96.4

But the wind at farm #2 made it much more comfortable than that. Up here on the hill the air is pretty still and the ground is light colored from drying out thus being between earth and sky is like standing in an oven.

The piggy pig bastards at the top of the irrigation ditch are hogging all the water for their lawns and useless (as in not even being used) pastures today. The fact of the matter is that they are just selfish sh!ts who have some hallucination about cooling off their part of the world by running as many sprinklers as they can. The stupid ditch walker put us on a rotation wherein the rich a$$holes further up the ditch get 4 days out of 7 while we and the rest of the unfortunates at the end only get 3. What passes for his reasoning was that when the people at the top weren't using the water on those 4 days some would be left over for us. But this seldom happens, instead people at the top steal water from us on our 3 days anyways and then the ditch is almost always completely dry during their 4 days. This old farm is so sad when the ditch is empty. Like a dusty old child's swing with one broken rope. Grants Pass Irrigation District, get your stuff together! Or die and get it over with.

Fortunately at farm #2 both of our landlords (2 parcels there) give us access to almost totally unlimited water. Charley and Pete, you rock! The cantaloupe over there
have reached the size of softballs, the watermelons are as big as eggs. The corn is tasselling and the first silk is showing up. Tomatoes are as big as golfballs. With the beginning of harvest still about 4-6 weeks off this shines well for a bumper crop.

Wishing you all a delightful day (except for the Byers and other a-holes at the top of my ditch!)

Power and Innocence

Can't have 'em both. A thought provoking article at TCS Daily: When Superman Shrugs

Hot Hot, Busy Busy

Spent this morning and early noon time working with dad and bro at our friend Terry Spencer's house putting down some turf. Terry's dad and son-in-law were there too and we had a fine time laughing and working. But bro set the pace so we worked pretty hard and fast. The lawn looked super when we finished but we were about 200 square feet short so we didn't quite get the total gratification of a job well done but we did do a job well. Terry was going to get some more rolls of turf to finish with when we left for home. With such a little bit to do he didn't need our help to do the last bit. It was a nice break from farming although the melons and the weeds in the corn weighed heavy on my mind all morning.

Tomorrow we will be spraying, fertilizing and prepping the last fields for corn and flowers. Zinnias mostly. And of course some more weeding in the early corn fields. Whew! This heat always reduces my enthusiasm for this line of work but the first taste of melon always restores it. Only three weeks (about) until we start picking corn! Now that is a big source of enthusiasm.

Hoping your day is fine and free.

Irrigation aggravation

The stupid neighbor woman from the bottom of the hill just came up to clean the filter on her intake. Dumb woman! the filter was clean this morning when I walked the ditch and all she succeeded in doing was dumping about a ton of muck and debris into my pump and irrigation system. The reason she has problems with her irrigation is 1) her system is really old, 20+ years and 2) they leave it open all winter long for frogs and insects to nest in and for leaves and other debris to clog. So instead of solving her own problems right off the bat early in the year she'll just play at fixing it all year long and cause me a world of headache twice a week. Dumb woman!

And to add insult to injury she trespasses and blocks my driveway. Some people are just alive because it's illegal to kill 'em. You'd think she was stupid enough to remove herself from the gene pool, but apparently luck is inheritable.

To spite my frustrations I'll wish you a lovely day.

Busy

It was 105.7 monday and 99 yesterday. A few hours off in the hottest part of the day saved my life.

Finally getting the last of the tomatoes tied up. Will also plant 2nd to the last field of corn today. And if there's time put down fertilizer again. Weeds are getting out of hand in a couple of corn fields but somehow we'll muddle through.

Strange dream last night, I dreamt about 2 theatres, both 2 stories tall with an "old west" fashion, lap board painted white (flaking paint) the theatres were on opposite sides of a side street facing the main thoroughfare. The looked almost identical and offered almost exactly the same movies. I was supposed to meet my lady friend there but some other people showed up and distracted me away into some nearby buildings.

Hope your day is cool and pleasant.

103 messing with me

Degrees that is, hot and humid. But my plants seem to be loving it. Especially the melons and tomatoes. Lost some late planted lettuce though.

Here in the dark, quite basement of an old farm house (circa 1943) we can pretend that outside all is fine and dandy. But step out for a minute and the heat closes around you like a fist around a mosquito.

I spent a good part of this afternoon sleeping. Yeeha! did that feel good. Even had a few flickering fluorescences of dreamery, but nothing memorable. It will be several hours still until temp comes down enough to work. Then I'll be shovelling dirt and tamping posts for tieing the tomato wires to. We use a method that we call "controlled sprawl" which isn't quite as good as caging each tomato plant individually but keeps 95 percent of the plants off the ground. Makes for good fertilization and easy picking too.

This heat is super for the corn, especially the warm humid nights. Our first field should be ready about the 20th of July. Probably have corn and squash as our only crops to open with. Tomatoes won't be ready until August 10 or so.

Wishing you a comfy day despite whatever weather you are having.

My birthday, the happiest day of the year

I just found out that my birthday was the happiest day of 2006. Check it out here.

Mandatory daily entry

Saturday June 24th, 2006
Hot. 100+
Sun very intense. Sizzling feeling on skin even with sunscreen on.
Did much watering, some spraying today.
Trapped between earth and sky like a piece of metal between hammer and anvil. Heat reflecting off the hard clay soil.
I gave an extra little drink to the baby watermelons and cants.

Birthday and corn planting

It's been just a lovely day, if a tad hot in 90+ degrees. As I was planting corn today the spray from the spirnklers would occasionally blow over and deliver a cooling burst. But the corn really loves this heat so I don't mind so much. As a matter of fact just about everything in the fields is loving this stuff. Cantaloupe have set on the first fat little fuzzy fruit, almost the size of a dime. No flowers in the watermelon yet, the males will show in another week or two and the females about a week after that. Tomatoes have also set fruit, some nearing the size of a cherry (except the cherry tomatoes which have just started to flower) Peppers are setting on a few early fruit and eggplants have started flowering. The first male zucchini flowers have already fallen off and a few more are about to open.

Wishing you all as lovely a day as I had a birthday.

Here we go again, Again!

"US sky regulator clips wings of Los Angeles police drone"
In this article we read about the LA police using a tiny, basically almost a toy remote controlled plane to remotely view surface roads and neighborhoods with 2 wireless cameras. A superbly great idea which any fifteen year old with a little lawn mowing money could pull off. And for the 15 year old it would be, if not totally legal, at least no big deal.

But damn those policeman for trying to fight crime without kissing every ass between earth and the heaven of regulatory masturbators. Argh! This sort of thing infuriates me. Some jackass at the FAA actually had to go and make a big issue out of what should just be common sense. How many times a year do the thousands of already in service RC airplanes cause mid-air collisions? I can't recall a single incident.

And of course the privacy tweaks had to weigh in on it too. Like any of us are going to be arrested for having a barbecue in our backyards. This device and those who use it purely intend towards crime control. No one would bother to use it for invasion of privacy.

As long as our society is so susceptible to such inane and inherently self-serving influences we will never see the peace-of-mind which we all know hovers just out of reach.

Howdy, New Jersey

Hey diddle, diddle, to Monmouth Junction. Interesting to note there is also a Monmouth, Oregon. I've only been there once but it was nice. What's it like in NJ ?

Religion and Science

Here is a great article about how religion and science go hand-in-hand.

Super summer to all

In the northern hemisphere anyways. Love you Aussies, so happy winter to you.

I'm so delighted with this season; it is impossible for me to work a longer day today than I did yesterday.

Today the nieces were a great help. They pulled weeds in the melons and tomatoes all morning, something which had been concerning me deeply. Dad and I finished putting down fetilizer through the next field of corn. Only need to put down about a ton more for the last few fields and then in a couple weeks we'll switch to sulfate of ammonia for the earlier plantings.

Tomorrow we'll plant white corn again. Not a new crop for us but one we don't usually bother with. Yellow is just better. But we had so many snobs ask for it last year that we will be providing it this year at a substantially higher price ;-) I just can't wait to hear the howls of indignation from the spoiled "want-ers".

Hoping life is giving you lots of lemons for your lemonade.

13 hours until solstice

Well, about that long anyways. Getting lots of final details done but some things are going to come in under the wire. Zinnias for instance. Sunflowers we got in last week and gladiolas (finally!) today but the zinnias might be another day or two. I have some plants I could put in but I haven't got a good place for them yet. Plus temps are getting too high for tranplanting. It is just about time for me to get a couple pics of the farms to put up.

Great news! Both of my youngest nieces (one from sis, one from bro) will be coming to help work tomorrow! Finally get the cantaloupe, watermelon and tomato fields weeded. Plus it is so nice to have an excuse to hang out with them.

We also planted our third or fourth to the last corn field today.

Oh, and fair warning, the big 4 zero happens to me this Friday so if I don't post or am particularly grumpy that day, don't be surprised.

Hope happiness and wonder stop by for to visit with you.

Zea-centric thinking

Even as I type this, as you read this, nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium are being carried by water to the roots of many corn plants. Tomorrow they will start to use these elements to build new chloroplasts. The plants will slowly turn a darker green over the next few days. Their growth will increase dramatically.

That is why dad and I are tired. We spent the day putting down many hundreds and hundreds of pounds of fertilizer. The corn plants will not question this sudden improvement in their fortunes nor will they thank us. They will ruthlessly use this abundance for their own purpose just as I will ruthlessly harvest most if not all their cobs for the delight of my customers.

The tomatoes, cantaloupe and watermelon are also growing very well. I've been using some of my more refined secrets to really push them along and they are about to roll off the green polymulch mounds in which they are planted like a tsunami played back in ultra slow motion. With so many things working in their favor this year the fruit should be particularly sweet, colorful and full of flavor.

Hoping your day is equally so.

