With coronavirus in the news, everyone is figuring out how to react. Habitual preppers hardly have to change a thing, but the rest of us have to decide how much we can afford to do, and what we can't afford not to.
I live in a rural area with a low and fairly dispersed population in the winter. How much do I need to worry? I don't discount it. I really wonder.
I went to the grocery store last Tuesday, thinking to stock up on a few items with long shelf life, like brown rice and canned beans. I'd read that hand sanitizer is a good idea, so I was going to get some larger containers of it to supplement the little ones that mostly lie around drying up in my car or in my traveling shaving kit that gets used maybe twice a year.
The rice was gone. The beans weren't completely gone, but the shelves had some gaps. Forget hand sanitizer. I bought a bottle of alcohol to keep in the car to clean the gas pump handle, and rinse all the oil out of my skin after touching it.
I'm a lousy prepper, because I can imagine too much and have the budget for too little. Fatalism kicks in. I fall back to my old standby, social isolation. It's not as stringent as quarantine. I just indulge my natural introversion and avoid people. It's virtually indistinguishable from the way I live my normal life. The major difference would be some degree of food stockpiling, but I try to eat mostly fresh food. I need to figure out what will provide decent nutrition for an extended period of shortage should a buying panic deplete shelves, or an actual epidemic cut supply lines for real.
I saw one person wearing a mask. I don't know if she was feeling sick and containing her own germs, or hadn't gotten the memo that a mask won't protect you from incoming pathogens. It wasn't even the recommended N95 model. I gave her no wider or narrower passing clearance than I give anyone.
In the produce department, some private thought made me laugh in a way that sounded like a cough. A store employee shelving vegetables darted a look at me. I tried to continue the laugh longer than was really called for, to prove that I hadn't just puffed out a disease cloud, but that just made me look like a crazy person. I moved away from her only slightly faster than she moved away from me.
Only a couple of cases have been reported so far in New Hampshire. It's been such a weak winter that we haven't seen large numbers of tourists. Here in central New Hampshire, summer is the busiest time of year. Second home residents and long-term vacationers come for the liquid water. Winter brings its own category of tourism, but the local population is at its lowest. Winter visitors come in waves: weekends and the notorious Massachusetts Vacation Week in February. The volume depends on whether the snow and ice are good enough to attract them. Even then, the biggest numbers tend further north and closer to the major downhill ski areas.
Local people travel. New Hampshire's winter school vacation usually comes the week after the Massachusetts break in most school districts. In the tourist business we notice that Massachusetts people come up here, but New Hampshire people go someplace warm. People are going to be in airplanes. They're going to visit places that may have reported a higher incidence of infection. More and more information emerges every day. And residents travel for other reasons, on their own schedules. Have they been exposed? Meanwhile, not much around here looks any different except for the few shortages noted above. How rapidly might that change?
At our bike and ski shop, we're all pretty germ-phobic already. Even when a new weird plague isn't stalking the land, there's influenza, the common cold, and norovirus. Our staff is tiny. Any absence due to sickness seriously hampers our ability to operate at all. We do our utmost to stay healthy. But up to this point the perils we faced were known evils with established courses of treatment. It is the unknown that makes coronavirus more fearful. You alternate between reassurance when you hear that the fatality rate is relatively low, and stabs of anxiety when you imagine being one of the ones who ends up gasping for breath while a helpless medical staff just watches you die. We all have to die of something, but most of us are in no hurry to meet that obligation.
Yesterday, a customer came in to discuss a future bike purchase. This guy is a retired physician, and he spent the whole time coughing all over the shop owner. One of New Hampshire's COVID-19 cases works for Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center, and the idiot ignored the order to isolate himself, choosing to go expose a bunch of other people and force them into quarantine. What do you do about oblivious, selfish people who blunder around smearing whatever they've got all over every surface, as carefree as a snot-dripping toddler?
As much as a densely populated area provides much greater risk of exposure just because more people are crammed more closely together, such areas also automatically tend to come with more densely located services. A widespread outbreak in an area of dispersed population such as the one where I live would present much greater challenges for treatment as well as self-care if you had to endure either protective isolation or ride out the course of actual disease.
Beyond just money, due diligence takes time. Routines fall prey to the need for more elaborate procedures. Most people will weigh the risks, do little or nothing, and hope. It's easy to tell everyone to wash their hands constantly. You never realize how scarce public facilities are, or in what gross shape, until you feel that you need them dozens of times a day. As for hand sanitizer, it's already in short supply, as noted.
