Merry Christmas To All

Merry Christmas to all! I have been remiss in my postings. I tend not to post unless I have some pictures. I worry that if I don't have something bright and colorful that I won't keep your attention. My apologies. Thanksgiving went well. The food was great and all of it hit the table hot. Everyone had a good time and no fights broke out. The farm proceeds, if not as planned. The calves are still growing, we've butchered the big chickens and ducks and have a lamb in the freezer so we're eating extremely well. The sheep are still on pasture but I'll probably have to switch hay by February. That's going to suck because the hay crop wasn't good this year. I tried planting sunflowers and oats this year. I need a better oat seed and planting sunflowers in a major bird migration route is futile. I'd like to try some Einkorn, a primitive grain, next year but I haven't found a worthwhile source. I still want to plant some feed corn and buckwheat. Much of those wants will be controlled by my paying job and it's demands. It's still 3+ years to full time farming. My Ford 8N tractor is reaching half of new price. It was squealing on the left side rear whenever I moved it. $600 later and I had a new left rear axle, bearings and seals. I finished the mowing and noticed that I had a radiator leak so I decided to pull it while it's winter. I got it repaired and am putting it back on. Oh yes, the right rear axle is starting to make scraping sounds. I'm still saving up to buy lumber for the barn. How I do will be determined by my taxes. Ohio has instituted something called CAUV. I haven't figured out how it works yet. It appears to be designed to screw small landowners out of more tax money. I guess I'll need a lawyer at some point. It may just be practical to pay the extra extortion. It's Christmas Day and it is cold out. That's it. No snow and the grass is pretty green. It's harder to get in the Christmas spirit when it's so green out. I want to garden. It has been a Christmas more focused on spirit than gifts. We can't afford much in gifts. There seems to be a discrepancy between the .gov reported inflation rate and what things really cost. Imagine that. We got food and a new house roof. We're good. Well that's it for now. I'll try and do better next year. I'll try and scrape up a photo or two.

There's an old story from Burton's 1000 and One Nights about a guy in the market in Mecca who sees Death. Death sees him, looks really surprised and heads toward him. The guy jumps on his horse and rides 3 days to Medina. He jumps off his horse figuring he's beaten Death when Death taps him on the shoulder. The guy says” I beat you for 3 days. I saw you in the market and knew you were coming for me. At least I slowed you down.” Death said” I was surprised to see you in the market in Mecca since I knew you'd be here in 3 days. I was coming over to ask you how you planned to get here so quickly.” Death catches us all . You can run all you want, fight all you want; Death still gets you. He got my friend John Burcham this last weekend. John fought for over 2 years but Death got him anyway. John found humor in his situation. He had dutifully gone for a colonoscopy when he turned 50. That's when the doc found the Stage 4 colo-rectal cancer. The doc said” You've probably had that for 20 years.” So much for that medical theory. John did have a strong belief in Christ and the Resurrection so I hope to see him and some of you again. Of course, it could be very warm where I end up in which case, I'll see the rest of you. Don't hassle Death when he comes. Remember, he's just the ticket agent. You bought the ticket.

Catching Up

I've been away too long. I never finished our vacation story. On our way back from Florida, we stopped to visit with our friends John and Janet Burcham. John has Stage 4 colorectal cancer. He's still making the docs laugh at last report but he seems tired now. John and J

anet, you are continually in our prayers. Winston-Salem , NC has changed so much over the years. It's much more built up than when I was first there. Economically depressed now, it's still much nicer than 1978. The old architecture is nice, the new could be better. Of note is the Wachovia ( now Wells Fargo) office building known locally as the Penis. If only they had added a spray of white lights flowing from the top. The symbolism would be perfect. We arrived home and everything was fine. Our orange tree is growing in our window, we've thrown away our tourist grade marmalade ( Oh that was bad.) and Stacey still hasn't eaten all the pecans. So much for vacation. Now for the farm update. It was a good lamb crop this year with many twins. I attribute this to pasturing the sheep through the winter. Of course, it could be just luck. We planted a large garden as usual and mostly it died or never came up. We kept the tomatoes alive with mulch and irrigation but it was costly. I plan on sinking a well point for a small well just to water the garden with. The temperatures were so high that after a day of work, I just couldn't bring myself to go out and work. We had to buy tomatoes to can. The tomatoes are starting to produce but not very much. We had some of our own corn. The wheat field that was all I could get in last year produced a whole 20 bushels per acre, less than half of an average year. I tried planting oats and sunflowers this year. The oats is worthless. The sunflowers are doing well. It turns out that they are a good crop for drought. If I can get my combine running, I'll have some chicken and cattle feed. We got 50 chickens. 25 are Turkens for the freezer and 25 mixed Bantams just for fun. We bought 14 baby ducks from the county fair. Stacey likes to go out to sit and watch the ducks and chickens. I suspect that with the ducks, she's sorting them by recipes. Dumbass the steer is now in the freezer. He was a good steer and would have made a good pet but he makes an even better hamburger. I bought 2 more Jersey calves to show in the baby animals at the fair. When I asked the lady I bought them from how much they were, she said “ Ten bucks each.” I almost said” I'll take a dozen.” but realized that I'd have to feed them and only bought 2. I've named them Carter and Reagan because when I first got them, Reagan would take the bottle and drain it right down. Carter was too dumb to suck. I'm in the process of weaning them now and they're doing well. We paid a professional painter to paint our house. He did a magnificent job but we're still paying it off. We got new gutters at the same time. The house looks far better than it has in a long time. Next big expense will be the roof and I'm going for metal. That should last the rest of my life. We've cut back on the fairs a bit. We'll hit the Fulton Co. Fair this weekend. We couldn't miss that as it's the best in Ohio. One more chance to eat fried cheese curds and Belgian waffles before winter. I don't have much more right now. Take care of yourselves.

Non Plastic Flamingos

It's not Venus

Dancing Mammals

Garden with Stacey