Happy Father's day

To any of you lucky dad sorts. Me and my dad are heading over to my bro's in a few minutes to let the dogs out (bro is away at a softball tournament for his daughter, what a dad...)

Today was another long day of back aching work. Planting more cukes, driving stakes for the tomatoes which are growing so fast that I'm getting really stressed about getting all of them staked in time. Sundry other chores like moving water etc.

One interesting dream last night. Was visiting my old pal Bill Lumen and we went out back of his house (which is actually forested) and he showed me this long, huge two story factory type building which he said I was free to use. That was pretty much it. No idea what catagory to squeeze that into.

Hope you all had a great Father's day.

Summer breeze

Another long day of hard work.
While setting water this evening I was forced to move with the breeze. It set my mind to flowing even as it struggled with my irrigation. The light of the nearly setting sun was faintly chiffon and the breeze was warm from the southwest. 22 years ago on this day four teenagers named Alice, Guy, Steve and Trina were driving towards the drive-in theatre in a van going to see Ghostbusters. The sky was clear and the air was warm and freedom tasted so sweet.

I spent a good part of today soil surfing on one of our old cultivators. Dad and I had to laugh that it still worked so well after all these years. We had almost forgotten this piece of equipment but it cut down weeds like an old champion. I wish I'd had my PDA with me to record the sound it made because it was a pretty cool combination of steel, rock and earth sounds. Balancing precariously on that bouncing, rattling steel monster is pretty tiring though.

I'll be going out shortly for one last task in the dark, gotta shut off the water we set earlier. This time of year the world begins to take on an unusual quality for me as my cycles and rhythm and algorithms are broken up by necessity. Some afternoons are so hot I have to stay inside and sleep in the middle of the day and then water needs to be controlled late into the night and very early some mornings. Then some days are so critical in work that I can't stop no matter how hot it gets. My routines disintegrate and stresses build which leave me exhausted and exhilarated.

Soon the solstice will come. The great turning point wherein power and potential exceeds the limits of possibility and the cycle of being turns on a celestial dime. Only a few weeks after that point and all propositions become mute. If the job isn't done it won't get done because the crop won't make in time to do any good after that. Getting "laid by" is mostly just a nice idea for me since even when I'm done planting a raft of other jobs like weed control and intensive irrigation will gobble up my every waking hour.

Wishing you a joyful moment of freedom.

Chaos-In-Motion

Lubos turned me onto a great blog I haven't seen before. Czech it out:
Chaos-In-Motion

One strange dream to report

Wow, this was a weird one. It started out with me watching a bunch of high school kids swimming down at a place we used to visit called White Rock which is one of the granitic boulders of the Grants Pass pluton that the Rogue River flows over. One of their coaches came by and we started talking. He introduced me to some people who were on a soccer team with him who were optometrists. They showed me some of their equipment and told me they were Mennonites. Then one of them got very angry at me and this is where the dream got really strange because I've never had that gut wrenching sensation of someone being angry like "all up in your face" angry in a dream before. The fella was bald with a uniformly waxy pale skin and wanted to box with me to prove he was right. I agreed to box with him the next morning if he would sit down and listen to what I had to say afterwards (whatever that might have been)

Damn, dreamspace is one weird domain. This dream definitely falls under the heading of processing random memories and impulses. Interestingly though I woke feeling quite peaceful and wholesome after this dream so something must have clicked in my subconscious for it not to disturb me.

Hoping your day is more orderly and sensible but just as wholesome.

Dad's feeling better

So of course I am drop-down tired. He got feeling pretty good after lunch and we really hit it until just a little while ago. Lots and lots of weed control done in the corn. Tomorrow we will finish planting the field for just after Labour Day and the big row of sunflowers (I hope) and probably finish doing weed control.

Now I go to clean-up and get some sleep. Wishing you all rest and wellness.

Poor day for dad

Got myself a haircut at Tony's Barber shop this morning. Nice to be a clean-cut conservative again.

Dad had a bit of an ear infection today so he didn't get much done and I say, "Hoorah!" he spent the day resting and recuperating.

I didn't set the world on fire either. So many rain showers blowing through it was hard to get anything cohesive done. Well at least I did some good studying and read a little fiction. I'm going out in just a few minutes and spray the walk-ways around our field of white corn with round-up. Glycine phosphate is good stuff. So safe and effective.

Hope life is treating you well.

Dodging Lightning

Riding on the back of the seeder again today I suddenly noticed some tiny drops of rain falling all about me. Look up and behold a dark and fulsome sky. Several clouds hanging in pointed retinue, hinting at spiral forces we seldom see in this part of the world. The thunder finally began to overcome the loud noises of the tractor. Dad and I finished the fifth of ten rows we had hoped to put in and beat a hasty retreat as the first flashes became visible. We covered the seeder and hopped into the car as the rain shower began in earnest. The drive back to farm #1 was a travel into increasing storminess.

Tomorrow will be weed control first off and then back to planting. Hopefully we can get the sunflower and gladiolus in too but I'm learning to restrain my expectations. Dad is busy this instant planting tomato seeds for our last late planting.

I had one particularly weird dream last night, I dreamt I was traveling from corridor to corridor through peoples houses. I'm given to think this was a dream reflection of my experiences with blogging. I'm getting around 20 visitors a day, some random some not and those minds reflect upon and connect upon the doings and not-doings of my daily journeys.

May you all find a tiny gem of wonder hiding in an obvious but overlooked place.

A challenging day

lots of grit, wind, dust, and dissatisfaction today.
Got to farm #2 with a list of jobs, only a few of which actually worked out. It was too windy to spray roundup between the tomato rows. The piece of pipe I took along for hooking up the drip tape on the cukes was too short. I ran out of propane for burning holes in the polymulch. Fortunately the tiller worked real good and I did manage to get some more good weed control done.

Many other things happened but I'm going to bed now, struggle makes me tired.

Wishing you a smooother and more elegant experience.

Halloween initialization

Phase one of Halloween has been completed. Jack-O-Lanterns, Howden's Howdens, Big Maxs, Ghost Riders, Half-Moons, and Savage Creek Farm's Witch-Kissed pumpkins are already absorbing water in the dark, rich, heavy soil on the south side of the Rogue River valley. Planted by the proper phase of the moon with Jupiter's powerful influence in full affect these pumpkins will be especially effective in warding off the undead, unliving spirits and alien influences ;-)

We've also got a dandy crop of winter squash in, which will assure one a fitting survival of the grueling darkness that follows in the months after All-Hallow's Eve.

Tomorrow will hopefully see a cap put on our primary planting season when I put in the lemon and marketmore cucumbers. All that will be left then will be flowers and repeat plantings.

Now I go to rest, wishing you again a delightful moment of unfettered awareness and vigorous thoughts of happiness.

Farming, dinner and dreams

Struggling through another gritty day. About to go out and finally plant pumpkins and winter squash. Just had a delightful dinner thanks to my mother being such a fine cook. Chicken, fried sweet potato and pears with cottage cheese. Healthy and delicious.

Had an interesting dream night before last, wanted to impart it before I forgot. 2 dreams actually both involving mobile homes. The first concerned a family of nice white folks somewhere in Conneticut or Pennsylvania who were struggling to evacuate their mobile home before the oncoming flood. They were cooking taffy on the kitchen stove right up until the last minute. I think the water receded just before it came through their floor but I can't be sure. The other dream was about an old classmate I haven't thought of in years, Charles Barnhart. He was working on some sophisticated drawings which I thought were farming equipment but in retrospect more closely resembled the innards of a electrical power meter. He kept arguing with me that a furrow opener would not go onto it, so that is probably what it was. He was living in a nice mobile home with rich hardwood paneling. It was well lit, lots of windows and smelled like coffee.

Gotta go make pumpkins happen, hope life is treating you well.

Farming Savagery

Swinging blades of steel dripped flesh and gore as the wind howled up streamers of dust.

Plant flesh and green gore but destruction is destruction, especially when I am savaging the horrid horde of weeds which assail my corn plants. Occasionally my blade will slip on a rock and slice through an innocent corn plant; collateral damage but without the price of a few unjustly spent lives I would lose the whole crop.

Along the fence I have deployed weapons of mass destruction to wipe away the horde which so offends my senses. Already their heads droop as the chemicals eat away at their inner functions.

The chosen ones are protected by my vigilance and poly-mulch. The first planting of melons has begun to burdgeon and clumps of new growth swell the field. Soon tendrils will quest for open space and spread their grasping feelers towards new domains beyond even the safe region of polymulch. Tomatoes have started to flower and I feel an imminence which drives me towards new efforts: I must soon stake these tomatoes or risk their collapse. Sprawled tomatoes produce poorly.

Meanwhile, I hear the rustling of customers in the back of my mind. Every time I go to town I run into someone who asks "how's the corn doing?" or "when will the tomatoes be ready?"

Wishing you a fine day and riches of time and attention.

Neighbors house up for sale

Originally they wanted $925,000 for this place. It seems to be a really nice place, 2 stories plus basement 3 bed, 2 bath on 7+ acres with out buildings, lots of fruit trees. Quite country living only 3 miles from major freeway access 3 nearby cities. And of course the coolest neighbor in the world who grows most excellent watermelon right next door! Now they are asking $895,000 but I still think they might have a hard time getting it. My hopes are that some smart single lady will sell her microsoft stock and decide to chase her dream of living in the country to write her book, but I'm used to not getting what I hope for. I'd gladly settle on some cool little family or some groovy early retirement couple.

Watermelon, zucchini and other happy cucurbits

This morning I spent spraying fence lines and roadways at farm #2 with round-up. Got done around 10:00 and came back to plant the last row of specialty melons which I didn't get done last evening.