How worried do you need to be, to avoid an illness that could be trivial or fatal, that's contagious before symptoms appear, for which there is no vaccine and no treatment other than amelioration of symptoms as your body fights it with only whatever your immune system can provide? And how aggressively are you going to have to compete against people who were more worried, sooner?
Showing posts with label Rural life. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rural life. Show all posts
Thursday, March 05, 2020
Tuesday, April 28, 2015
Habit change equals habitat change
Raking the garden beds today, I noticed that the ones that had been underneath the piles of snow I'd blown from the driveway had many little rodent nests and burrows in them.
When I used to have the driveway plowed, the snow was all pushed along the driveway, creating an artificial glacier beside the garage. Nothing lived in that. It was very dense and tightly packed.
Even in previous years since I've been clearing the driveway with the snowblower I had not noticed this much nesting activity -- possibly because I was not the one clearing the garden beds. But I think the combination of deep cold and powdery snow created a need for nesting shelter and an ability to create it in the snow piles I made.
They might also have been driven to camp out because I used the garage more and had treated it with a lot of peppermint oil in the fall to discourage occupancy. And the rate at which I used firewood in this deeply cold winter meant that they couldn't hang out in the wood pile for long.
When I used to have the driveway plowed, the snow was all pushed along the driveway, creating an artificial glacier beside the garage. Nothing lived in that. It was very dense and tightly packed.
Even in previous years since I've been clearing the driveway with the snowblower I had not noticed this much nesting activity -- possibly because I was not the one clearing the garden beds. But I think the combination of deep cold and powdery snow created a need for nesting shelter and an ability to create it in the snow piles I made.
They might also have been driven to camp out because I used the garage more and had treated it with a lot of peppermint oil in the fall to discourage occupancy. And the rate at which I used firewood in this deeply cold winter meant that they couldn't hang out in the wood pile for long.
Sunday, November 23, 2014
Immunization and reduced susceptibility
When I went for a flu shot today, the young woman who attended to the initial paperwork saw my address and remarked that she knew the road well. She said she also works for the Green Mountain Shooting Preserve. That's the place that moved in and took over what was once a beautiful area in which to take little walks, ski jaunts and mountain bike rides. It was where I used to be able to nip over for a quick dose of rising sun long before that light would reach my house. It has been barred to me since the early 1990s when the present owner posted it with warning signs about the gunfire that rakes it whenever the guys are practicing or the clients are actually there for a nice killing spree.
"Have you met Dave?" she asked. "He's such a nice guy."
I knew she meant the owner. I did not say, "Has anyone asked what the birds think?" I did say I had not made his acquaintance.
The nice young woman said she takes care of the birds. I assumed that she meant this was before the clients "take care" of them in the manner of Guido the hit man.
When I got home and went out back with the cats, we met a refugee from the shooting preserve's recreational death factory. I don't know enough about game birds to know the species of this particular survivor. It was speckled, seemed taller than a quail, and not terribly afraid of humans. I was able to walk quite close to it, talking quietly. It blended so well with its background that I could not get a clear photograph even from a few feet away.
These birds are unrescuable. They don't live in this climate naturally. They become easy meals for local predators or the winter kills them. I suppose I could build a nice chicken house for them and call it the Real Green Mountain Preserve (where we actually preserve something), but that could turn into a pretty big operation. Probably better to let the foxes, weasels, coyotes and bobcats clean up after the wasteful humans.
The Green Mountain Shooting Preserve website is full of happy talk about bonding with your fellow humans, and -- get this -- "enjoying the solace of nature." I'm sure nature enjoys the solace of a rain of hot lead.
In another context I wrote something about hunters salivating over a picture of a deer. I was told reprovingly that hunters don't do it for the enjoyment of the kill. If the people who line up to blast a flock of pen-raised birds aren't enjoying the process of killing, what exactly are they doing it for? Be honest. It only takes a minute to explain to critics that humans are predators and that killing things is fun. Hell, I've even heard that killing people is fun. I don't advocate it, but I understand it. Once you suppress your susceptibility to the plight of your target it just becomes a game. See how many you can blast. It's cool. Everything dies eventually. Why not have some fun with it?
