Happy tomato home

It's so nice to finally have some fields ready to plant. This year we're using green plastic mulch for a change, check it:

This is the same field which was just plowed in the early morning picture shown here.

That's 1500 feet of row space- 5 rows 300 feet long. Enough for about 800 tomato plants. We'll have another couple of sets over at Charlie's field along with about 20 more mixed melon rows, all that same length.

It's still a few weeks until the Grants Pass Irrigation district gets us water so there'll be a brief period where this field will have water hauled to it. The ultra good water news is that Charlie got the pump running over at his field so Hoorah! for Charlie. Now we can finish prepping the corn field, maybe get it planted by Monday.

Glorious day to you!

Another glorious morning

Bright blue sky, cool breeze and singing birds. What more could you ask for?

Today we'll finally start pulling some plastic mulched mounds for planting some early crops. Might have a little trouble with the deer punching holes in the plastic but since we finished renovating the vineyard there is little cover for them to hide in and they have diminished quite a bit. And we'll be putting up a little more fencing soon so that really should put the lid on them. I'll use Deer-X to keep them off the young plants until then.

Wishing you a fine and frolicsome day (or night if you're on the other side of the world)

Nano-safety hype getting on my nerves

Greenpeace is making another stab in the dark at saving us all from ourselves. Check out the nano-details over at Nano Guy.

Rip snort'n

Having a great day so far. Moved a bunch of plants to the cool part of the big greenhouse in prep for tomorrow's 90+ degrees. Going out now to put fertilizer down for the early tomato, lettuce, and summer squash rows. Super-phosphate and calcium nitrate in the first couple rows then lime and triple 16 in the last 3.

Yes, I use chemicals. The biggest 2 chemicals I use are carbon dioxide and dihydrogen monoxide. Both of which can be very deadly. That's CO2 and water without which life on this planet would be impossible, in case some organic fruit-nut wombat is having apoplexy at the thought of me poisoning the planet with my "deadly chemicals". You can drown in either one of them if they are deep enough.

I hardly ever need to use synthetic pesticides, which is what most people should actually be worried about although biological and organic pesticides can often be more dangerous than the synthetics (rotenone and nicotine both from plant sources are quite nasty, look it up...) I really don't understand the fear over part-per-billion trace residues anyways. As if having 800 nuclear devices detonated on the surface of the earth didn't dramatically drive up the tritium and other radio-isotope count everywhere. What's a few dozen molecules of mostly broken down Sevin gonna do compared to that?

Oh, enough gloomy text. It's a lovely day with wonderful butterflies and hummingbird working the bushes in the front yard and I have productive work to do. One could not ask for more.

Wishing you a happy day of freedom and wonder.

A fine and lovely day.

Despite numerous stresses, set-backs, and people who actually think they have an obligation to coerce my mind. Good luck with that!

Beneath the open blue sky and the blazing sun there is little that man has to say which will reflect across the mind of a being solely engaged upon the fine and fibrous light of effort. Onions are starting to flower and dad's fig trees are happy with their roots wet in their new homes of thick clay and vibrant mineral. Here the land and wind sing of time beyond measure and powers which only the body in its entirety can apprehend. Feel the creaking of the earth, the slow squeeking of plant flesh pushing towards heat and sun and sky. A hawk flies by chased by the male of a nesting pair of purple martins. She's gone so fast I only recognize her by the bars on her wings. The frost which decorated metal, plastic, and stone this morning is less then a memory although coolness can still be found in small patches of shadow. The onions will be allowed to flower and seed so that next year I might plant a huge field of sweet and fragrant bulbs. The figs I pray survive.

Good luck and may all your efforts bring peace, freedom and happiness to those around you.

Hot, hot, hot

In the greenhouse. 104 not as bad as it was but still way hot when you have to stay in there watering plants for like 15 minutes. Exactly like being in a sauna/steam room. All the little plants are so happy. It gets sort of intoxicating in there it's so warm and humid with lots of good oxygen.

Gotta go out now and spray round-up along the driveway and around the vineyard and maybe try to get some water down by dad's new fig trees.

Hope life is treating you well and the wind whispers happy secrets to you.

Corner posts

Got the last 2 sets of corner posts set for the big cantaloupe/watermelon field over at farm #2. Will get fencing up in the next couple of days and plant corn as soon as we get the water turned on in that field. Hopefully soon.

Pretty hard bit of frost last night so I'm glad we weren't all gung-ho planting stuff early. Usually we can't safely plant until May 15. Unfortunately lots of trees were in flower but I haven't seen any sign of obliteration yet so we might have just squeaked by.

Dreams. Had one worth a giggle: I was being chased through the wine cellar of a monastery by zombies who came up through a floor-drain like spaghetti played backwards. They were trying to catch me because a monk gave me a magic rosary bead on a rosary necklace. The bead looked like a sort of moldy acorn. All that and I'm not even catholic.

Hope your day is full of freedom, truth and happiness.

3,080 dollars stolen from every American home

I promise I'll get back to the fascinating world of farming soon, but since today was commie illegal alien day I found 1 more great stat:

The net cost to the federal government in 2002 for public services provided to illegal aliens was $10.4 billion or $2,736 per household according to a report by the Center for Immigration Studies. Estimates for 2005 put the amount at $11.7 billion or $3,080 per household.

That's from Human Events Online much more details and an even higher price tag there.

What they're really protesting for

TCS Daily has a fine article on the true motivation behind today's marches and protests. The best quote from the article is:

Any general strike poses a danger to constitutional government by offering a path to political power that short-circuits the normal rules of the political game that everyone else has been playing by. That is why, whenever a government permits itself to be influenced by the tactics of the general strike, it is unwittingly preparing for its own dissolution -- it is de-legitimatising itself by legitimatising the streets. The moment people believe that the traditional rules of the political game get them nowhere, and that the most effective means of procuring what they want is by taking to the streets, then everyone, sooner or later, will end up taking to the streets, and no one will see any point in playing by the old traditional rules of the political game.

In many ways, the key to the stability of those nations founded on Anglo-Saxon political institutions has been their refusal to permit political decisions to be decided in the streets, and their stern insistence that change could come about only through the ballot box and not by manning the barricades. Unfortunately, many Americans today, on both the right and left, have come to look upon masses of people filling the streets with their protests and demands as a healthy exercise in democracy. In fact, once those who control the streets learn that they can force governments to change their policies, or even to bring down governments altogether, then power automatically goes to whatever group can be most effective in organizing the streets to their own ends, at which point constitutional government simply ceases to exist, and the rule of the survival of the fittest comes into force.

That was written by Lee Harris at TCS Daily. Read all the rest Here.

CNN: the meat grinder of truth

Since I like the sensation of having my toenails sanded off, I stopped by the CNN website after lunch. Once more they impress me with their ability to obfuscate and spin on behalf of their Overlord masters. Today's rallies are no longer for illegal immigrants, CNN has used its journalistic omnipotence to give them all full amnesty. All articles simply refer to "immigrant rallies", "immigrant protests", and "immigrant rights." With a few clicks of the keyboard CNN has over-ruled every objection rendering those who oppose the fashionable minority of the day as unreasonable racists.

Of course the corporate suits who salivate over the prospects of even more slave labor from mexico are the ones behind this editing of reality. Further depressing the labor market will fit the fancy of the Federal Reserve while diluting the already fractured American voting blocks will titillate and delight the Republicratic Democan politicians who feed on every vein of industry and artery of reason which once made this country great. Auctioning of our interests and security to China and Dubai will continue until we reach the highest bidder.

May 1 and all is well

No one has starved to death in America and no lawns have suddenly exploded in growth thus smoothering children waiting for the school bus. Strawberry prices haven't suddenly skyrocketed and everyone has found an alternative baby sitter. Pallets are still being made and turf still being laid. Hmmm? Where are all the illegal immigrants? Maybe they finally went home.

Had some wonderfully strange dreams last night. Like my brain made up it's own variation on one of the star-wars movies; Leah, Padme, Obe-Wan and super-force weapons used to prevent the collision of a moon with a planet. How trippy. I still haven't seen the third movie. The dream was so vivid it unleashed some memories of earlier dreams I had last year about stargazing and seeing UFOs in the sky. I had totally forgotten that dream.

Much hard work today: moving earth, drilling post-holes, preparing mounds for transplanting. So I can't dally with this blog for long.