After lunch Dad got my old blue truck running today and after a visit from the Bro we went over to farm #2 (only about 2 miles down the road) and planted red and yellow triploid (seedless) watermelon and a bunch of zucchini, yellow crookneck and white scallop (patty pan) summer squashes. Dad also prepped the row we'll plant to cucumbers tomorrow morning. Main season planting will almost be finished then. All we'll have left is beans, pumpkins, winter squash and 4 big corn plantings. Oh yeah, and the late tomato and cucumber plantings. Ok, so we'll call it half finished then already.

I'm tired and my back is sore so I will wish you all fine days and sweet dreams.

All's well 'tween earth and sky

Dad and I just got through putting in another acre of melons. 9 types of cantaloupe and 7 types of watermelon. Oh I just can't wait. Gotta run back out when it cools down a bit and put in one more row of mixed specialty melons: casaba, crenshaw, some asians and a few more european melons if I can find the dang seed.

The sky has been criss-crossed with lovely clouds as the day drifted by. Unfortunately that didn't really keep things cool. Warm soil helps those delightful little melon seeds to quicken and raise up their nodding heads.

Dreamt about a big earthquake last night. Dreamt it split the face off the mountain across from our second farm. Hmmm... ominous. Was really cool being able to see inside the mountain though. That's the sort of thing I love about dreams.

Popsicles, oh you save me! I dread and cherish the upcoming heat of summer. My craving for melons have taken on torturous proportions.

Mom gets back from Kansas tonight around 8:30. Sparky will be sooooo happy he'll just about burst.

Wishing you a sweet dream of freedom and a fine day of rewarding efforts.

Soil Surfin' Safari

Oh what another wonderful day of spending my life force near unto exhaustion.

Did a bunch more equipment tinkering this morning then went over to cultivate the corn field. Dad and Bro had rebuilt the cultivator with some tricky new bits and so we weren't too sure how good it would work. Turned out it needed a little extra weight on board to get it to bite in to the correct depth, so I hopped on top and road the thing around the field for a couple of hours.

This re-introduced me to a sport I haven't practiced in quite a few years: soil surfin. It was fun but quite tiring, moving in synch with machine and earth. A number of times in the last 18 years of farming some piece of equipment has required extra weight or a functional operator on the back so it wasn't exactly a new experience but definitely unique. Rock and soil and steel clashing and thrashing against each other produce an indescribable motion. Probably a lot more dangerous than I think or know but what the hey, you only go around once and if the corn tastes especially good this year all the better.

And to make the whole thing a safari, there was even some wild animal action. No I'm not typing about Sparky chasing us around the field, although that was happening too. The really cool part today was watching the ground rush by beneath my feet. At one point, before thought or action could've done anything, a kill-deer nest zipped by into the maw of the weed and earth shredding machine. Miraculously the nest had been placed in just exactly the one tiny spot where it would negotiate the cutting, shredding equipment I was riding like a bronco. Looking back I could see the two tiny brown speckled eggs sitting undisturbed in their nest.

Wishing you an equal moment of grace.

Dodging raindrops

Lots of little showers blowing through again today. The ground is too wet to do any of the planting I was planning on so it has been a make-work day. Lots of clean-up, sorting, sifting and shifting.

Yesterday dad planted onions while I fed miracle grow to my melon transplants. That took most of the day after some equipment tinkering in the morning. Funny how seemingly trivial jobs can consume entire swaths of time from your day.

This warm, damp weather has the mosquitos swarming like we seldom see them in southern Oregon. Deet is my cologne of choice 2 or 3 times a day. Global warming is transforming my little corner of the world into a tropical jungle. Now if I can just find a good supplier for banana plants.

Wishing you a day of mystery and freedom.

Why?

And 1 more thing. This is OUR internet. We, America, invented it and made it happen (with integrated circuits and computers which we also created) we're just letting the rest of the world use it. I think it's about time we start getting a little credit for all the good things we do as well as the blanket of blame and threats that get laid on everyone of us each time there's a traffic accident or someone stubs their toe on a street curb that our soldiers helped put in at a risk to their lives or some idiot races a checkpoint hoping to make the evening news for Allah.

Tuesday struggles with machines, weeds and bugs

Still dripping wet from the shower, I heave a deep sigh of satisfaction at a day well spent.

Came back from farm #2 about 2 hours ago and there was a glorious rainbow sundog shining in the sky as I drew close to the bottom of the driveway. Dad was putting the final touches on the irrigation system back here at the old farm. So lovely to have water running, dripping, spraying, trickling, soaking, oozing, misting and gurggling again.

We started the day with weed control at farm #2, hoeing the corn and spraying the walk ways. We returned here and I sprayed the fruit trees with boron and trace minerals while dad leveled the pumpkin and late melon fields. Then after a short brake we returned to plant corn only to find that this years batch of seed was a larger size so we needed to re-grind one of our old sets of seed plates to accommodate the larger seeds. After several hours of struggling with that equipment we finally got another planting of corn in. Headed home for dinner then.

Topped the day off with a return trip to farm #2 where I've been forced to fight off another attack of two-striped melon beetles with Sevin. Hate using that stuff but it is either that or completely lose 2500+ melon plants. I pulled an extra little trick and included my own special formula of trace minerals and vitamins in the spray so that should help the plants stay extra healthy. Which will also mean better fruit with more vitamins in them for my customers.

Well, I'm tired and have neither great wisdom nor refined knowledge to impart tonight. Hope life is treating you well.

Heavy dreams

A deep and portentous slumber ruled my night. The only dream I can remember well is being chased by a disgusting bear-like creature through a junk yard and into a darkly cast cityscape where humanoid figures with twisted limbs ran pell-mell beneath flickering lights. I got into a small pickup, trying to get/drive away but of course vehicles never run right in dreams. I Gotta stop watching television.

My world is enveloped in fog this morning. A dome of featureless near-white grayness lowers the sky to just overhead making everything seem quite and close. The temp is 42, comfortably chilly for me.

Happy Memorial day to all my fellow Americans. May your barbecued hot dogs be plump and juicy and your beer cold and foamy.

To the rest of the world I wish tranquility and freedom.

Working Sunday

But not terribly much. Finished breaking out the last of the ground today. Plowing that is. Will use the cultivator tomorrow to re-rip the top 2 fields and knock down the plowing furrows then bring the drag bucket home from farm #2 and smooth everything off (well, dad will probably do that part, it's his favorite)

While he is doing that I'll be spraying the fruit trees to prevent fungus and insect infestations. Will also throw a little trace mineral in there to help the trees be really healthy.

Later in the week we will be planting the top field dad will be finishing tomorrow for a later harvest of melons, cantaloupe and our pumpkin/winter squash set. Really only need one planting of pumpkin and winter squash. I've got some extra special pumpkins for this year, should be really fun, my own breed dad named "Witch Kissed" (trademark Savage Creek Farms 2006) and that reminds me of a dream I had last night. I dreamt I was picking some of my pumpkins, only they were like really huge and shaped sort of like papaya and they had really smooth orange skin. Weird.

Hope life is treating you well.

How to : planting corn

Having seen a couple people drop by looking for gardening advice on corn (shame on them for not leaving their questions in the comments!) It is time for another addition of "Advice from the Savage Farmer"

Today's Subject: Corn.

We plant our corn in rows of alternating distance: 2 rows at 2 foot spacing and then 5 feet of space followed by another 2 rows at 2 foot spacing etc. This facilitates weed control and harvest. The home grower might want a standard spacing of 3-4 feet between each row. Seed in the row is spaced about 9-10 inches apart. This is a little sparse by some standards, certainly so by seed corn standards, but we find it helps produce a large ear with lots of sugar. Seed should be placed at a depth of about 1 inch depending on soil consistency. Heavy soils such as clays might require a shallower planting while sandy, loamy or pumicey soils might benefit from an extra 1/8-1/4 inch. Soil temperature is also an issue; cooler soil temps might require a decrease in planting depth while high temps which might dry out the soil to the seed depth would necessitate deeper planting. 1 and 1/2 inches should be about the max depth usable although I have had deeper plantings which still managed to make it to the surface (an accident involving my depth gauge caused that...) Soil temps below 60 degrees greatly reduce sprout.

On the subject of weeding: weed early and often. Use of a burner to remove tiny weed sprouts prior to corn emergence is very helpful.

Corn is a voracious nitrogen feeder. Use a full spectrum fertilizer early (16-16-16 or miracle grow is acceptable) and a later feeding of high nitrogen fertilizer such as Urea (if you must be all organic) or sulfate of ammonia (if you're intelligent and practical) just before the corn is knee high will lead to wonderful growth and large, sweet ears.

Good luck and good gardening.

Call me Mr. Plow

Just done with a spot of lunch and about to head back out to do some plowing if the rain doesn't dump on me first. Today has gone well, lots of bush-hog work and ripping of soil done so far. Also some morning clean-up of the work area and front yard.

Hope your day is flowing with the rhythm.

4 osprey day

Four vociferous osprey greeted us when we arrived at the 2nd farm this morning. Wind and rain showers lashed us throughout the day but we persisted and managed to finish all the melon transplanting we will be doing there. What a great feeling to have all that finally behind us. One row of mulch is left for transplanting onions into and the last 2 rows of mulch will be planted to seedless watermelons and summer squash as soon as the weather turns warm again.

Sparky has been a little out of sorts since mom left. He isn't used to being on the go all day long with us fellas and his social doggy mind is a little confused by the absent person.

This cool weather is a tremendous benefit to our transplants. The tomatoes, peppers and melons are all taking a strong setting into the ground now and you can already see fresh green growth. If the hot weather doesn't return too fast, which it looks like most likely will be the case, then they should make a smooth healthy transition into vigorous growth.

Wishing you all a healthy, happy day and hope you can share with all those around you.

More transplanting- eggplant, peppers and melons

Put in 4 new types of eggplant today should be really interesting; from parts of Asia and India. Also planted a big variety of peppers including Habanero, Thai, Serano, Yellow Bells, and Pablano.