Hunters have referred to the clean death they offer their victims, as opposed to getting shredded alive by a pack of predators, or dying of disease, or starvation. That holds up as long as the hunter does not merely wound quarry that then escapes to finish its agony, or, as happens with many of the shooting preserve's birds, misses entirely, leaving confused and unready creatures to fan out through the woods to suffer various fates. In no case does that life amount to much of a "happily ever after."
Right before getting jabbed with a needle did not seem to be the time to fire up a controversy at the pharmacy window. I don't want to make this woman hate her job and I probably wouldn't be able to make her see her employer for what he is in the few short minutes I would have had to crap in her pool. Maybe Dave really is a sweet guy who simply hasn't connected the dots in his lifestyle. I will say I doubt it. He's selling a death sport and sugar coating it to attract clients and deflect critics. Since he's kept the place going for about 20 years now, I'd say he has plenty of customers who enjoy snuffing out baffled featherbrains. You can't argue with success, right?
"Have you met Dave?" she asked. "He's such a nice guy."
I knew she meant the owner. I did not say, "Has anyone asked what the birds think?" I did say I had not made his acquaintance.
The nice young woman said she takes care of the birds. I assumed that she meant this was before the clients "take care" of them in the manner of Guido the hit man.
When I got home and went out back with the cats, we met a refugee from the shooting preserve's recreational death factory. I don't know enough about game birds to know the species of this particular survivor. It was speckled, seemed taller than a quail, and not terribly afraid of humans. I was able to walk quite close to it, talking quietly. It blended so well with its background that I could not get a clear photograph even from a few feet away.
These birds are unrescuable. They don't live in this climate naturally. They become easy meals for local predators or the winter kills them. I suppose I could build a nice chicken house for them and call it the Real Green Mountain Preserve (where we actually preserve something), but that could turn into a pretty big operation. Probably better to let the foxes, weasels, coyotes and bobcats clean up after the wasteful humans.
The Green Mountain Shooting Preserve website is full of happy talk about bonding with your fellow humans, and -- get this -- "enjoying the solace of nature." I'm sure nature enjoys the solace of a rain of hot lead.
In another context I wrote something about hunters salivating over a picture of a deer. I was told reprovingly that hunters don't do it for the enjoyment of the kill. If the people who line up to blast a flock of pen-raised birds aren't enjoying the process of killing, what exactly are they doing it for? Be honest. It only takes a minute to explain to critics that humans are predators and that killing things is fun. Hell, I've even heard that killing people is fun. I don't advocate it, but I understand it. Once you suppress your susceptibility to the plight of your target it just becomes a game. See how many you can blast. It's cool. Everything dies eventually. Why not have some fun with it?
Hunters have referred to the clean death they offer their victims, as opposed to getting shredded alive by a pack of predators, or dying of disease, or starvation. That holds up as long as the hunter does not merely wound quarry that then escapes to finish its agony, or, as happens with many of the shooting preserve's birds, misses entirely, leaving confused and unready creatures to fan out through the woods to suffer various fates. In no case does that life amount to much of a "happily ever after."
Right before getting jabbed with a needle did not seem to be the time to fire up a controversy at the pharmacy window. I don't want to make this woman hate her job and I probably wouldn't be able to make her see her employer for what he is in the few short minutes I would have had to crap in her pool. Maybe Dave really is a sweet guy who simply hasn't connected the dots in his lifestyle. I will say I doubt it. He's selling a death sport and sugar coating it to attract clients and deflect critics. Since he's kept the place going for about 20 years now, I'd say he has plenty of customers who enjoy snuffing out baffled featherbrains. You can't argue with success, right?
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
March is the brightest month
In the snowy part of the Northern Hemisphere, March is the brightest month. The sun is strong and the white cover on the ground reflects it upward even under the evergreens. This makes the arrival of actual warm weather a bit of a step back, visually. The warmer air holds more moisture, breeding more haze and clouds. The brown earth and flattened vegetation revealed by the melted snow looks deader than the gaunt twigs in the gloom of November. This all died last fall and has been lying around crushed beneath the snow ever since.
The first few days or even a couple of weeks in spring have lost the hope of reflected sun and still don't offer the solace of green shoots. Warmth is relative, and greater warmth will only wake up the bloodsucking insects faster. If I was going to go away from here for any part of the year it would be that gap between meltdown and green up. But I would feel guilty.