Hope your day is free and clear.

Liberal gibberish: they call it communicating

If you haven't had a giggle today, slide down the page to just past my list of interesting links and click the Rant button on the Autorantic Virtual Moonbat. Or if you are from Oregon and need an emetic to regurgitate that poison tofu you just mistook for food, you can go to the so-called Democracy for Oregon website. I don't normally like to give the opposition a push, but it's worth a giggle to read some of their balderdash plus like Sun-Tzu says

know yourself, know your enemy: 100 Victories.
Don't know yourself, don't know your enemy: 100 defeats

Which is also a good reason to go to these sites:
Faith Freedom
Apostates of Islam
Religion of Peace

The fall of Rome, redux

Ooh, I like this place. Heavy themes, gnashing teeth and visceral responses. Truth is painful but cleansing.

Over the Bill and Far Away

Over the Bill and Far Away This kid is funny

Repeat until heard: Close the Borders

Heidi at Euphoric reality has a great article entitled It's the Borders Stupid! and I can't agree more. Let's all just keep chanting "Close the Borders" and like Horton Hears a Who Washington will finally hear us.

An interesting side note: I just read a Rasmussen poll that says a third party candidate could conceivably win the 2008 presidential election running only on the Broken Borders issue. If Colin Powell would run independent on that issue he'd scoop it for sure.

More thoughts on cooperation

I've been thinking about my earlier posting about the Gasoline boycott Chainletter and you know, it's sort of funny but my recommendations have a lot of other things going for them besides saving gas. There would be a dramatic increase in personal connectedness in our society. People would have to learn some of the arts of tolerance, forbearance and social grace that have been gradually declining for the last 25 years or so. People would be safer (traveling in groups often has that affect) Both creativity and technology would be given a big boost. The division of opinion and an individual's sense of isolation would be decreased. Don't get me wrong, I'd love 50 cent a gallon gas, but if we can't have that maybe there is a silver lining to a little bit of creative social adaptation.

Another hot day on the farm

Got through wrapping the little trees in Deer-X, watering the greenhouse and spreading many hundreds of pounds of year-old fertilizer in the grapes and orchard. Had to break the ammonium sulfate up with a shovel. Then I had a sort of flashback to that "ice warrior" dream earlier in the week. Ammonium sulfate looks very much like several day old snow.

Also went and re-watered the greenhouse after lunch. It was 107 in there, what a sauna! But the plants still seem to be loving it. It is supposed to near 90 external temp next week so I will definitely have to move the plants out before that as internal temp will be about 120 when that happens.

No dreams to report last night. Probably getting too busy and physically tired to support the additional mental activity of lucid dreaming these days.

Corn planting starts in about 4-5 days followed by black plastic rows and transplanting of melons and etc.

Hope your day grows with happiness just like my little plants.

Aha! Gotcha you corrupt politicians

Y'all probably know all about this, but I just found opensecrets.org one of those websites I was wishing existed only it did all along. Finally we can all see who has been buying our so-called representatives.

Another great little article from TCS daily. I love this line:

It's as though aid agencies need to fail in their targets in order to maintain their missions. After all, if their programs succeeded they'd put themselves out of business.

It's the same story with doctors and politician. If doctors actually Cured things instead of just treating them they'd lose business. And if politicians actually solved problems they would diminish their hold over the mass consciousness of their slaves constituents.

A story worth repeating.

Kyle McDonald is trading his way up to a house and all he had to start with was one large red paper clip. You may have already heard this story but I found it fascinating. It exemplifies the great spirit of companionship which the web often fosters.

Protesting the wrong thing, again.

Illegal immigrants are preparing to protest again. Like it's really going to mean something this big push on their part. If they have to protest why don't they protest over something really important like the ongoing genocide and repression by islamists in Darfur? Oh no! It's way more important that they get some stupid symbolic victory over the will of the American people, proving to us once and for all that we'd all be helpless without them. "Forget all the pain, murder and suffering going on somewhere else in the world and pay attention to our little problem" is what they are saying.

In some ways I'm totally looking forward to this because maybe it will wake America up. More importantly it will prove that life will go on just fine without slave labor.

Another hot day.

Planting, planting, planting. My fingers are getting rubbed down from all this planting. Dirt under the fingernails is irritating. And this is just planting phase 1. Phase 2 will be when we pull the black plastic mulched mounds and put these plants into them. There will be at least 8000 feet of that another 12,000 feet (all lineal not square ) of watermelon, pumpkin, winter and summer squash. About the same time we'll start putting in a half acre a week of corn. The first planting will be closer to an acre as there are three different types in the first planting: 65, 75, and 89 days to production respectively.

No dreams of import last night.

I've got a small side job today of wrapping some of our young fruit trees in Deer-X to keep those giant buck-toothed long-legged hoofed rats from eating on them.

Apple trees are flowering like crazy and turning the air into a living perfume of wonderment.

Wishing your day full of love and light and life and freedom.

More Dubai shinanegans

Curious George is up to no good again. Damn he makes it hard to stay with republicans. On Bloomberg TV this morning I saw that el Presidente is pushing to sell 9 of our military manufacturing facilities to a Dubai owned company. What absolute nonsense! Didn't he get the message last month? Once more this will push Congress and the Senate to unite against him, I hope. Does Georgie boy really think that any country which is actively funding terrorism can be trusted with any part of our military operations? What sort of Orwellian doublespeak is this?

It really makes me agree with my dad. This just looks like some enormous convoluted chess game designed to keep the people of America (if not the whole western world ) agitated, upset and tired. A sort of shell game between our politicians and our media. Over here it's illegal immigration, over there it's the war on terror, the middle shell has gas prices and the one on the far right is global trade. Oops! don't forget China and then Russia sneaks up and steals your sandwich.

I gotta go work in the garden just so I don't think about this stuff.

Have a wonderful day.

Just curious

Just curious aren't we all Jason? This kid has some good stuff (he could be 80 for all I know but he strikes me as having a young mind and that's a good thing) He also seems to be good at peaving off liberals and that's always fun.

More acres turned

A bunch more soil broken out, half way to being ready to plant. Big greenhouse got to 103 today, going to have to start moving plants out if that keeps up. Supposed to cool off after tomorrow though so we'll see. 5000+ melons and sundry other plants growing like crazy.

I'm sore and tired and dirty and I've still got a couple of books I need to read on and have to do one last water check on the plants so this evening's post will be cut short.

Wishing you freedom, insight and happiness.

Another fine spring morning

Going out to bush-hog a field of mustard here in a few minute. Then I'll be plowing again for a couple of hours. Maybe take a break to work in the vineyard for a bit, put a little fertilizer on the grapes etc.

I had a really interesting dream about being at some sort of a resort and then I had a moment of lucidity which totally screwed up the dreams because I was like "Cool, now I can go anywhere" so I went to this little bistro in what I think was New York City or maybe Chicago. Somewhere mostly east and a little north. Distance and scale are difficult to judge in dreams. Could've been in Europe for all I know. Other than that the dreams I had were some of the coolest ever except I can't remember much before that moment of lucidity and after I was free from whatever influences regularly plague my dreams and having too much fun to record it all.

Hope your day is fine and smooth.

Gasoline boycott chain letter

Ever since 1996 whenever the price of gas has spiked at a new high I have gotten a chain letter in my email. It goes something like this "Want lower gas prices... Let's all boycott the biggest 2 producers Exxon and Mobile... We can get 300 million people to join the boycott just send this to 10 people on your email list.

The first 3 times I got this I did as suggested, sending it off to 10 of my friends. And presumably most if not all of them did the same. And yet nothing came of it. Exxon and Mobile didn't lose huge profits that year. Their stations here in town remained busy. Why? More importantly why not? Why didn't this work?

Several reasons come to mind. The internet has penetrated less than what, 60% of homes in America? (South Korea kicks our butts with 71% highspeed connections) So at most it could leverage like 160 million people. Figure the chain letter doesn't work well and you lose as much as half again (unlikely, how hard is it to forward?) that leaves 80 million. Still 80 million people boycotting the biggest producers and discussing this with their friends, family, coworkers etc. should've had some impact.

The problem is more complex and simpler than the letter assumes. More complex because gasoline producers and their system of pricing is interconnected. Gasoline at your local station could originate from any number of producers. Plus it's the total supply that affects price not just the demand at one or two major outlets.