The triploid (seedless) watermelon seed arrived today, red and yellow varieties which we will plant tomorrow. I've desperately got to put an order together for more standard watermelon seed from Chesmore seed co. if only I can compel my tired self to do so.

Also planted 8 more rows of sweet corn today, just a bit to sort of stop gap during this cold weather. It's hard to control weeds during rainy weather so we're keeping this field to a minimum while we wait for better germination temps and sun for weed control.

My good bud and classmate Mike Light might be able to stop by this weekend. Hope he doesn't mind squalor as I have been way too busy to clean up for the last 3 weeks or so. It isn't really squalor by other people's standards but I prefer a much tidier place than I have at the moment. He'll have to focus on my sterling personality and ignore my ambiance.

Our neighbors have decided to sell their house. I had heard rumors to this effect but when the sign went up a few days back I was sort of thrown for a loop. Wild! Should be interesting having new people in there. Hope I get some cool folk my own age that I can hang out with. It'll have to be someone wealthy 'cause they are asking 925,000$ whew! a bit steep for me. It is a really nice big 2 story house with basement and 7 acres of land located only 3 miles from an I-5 on-ramp. Housing prices here have been totally insane for the last couple of years but I really wonder if they'll get that much for it. I'll try to get a pic up here for everyone to see.

Wishing you a delightful day and a nifty night.

Why won't congress do as we ask?

I was speaking with Anna down at the library and we got onto the subject of illegal immigration. I mentioned the article at TCS daily "Immigration's 15 minutes. Why Now?" and her response was classic "because illegal is illegal and it isn't right now, we've been mad for a long time" She went on to make a statement which I have heard, read and felt again and again. When I mentioned I had written my senators and congressman she said she had too and then in exactly the frustrated tone I have felt she asked "We've told them, well 85% of us or more have told them, again and again what we would like done. Close the borders, send the illegals home either by cutting off their jobs or rounding them up and bussing them out. Why won't they listen to us?!"

Why indeed? What political power game are they playing behind the scenes which forces them to ignore the wishes of such an enormous majority? Even the heavily slanted polls of the worst liberal mainstream media outlets show that an overwhelming majority demand a closing of the border and an end to unrestricted illegal immigration.

And what does the media offer us? More instructions on what we are supposed to be thinking about instead. I'm getting so tired of hearing this stridently obvious dichotomy between what all the news channels keep saying we are thinking, feeling and doing and the actual thinking, feeling and doing that is going on out here in the real world. None of us give a (r^p about Katie Couric or the Duke Lacrosse team. Neither do all of us think we're losing the war in Iraq. These are blatant lies and distractions being created by the media and some congresspeople and being fed out to the population on the assumption that this is still the 70s and they can still control popular opinion in this manner. It barely worked in the 70s and today the diversity of information sources prevents any sort of the cohesion needed to make such an approach affective.

Some of the things which I am interested in: What are in those papers the FBI took from Rep. William Jefferson that has Congress so freaked out? And if the Abramoff scandal was sooo important to all those liberal bloggers and media types out there then why isn't the Brett Pfeifer and Jackson case equally important? Why if the Duke Lacrosse team story is so big has the story of Teharri Aziz been all but forgotten? (he ran an SUV into a crowd of students if you don't recall) Why is it that we get reminded every day that we have lost 2400+ soldiers in Iraq over a three year period but no one reminds us we lost 3000+ innocent civilians in 20 minutes on the morning of September 11th? That should be at the top of every newspaper at least once a week.

3 more rows

1 row of watermelon and 2 of assorted melons planted today. Would have gotten more done but dad had to run mom to the airport around noon.

I got quite a bit finished in the grapes. If the deer will lay off their predation there should be a nice crop of red suffolk this year. I've began taking steps to discourage them.

Water finally got in the ditch yesterday! thank goodness. What a change in attitude that makes. Now we can finish prepping fields here at the old farm and begin setting up the irrigation system.

Wishing you a great day.

Mid-week transitions

Mom's heading for Kansas today. Will be gone for about 2 weeks.

We were supposed to plant corn today but the ground is too wet and cold so we'll put it off a day at a time until conditions are right. Things might mellow out today and tomorrow so I think we'll be back on track shortly. The trade off is getting the rest of the peppers, eggplants, melons, summer squash and cukes planted in a timely manner.

Several strange dreams last night parts of which I feel were "exterior forces" and others which reflect some sort of angst. I dreamt that some teenagers found out our neighbors were not home while they try to sell their house and that they built a huge bonfire in their back field. One of the kids threw a burning branch into the back of my blue chevy pickup which was loaded with boxes and it burned everything but the back wheels and the cab (an obvious impossibility). The dream went through a hazy transition and some weeks had passed or something, my pickup was gone but my niece, dad and I were in the yard besides the orchard and some crazy hicks in a truck came driving down the irrigation ditch (also impossible) and tried to drive around the back of the south barn which they crashed into instead. Huge chunks of truck parts went flying through the air as I scrambled to call 911 on my cellphone. One piece was a huge gear sprocket about 4 feet tall that would've weighed in over a thousand pounds. It rolled towards my niece; I had a sense of dread but when it reached her she grabbed it and just pushed it away. She's a good athlete but that was like the third impossibility.

Once more the dream realm serves up strange irrelevancies.

This morning I will be chopping the fresh blackberry growth that has returned in the vineyard. Unfortunately we weren't able to finish using round-up on every row before the grapes came out of dormancy. So I'll be string-trimming the rest several more times this season to keep those dastardly thorn monsters from taking over.

Wishing you a profitable, educational day with three full moments of natural glory to distract and humble you.

Maw of the Storm

We were just finishing up the deer fence around our melon/tomato/pepper field when the showers started. The wind set in and the sky began to turn grey, then dark blue. As we tightened the last wire and then drove the tractor towards the equipment area the down pour hit in earnest. Dad and I quickly covered the motor on the spray rig and ran for the car. What a feeling to just escape the teeth of the storm and then watch it unfold into a vicious cloud burst as we drove for home. Our hair and clothing soaked we made one last dash into the house to be greeted by Sparky.

Last night I had one dream which stood out in my mind. I was in a small storage area/lean-to or wood shed looking at some apple boxes full of the usual personal possessions you might find stored in apple boxes. I suddenly noticed a large green plant growing in the open end of the building. It was a huge specimen of Horsetail, Equisetum which unlike most of its species had huge branching arms. As I got close to it the wind picked up and the thing thrashed at me. I studied it for a few seconds noticing large, strange globules near the tips of its branches. I grabbed on to inspect it further and could feel the tough fibrous quality which equisetum has. I tugged on of the unusual globules and pulled it loose from the plant which continued to thrash in the wind, scouring my skin with its fibrous fronds. I broke open the fleshy sphere and studied the contents which looked much like a broken open seaweed pod. Juicy and translucent with a J shaped groove or hollow inside.

Don't know why that dream stuck with me. Probably because of the utter foreignness of the giant equisetum plant.

Wishing you a pleasant evening and a night full of restful slumber and playful dreams.

Good news the liberals don't like us to know

Real Clear Politics has an article about all the good news happening in the world today and I found it a very refreshing read. I feel very vindicated in my doubt of the ongoing negative campaign by media, liberal activists and narrow-minded lefty academicians.

Could it be that our president isn't such a slouch after all? Could it be that we Americans aren't to blame for all the worlds ills? The lefties and islamists gnash their teeth while holding out their hands to enjoy all the benefits of this truth.

Education and agriculture

An old farmer works extra hard to make sure his son can go to college.

After the first year his boy returns home looking dapper and intelligent.

"So tell me son, what ya been studyin'" asks the farmer.

"Well lately pa we've been studying geometry" the young man replies.

"Well, speak to me in some of that geometry so I can hear how smart y'are becomin'" the farmer says.

"Uhm, ok, how about this: PI R Squared."

"Well, that's real impressive son," the farmer says struggling to keep the disappointment off his face, "now your mother'd love to see you so get on into the house."

As soon as the boy is in the door the old farmer shakes his head and grumbles to his self:
"All that money down the drain, any fool knows PI R round, Cornbread R Square!"

Planting melons

Today we finished our first planting of tomatoes and continued with the cantaloupes and mixed melons, watermelons etc. For the gardening curious we are planting them a little over 2 feet apart in rows 8 feet apart. We like to give our melons plenty of room. We pre-fertilize with triple 16 [300-400 pounds per acre] and lime which are thoroughly mixed in by our row maker. Plastic mulch really helps melons a lot, warmer soils they prefer.

The biggest enemies of melons are the green cucumber beetle (also called the mexican bean beetle in some locales) and the 2 striped melon beetle. Should these show up in your garden spray aggressively with sevin, malathion, or pyrethrins. I used to encourage the use of the organic pesticide rotenone but it turns out that it is more toxic to mammals than malathion or sevin. I would stay away from pyrethrins because they do not affect spidermites and thus their use can encourage spidermite outbreaks. The reason to be particularly hostile to these beetles is that they will not only feed voraciously on your plants but they will also infect your plants with bacterial blight. Do not lie to yourself that somehow mother nature will take care of these pests. I have used every control method both organic and synthetic and I can tell you that unless you have only a few plants and can hand remove these insects in the morning with a vacuum cleaner they will utterly destroy your crop if you don't apply a strong effective insecticide. No organic method exists to control these pests and trying to maintain a balanced predator population will not help if they are flying in from a neighbors yard (that's what happened to me a few years back, disaster!) unless you can buy a kentucky fried chicken tub sized container of ladybugs and another of praying mantis and even then that won't protect your plants from the blight. Better to buy a few dollars worth of sevin and do the job right. I ferverently HATE those beetles.

Ok, enough gardening 101. The day has been lovely and productive. A few showers blew through this morning washing everything clean and leaving a rich spicy scent in the air. Now the breezes have begun picking up and giving me an invigorating feeling. We might have a thunder rumble or two, I feel.

