OK, we’re not in Houston, and it isn’t the full 400′ of fencing along the common boundary between our property and redneck neighbor’s, but the fence is up in the two most vital areas right now: at the far southern back end of the property where he removed his fence, and a section nearer to the cultivated area where his kids and our other neighbor’s kids have tromped down the wire fencing. We’ll work on clearing out the remaining 200′ between the two sections, which includes taking down a massive pine tree that looks to be about 75′ tall (hello, tree service!), as we go along so we can get the guys back and have them construct the remainder of the fence. I walked around quite a bit through the wild part of the property – where most of the fence was being built – with my nephew and did a lot of squatting to talk to him and point things out in the process, and this has turned into a huge mistake on my part: my back is seizing up in an even more painful way than it did the first morning after the original strain, and it’s making for a very uncomfortable evening here, even sitting in my recliner. But, dinner is good – almond crusted, lightly fried chicken tenders, and loaded potato au gratin. Plus a pain pill and a muscle relaxer to try to help my back, neither of which seems to be doing any good but which will hopefully kick in at some point for a little relief.
Tag Archives: Homestead
Clearance
Me and my strained back stayed inside, and my brother and his son cut down the couple remaining trees along what will be the new fenceline with redneck neighbor, and removed the posts that remained from the section of fence he had taken down. We’re ready for the fence guys to come and start walling off redneck neighbor’s crap-filled property.
Hopefully my back will get over itself, get back in order, and let me go back to doing what I need to get done as the season is creeping up on us.
Only you
can prevent forest fires. Out here, that means keeping track of your kids and not letting them play with lighters and matches in the forest that backs up to all the properties on the south side here, especially during a period of very cool weather and no rain for over a month. A couple of kids – one of whom belongs to redneck neighbor, it seems – did not learn this lesson and yesterday we had a rather large firefighting group out beyond the south fenceline two neighbors down, putting down a fire started by a couple of kids. They pumped from our immediate neighbor’s pond to put out the grass on his side of the fence that had started burning. Fortunately, the are was not densely wooded, and they were able to get in there and take care of it. Also fortunately, the wind had died down from the previous day, as otherwise it could have been a true disaster. As it stands, no one was injured and no buildings or outbuildings were damaged. A lucky day.
Window on the garden
Memories of spring
Can’t wait.
Clearing
Good fences make good neighbors.
Robert Frost said that, and it’s as true now as it was then. Case in point: our redneck neighbor, who lives adjacent to the southwesterly area of our property.
When we bought the place, the entire rear acre-ish was wild and overgrown, and incidentally had three dumpsters worth of trash that people had been dumping over the years. We cleaned all that out, and took down some of the wild area for what is now the orchard (or the beginning of the orchard, anyway). Since then, we find more trash here and there, either bubbling up from being buried, or just from the redneck and his group tossing trash over the fenceline because they’re too lazy to dispose of it properly.
I admit I will never understand people who can’t be bothered to throw things away. For instance, I have a fascination with the two hoarder shows that are on, and I’m simply amazed at their representation of geologic layers – except instead of rock and sand formations, theirs are formations of takeout containers, pizza boxes, cups, bottles, cans, and any other sort of trash that the rest of us (rightfully) recycle or toss out as a matter of habit. Likewise the people who have mounds of crap all over their property, whether it is things they thing they can “salvage”, junk they’re collecting in hopes of it being worth something (scrap metal, which would be if they actually took it to a center), or just trash (because once again, they’re just too lazy to put it in a trash can).
This is how it is for the redneck neighbor, apparently: some things, like bags and bottles and whatnot, they’re just too lazy to deal with, so they toss it onto our property. Then we wind up picking it up and disposing of it. I should point out that the redneck family is not immobile, nor are they disabled in any fashion. They’re just lazy, trashy people. Other things, they’re simply too cheap to properly dispose of: this includes batteries and tires. Not just any tires, either: the kind of tires that are used on very large trucks and construction vehicles.
The redneck neighbor took down his fence at the very rear of our property for some reason last year. After that point, we had a rather massive issue with deer coming in from the state forest that we back up to, who then got into the back garden and treated it like their personal buffet. We dealt with that by raising the fence around the garden to about six feet. No more deer in the garden. However, we were still left with redneck neighbor tossing trash onto our property as if it was still his personal dumping ground.