The problem is simpler because of the people getting the email: they just didn't change their behavior, continuing to buy at whichever station was convenient.

The reality everyone in America is avoiding ( for very selfish and self-centered reasons ) is that we could easily solve this problem. The solution is no further away than the end of the arm you hold your cellphone with. Our behavior is what drives these prices. Feeding money to the terrorists who want us all dead and the corporations that could care less so long as they keep making money hand over fist.

If (and it is a huge IF) we would just work together to reduce our driving, use of electricity and other oil consuming behavior things would change quickly. Most importantly IF we stuck with it for even a short while longer than the bare minimum that SUV and Humvee owners feel we must then there would be a huge backlash throughout the oil industry and the middle eastern oil producing countries.

Can you imagine the impact of a concerted effort by Americans? Everyone car pooling, grocery shoppers forming buying and transport consortiums for each neighborhood.
Cut back on the use of plastics, switch to more efficient lighting. Don't travel unless you must. Use the phone! Telecommute a few days a week. And do all these things for like 6 months. Every oil tanker in the world would be sitting still full in port.

Our previously mentioned chain letter has already given us some statistical data about the likelihood of such an intentional and conscientious change in behavior. Unlike during World War 2 when every single American worked for the good of the whole world, the Democrat and Republican politicians have already made sure in at least one arena the first half of that old adage no longer holds true: United We Stand.

The second half of that phrase is disturbingly much closer.

Update: in case you are looking for afore mentioned letter, go here.

I love wikipedia

For lots of reasons. I've learned a ton of stuff about math and string theory I never knew thanks to them. Wish I weren't a poor farmer or I'd contribute some cash to them.
Today's featured article was a real blast from the past and a reminder of the sort of thing that is easily forgotten (or covered up by certain parties) check it out:
1996 U.S. campaign finance scandal I bet the demos wish that was forgotten. An interesting reminder too because that Hu fella (murderin' bastard as his people call him) was just here being entertained by Bill Gates and Pres. Booshy.

Liberals like the taste of foot

Will they ever get their foot out of their collective mouth?
My friend Del sent me this:

Gym Instructor Mocks Bush In Front Of First Daughters
Tue Apr 25 2006 10:32:05 ET

A spinning instructor at Washington, DC's Sports Club/LA mocked President Bush without realizing (believe it or not) that a first daughter was in his class!

ROLL CALL reports: The instructor, Glenn Makl, is said to be horrified to learn after class that the president's daughter Jenna was there to hear his making fun of President Bush and handing out of a video clip compilation of some of the president's more memorable gaffes and malapropisms.

Jenna Bush was working out at the club with her boyfriend, who later complained about the politcal ranting of the trainer, a source tells the DRUDGE REPORT.

If you haven't got enough of such rants, please try the "Autorantic Virtual Moonbat" in the side bar further down the page. Quite Droll!

Saber Point

Ol' Stogie Chomper at Saber Point hits the nail on the head again. What will we ever do with this so called "leadership" we have in Washington D.C. ? Voting in democrats is like swapping one kind of cancer for another. Both equally deadly. The problem with our system of representational governance is that once someone is voted in they are no longer accountable to their constituency. The electorate should be allowed on the fly replacement options just like anyone would have in the working world. If an employee is jaking it, fire the bastard right then and there and replace them with someone who actually will do the job. Rinse and repeat for an effective leadership.

Morning report

Will be working in the greenhouse this morning, getting in the last of the melons. Should put us in the 3000+ melon plant range. The rest will have to be direct seeded.

Many dreams last night, mostly gibberish. But I did have 1 of interest (and no I haven't checked the comments from yesterday's posts yet...) In the dream I was walking down a sort of alley or path lined on both sides by a weathered grey wooden fence. There were patches of bright white snow on the ground, so I could tell no one else had been walking there. The path seemed to be in the mountains because it was quite steep and had sharp switch back corners with mounded sides of bare light orangeish colored earth. At one place on the fence someone had written three times one on top the other: Ice Warrior. When I arrived at the bottom of the path it opened into a sort of meadow with trees and a few spring flowers showing.

Well, off to work I go. Hope your day is sweet and fine.

Casting Pearls Before Swine

Casting Pearls Before Swine
Right wing funny warning: this is pretty cool.

Post shower relaxation

Broke out about another acre of ground this afternoon: hot, dusty, gritty work. Also loud and smoky.
But I feel much better now.

Have a bunch of items to take back to the library tomorrow. Some I finished some I didn't.

After last night's delightful dreamlet I'm looking forward to what tonight might bring. It's always sort of like panning for gold or fishing. You just let it happen and accept what comes to you. I wonder if I can dream about something that someone posts in my comments before I read it? That would be freaky. Nothing gross please. I will chose not to dream of anything someone might write which I would find unpleasant so save yourself the trouble if you're cruel. Otherwise any suggestion will be interesting and I'll post any results of weirdness. Might even make that a weekly feature.

Sending you freedom and exuberant thrills of happiness.

Yet another thing to worry Rae Ann

Positive Liberty describes a drug-war torture incident in Campbell County, Tennessee including a link to a 40 minute recording of the incident made by his wife.
Oh America, how I cry for thee...

Springity spring

Another delightful warm day in the fields. Just got through watering the big greenhouse again, 99 degrees on the ground and everything is growing great.
Earlier I went to the big city of Medford and spent out about 600$ for drip tape, irrigration parts and sundry others. These hallucinatory oil prices are killing me! And still 2 months at least until cash flow which means the credit card companies are very happy.

It is so beautiful out there today. A few puffy clouds again but the sky is mostly tending towards azure. The shadows have an unusually lively and refreshing quality on such a fine spring day. Like the faint after taste of winter still lingering on the world's tongue.

Only one dream of interest last night. It was early in the day and a spring shower lashed the yard between mom and dad's house and the maintenance shop. A feather blew by as splatterings of rain covered me. The first time ever I actually felt the rain on my skin in a dream. I grabbed the quill of the feather and it pulled me into the sky, tumbling in the wind with the rain drops.

A day of happiness and freedom to you.

The price of hubris

Ahhhggg! Apparently it is alright to feel like a god but when you admit to it that's a bit much. My back is so sore and I've had a rotten afternoon. I can't get the darn emulator for my Smartphone program to work right. The emulator runs but the stupid VB embedded program environment won't hook to the emulator correctly for some reason. I had the same problem 2 years ago when I did some PocketPC programming but I can't remember how I fixed it. After that my main computer crashed and one of my acquaintances had to poop in my cheerios (figuratively speaking) It always sucks when someone not actually part of your business has influence over how your plans are going to be directed. I won't name names but someone decided they didn't like the way I was designing part of my program and decided to interfere. Thus causing me much angst. What good is being in business for yourself when someone else can force a change in the direction of your operation? I don't mind the change in direction, it's the almost 100% certain loss of money that pisses me off! And it always has to come out of my wallet never anyone elses.

Ah well enough whining. I'm glad to be alive on this bright green and blue ball of mud.

May the sky and sun and moon and stars smile upon you.

Plowmeister

Woo-hoo!
Man, have I had a long day of breaking earth. I don't take my ego seriously at all, it's the best thing in the world to laugh at but sometimes when the tractor is roaring like some ferocious beast and ground is grinding and crushing and plunging under steel blades of mighty infernal smoke belching machinery and my tiny frail human form is mastering muscle and hand-eye coordination to control the whole fearsome mess I feel like a FREAKING GOD!

And it was a terribly lovely day with puffy white clouds blowing around a limpid blue sky. I don't really know what limpid is but it looks right in that sentence.

No dreams to report from last night, thankfully. That was getting to be a bit much.

Will probably take a short nap and then go do some work in the vineyard. Need to cut a bit of regrown blackberries and maybe trim a few more grapes before they get too far out of dormancy.

Wishing your day full of energy and joy and lightness of spirit.

And even more insanity

While I'm on the whole intellectual property subject: here's some more insanity to show us all where the world is headed

more fascinating stuff

The Creative Commons seems to me a pretty smart organization. Somewhere in the world some control freaks (either in gov't or industry like the RIAA) are totally freaking out!