No interesting dreams to report last night. No new collective recollection. Perhaps the ebb and flow of "manna" has trended down a bit or maybe I'm still too tired from work.

Wishing you a perfect moment of unreflected clarity and two more of giggles.

Mellow rainy Sunday

As much as I love this weather, it is always easy to fall into melancholy while it is raining. A rare allergy attack didn't help much either. Gotta lay off those candy orange slices. Antihistamines make me edgy, grumpy, and tired.

I spent the day with little productive labor. Mostly just straightening up the barn and reading. Dad went to work on his landscaping job and Bro borrowed the truck so I didn't have a lot of options anyways. Mom is getting ready for a 2 week visit back to Kansas with her family so I also spent a little time today scanning and editing photos for her to take with her.

One nice thing about doing some clean-up is all the cool weird stuff you unearth during the process. I've got a rather sizeable collection of potential BEAM robot parts (see sidebar-> ) which I seldom look at once the season begins. I also filed all my remaining plant-tissue culture materials and chemicals today. If I get another rainy day or two in June I might actually get around to sterilizing some agar and cloning some plants. Wishful thinking is mostly harmless and always fun.

The ol' pinched nerve is acting up again thanks to all the stoop labor from the last couple of days. You can get used to just about anything but pain still sucks.

Wishing you a delightful end to the weekend and an invigorating beginning to the week.

Cool maps

The Canadian cartographers association has a webblog with lots of cool map links.

More good melon transplanting weather

Thank you oh forces of earth and sky. This weather is making for some great works.

Finished the 4th row of tomatoes and planted 1.5 rows of the ol' Standard cantaloupe. This is a cantaloupe my brother got from an agricultural extension worker from the Hanby farm 4 years ago. We kept the seed from that first melon and have been hand selecting the best melon from each crop since to maintain top of the line quality. So glad to finally have some melons in the ground.

Tomorrow I will finish connecting the last 11 rows of drip tape and hopefully plant some watermelon and summer squash. Peppers and eggplants should be going in Monday.

I've been so tired this week that no dreams have survived the morning haze. But I have been noticing a strange clustering of dream memories all week. Single scenes, panoramas or locale snapshots which I can suddenly remember having dreamt about repeatedly. A short list: a white mobile home planted near a hilltop amongst sparse tall trees and heavy underbrush lush with flowering plants like sweetpeas, the road outside a Coca-Cola bottling plant, a county fair or carnival with many long rows of booths, a particularly curvey stretch of road on Abegg Rd., my high school's parking lot at night, a huge barn with concrete floor which my grandpa used to own. There are too many others which now fade under the scrutiny of my thoughts and your attention for me to list them. I'll try to jot them down if they continue surfacing.

I was listening to a great song earlier but I didn't catch the performers name. The song title was "My Sapphire Love" and it was a wonderful jazz tune with a female singer.

I hope your day is smooth and sweet.

The fascinating world of transplanting

While punching holes in the soil for my little tomato plants I was fascinated by the plastic mulch we work with.

We used to punch holes in the plastic or slit it with a knife but both of these methods lead to an unnecessary number of plant deaths when the plastic contacted the stem of the plants. The plastic would either shrink back or flap over and touch the stem and then get so hot in the sun that it would kill. Nowadays we take a small propane tank and burner on the end of a long hose and melt our holes into the plastic.

This leads to some interesting phenomena. The water and soil under the plastic affect the manner in which it melts or burns, leaving these crazy weird looking patterns half melted, half burned and some untouched on the edges. The patterns sometimes look like reptile skin or clouds or weird striations. I've made fractals for years using my computer, the image beneath my blog title is one such. Now I find them occurring in many arrangements around me.

Another for instance: when the poly-mulch first comes off its roll there is considerable static discharge. Splays of dust will be sucked up onto the sides of the mulch and the tug of war between gravity, air currents and static charge will create hundreds of instances of circular patterns which look very much like the Mandelbrot set or the so-called "magnetic Mandelbrots" which are derived from the equations determining the behavior of magnetic fields. I've noticed the dust being sucked onto the plastic before but this new green poly we are using has a much better contrast and the fascinating self-similar patterns of some fractal dimension are vividly visible.

Anyhow, that's my interesting observation of the day. I'm sure the rain has ruined all such patterns and unfortunately I didn't have my camera with me last time I noticed them. If the chance arises when we make some more poly-mulch rows I'll try to snap a pic for y'all.

Cool weather=happy transplants

The first 370 tomato plants are in the ground! Due to lack of irrigation at the old farm (thanks loads Oregon Watcher Watch, Sierra Club, Patagonia outfitters, ODFW, may you all rot in hell!) we've planted them at farm #2 and they are happily absorbing drip irrigation. The brisk wind is a little hard on them right now but intermittent showers are keeping their spirits up. We anticipate about 4 more plantings of tomatoes if all goes well.

The sky is a rumpled panorama of grey, ghostly blue and white. Showers blow through about every 20 minutes but dad and I pressed on with our planting despite the gusts of grit and cold bluster. We have automated quite a bit of the process so I get to laugh at farmers who are still trapped using illegal aliens to do their work.

After lunch I'll be hooking up another 9 rows of drip tape while dad finishes prep on the next field for corn planting.

Right now I'm going out to water my 7200+ melon plants and mourn the loss of lettuce to evil deer.

Wishing you a happy, healthy and vigorous day of freedom on this good green Earth.

Planting tomatoes

Someone found my blog through google looking for "how far apart to plant tomatoes"
I doubt they'll be back soon but just in case.

We plant our tomatoes about 2 feet apart in rows about 6 feet apart. Good strong trellis or wire/stake cages are a must. Sprawling tomatoes do very poorly in comparison. The home gardener will want more room between plants in the row and need less room between rows. I would suggest 3 foot between plants and 5 between rows for the small farm or garden. A soil test kit will give you a fairly accurate Ph reading, adjust close to neutral with lime. Gypsum can also help to raise calcium content if your soil is a little alkaline. Calcium is a must for tomatoes along with a steady supply of moisture. Not too wet and never completely dry, soil moisture fluctuations will definitely increase the incident of blossom-end rot as will excess nitrogen. Tomato plants like a little bit of extra magnesium, I will put a short tablespoon full in with each gallon of miracle grow (or other water soluble fertilizer) about every other time I foliar feed (that means feeding through the leaves)

Good luck and happy gardening!

Some sunset silhouettes

Since I didn't get any pics of the poly-mulch laying, I tried to capture a little of tonight's beautiful sunset. Not my best pic ever but maybe someone out there will like it.

News sux

I was just flippin' through the "big" news channels and you know what? They suck. Everything is sensationalism and confabulated stories that at any other time we wouldn't give a darn about.

Pres. Bush is at the border, making a show of stopping illegal aliens: About time but the media has to send 10 reps each who has to have an indepth and personal interview with Geo and ask him virtually the same stupid set of questions which they are sure are going to "blow the lid off this case" whatever they think that is. Of course while they "had him on the ropes" (in their own minds) they had to ask him assorted asinine questions about the war in Iraq. BFD.

The Lacrosse rape scandal: how many other violent crimes have occurred across America and the world since that story emerged? But hours a day are given to one incident that is so shady, seamy, tawdry; I can't think of any other adjectives to denote low and disgusting. But I'm sure the media will fill us in on all the vile details if we accidentally turn to CNN, FOX, CNBC, MSNBC or the next one to bubble to the top of the cauldron.

Glenn Beck on CNN was interviewing some propagandist for Libya who was trying to sell us all on how much they have changed. I did get a momentary giggle from that thanks to the movie "South Park, Bigger, Longer and Uncut." That one scene where Saddam Insane is in hell having a homosexual affair with Satan and he does a dance number exclaiming "I Can Change!" popped into my head when I saw Momar Khadaffyduck hugging Hugo Chavez. Momar's attire was pure retro San Francisco with a modern silk turban on top.

The local channel had a brief retrospective on Mt. St. Helens. That was actually sort of news as I had forgotten it was this same time of year. I was in 5th grade in Mr. Stoddard's science class when it happened. Dad was working with my uncle in Colorado at the time and when he washed the ash off his car it was so abrasive that his car was like 2 shades lighter green when he was done.

So much for the national news.

Our ditch is still dry. Last night the deer broke into the pen where I keep my plants and ate about 400$ worth of head lettuce and about 100$ worth of cabbage. Thank you so much department if fish and wildlife; why can't I just shoot the bastards? It is supposed to cool off but today was still a scorcher. Record setting even. Possible thunderstorms tonight which I dread and await with much anticipation. I love thunder and lightning but hate the other evil thing which might fall from the sky during a storm (I'm too superstitious to even type the hated word in, it rhymes with snail and smashes things.)

So much for my local news. Good night and god bless.

Drip, drip, drip

Got an early start today; delightful! The sunlight had a rich yellow cast as it lit the world around us with that special morning vibrancy.

While dad was watering some flowers and running the spray rig around our next field of corn (he had to stop because of an unusual morning breeze) I was hooking up the drip tape in our recently pulled rows of mulch. As I type this they are dripping, dripping, slowly wetting those rows with cold Rogue River water. By tonight hopefully the mounds will be moist enough to plant with tomatoes and the first of the melons.

I'll be going out shortly to put miracle grow on my little transplants. Should help them with the upcoming shock of being moved and planted.

Wishing you a day of hope, joy and freedom.

Summer is coming: Popsicle Jokes

That was a lot funnier when you had to wait while you ate the popsicle.