The people who come here for the very best of any season, particularly the ones who can afford to buy a luxurious house to occupy during those times, are cheating. I'm sure many -- if not most -- of them would say they have to live the way they do and they envy those of us who live here all year, but we know that's bullcrap. They chose that life and they're cherry-picking the best of our conditions the way they take the best of everything else they can get their hands on.
I know that sounds resentful. Sorry about that. It isn't really. I don't care much either way. Their influx makes life here possible the way lots of seasonal fauna and flora do. I just wonder how many of them would earn their good times if they had to endure the bad ones to get there. Would they divest and depart forever? Some sort of life would be possible here even without them. It would be less lavish overall and more practical.
I keep wondering what one of Wolfeboro's celebrity residents would think if they saw the place in its winter disarray. Would they be so grossed out by it that the unshakeable image would ruin summer for them as well? Once in a great while we'll see one of the uber-capitalist tycoon types in the off season, but any sighting of the high-end summer folk is limited pretty completely to summer, and high summer at that. So even though someone might have been coming to town for years, they really only know a few weeks of it.
If someone put in a fracking well near one of the tributaries to Lake Winnipesaukee and let chemicals flow down to turn the water weird colors, would the few best weeks of summer hold their value? Lucky us, we don't have that kind of rock under us. But what if other businesses started locating big facilities even a few miles from the lake? Our image of quaint purity would be blown.
Timber harvesting used to be the big industry in the northern half of New Hampshire. Residential development has squeezed forestry and agriculture in the southern half. The commercial development that followed simply provides for the hordes of consumers occupying the sprawl around urban centers. Rural character recedes northward to the point where already dim economic prospects darken almost to complete blackness. In the transition zone we live off our looks. Big money looking for deep rurality goes to Montana or Wyoming. Sorry, North Country. Screwed again. But south of the notches and north of the sprawl we try to maintain our balance: easy to get to, but not too easy. Quaint and peaceful but not too boring or remote.
The mud is going to be epic this year. Looks like the weather pattern is not going to shift suddenly and completely to warmth. We may get more snow to add to what already has to melt. The slow infusion of meltwater makes the deepest, most persistent mud. The top layer of ground thaws to pudding before the frost has left the deeper layers, so the water has nowhere to go. Grudgingly the earth softens so that the water can soak down, but when it is fed by glacial snowbanks the process can take weeks.
The process, no matter how dismal and endless, is fascinating. How much more ugly can it get? How long will it remain dank, murky and hypothermic? We need to market this. Come to New Hampshire! See if you can take it! Check out how unbelievably useless and gross conditions can be! Drink like a local! Experience the season of alcohol and comfort food, when there's really nothing else to do. Be amazed!
It'll be a little while yet. There's still some spring skiing. And then...
The first few days or even a couple of weeks in spring have lost the hope of reflected sun and still don't offer the solace of green shoots. Warmth is relative, and greater warmth will only wake up the bloodsucking insects faster. If I was going to go away from here for any part of the year it would be that gap between meltdown and green up. But I would feel guilty.
The people who come here for the very best of any season, particularly the ones who can afford to buy a luxurious house to occupy during those times, are cheating. I'm sure many -- if not most -- of them would say they have to live the way they do and they envy those of us who live here all year, but we know that's bullcrap. They chose that life and they're cherry-picking the best of our conditions the way they take the best of everything else they can get their hands on.
I know that sounds resentful. Sorry about that. It isn't really. I don't care much either way. Their influx makes life here possible the way lots of seasonal fauna and flora do. I just wonder how many of them would earn their good times if they had to endure the bad ones to get there. Would they divest and depart forever? Some sort of life would be possible here even without them. It would be less lavish overall and more practical.
I keep wondering what one of Wolfeboro's celebrity residents would think if they saw the place in its winter disarray. Would they be so grossed out by it that the unshakeable image would ruin summer for them as well? Once in a great while we'll see one of the uber-capitalist tycoon types in the off season, but any sighting of the high-end summer folk is limited pretty completely to summer, and high summer at that. So even though someone might have been coming to town for years, they really only know a few weeks of it.
If someone put in a fracking well near one of the tributaries to Lake Winnipesaukee and let chemicals flow down to turn the water weird colors, would the few best weeks of summer hold their value? Lucky us, we don't have that kind of rock under us. But what if other businesses started locating big facilities even a few miles from the lake? Our image of quaint purity would be blown.
