this voluntarily. You could throw a brick through the tv, go out and dig up the ornamental shrubbery in the yard and plant a stupid squash and bean patch. You could forgo the cell phone and enjoy the peace that comes from slowing down to land line plain old telephone service. Har har – POT for Peace. What a slogan. Take a thermos of coffee to work – the amount of energy used by Starbucks is easily equal to the production of the nuclear power plant at Diablo Canyon (since reactor meltdowns seem to be the hot topic of the month). In other words you fat lazy stupid mutant creations of civilization at the top of the pyramid, reign it in by 20 or 30 % and give the rest of the world a break. Pull back by half and we’d stop being viewed as galacticly stupid assholes on the world stage. Better yet, throw in the towel and make a headlong rush to a lower tech agrarian based society with decentralized cottage industries making the hard goods showcased in pre war catalogues. America could then once again claim her status as a shining example of decency in a troubled world – assuming the people would be smart enough to not sell or give food to the sick… those who have a need to wield power and control over others.
Uh huh. I can’t help it if the solution is impossible. We dig our aircraft carriers too much.
Remember the great community garden I worked my ass off for a couple of years? Yeah, sure, nobody paid any attention to it and I wound up planting potatoes and cowpeas on the damn thing before I gave up and sowed it in winter wheat and walked away. Well, I drove past it today and all that beautiful dark rich ground was being scraped off and loaded into dump trucks in preparation for extending the parking lot at the community food pantry and used clothing emporium.
Guys, I’m outta here. That’s the last straw. No need to spend another 65 bucks to renew my bluehost account to yammer on about stuff and things for another year, so when it expires this blog will just disappear. I’m hanging out at the Silent Country Forum for my social and doom needs. Don’t feel the need to continue here.
The quest for cheap electricity has turned Japan into a toxic wasteland for generations. I’m hoping the New Madrid fault just cuts loose and knocks the US on its ass for a spell. Nobody gets the food thing, so I’m going to keep planting away like a psychotic peasant because “Fuck You – I’m Eating”. And as far as the local talent goes, when motherfuckers begin to starve it ain’t my fault – it’s the asphalt.
Fuck. Fuck it. Fuck it all. It been grand.
…howdy March.
It’s waking up around here; spring activities are taking the place of the winter ones. Cutting seed potatoes instead of throwing wood in the stove is a nice change.
The short project list is stringing up a new piece of fence for garden expansion, flashing the chimney before the monsoon season, and clearing out a friend’s horse barn for the manure. Got a new milk goat so I’m pulling teats, along with turning eggs in the incubator twice a day. The rabbit is set to drop kits in a couple of weeks, and the worm bin needs rejuvenated- worm castings in planter pots is the world’s best seedling food.
The new motor on the monster old time Troy Bilt tiller runs like a top, and the new tine shaft bearings and seals went in without a hitch. The difference between being able to stroll behind the troy bilt rather than manhandling that piece of shit front tine MTD is like night and day. The new tractor is causing visions of truck farming as I gaze out across the pasture. I have soil under my fingernails again – got the turnip itch – keeping pace with the chickens that are back up to peak production.
Spring sprung. Here we go again…
It is 88 degreesF under the Pioneer Maid and the chicks can hang out there when they get chilly. Need to put a little wire pen around them – don’t want to step on the little guys. Got some pure breed chicks coming to the post office tomorrow so I dug out the driveway with the shiny new tractor. The guy across the road was happy to have me claw him a path out, too, so I guess he got over me shooting at his chicken eating dog. As Neville Chamberlain would say “there’s peace in our time”, however, huge amounts of alcohol could still spark off WWII.
Got another 8 inches of snow last night on top of the 10 inches left over from last week’s storm. The woodpile is good for another 4 days, and a thaw begins in two so I ought to squeak by on this one. Gotta love those quaint farm magazine pictures of cords and cords of wood split and stacked by the back door. I guess you could call somebody and have them deliver it, but it seems like here in the real world, or from my side of the chainsaw, the pile is always barely one step ahead of the weather.
The goats are crabby from being cooped up in the barn with the chickens; the bunnies in the garage seem as happy as usual and the boy really wants to go back to school. I’m just kinda bored.
Three weeks to peas…