Happy Dirt Day

Yesterday was Earth Day so I declare today Dirt Day:

If you click to get the bigger view on this one you can see our ol' 806 international which needs a new fuel pump, starter and some cam inserts. It's on the left behind the dirt. The dirt was so beautiful I decided we needed 2 images for your edification. In the one below you can see some of the mobile home park which is next door.

deep dreams

Some heavy stuff last night, even a tiny bit of lucidity in my dreams.
Found myself visiting with an old friend, Scott Davis. He'd put on some weight. We were at the coast touring through some dilapidated buildings which turned out to be craft shops. At one we found a curio shaped like a translucent red snake wrapped around 2 dice. It reminded me of a ter'angreal from one of Robert Jordan's books and I told Scott about it excitedly. I think my reading about quantum probability influenced that one. I entered a deeper dream state then which is foggy now. An episode of time later I found myself wandering in a swampish region near a desert where some people were having a gathering. I spotted a fellow wearing a turban who kept trying to hide behind a towel draped across a dead tree. In a nearby glade another man was hanging snake skins on a tree to dry. He told me they were for a special charm he was making. I threw up my arms and thunder rumbled in the distance. The man flinched and said "I wish you would stop doing that!" Again some time passed between dreams and I found myself walking across the roof tops of mills and factories in the nearby town of Grant's Pass. I began to traverse a suspension bridge which was made of cable and noticed a graduation going on beneath me. The bridge was very high in the air and began to sway and tremble and seemed about to pull apart. Then I woke up.

Now most of that I can tweak a series of psychological perspectives out of easily enough. Much of the rest I can derive from reprocessed memory. The last bit was particularly vivid as if lit by early morning spring light. But really nothing of significance there except for the further practice of refining my dream attention. Maybe a little insight about the mullah snake magic if one believes in such things. I avoid the blindness of skepticism as much as I do that of credulence.

Well, it may be Sunday but the good weather forces me back onto the tractor today. If I knew for sure it would rain Tuesday I'd wait but since chances are low I've got to bust down everything I plowed yesterday with a disc today or I'll be planting in slabs of sun baked adobe.

Freedom and happiness!

Going to bed early

Because I is so tired. I'll try to get pics of the field up tomorrow morn.
Blog on lovely world.

Chance and stupidity

Ifni (goddess of chance and numbers) taught me a lesson about keeping my mind on the job. I was moving the cement mixer down by the big greenhouse, still frittering to myself about complaining neighbors, when I forgot that the mixer handle folds in one direction. As the thing got going down hill the mixer barrel got over center and the handle folded thus flipping it onto it's side and jamming one of the foot pads into the soft flesh above my left knees. Gave myself a nice little furrow of my own about 3 inches long. Son-of-&!#(% you can imagine I turned the air blue for a few minutes as I limped into the house for some bandage and tape.

But other than that the day has gone well. Almost done plowing last year's cantaloupe field. Will try and get a pic of that up here for your edification.

One sided civility

Getting some plowing done this morning with the ol' 165 Massey. A lovely morning with puffy clouds.

Had the neighbor flag me down and complain that I'd left the radio on in my greenhouse over night and it had kept her awake. So sorry about that, you can be sure it won't happen again. It amuses and worries me when I have such an encounter. She mentioned that other people in the mobile home park had been over-hearing my radio during the day. So now I'll remove that from the greenhouse. Because in this day and age of civil complaints and warrantless lawsuits I just can't take the risk of offending any one of the 50+ people in that mobile home park. Sure, it's ok for them to throw empty spray cans, wood scrap, paper towel rolls, broken toys, old plastic containers and an assortment of other junk over the fence into my fields but if even one of them go to the county with a complaint about dust, noise or smell from my farm then Bam! restraining order and/or financial penalty on me. Never mind all the years that someone from the mobile home park has stolen corn from my fields. Apparently civility is a one way street. I think the real reason they didn't like my radio playing was that it was tuned to Lars Larson.

Anyhow, done with my little break and snack so I've gotta get back out on the tractor and start plowing the next field. This'll be where we plant white corn this year, was the cantaloupe field last year so there should be some good residual calcium to help the white corn be especially fine.

Wishing you freedom and happiness.

Blogriculture

Shameless elf promotion. Oops, I mean Self promotion.
I've been linked by yet another blog! check it:
Blogriculture
Thank you Capital Press.
That makes 2, I hope I can stand the fame!

Brrrr....

Something to give you the chills. {warning! graphic images from Iraq }

Looking forward to Glenn Reynold's new book

New Atlantis has a great excerpt from Glen Reynold's upcoming book "An army of Davids" which I am now totally looking forward to. I might even Buy this one. Nobody tell the library, ok?

The article is called "The rise of the guerrilla media" and it's about us, the bloggers. Since we're all immense egotists I'm sure you'll all love it as much as I did.

I can substantiate the fact that I've been telling my friends something like this for years, although I wasn't thinking of blogs at the time. To me the big transformative media change was going to come from what I saw as the obvious convergence of 3 technologies: the cell phone, live streaming video and GPS. Put these together with a little cryptographic trickery to prevent faking and you have the perfect witness. Events will be recorded with unquestionable veracity especially if more than one witness is present.

I feel like a bum Friday

I feel like a bum because I didn't work very hard today. Got up a little late (6:30!) did a little computer stuff, planted a few trays of melons, got ready for a new software project involving smart phones (just what I need!) then went over to the second farm and sprayed the roads with round-up while dad disc'd the field with the 165 Massey Ferguson. Only serious work I did today was pulling up the old rug from our selling room, that was hard but didn't take but about 20 minutes. Came home, watered the greenhouse and planted a tray of "Planter's Jumbo" cantaloupe and "Jumbo Hale's Best" similar but different varieties.

So all in all I was pretty much a slacker today. If anyone has some good ideas for smart phone programs they'd like to have just let me know, I'm gonna need some projects to stretch my mental muscles on. Will most likely write the first programs in Visual Basic Embedded and only move to VC++E if I have to. I hate C++ it's just an excuse for some programmers to be obtuse. I wonder what the situation with Java is on smart phones? I'll have to look into that, I really like Java (both the code and the drink.)

Wish the world freedom and giggles.

Collective artificial stupidity

Oh, this is just too good a giggle. Big thanks to the Egyptian Sandmonkey for pointing me too this most illustrious source of Unformation: The Uncylopedia

synthetic knowledge

I've heard of artificial flavoring but not synthetic knowledge.
Bookmarked this fella about 2 months ago and then forgot all about him. He's got some good brain morsels in his writing.

Watermelon me worry?

Spent much of the day in a steaming hot greenhouse planting cantaloupes and seedless watermelon. With the radio tuned to classical music instead of talk radio it was easy to forget the problems eating at the human world. I was busy making things grow and that is the best effort I can make to improve the world so why should I carry the extra burden of worry? Find something real in the world that you like and can do well. (Not just reading web pages and dreaming up angst) Focus on how you can make your private little area as best as possible. That is the only hope we can offer this troubled little world.

Good morning bloggy

Today is planting: melons, melons, melons. 8 kinds of cantaloupe, crenshaw, watermelon all sorts of good stuff.

Only one dream of interest to report from last night. Sometimes I think that things from outside my usual realm of experience impinge upon my dreaming mind. Last night was a good example. Steve and I were driving to one of our high school hang-outs, a swimming hole on Abegg road. Only things were different now, someone had planted huge trees along the left side of the road. The trees where white almost like paperbark birch but instead of branching out like birches they tapered to a single point like delimbed pine trees. They were bundled together with steel bands in places and floated suspended about a concrete like surface. In retrospect they remind me a lot of rockets. Except they whispered in the wind like real trees do and seemed to sway with some internal movement of earth and sky.

You've got to see at this point that there's absolutely nothing about these "trees" which could come from my daily conscioussness or experiences. They don't represent anything and they aren't a reprocessing of my memories as current psychological theory says dreams would be. They must have some exterior source.

A day of freedom and happiness to you.

Tell the president of China

Just got through with another Chinese frustration torture ala Walmart.

Had a battery that I needed to charge, it was drained (not dead, just out of juice) and I needed a new battery charger so on the way home from my niece's softball game dad stopped at Walmart; bought me their best (made in China) battery charger.

When hooked to the battery it refused to charge, just kept flashing the "Check" light. Turns out they designed it as a "smart" battery charger which is supposed to detect the battery before it will start charging. I'm standing there staring at the thing. With a little testing I figure out one thing: it works great when hooked to a battery which is already charged. Now just how smart is that? As safety features go it stinks since now I'm tempted to go on a shooting spree in Walmart, since I can't go on one in China (totally kidding here, I'd never do such a thing!)