The Reason I Like Triple Esspresso Milkshakes

From Mike Light's delightful comic "The Band"

18 tons of coal

Or in this case 18 rows of turqoise green polyethylene mulch 300 feet long. That's what we finished doing today, thank goodness. It was a blazing furnace under the noon day sun. My skin seemed to sizzle with the heat even under the SPF50 I had on. The dust and grit of the pumice soil worked its way into my eyes, nose and throat. An osprey that lives on the ridge above Charlie's place flapped past seeming to also find the heat a bit oppresive. He was heading for the river, which is where I also would have gone if I'd had the time. Sorry I forgot my digital camera or I would've had pics of the process and maybe one of the osprey too.

It's about 96 degrees out there right now at 4:28 and I'm glad I no longer need to be out there, although I will soon have to go out and check on my plants to see if they need water. Uhg. I am so much looking forward to a week of 70s, I really hope it manifests especially so I can transplant all these little melons safely.

Irrigation and row making

First thing today we'll move the 3 inch irrigation pipe into the next field to be planted to corn. Dad finished prepping it yesterday while I was burning more orchard waste. Once it's watered we'll be ready to plant that come Monday or so. That'll be field 3 of about 9.

After the water is set we'll move on to pulling green plastic mulch and drip tape into mounded rows with the row maker my brother built a few years back. It's a little fidgety to get it adjusted just right but once you get it set that thing is the greatest. In a couple of hours we'll have 15 new rows ready to plant to melons, tomatoes, peppers and many others. And the timing should be perfect as we have some cooler, showery weather coming this week. That'll really help the transplants to survive.

Wishing you a day of tranquility, rewarding struggles and freedom.

Hey University of Oregon!

Had a U of O visitor last night around 9:56. Sure wish they'd left me a message from my ol' stomping grounds. That's really weird 'cause I dreamt about Otto K. last night one of my partners in not-very-much-crime when I was mooching living there.

If that was you Otto I hope life is treating you well with many a dark night from which to shine your grin like the Cheshire cat.

Donkey raffle

A city boy, named Kenny, moved to the country and bought a donkey from an old farmer for $100.00. The farmer agreed to deliver the donkey the next day.

The next day the farmer drove up and said, "Sorry son, but I have some bad news. The donkey died."

Kenny replied, "Well, then, just give me my money back."

The farmer said, "Can't do that. I went and spent it already."

Kenny said, "Ok, then, just unload the donkey."

The farmer asked, "What ya gonna do with him?"

"I'm going to raffle him off!"

"You can't raffle off a dead donkey!"

"Sure I can. Watch me. I just won't tell anybody he's dead."

A month later the farmer met up with Kenny and asked, "What happened with that dead donkey?"

"I raffled him off like I said I would. I sold 500 tickets at two
dollars a piece and made a profit of $998.00."

"Didn't anyone complain?"


"Just the guy who won. So I gave him his two dollars back."


Kenny grew up and eventually became the Chairman of Enron.

Mixed feelings about the President

Nathan Smith's article "Living the Creed" at TCS Daily had some interesting things to say that I had to force myself to pay attention to. Overcoming the momentum of my personal feelings about the issue of border security and illegal immigration wasn't easy but one or two of the points he made were so valid that they can't just be ignored, even if he says nothing about the overarching issues of cultural change, social expense and possibilities of terrorism which go along with these issues.

I've really got mixed feelings about this article. There is such an overwhelming roar of left-wing rhetoric against the President these days that a well reasoned voice of explanation almost invokes a sense of cognitive dissonance, a moment of confusion. Especially when that voice invokes what used to be some of the highest ideals of liberals and democrats everywhere. It's really freaky.

All humans are created equal, one of those facts our enemy in the middle east would like us to forget.

2nd Corn field planting today

Will be running the ol' Massey 165 out again to put in about 5 more rows of corn. Going to keep this field a little smaller because of possible rains this weekend. Will plant a bit larger field a day earlier next week to compensate. That way we won't have such a large field to control weeds on from this week (always harder to do after a rain.)

Gotta feed the barn cats and get to work. Hope your day is lively, fun and free.

UNC: howdy

A big "Howdy-who!" to the University of North Carolina. Thanks for stopping by.

Oh and Abi from India (I'm assuming that's you) thanks for the re-visit. Tell me about your countryside there, if you would?

It's Global Warming all over again

It is 95 degrees in the middle of May !? Oh my goodness, must be global warming coming to get me.

This time last year it was still raining. I couldn't plant my corn until the 23rd of May and we had a light frost just a few nights after that.

Seasonal fluctuations are just that. Even the cycles of glaciation and retreat are unpredictable and driven by forces too complex for human reason to unravel.

Today it is unusually hot for this time of year, but the weather man says that a week from yesterday we have a chance of rain. That is pretty much the same conclusion which can be extended about any period of time into the future: a chance of things being one way or the other. Otherwise we'd call it the past.

Oh, and back to the corn: this year's first planting is just about to pop out of the ground. Should be up and growing full force by Wednesday. Woo-Hoo!

Lunch break!

Got the walk ways and field roads sprayed with round-up at the 2nd farm. That rebuilt spray rig kicks hiney.

After lunch I helped dad put the drag bucket on the truck and he's hauling it back to the 2nd farm to drag the row crop field. It was just too rough and cloddy to put poly-mulch on so he disked it with the one-way and now will drag it smooth. It looked soft and powder now so it should be a nice seed bed when we're finally done laying drip-tape and mulch on it.

I gotta go back out and torch some mounds of grape prunings and blackberry canes. Yep, it's a burn day in Jackson county so you know what that means: fire, Fire, FIRE! FIRE! Yeehaa! call Beavis we got some FIRE!

Woops, let out the pyro-Guy a bit too much there.

Have a safe, fun, wonderful day with liberty and justice for all.

Low posting warning

A couple of serious days of work ahead so I might not be posting for a short while. I'm such an addict to this medium that I'll try to get in at least once a day but I have my doubts about that even.

Have a good'n

Post dinner relaxation

Went to the illustrious city of Rogue River and got Chinese take-out from Sally's Place for mom on this, her day. There was a pleasant little blond lady running the place, she was delightful. However once again they forgot the noodles for the chow-mein. Fortunately we keep a supply on hand for just such an emergency ( at 3.09 a gallon and 92 degrees I wasn't about to go back.)

Here's the fortune I got in my cookie, I think it is particularly apropos:






I'm hoping that all of you have had, are having, and will continue to have a wonderful Mother's day.

Acemetrical: Brilliant!

Ace Emery, another clear thinking person carefully crafting words of wisdom. I especially liked his entry on the US invading Mexico, not during the Mexican-American war, but in the early 21st century. That would be cool.

Happier Mother's day

Took a moment off from working on the spray rig and got caught up commenting at Lubos'. That young man is a troll magnet.

Hope you mom's are having a great day.

Interesting dream last night: I was at an art auction in some huge hotel/castle/mall. There were bizarre displays of art in every hallway. The auction started and the first thing up was a chess set and table. The chess set was made from titanium, very cool looking metallic blues and gold. The table was mahogany. I was admiring it when this rotund fellow at the next table (the auction was being held in a open air cafe within the large central area of the mall/castle) leaned over and said to me "Titanium is so last year. We're waiting until they bring out the plastic."

"Plastic!" I exclaimed

"Yes" he replied "Plastic is all the rage"

Then I tried finding my way to the swimming pool but had to climb out through an arrow slit in the castle wall and down a rusty metal cable to get to it.

I gotta stop watching that history channel before I go to bed.

Wishing you a joyful day of freedom and laughter.

Happy Mother's Day

In case I'm too busy tomorrow working the corn field or rebuilding the irrigation system in preparation for this week's imminent arrival (finally!) of water from the Grants Pass irrigation district, just wanted to wish all you moms out there a super duper happy Mother's day. For all the bandages applied, cool-aid mixed, cool hand on a warm forehead, soothing voice, and just all around delight of the human world, thanks for being there and don't ever think that somewhere deep down inside we don't all appreciate it. (woops, double negative, you know what I mean...)

The most Medford

If you haven't gotten enough Medford lately, go to the Medfordist. It's the most Medford you can get.

Will they ever learn?

The latest uproar being aimed at the Bush administration is once more over them doing their job. Not only their job, but a job Americans overwhelmingly approve of (if 51% is a majority, 68% is overwhelming) I'm typing about, of course, the NSA phone number database "scandal" which democrats are once more "deeply concerned" through "righteously outraged" over. But it seems to me, the dems haven't been doing their job or their homework very well. This story is not new at all, in fact as Dafydd at Big Lizards points out it is about 5 months old first being published in the New York Times. I find it an interesting parallel that the Danish mohammed cartoons had also been circulating for 5 months before anyone decided to try to use them for political gain. Is this some sort of gestation period for manipulators? A spin-doctor window of timing?

What is bizarre to me is that an entire industry and large group of political affiliations are so ignorant of the times we live in that they actually believe and act on a daily basis as if no one will recognize or point out the obvious blunder of their attempts at controlling opinion. I've had acquaintances who I never even knew were into blogs and the web as information sources start to point out things to me during our conversations that I hadn't even heard yet. Surely the big news organizations and our democratic senators and representatives are capable of being more savvy than this?

So far in all my reading and watching television I haven't seen a thing that either worries me or strikes me as illegal. I can readily go out and buy all sorts of databases containing a myriad of information about potential customers and their transaction habits. What the NSA has done in mining our phone records for terrorist patterns is not only sensible, in the least, it is also a bit overdue. That the democrats will try to polarize and terrify the American public with Orwellian boogy-men prior to an election is not only to be expected it is another example of how desperate they are. So desperate that they would rather endanger this country than get behind it in our efforts to defeat an enemy which wants all of us dead.

Lazy Saturday afternoon

Done watering, done mowing, a little bit more work on the spray rig to do. First I'll go out and water the plants. So glad we got them out of the greenhouse yesterday. It is much nicer watering them in the open air, cool breeze and bright sun. The plants are suffering a little because of the loss of humidity to which they were accustomed but they are recovering nicely.