So we had a fence guy come out to give us an estimate on getting the back 120 feet or so refenced. This time, with privacy fencing, solid enough that redneck can’t just roll dead tires back to our property, and high enough that they’d need to work to throw things over it. Since redneck neighbor’s kids and the neighbor kids to our immediate east also walk across our property to a sag in the wire on the fenceline we share with redneck, the sag is now completely down. So we added another 72 feet to get that portion fenced as well. When we were walking the fenceline to take a look before the fence guy was here, what did we find? yet another tire. Which we promptly rolled right back across the fenceline to his property. It’s your crap: deal with it.
This leaves us with about 150 feet of fencing that will still need to be redone. We went with the almost 200 feet to start because these are the areas most in need at this moment, and because it looks like I’ll be clearing the room they need to work by myself foe the most part. I don’t mind this, but there is a limit as to what I can get done before the actual fencing workers are due to show up, so this will do. Once this is all up, I’ll work on clearing the remaining line and we’ll get them back to complete the line. It will be a great joy to be at the back of the property and not have to look at redneck neighbor and the miscellaneous heavy equipment he has scattered around his property.
As an added bonus, we also noted that redneck neighbor has (illegally) cleared out a section of the state forest just at the back of our property where the line to the forest begins. Back there, he has huge tires – the really big ones, that go on dump trucks and the like – a big pile of garbage (bikes, pieces of heavy truck gear like cranks and brakes, and just general crap), and a dead log picker. That will be an issue for the state to take up with him, because they’re definitely going to be notified about that.
In the meantime, we’ll have the start of a better neighbor in place: a new fence.
Bee feed
If we already had bees, they would have already been out foraging, gathering at least pollen (and probably nectar as well) around here of late. How do I know this? Oh, just an educated guess.
The season comes to a close
The football season, that is! Tonight’s the last game until fall – boo. I’m sure we’ll find a way to keep ourselves occupied in the offseason, which is the real season on the ranch. Tonight we’ll have pizza, subbing for brisket, and guacamole, and chips, and other assorted crap that is suitable for noshing during a Super Bowl.
The flats started last month in the barn are all up. Tomorrow I’ll start the flats of tobacco (for mom) and keep working on the reconfiguration of the frames in the front garden. And f still refuses to rain, more dragging hoses to the trees to try to keep them going. The grapefruit and the orange out in the orchard are striking quite the pathetic poses, as are the lemons. Sad, but I figure they should be able to pull themselves out of it. After all, citrus farmers down here have had trees go through this kind of oddball weather and still produce a crop.
Today I began the first fermentation of the wine (riesling), in the bucket, airlock on, waiting for the yeast to get busy. In a week, time to shift it to the secondary fermenter, and maybe start another round of beer. If only I could drink any of it…
Workaday
Working away at the ranch: taking down Mount Mulch a wheelbarrow at a time. Hauling hoses out to the trees to water them since we’ve had no rain at all. Spraying fish gut solution on the garlic and making the entire front garden smell like a fish processing factory. Pulling weeds. Shoveling soil from where I’ve reconfigured frame lines up front. Checking the blueberry plants to make sure they’re still alive (they are). Realizing while eating after washing my hands three times that next time, wearing gloves while using the sprayer to dispense fish gut solution would be a good idea. Playing with the lazy dogs on this ranch. Wondering if the clouds will finally get together and bring some rain. Sitting down to watch Colony again and try to finish the review of it. Thinking about bees. Laughing at the crow that followed me around this morning, cawing away at me as we moved along from task to task.
In all: a good day. And it isn’t over yet.
Worthy lawsuits
I’m not a huge fan of overly-litigious people or corporations. That’s why I was quite happy to see this suit last year from a wide group against Monsanto. Monsanto, of course, has “security” people that roam around, getting in the faces of farmers when they suspect their GMO crap has “been utilized” by those farmers, when in fact, it is Monsanto doing the trespassing. Most farmers wind up settling – and being bound by gag orders – because they simply do not have the money to fight. This battle, though, is well worth it, and it boggles the mind that anyone would agree with Monsanto’s arguments that the farmers are infringing when Monsanto’s seed invades their fields. It will take a couple of years to get this done, but hopefully more sensible minds will prevail and people can tell Monsanto to get stuffed when they come knocking.