It makes me wonder if I should be afraid of the Chinese because it is such a clever way to destroy a country: by undercutting their business competition with low price goods which in turn are utterly useless to the consumer who is forced to endure another wasted trip to Walmart. Or, should I feel sorry for them because this is actually their gods-honest best attempt at manufacturing something which should be a simple product?

Anyways, here's a picture of the damn thing, try to avoid it:

Status Quo: no mo'

During today's brief shutdown of blogger I came inside from watering the 107 degree greenhouse (whew!) and watched a little TV. Skipping from news channel to news channel, history, diy, hgtv, discovery it really got me thinking of a recent post by Lubos Motl.

I more readily find fulfillment of my entertainment and information needs through blogs and the web than I have any hope of doing through broadcast TV. Furthermore reviews of products and services by my fellow bloggers are collectively more reliable despite any corruption due to commercial agencies or special interests. This is sort of a case of what David Brin calls "reciprocal accountability" and a very fine concept it is. If only we could get this sort of accountability from our elected officials.

My hope is that as this medium continues to enrich our lives it also gives us all some advantage which will become evident to those who are averse to seeking out and exploring the blogiverse; lowering their natural resistance to new things. Perhaps there is a threshold of connectedness, a sort of critical mass of understanding beyond which we as a collective could finally realize some of those dreams that individuals have always sought from their society. I'm not about to suggest peace would be one of those: that's too grandiose a dream for this realist. But if we could solve some of the little problems in each of our lives maybe we could then each work on solving those problems which are in all of our lives.

And that's Guy's Groovy thought of the day. Be Happy.

A lovely spring day

To spite the enemies of freedom and joy here is a happy picture of Fielder Mountain.

Early to bed, early to rise

But I'm neither wealthy nor wise.
No significant dreams to report, one minor dream of being back at North Valley high school. Steve was there and I kept finding handfuls of electronics parts scattered around, mostly coils and circuit boards. Go figure! Oh, and I dreamt of borrowing someone's flute although I didn't start playing the flute until years after high school and those were all handmade bamboo flutes, not the silver kind that comes in a case.

Today is another fruit tree spraying day and start filling pony-paks after I go to Ace and get some soil. But first I have to water the big greenhouse (you can find pictures of that in my January archive, I think)

Have a wonderful day of enlightenment and delightenment.

The Lumley Vampire "underground" NEWSLETTER: Persuasive Interrogation

Wow! the blogosphere has tuned into me, trying to like totally cheer me up. Another funny story from
The Lumley Vampire "underground" NEWSLETTER: Persuasive Interrogation

ReLo Angst: It's Just a Numbers Game

Oh man, I don't know why but this story made me laugh. It was nice to have a lighter mood after today's political nightmares... Hope you enjoy it.
ReLo Angst: It's Just a Numbers Game

McCane-Kennedy nightmare

Apparently the American people are about to receive a spiritual a$$ fu(K!ng courtesy of that fat windbag drunk driver Tedward Kennedy. He has proposed a bill which will allow 30 million foreigners to legally invade our country over the next few years. Almost 10% of the population will be people who have nothing in common with us, not language, not loyalty, not philosophy not even hygene. (Oh yeah, and now I'm instantly labelled a racist just because I care about the country we live in.)

The sadistic bastards in Iran are chuckling with glee as they cook up nuclear death and those lousy liberal bastards and republican sell-outs are playing social grab-ass with our culture. If my psyche weren't already numb from the constant erosion of common sense in America I'd be sick to my stomach. But you know what? I'm gonna get up tomorrow morning and go back to work and keep on making my little corner of the universe the best place I can. And when some moslem terrorist roasts Ted Kennedy's fat backside with a nuclear bomb I'll just say "Told ya so!" and I won't even feel bad about it because I'll still be too numb.

A limited time offer!

For a brief time only I'm making my Enormous List Of Blogs available to the general public. Don't get your hopes up! Although this is a pretty big list, the categories aren't linked to a single index yet and my brain works in weird ways so figuring out the categories might weird you out. But every single blog is from someone who is a REAL PERSON and not some commercial entity. Well, ok, except a few under bizness.
Enjoy!

Yae! the pony-paks are here!

Finally. Now I can plant another 7200 wonderful flavor generating machines for the delight and wonderment of my human consumption units.

Mainstream media info conspiracy?

I've been following some disconcerting news from Alexandria Egypt via the Egyptian Sandmonkey and Big Pharaoh apparently there has been some remarkable violence there between Coptic Christians and muslims since Good Friday. I've been watching and watching all 5 major news channels (on cable) Fox, both CNNs, MSNBC and that other one CNBC, I think. Not a single channel has mentioned this outbreak of sectarian violence once in the last 5 days. What's the deal? Do they really think that Katty Couric changing jobs or the lacrosse team getting busted for alleged rape is more important to us? Or is my dad right (as he so often is) and there is a program of disinformation in place yet again. I know what Uncle Al would say, or I can imagine something sufficiently caustic. Even KCMX talk radio with Bill, Lars, and Mike haven't popped this up on their radar. Weird!

A bibliophile's nightmare

Whoa is me! Calamity, disaster and despair.
I just found out that the Jackson county library system has had it's O&C funding pulled. If we don't get a districting bond passed between now and next summer we'll lose all 15 branch libraries.
If you haven't had the fortune to enter a Jackson county library, let me tell you! It is one of the finest library system's I've ever been in. Certainly the best on the west coast. I've been in libraries in every major city from San Diego to Seattle and on the whole none of them can beat the service, efficiency and efficacy of the Jackson county library system.
And to really ice my aggravation cake I've found out that the county commissioners are playing political pool in an attempt to leverage the library system, basically holding the libraries hostage. Neither of our senators are doing anything about it either. And el Presidente supremo Boosh has denied any extension to our O&C funds as well.
The clouds of stupidity gather on the horizon of southern Oregon. Will the rain of chaos come and wash away all those who might dare to learn and think?

Monday's aren't so bad...

Just got back from a delightful breakfast with my friend Del at the Powderhorn Cafe. They have some really wonderful biscuits and gravy. Del is a retired junior high school science and math teacher and we have some of the most pleasant conversations, subjects ranging from quantum physics to social dynamics to our favorite foods and other elements of personal history. It is vastly interesting the coincidences between my life and the lives of my friends.

Waiting for the plastic pony-pak trays to show up for my greenhouse operation; bummer. I've got a few dozen I can scavenge from last year but they're a pain in the behind to use.

Only one interesting dream to report from last night: was visiting my uncle in Colorado Springs and found myself relaxing with a lovely lady on my arm while watching some movie or another. Very peculiar that as I haven't had a girl friend in some years much less one while being in Colorado. Then she and I went to the coast and she kept freaking me out by talking like the susuration of the surf. "Quit it! You're freaking me out!" I told her. She had a shopping list at the top of which was a CCD camera, that especially charmed me since most people would have written digital camera, not Charge Coupled Device (which is what CCD stands for) I think it was the fact that she knew what CCD meant that charmed me. Then she stuck the list to the bottom of my bare foot and laughed at me. Anyhow, no idea where the content of that dream originated, would almost certainly have to categories it as "external influences"

Hoping your day is peaceful and vigorously full of freedom.

Easter morning excitement

Whoa!
One of the heating coils in our small greenhouse (which is against the back of mom and dad's house) decided this was a good time to burn out. So shortly after 9am the smell of burning plastic began to pervade the house. Thank God we didn't go out for Easter breakfast with the family! Quickly the three of us were searching for the frightening smell. "Out back, the greenhouse!" dad shouted. I dashed up the steps and around the side of the house. Sure enough, black smoke filled the small space. Dad was on my heals with the fire extinguisher. He held his breath and ran in, already small 4-5 inch flames could be seen above the sprouting table. One big Swoosh of extinguisher powder and the thing was dead. Dad and I were shaking and almost laughing with relief.

That was a couple of hours ago. No damage to the house but what a smell! Icky, icky, icky! We lost about 100$ worth of sprouts but who cares about that? I can replace them easily enough. A couple of big fans running in the doors and the house is almost clear of the stink.

Anyhow, hope your Easter is safe, fun and peaceful. God bless.