Currently reading "Out of Control", "How to talk to a liberal", and "We have blog" all quite interesting. I'm also running through a reprise of David Brin's uplift series, book 3 "Infintities Shore"

I really enjoyed doing a little javascript work a couple days ago when I rebuilt my random paragraph generator. I'm trying to think of some more fun ideas like the rant-o-matic robot or maybe something involving a little sound and animation. If you have any suggestions please feel free to include them in a comment.

Not That Anyone Else Cares....

Not That Anyone Else Cares.... Well some of us do Jeff. I'll be adding this fella to my sidebar links shortly. Seems like a right-on thinker to me.

Mowing day

Since dad will be working on his landscaping job today I'll be doing lots of single operator stuff. First I've got to work on the row sprayer, get it all refurbished for this year. Then I'll go to Charlie's to put water on the next corn field and mow the roads and parking area.

No dreams to report.

Wishing you smooth sailing.

Some struggles, some juggles

Well we only got 1 row pulled today. The soil had just gotten too compacted since we plowed it. We made the mistake of putting down water because the pumice soil at Charlie's field dries out quickly and we basically made ourselves some concrete blocks. So we'll have to go back Monday with the rippers and break up each row before pulling the mulch and drip-tape over it. Dad and I got a little distressed while working on calibrating the row puller but after that first row was finally pulled we threw our hands in the air and said "no way, stress is pointless and we'll just get this done when we get it done." Last year it rained until the end of the month and we didn't get anything planted until the 23rd so we aren't anywhere near that far behind yet.

We did make good progress on the fence though, well over half done with that. Still have to construct a gate but that shouldn't be too difficult with my brother the most excellent welder to lend a hand. He's building a wonderful gate for some lady's driveway right now, I don't think my field gate will need that fancy scroll-work though.

I think it's about time for another dreaming experiment. If anyone wants to provide an image for me to dream about please do so in the comments and I will check them tomorrow sometime to see if I did so. Once more, please nothing vulgar, violent or gross, I will not only not dream about it but I will also delete the comment.

A strand of gossamer magic decorated with dewdrop rainbows to set you free.

Beautiful morning

A triangle of thickish clouds hang on the eastern horizon above the ridge behind the farm. Three crows hang desultory in the almond tree. An occasional squack or caw is their only comment on the morning. It is cool but I wish those clouds had done me the favor of bringing a dust settler. Just a little shower to freshen the air.

This morning we will empty the big greenhouse in preparation for the warm weather that is around the corner and in order to begin planting in a few days. Unfortunately we'll also have to spend some of this valuable time doing clean-up as the assorted field roads and parking areas are getting quite shaggy looking.

Last night's dreams were vivid, intense and rich. The first one involved me as an investigator going into a large fabric boutique/ garment warehouse checking for stolen merchandise. The two ladies at the desk were like "no! no! you can't go in there!" as I strolled past the store front and into the cavernous building beyond which was hung from floor to ceiling with huge bundles of brightly colored cloth. I pointed at my badge and said "This lets me go anywhere" and then walked over to their computer. Suddenly a white cat wearing bright sparkles of spiral diamond shaped patterns walked out of the computer and curled around my legs. The building shimmered and the dark shadows which pervaded the place became even more voluminous, seeming to devour the very shape of the warehouse, turning it into a deep midnight forest.

The second dream of interest involved me living in a tiny aluminum windstream trailer and a couple of rude young men who kept stopping by to visit. They were always digging amidst my cupboards and closets looking for items of interest, my stash of the peculiar and unreal. In the midst of this dream I had the overwhelming impression of 2 words: Irrelevant Immutables. And so I decided I would make a blog by that name, perhaps to place my more esoteric dreams and oddities of thought.

Well, gotta go have breakfast and get to work. Hope your day is fun and fulfilling and free.

Unintended consequences, interconnectedness and 2 sides to every story

A friend wrote me about an earlier posting ( Corn Planting day, Part 2 ) and commented that he and his wife were noticeably benefited by the new Medicare prescription program and that the savings would allow him to buy more of my good produce this summer. As is my unavoidable nature I dwelled upon this for several days allowing my mind to cascade through numerous related and unrelated subjects. One of the things which caught my eye during that duration was the recent tax cut which gives 70 billion dollars back to Americans. Normally I might think this is a good thing, but the mainstream media made sure to polarize the issue by pointing out that about 60 billion of that would go to the richest people in the U.S.

Which of course immediately makes a poor fella like me a little angry. But then, as is my unavoidable nature, I reflected on what my friend had said. Now I realize those rich folks will mostly waste that money on frivolous things like boats, electric dog polishers, gasoline powered turtleneck sweaters & etc. but they've got to spend their money somewhere. After all money is meaningless until you spend it. And if that means I can sell more electric dog polishers then so much the better for me.

Just the kinda thing that makes a guy think.

Gas boycott letter update

I've had a number of people visiting looking for info on the gasoline boycott. I was so surprised by this because frankly I figured people just didn't have the cohesive power to follow through. Nonetheless, perhaps I'm wrong so I'm putting the original letter (Thanks much, Alice.) up where everyone can get it and if they choose, forward it to friends and family. Go here to see the original gas boycott letter.

A good days work

Got about 1/3 of the fencing done today. Getting the stage set, the corners posts cross-tied and all the wrinkles worked out of our methods took up a good chunk of the morning. Finally got the 8 foot posts driven and ran home for lunch. After baking in the greenhouse at 110 degrees for 20 minutes while I watered the little plants I had to take a short break and then dad and I returned to put up our first piece of field wire. That went ok once we had the tightening mechanism reconfigured for this size of field fencing. We've got the south 340 feet up and the west 165 feet and will finish the other 2 sides in the morning along with stretching the top 3 "jump prevention" wires.

We should be pulling rows no later than Saturday. Normally we'd be doing them tomorrow but mom and dad will attend my niece's softball game in the afternoon. Should be a blast as they are up for a position in the state championship; not sure which placement they are playing for, some uncle I am.

Saw a gorgeous hawk fly overhead after lunch. Couldn't tell if she was one of our red-tails, didn't seem to be. She had distinct white bands near the end of her wings and quite a piercing call. It was hard to gauge her size, I don't think she was as large as a red-tail but she was much larger than the usual gos-hawks that haunt our orchard and the local woods. Flying in wind swept circles her cries filled me with a sense of intensity and concentration.

I always have to laugh when I hear environmentalists bemoan how agriculture is destroying wildlife. They should have to contend with all the critters who constantly draw sustenance from my efforts (some of them are even human; damn hippies get out of my corn field!) It is especially delightful to see the quail, pheasant, wild turkeys and dozens of other bird species that find my domain to be a safe and bountiful place to live. I've one particular gos-hawk which flies past the back door to my barn every once in a rare while that really puts a thrill and stunning moment of silence into me.

And I hope you have such a moment of silence to thrill you as well.

Driving posts

A fencing I will go. Actually I'll probably drive the truck while dad drives the posts unless I can talk him into trading off every 5.

I was messing around and found some of my old javascript from like 8 years ago so I added my random paragraph generator to this page. It's under my profile in the right sidebar in case you hadn't noticed. That was fun, I'll be bringing you some more code gems from the past and future as I have time.

No politics to discuss this morning. Only one dream: I was working as a teacher in some sort of art school. It was like one huge long unit storage company that had been converted into a school and I strolled from block to block looking at all the different forms of art. The woodshop especially stuck in my mind for some reason. There was a dark haired teacher there in long robes (sort of like from Harry Potter) who was asking me about watching the school in the afternoon, like during extra-curricular hours.

What a strange dream. My brother was a teacher and my family has a history of teachers but I've never before imagined myself as one.

Wishing you a happy day with lots of birdsong and wind whispers.

Corn Planting Day, Part 3

Alllriighty Then! We've got our first full field of corn planted. 5.5 rows of 65 day Seneca Pronto SE, 8.5 rows of 75 day Bodacious SE, and 7 rows of 95 day Incredible SE. Actually I can't really recall how long Incredible takes, but it deserves the name. People can't believe how good it is until they try it. Then I've got them hooked, I swear the stuff is almost as bad as heroin. People just freakin' love it.

So later today or early tomorrow we will be putting down fertilizer and then pulling green polyethylene mulch and drip tape over mounded soil for our cantaloupe, mixed melons, tomatoes, peppers, summer squash and eggplant over at Charlie's. Gotta put together the filter system too, I better not forget to gather parts, tools and stuff tonight. 7500+ plants in the big greenhouse just waiting to get out and grow.

Speaking of that I better mosey on out there and water them. It was 105 in there earlier but the sky has been a little hazy with an occasional cloud so maybe it won't be too bad. Yeah!

Wishing you all a lovely, safe, wonder-filled day of freedom and joy.

CNN, George Bush, Illegal Immigrants and high gas prices

I've been really weirded out the last couple days by CNN. They keep saying that President Bush's low approval ratings are purely a reflection on the war in Iraq. That Glenn Beck fellow mentioned it several times today and I think it was Wolf that said so a few days ago. I have heard it from CNN repeatedly and from a number of other liberal sources like that hardball Chris Matthews.

But when I search the blogrolls and talk with my friends and family, our low opinion of Bush has nothing to do with the war in Iraq. Everyone is frustrated first about his stance on illegal immigrants and open borders (most especially the open border which is an open invitation to terrorism.) Do a search of the blogs for "illegal immigrants" and you'll find 20 blogs against illegal immigrants for every one pro (I counted yesterday.) Secondly people have an indirect anger with Bush about gas prices. Personally I think this is a little unfounded psychology at work because of his ties with big oil, but then again large groups often have a pretty good peg on things.

The point is almost everyone is indifferent or even positive on his roll in the Iraq war. In this part of the world I would have to say the vast majority of people are actually approving of much of the war effort, not that it couldn't have gone better. The same goes for the international wire tapping issue. No one here buys into the democrat's allegation that the NSA has been tapping domestic phones; it only makes sense to tap phone calls to islamic countries during this time of crisis, so what is the liberal's beef with that?

What do CNN and the liberals hope to get out of this distortion of the truth? Are they really dumb enough to think that they can tell us what is on our minds and that we'll then believe them?

It is fascinating to witness this divergence between what they would like us to believe ( with their effort to reinforce such ) and what everyone has their concerns set on. I think this sort of slanted journalism is becoming very visible to a world equipped with the mass consciousness of blogs, the web, etc. and is actually starting to discredit some of the broadcast news media and cable channels that are so accustomed to applying their opinion swaying muscles.

India is cool

A big wink, wink to the city of Madras in Tamil Nadu, India. Thanks for stopping by.

Woo-hoo! Take that!

Corn seed in the ground, happiness is the tractor sound.
Warm sun on well tilled soil, soon the weeds will make me toil.
Sprinkler pipe that I must move, listen to Rock to hitch my groove.

Plants will sprout beneath the sun, leaky pipe will make me run.
The hoe I swing. Weeds I chop. So we can have a happy crop.
My enemy want me to drop, they'd best give up 'cause I won't stop.

The swinging blade - The shiny steel
of my plows turning keel. Folds the earth where they would walk,
stills their tongue so they can't talk.

Feed my folk, their bellies full.
So strong mind, and arm, and spirit rule.

Corn planting day, Part 2

We've just about got the seeder calibrated and then mom and dad had to go for an appointment to get their Medicare supplemental insurance program. This is another ridiculous twist by our governance. Mom and dad are going to be paying a couple bucks more per month than they do now for their medication on the off chance that if they need something more expensive the insurance industry and the feds will cover it.

Man, am I a whiney gub'ment basher or what? But so much of this just seems terribly illogical to me, all so some pharma-con companies can squeeze even more blood from the turnips. I think they are just envious of the petroleum companies.

It is another gorgeous day in southern Oregon. It was quite cool last night so the air and sun haven't started to bear down yet, no skin sizzle and no eyeball congestion. I'll be going out shortly to water the greenhouse and tend to some more work in the grapes. We're a little over a week out from having irrigation in the ditch at last. Since our watering days are Thursday-Saturday it will be a while longer until we can finally get the drip systems hooked up in the rows I showed you here. We'll be planting the tomatos sooner than that so we'll have to hand water with a tank pulled by the tractor until then.

I hope your work and play fills you with happiness all day.

Keep Internet Liberty

The Internet Freedom Coalition is working to help prevent government restriction of the internet. Let's all take a moment to help keep this vibrant medium a free and open place for the exchange of ideas, information, and hope.

Domino, butterfly effects and relativity

Well, relatives anyhow.

So my brother's truck broke down last week. The head gasket blew, what anyone would call an "act of god" since there is no way to prevent or predict such an occurrence. He maintains his equipment well, changes oil frequently drives reasonably etc. but variations in manufacturing, wear-and-tear and weather conditions lead to such events at random intervals.

Here's what I don't get. No one is going to bail my brother out. No government agency is going to pay for repairs, labor, a new truck or anything. And yet how is his case any different than those who decided every day to keep living in a city built 30 feet below sea level in the path of recurring hurricanes? They were warned again and again for decades that what did happen would happen. My brother had no such warning but he'll get no help and no free support.

My brother works very hard, he is a sincere, honest person. He has been struggling to get his own welding business going (he's an excellent welder) but the state licensing board, bonding agencies and insurance companies have been throwing out roadblocks every step of the way. The same sort of people who will be paying to rebuild New Orleans are not only not helping my brother, they are actually actively participating in slowing his progress. What in the H&l! ?

These regulations, constraints, and irrational methods of operation are a product of 40 years of democratic ideological dominance which barely if ever reflected reality followed by a restrictive republican control that leverages influence to large financial concerns while currying favor from large voting blocks.

Our government has gone insane.

Once more with the hubris

I was so excited to get corn in, I should've known the universe would take a dim view of my zealotry.

So one thing after another and by the end of the day, still no corn in the ground. And with tomorrow's appointment and the niece's softball game in the afternoon it will be Wednesday before we can make another attempt. Say Lah Vee, eh?

It is interesting how the domino/butterfly affect works. My nephew-in-law left a piece of steel laying in my brother's lawn which caused him to fracture 2 spindles on the riding mower he was borrowing. He was livid, no doubt. So then dad brought the mower home to work on it instead of dropping it off at the other field. Each event after that consumed an additional 20-30 minutes apiece until we were so late getting into town that by the time we got home (from getting fertilizer and some funnels for the seeder; to complex to explain...) it was too late to seed.

So I've been mowing in the vineyard for the last several hours. Which is cool because the vineyard is the only dream from last night I can recall. I've been having these odd dreams on and off about having neighbors with additional property to lease me long term for quite some months now but only last night did the entire series stay with me upon dreaming of finding an heirloom vineyard buried beneath blackberries in that field. Weird, I hardly ever dream of farming. Last night I dreamt of cleaning out the large old canes and getting them ready to produce a big crop, which is more or less what we are doing in one corner of our own vineyard. No idea why my mind cast the whole thing that way.

Life, happiness and freedom to you.

Corn Planting day

Hooray, hooray, it's corn planting day. Rills of puffy cloudy lace the sky and sunrise gives them colors for my eye. The gentle breeze stirs the trees and flower petals drift down to decorate the ground. Oh be happy human world for sweet corn begins today.

Coercion

Just got through reading Douglas Rushkoff's book "Coercion, why we listen to what They say" and found it pretty heady stuff. Definitely gave my eye a slant towards all that garbage advertising on television. Of course as I recently told a friend, I've virtually given up television for blogging. This is way more fun!

I think what I found most interesting about Mr. Rushkoff's book is when he points out how forms of coercion have spread from their advertising routes and permeated many people's daily behavior. That was really fascinating and totally witnessable. I know some of my customers are occasionally baffled when I just offer product and don't include a "hard sale" line of thought. As if they've become so saturated by advertising influence that they are at a loss when it is absent. I've got good corn, tasty watermelon, what more do I need to say? It doesn't matter to me if they trust me or not, they either take some home and come back believers or they don't.

Environmentalists are evil

Here is a picture of our irrigation ditch. As you can see it is more ditch than it is irrigation right now. The Grants Pass Irrigation District used to fill it with water in mid April to the delight of farmers and wildlife. Now, thanks to misguided environmentalists fronting for large land developers and power hungry political organizations like Oregon Water Watch the deer go thirsty and my fields are dry.

For 80+ year the Savage Rapids Dam has provided inexpensive water to over 7000 homes and farms in the Rogue Valley. In that time we have had numerous record setting salmon runs above the dam. But in the mid 90s GPID and SRD came under attack by an assortment of organizations all being liberally supported by land developers and special interests groups none of whom even live in Oregon. Their cause: save the fish.

GPID has been forced by a liberal federal judge out of L.A. to begin preparations to remove the dam to protect fish passage. Although upgrading fish passages (which are already far and above adequate) would cost less than 14 million dollars, GPID will be forced to find and spend 27 million to remove the dam and replace the current gravity powered pumps with electric pumps (read: oil or nuclear powered) it's either that or lose their rights to the additional 60 cubic feet per second that it takes to service most out-lying farms such as mine. Water which would otherwise just be flowing out to the ocean.

All of this for a fish which is no longer even on the endangered species list.

Some pics of the fields

The first pic is of our primary corn field. The second is a subset of the same field where the mixed melons and cantaloupe will go. Those sprinklers make me happy.

Come on in the weather is fine

Gotta run over and shut off the irrigation in just a couple of minutes but thought I'd take a second to post how nice it is here today.

The sky is hazed over with a thin frill of clouds and there is an intermittent breeze taking off the edge of what heat remains. The greenhouse is about 102 and I just got through watering it so all 7000+ plants are very happy. Today is an easy day because dad is doing some landscaping with/for his friend Terry. All I'm doing after I get the water shut off is working on calibrating the corn planter for Monday. Will be putting in 3 plantings of sweet corn that day: 65,75 and 89 day respectively. After this planting it will all be the 89 day Incredible that we have going in about 14 rows 300 feet long each week except for the planting intended for Labor Day weekend which will be about 18 rows.

Hope your day is fine and sweet.

Charlie Daniels on Illegal Immigration

Charlie Daniels sums it up.
Tip of the hat to Del.

It's a Kennedy family tradition

First: He might be totally innocent so let's all give Pat Kennedy a momentary benefit of the doubt.

That being said, it is an outrage that he was treated any differently than you or I would be under such circumstances. In case you hadn't heard he was involved in a automobile accident and then released without any form of test of his sobriety. No other person in America (not even an illegal immigrant) would have gotten such a lenient treatment. We see the insidious hand of favoritism once again.

Investigation of the police official(s) who demanded his release without breathalizer or blood test is underway. And I'm sure journalists are scouring Washington D.C. to see if they can find his bar tab from that evening.

My only hope involving this whole incident, above and beyond an end to special treatment is that someone will put together an audio/video blurb of Pat and Teddy featuring the Hank Williams Jr. song "It's a Family Tradition"

Water, water, everywhere

I suppose you could drink it but it's straight out of the wild Rogue River unfiltered and I'd hate to think of what you might catch. However it is superlatively fine for preparing corn fields and irrigating melon patches.

The sprinklers are running even as I type. The rich, loamy pumice soil at Charlie's field turns a lovely dark color when wet. It looks like a milk chocolate cake. The river is a milky jade like green, loaded with minerals. The spray from the sprinklers is very cold from recent snow melt high in the mountains and has a delightful smell on fresh turned earth which is beyond my ability to describe. Rainbows abound, no matter where you stand one of the sixteen sprinklers is showing off prismatic color at all times as they turn. (sorry about that plurality mixing.)

Time and happiness to you.