Rain makes blogs

I'm out of pony-paks and almost out of potting soil and it's pi$$ing down rain so I'm being a delinquent and writing lots of blogs today. Just found this site: Porkbusters These people are freaking awesome! Please visit them and pass the link on to someone else.

And another one

Just because it inflates my ego!

You Are Internal - Realist - Powerful

You feel your life is controlled internally. If you want something, you make it happen. You don't wait around for things to go your way. You value your independence and don't like others to have control. You are a realist when it comes to luck. You don't attribute everything to luck, but you do know some things are random. You don't beat yourself up when bad things happen to you... But you do your best to try to make your own luck. When it comes to who's in charge, it's you. Life is a kingdom, and you're the grand ruler. You don't care much about what others think. But they better care what you think!

The Three Dimension Luck and Power Test

Yep, that's me alright...

Another of those silly blog things

Here's one of those weird blog elements you can get for free. I kinda liked this one today so I decided to put it here. I've been reading a lot on quantum mechanics and string theory lately so the probability angle on this seemed pretty cool right now.

You Are The Wheel of Fortune

You represent the cycles of life, death, and rebirth. You embrace change, the the ups and downs of life. Fate is something you accept, even when you could possibly change things. Big things tend to happen to you more than other people. Your fortune: Something huge is about to happen in your life, and you have little control over it. You must accept your destiny, but luckily it is good fortune that has come your way. Big things and big changes are about to come your way. And while things will be intense for a while, they will be followed by a period of rest.

What Tarot Card Are You?

Rain this morning, Spray this afternoon

It's lovely and wet out there this morning. So peaceful and calm beneath the low grey sky.
Will spend part of this drippy morning repairing the spray rig so I can put copper fungicide on the fruit trees later today. One of those tasks I'm not terribly excited about doing but it has to be done despite any dislike of mine. Always rewarding to know the trees are happy though.

Nothing special to report in the dream domain. Did spend part of yesterday working on some sounds for the 3DML dreamroom project I've imagined up. Going to be using binaural brainwave guiding to produce some special dreamy effects. If you haven't got the flatland rover for use with 3DML you're missing out, it's plenty fun especially if you like playing god or goddess. Check it out at Flatland.

May your day be full of happiness and struggle that leaves you stronger.

Illegal immigration and farm workers

Had a friend ask me if new immigration laws would affect me. Apparently they assumed I was using cheap migrant workers on my farm. I had to make my self very patient and explain that I couldn't afford migrant workers or the inclement insurance issues that go with them. They seemed stunned that I was able to operate this entire business with just me and dad and the occasional assistance of a niece or other relative.

My first impulse when faced with a labor need isn't to go looking for some poor shmuck who can't find anything else to do. I automatically turn to further automation. Machines always work better than humans. And I think this is really the case for anyone seriously thinking of achieving a productive goal.

The reason I had to be patient while explaining this to my friend? My grandfather had to work hard for over ten years to become an American citizen. He and his entire family had to completely abandon their native language, Dutch (it was the law at the time) and my father and his siblings had to endure what can only be described as racism from English speaking whites as they entered the American mainstream. And yet we are all happy to be Americans, we pay our taxes and obey the laws of the land. I don't see any of this dedication on the part of those illegal aliens forcing their way into our country and our economy. Furthermore I and my cousins, third generation Americans, still face the after effects of the financial burden placed upon my grandfather's family when coming to this country. No one will ever pay reparations to us, entitle us or provide us with the additional services many illegals now enjoy for free. And why not? Because we are legal white citizens.

America is the greatest country on earth, a beacon of freedom and prosperity that everyone in every country yearns to emulate despite their despots' best efforts to suppress the truth. My people came here legally because of this and will continue to contribute to that greatness. We won't be swamped beneath a tide of cowardice and despair which has nothing but contempt for the people of this great country.

Feeling good

Another hot day in the big greenhouse. Started moving cukes and melons off the tables and onto a holding pattern on the floor. Still putting in lettuces and more new melons, winter squash etc. Also making another attempt at papaya but I think the seed is too old so I way over planted those. Will be interesting to see if I can get them up and growing better than the ones I lost last year (damn all spidermites!) if the papaya grow I'll keep them in the greenhouse as late as I can and then move them into big pots for the rest of the summer. Then if all goes according to plan I'll plant them in the center of the big greenhouse next fall and maybe by summer '07 I'll be the only Oregon papaya producer. Not really a financially viable crop, just trying to prove my superior gardening prowess.

No significant dreams to report from last night. Just one weird one about living in an apartment complex, apartment 4B. Icky, icky, icky! The Guy don't never want to live in a little box. Must have sky over head or just as well be dead.

Wishing you the love of the spirit and freedom.

Hopefully I won't offend blogger

I love writing using blogger. Blogging is a fun release wherein I can pretend that someone cares.
However I've really got to wonder about the other blogs out there. I've just been hitting the "next blog" button for a while and what a raft of absolute shlock I had to drift through just to find one or two blogs by real people who were only slightly less interesting than my own random ramblings about farming and my nightly sojourns into the realm of dreams. Most everything is either some bizarre commercial attempt or else just completely un-interesting. Furthermore since I only speak a smattering of Germanic languages, very few of the enormous scaffold of blogs in spanish, portugese and/or the dozens of other languages are anything more than an irritant. A nod to you multi-cultural snobs: yes I know these people are real valuable human beings with feelings and rights, yadda, yadda, yadda. Doesn't mean jack to me bub. On more than a few occasions I've found Japanese blogs which were delightful even though I couldn't read a smek of it. Why Japanese? I don't know, but some of them make really cool blogs especially some of the freaky anime/tech/geek/nerd stuff. Rock on you Jappy brain-cases!
Anyhow, on back on the subject of dreams: this place is really cool. I printed up one of the entry point images and hung it in the barn at a place I pass by every day. Sure hope I can orient while dreaming and find my way there. Will be the first time I've actually tried to control my dreams with a real target in mind. Should be worth the effort just for the sake of some inner discipline and exploration if nothing else.

In the greenhouse many, many cantaloupe and cucumbers have emerged from the soil. Watermelon are also starting to pop up along with the first of the specialty eggplant from Baker Creek Seeds.

Still wishing you love and freedom.

Workaday

Planting mix:
8 parts peat moss
7 parts vermiculite
3 parts perlite
2 parts sand
1 part dolomite
Actually I'm not sure if that is exactly how I mix it. I've been doing it for so long I don't measure it like that anymore, but it's something like that. I mix the first 4 and add the dolomite and mix it again and then add water.
The lettuce plants that are coming up look super. The melons and cukes have just emerged and also look great but time will tell for sure if everything is right. I lost a fair number of tomato plants to botrytis because I let them get too damp, dang it!

Dreams continue to haunt. Not as compulsive or weirdly threatening, but the night before last I struggled with the wall of fog and early this morning I dreamt a strikingly real experience of being in my greenhouse. The white of the plastic formed a perfectly uniform perceptual cue not unlike the wall of fog, perhaps transformed into a dome which due to it's familiarity was not so threatening. Also there weren't the weird insectoid angles of dark emanations which I kept getting glimpses of through the wall of fog. Definitely will find the dome of fog much more usable and not so hard to penetrate.

Hoping the spirit finds a way to free your heart.

Daylight driving me out of my mind time

The recent flood of vivid dreams seems to be receding. Only had one episode wherein I was watching an empty warehouse for some odd reason. I have a feeling I was waiting for blind Gregory to show up, not too surprising after his uncalled for ejection of me from his acquaintance. At least I found out exactly how important my "friendship" was to him. Always best to move on smoothly but the subconscious often reflects. Another oddity was the shady tree lined lane or cul-de-sac wherein a lady darkly dressed strolled up to me unexpectedly from between the trees. A brunette with oddly hispanic/asian features. Slender and graceful she frightened me from the shadows.

Out of sorts during the daylight due to savings time. That and the encroaching allergy season getting its hooks into me. Still, getting some good planting done as well as a little reading. Ray Kurzweil's book "The Singularity is Near" is sort of inspiring although heavy on supposition. Nice to read something with a positive incline after reading Robert Spencer's book "Onward Moslem Soldier" which I suggest everyone who cares for freedom to read. It might ruin a nights sleep but better that than school bombings.

May the Dragon's eye pass you by and the shining light of freedom show you the way.

Dreams along the coast

Continuing the saga of dreams fostered by a lack of inebriants, last night was another marathon. This time every dream and dream sub-scene contained a coastal reference. Firstly just traveling along that oddly unique roadway that is the coastal route. Escaping from an assortment of pursuers I found myself in a tour boat, witnessing whales and the rocky shore so common along Oregon's coast. (I should note that I've never been on the ocean so my imagery sprang from somewhere else; a mix of river trips and TV shows perhaps?) I spent a little time exploring green and mossy tidepools slimey with algae. I began to feel queasy and someone kissed me on top the head and I felt better. Then I was thinking of buying a bowling alley/movie plex which was slowly moldering in the salty ocean air, probably at or near Brookings. Some people with children in a van came by and gave me and the lady I was with (? That's a new one worth noting) a ride to a different local, a wind swept but heavily forested hill high above the ocean with new paving on the road. There was much more but it is now becoming lost in the fog of daily awareness.

Today: more planting, repair the spray rig so I can hop on protecting the fruit trees whenever the weather turns dry enough again. Dad and Bro are gonna go take down the sawmill frame from the hill where we were cutting oak planks a couple days ago.

Hoping the spirit spices your life with some vivid moments and breathe-taking freedom.

Last night and today

Whew! Vivid and intense semi-lucid dreams last night.
Started out visiting with Steve and his family. Pat got ahold of the knife I got for christmas last year and broke the blade. In a rage I managed to restrain myself and while my arm was shaking I forced myself to put the knife down on the table rather than stabbing anyone. Then I was sucked into one of the gaps in the broken blade and found myself on a bus trip to a campus where I was lost but could move with fluid grace and lightness of body. Climbing walls like a spider by rocky handholds I could also fly but when I flew towards the ceiling of one corridor's tiled roof the brick like texture kept receding. The higher I flew the bigger the volume I was in became until my flight created a huge cavern. I dropped to earth and found my way through watery waysides and liquid landscaping lined with blue primroses, daffodils and azalea. I couldn't get out of the interminable corridors, but unlike such dreams in the past I refused to awaken. I persisted in searching for a way out and found my way to a place where the road led into a great chasm looking off into a vast wooded space which terrified me. A lady who looked a little like my niece Charley told me which way to go and I found my way back through a restaurant with red velvet walls and onto the bus I had earlier departed only now I was carrying a bag full of items which weighed me down and kept my movement from being so graceful. My friend Steve showed up again at this point and I think he helped carry the bag because motion became much easier. We found our way to an auditorium where some people were waiting for us and the show was about to start. Just before I woke up I had a vivid image of Mt Hood with no snow on it. This description doesn't do the dream justice because it lacks in every way the immediacy and intensity of the experience but it was fun for once.

Today was a great day for work. Planting cantaloupe and cabbage. The big greenhouse is nowhere near full yet but it's definitely shaping up. Dad and I went to the second field and laid out flags for the new fence, a job which looms large and burdensome.

Wishing you freedom and joy.

Steve and Trish and Boss

Well I got at least the one pic uploaded. We found some wonderful agates, Steve found a very nice piece of fossilized wood and I found a super nice rock with bivalve shell fossils in it on the beach that day. Salishan is a lovely place. Boss is the little white one.

Planting, planting, planting

Many thousands of seeds in the ground. Been listening to Deepak Chopra's "Healing sounds" pretty much just the Rig Veda on CD. Still, very much better than trying to read the lousy English translations I've found so far. Fascinating how much the philosophy parallels much of what is recounted in Castaneda's work. Although the toltec seemed to be much more practice oriented.
Dreams have been vivid lately, likely due to the lack of intoxicants messing up my perceptions. Although lots of fun, much of the dream realm has been morbid and grotesque in the last few days. Strange alien snail/slug things drilling into the lower part of my consciousness. Unpleasant. Also got zapped by a ribosome diagram last night. Weird that one. As usual, any advances in awareness brings the unwelcome attention of things from beyond. As if I were a bright and sparkly gem tumbling in the surf of time.
Most likely the morbidity is partly due to the reflection of the current state of affairs in the national and international scene vis-a-vis the nightly news. Also falling asleep after watching the sci-fi channel (and it's freaky commercials) doesn't help any. Ah, but were would we be without struggle?
The lettuce is sprouting great, another 566 of those planted today. Need to get onto rooting tea-rose cuttings and mums. Also have started peppers, melons and other large fruit plantings.
I know I promised picture of the coast, will try to get to those soon.
Hope life is filling you with light and freedom.

Long time no blog

Wow! So much has happened since last week. Spent the weekend at Steve's (starting Thursday evening actually!) we had a blast, I even got a little tipsy on wine. Steve's wife Tricia made a delightful fish stew with crabs and clams that Steve and I gathered Friday.
I actually managed to forget all my worries Saturday. On Sunday Pat (Tricia's son) and I watched the last 2 Harry Potter movies, they were pretty good. I will upload pics of the coast when I bring my camera cable in tomorrow.
Monday I got home late and came down with the flu (ICK!) feeling much better now though. Spent most of yesterday just getting two 288 flats planted with lettuce and taking long, healing naps.
Hooray! It's spring. I have to celebrate now since I was absorbed during the equinox, a very magical time for us farmers.
Here's a wish that life fills you with radiant joy and exuberant freedom!

Mighty Transplanting of Justice!

Or something like that. I used to love that animated show "The Tic!"
Today has been more 288 trays (endive, head lettuce, raddichio etc.) and also transplanting some wonderful bromeliads I got from the budmeister Butch Cox. He's gone but his plants live on. And they've completely overgrown the pots they were in so I'm tearing them apart and replanting into 5 inch round pots. Really some nice bromeliads, I should end up with about 50 or so. Just gotta love that big greenhouse on these rainy days. It's so warm and comforting in there. Safe in a world of terror and tribulation.
Hope your day is fiercely free and wonderfully amazing.

Sprout moving day

Moving masses of plants from the little greenhouse to the big greenhouse today. Also setting up heating wires for bottom heat. Also, also, planting some more 288 trays of lettuce and cole crops.
Circumstances are looking good for me to take a couple days off this weekend and go see Steve and his family. (Sorry Mike, know I told you I couldnt make it up there for the gig but this just sort of happened to fall together, blame it on St Patty....)
Hope everyone reading this enjoys that feeling of free will. Let it light up your mind!

Snow on the mountain

Not much else to say here. Very busy in the greenhouse. Had a weird shock yesterday when blind Gregory sent me a nasty email. Don't know what crawled up his a**, but I don't have time to care. Probably a misunderstanding brought on by the "cognitive impairment" caused by his MS. Oh well, his wife is a nice lady but all things considered I'm better off not having to put up with him.
Here's the mountain:

A brief lull

Got a few moments. They sky is blue with bright, puffy white clouds blowing around. Been moving plants into the big greenhouse (mums mostly) and doing a little planting today.
Having one of those "inertia" moments where the difference between my state of mind and the physical present have diverged too much. And not even the illusion of memory can compensate for it. I know if I wait a while something will come up to distract me or either my state of mind or the state of physical being around me will once more synch up. But until then this is a morose and combersome sensation. It all started last night when I spent some time reading up on "cold fusion" a subject I had thought was dead but turns out to have a little life left in it after all.
So that has absorbed a bunch of my cognitive power and meanwhile the workload on ther farm has been continuing to increase thus the divergence.
Freedom and joy to you.

Busy is as busy does

You can tell from lack of recent posts just how things have been going. With the big greenhouse up and the little greenhouse quickly filling with sprouts not even the recent rains have given me time to sit down and write.
There is some gorgeous snows on the surrounding mountains. If time allows I'll post a pic later.
Dad is out planting mixed greens and veggies in a corner of the big greenhouse. Some for sale and some for us to eat. Nothing beats fresh veggies.
May the spirit guide you to freedom today and the sky smile upon your efforts.

Busy for a sunday.

Got a few hours of pruning in, worked in the little greenhouse. Dad is out tilling.
Thinking of working on some new image manipulation routines. Been reading a book on "magic squares" by Clifford Pickover and it's given me lots of ideas for some new pixel manipulation routines. Gonna have to think on it some more.
No dreams in the last few nights, at least none pleasant enough to report. Scary times on planet earth as the forces of chaos attempt to set their hooks firmly into the crust of our world. The shadows of great and ancient struggles heave across the mindscape of humanity. Here and there a brave soul struggles to keep their little pocket of time afloat. Ravening hoards driven by demons and lured by genies lash at the strugglers. Reason's bright light throws back the screaming masses from time to time as the strugglers seek to put one foot forward after the other time and again. Unbending intent burns from our eyes and from our hearts as we strive to set the world on a course which glimmers faintly like a distant beacon. Will we complete the new pattern in time, or will our bodies fail us so that the hopes of beauty and the wonders of knowledge are lost forever? Will the wrath and anger of that thing from the universe continue to devour our fellow humans or do we still have a chance to triumph against that which calls itself the truth but lives upon the suffering and harrowing of human minds and souls? Prayers were not enough to silence it's hunger and violence only enlarges it's reach. Can the answer be found? Can the jewel return from the depths?

Pruning and other minor activities

Raking, planting, blackberry cutting. Just got a little weak and came in for a hot dog. Going out now to plant brocoli.
Hope the sky and sun smile on you, or cry for you if you need the rain.

More sun, more work

Getting the fields at our second location ready for soil prep. Picking up hard debris (wood, posts, plastic film, pipe, etc.) and also spent a good part of today and yesterday harvesting dahlia tubers.
Dad just got through dragging the inside of the greenhouse so we'll be moving a table in there for planting/sprouting. Less than 100 days until we open if all goes right.
May the sky and earth be as kind to you.

The Big Greenhouse

The air supported greenhouse is up and working great. Here's pics:
140x35x13high
Outside










Inside:













Notice the black pipe laced with poly rope to keep the thing from huffing in the wind.
Total cost about 1000$ including fan and motor for air support. The plastic has a four year gaurantee but I should be able to get an extra year or two out of it because we take it down and cover it in summer. This is the second year we've had this one up so 2-3 more for sure. The discoloration to the right is just a little dirt that got on it and should wash off in the next rain.

Friday, my Friday!

Had a great breakfast with Del this morning. Snow flakes were blowing around as our conversation similarly swirled and floated from subject to subject. Dotty's diner makes superlative chicken fried steak!
Then dad and I went to the welding shop and worked on the box scraper and the cement mixer. The mixer is almost done but still lots of cutting and welding to do on the scraper.
Last night's dream were mixed to varied. Some lady stuff, some monumental fears. Nothing vivid enough to recreate here.
Might go visit blind Gregory this evening if the rest of today's work doesn't leave me too tired.
A hundred and one happinesses for you.

Arduous day of shoveling

Back pain lets me know that I'm alive.
Had a great day, got a lot done. Shovel, shovel, shovel and the big greenhouse is almost ready to be "erected" I'll definitely have photos to show. It's 140x35 air inflated and I freakin' love it. There's no place that's quite like the inside of a greenhouse. So warm, so humid, so full of love.
It's hard after such a successful day to still face all the things we must do before opening for the spring season. We'll be opening much earlier this year with lettuce, onions and lots of other salad products. Maybe even as early as May. But that's only like 100 days. Madness!
Hope life is giving you sweet kisses.

Farming Saturday

Today: pruned fruit trees and pulled up stakes from last year's tomato field.
Last night I had wonderful dreams most of them unremembered. But there was one wherein I suddenly found myself looking at my right hand. My hand blurred like a multi exposure film frame, became outlined by a bright white light which suddenly infused my whole hand. I could feel the light spread throughout my body and it felt great! All the daily aches, pains, fears, angers, etc. were all suddenly gone. Purity.
Unfortunately the waking world still contains the pinched nerve in my back.
I'm just about done reading James Burke's "The day the Universe changed" it's been pretty good if a little weighty. Probably why the tv show was a lot more fun.
Hoping the light is with you today.

Ohhhh I'm getting old

Tired and sore, sore and tired. Got the trees sprayed and helped dad pull up black plastic from last years drip irrigation rows. Also the drip tape, still gotta finish that. If the super delightful weather keeps up we might even have time to work at Charley's. My condolences to their family; Byron's wife Alice went to join him at that great big backyard barbecue in the sky. May the lord comfort them.
Big Greenhouse going up monday, Yae!
(hmmm what's the correct spelling, yay, yae, yai?)
Oooohhh, I'm going to bed.
Ciao!

Spraying copper on the trees

That's my next chore. Have about 17 more trees to spray. Hope I have enough copper mixed up to do it but I'll probably have to make another tank. Just waiting for the temp to get high enough that I won't be chilled while I'm working.
It's actually quite warm. We had one of them there "sorrocos" or whatever blow through last night. A warm gusty breeze from the south ;-)
Hoping your day is full of love and light.

Good weather no blog

It's been such fine weather I've had no time until now to blog. The worst of the blackberries have been removed from the vineyard (thanks to dad's super blackberry shredder) and I've started spraying the apples, pears, peaches, almonds and other fruit trees. Will have before and after pics of the vineyard in a couple of days.
Not many good dreams in the last few days so nothing to report from that realm.
The weather is getting ready for a slight shift, air pressure is going down so my wisdom teeth are aching like usual.
Best wishes to you and yours.

Ready to go

But I can't go. Half way through helping my uncle recover some files from his old computer. The IDE ports failed on his old NEC machine so I'm walking him through the process of moving the HD to his newer computer (still a win98 machine) Mostly he's worried about some land leveling software he needs for his business. Wish I'd had time to finish the 3D terrain modeller that I was writing a few years ago.
It's gonna be another blackberry shredding day. The weather is fine if a bit chilly. Some fog making things grey and dreary but as long as I've got you my mood will turn out fine ;-)
Nice to have it dry again. Supposed to last until Saturday, hurray.
Have a wonderful, wonderful day.

Get infected

I love all life, but especially that fragile creature, Alife...

Breakfast and a sub-tonal vibration in the base of my skull

Feeling weird this morning. A little ache in the base of my skull, could be air pressure changes from this afternnon's approaching weather front or tension leftover from the week's work. Looking forward to Sunday. Not because of the super-bowl! I just want to sleep in.
Just grabbing a bite to eat before heading back out to prune. Apples and grapes and hacking blackberries. Cut blackberry vines have a delightful rose/apple aroma to them. The vineyard has really started to shape up but I've got a ton of apple pruning left to do.
Really wishing I had time and concentration to do some software work right now. I've got about a dozen ideas for improvements to my image manipulator and another dozen ideas for software projects I'd like to start/finish. But if I want the farming season to turn out really well (who'd ever believe I'd end up making less from my software work than I do from my farming?) I've got to put in extra time now. Besides, I'd really like for the pinot noir grapes to do well enough that I could send some "bodlles uv fine Vine" out to mein freunds.

Mandatory daily entry

Gotta at least make one.
Spent most the whole day chopping blackberries. Dad's new shredder/mower needed some last minute repairs but we got it working great now. It shreds blackberries like nothing else. Will have some before and after pics of that part of the vineyard sometimes next week.
Supposed to have about a whole week of good weather next week. Hoping and praying we'll get the big greenhouse up. All it takes is a little drying of the ground. Dad has a great idea about having a sunday brunch for the whole family in the big greenhouse this spring. Greenhouses are just the most copacetic environment. So warm and humid and loving. There's few places I'd rather be in winter than in a greenhouse.
Hope your day is/will be fine and sweet.

Ooooh, back ache of glory

Spent today welding and wrestling with heavy metal. Cast metal to be exact. Here's a pic of what we're working on:













It is a cement mixer barrel. We're rebuilding the base. Should be nice when we're done. This is for pouring cement flagstones/stepping stones and mixing soil in the greenhouse. Can sell the flagstones at the stand as well as to some friends who are doing some of their own landscaping.
My day was difficult but rewarding. Hope your day went well.
Sweet dreams.

Rain last night, work today

Another crazy pouring down Oregon night. This morning it was so fresh and damp outside it almost smelled like being in the coastal forests. I wonder how my friend Steve in Salashan (on the Oregon coast about 3 hours northwest of here) is doing. A couple days ago they were having 70 mile an hour winds.
Today: more welding. Getting the cement mixer put back together.
No dreams to report from last night. My advice: avoid taking CoQ10 in the evening. The metabolic lift it gives will make you sleep poorly as it did me last night.
Hoping your day is sweet and fine.