Timber harvesting used to be the big industry in the northern half of New Hampshire. Residential development has squeezed forestry and agriculture in the southern half. The commercial development that followed simply provides for the hordes of consumers occupying the sprawl around urban centers. Rural character recedes northward to the point where already dim economic prospects darken almost to complete blackness. In the transition zone we live off our looks. Big money looking for deep rurality goes to Montana or Wyoming. Sorry, North Country. Screwed again. But south of the notches and north of the sprawl we try to maintain our balance: easy to get to, but not too easy. Quaint and peaceful but not too boring or remote.
The mud is going to be epic this year. Looks like the weather pattern is not going to shift suddenly and completely to warmth. We may get more snow to add to what already has to melt. The slow infusion of meltwater makes the deepest, most persistent mud. The top layer of ground thaws to pudding before the frost has left the deeper layers, so the water has nowhere to go. Grudgingly the earth softens so that the water can soak down, but when it is fed by glacial snowbanks the process can take weeks.
The process, no matter how dismal and endless, is fascinating. How much more ugly can it get? How long will it remain dank, murky and hypothermic? We need to market this. Come to New Hampshire! See if you can take it! Check out how unbelievably useless and gross conditions can be! Drink like a local! Experience the season of alcohol and comfort food, when there's really nothing else to do. Be amazed!
It'll be a little while yet. There's still some spring skiing. And then...
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Mid Autumn
Monday, June 27, 2011
Two Seasons
New England has two seasons: winter and getting ready for winter. Whenever anyone makes a joke about New England and its seasons, winter is always one of them.
Today I spent hours stacking wood in the shed. I also tested the Ossipee River, testing a pair of waders at the same time. It's handy to get this gig testing hip boots just in time for presidential primary campaigning.
This year we got four cords of wood instead of the usual three. Three fills our shed. The fourth will have to go up in the back yard. This will make it more convenient to bring to the living room to feed the new wood stove that will heat that space since we had the gas bomb removed. The old gas unit had just gotten too scary. A wood fire in a good stove gives more consistent heat from a fuel that literally grows on trees. During the lean times I would burn busted up pallets, scrap lumber, old furniture (don't worry, not the antiques) and logging slash gleaned from old sites nearby.
When you're stacking wood you're not doing anything else. It's a long, steady grind. You can't look too often at the pile or you'll just quit and find something else to do. You have to get into a groove with a good train of thought or some sort of meditation. If I get a really good idea I might stop to jot it down or keep refining it until I finish the day's labor and turn to the evening's contemplation.
Right now I'm sitting in the dark so I can see the fireflies outside. Unfortunately, the door screen is pretty well shredded by the cats. Less enjoyable bugs than the fireflies are making their way in to investigate the light of my computer screen and drink my blood. Maybe I can drive them away with some bad fiddlin' in the dark. Or perhaps they'll take that annoying whine to be a mating call. We'll see.
Today I spent hours stacking wood in the shed. I also tested the Ossipee River, testing a pair of waders at the same time. It's handy to get this gig testing hip boots just in time for presidential primary campaigning.
This year we got four cords of wood instead of the usual three. Three fills our shed. The fourth will have to go up in the back yard. This will make it more convenient to bring to the living room to feed the new wood stove that will heat that space since we had the gas bomb removed. The old gas unit had just gotten too scary. A wood fire in a good stove gives more consistent heat from a fuel that literally grows on trees. During the lean times I would burn busted up pallets, scrap lumber, old furniture (don't worry, not the antiques) and logging slash gleaned from old sites nearby.
When you're stacking wood you're not doing anything else. It's a long, steady grind. You can't look too often at the pile or you'll just quit and find something else to do. You have to get into a groove with a good train of thought or some sort of meditation. If I get a really good idea I might stop to jot it down or keep refining it until I finish the day's labor and turn to the evening's contemplation.
Right now I'm sitting in the dark so I can see the fireflies outside. Unfortunately, the door screen is pretty well shredded by the cats. Less enjoyable bugs than the fireflies are making their way in to investigate the light of my computer screen and drink my blood. Maybe I can drive them away with some bad fiddlin' in the dark. Or perhaps they'll take that annoying whine to be a mating call. We'll see.
Sunday, May 29, 2011
You can't go home before the pig roundup is finished
About a mile from home on Elm Street we saw the lights of cars stopped in the road in front of us. The one facing toward us approached slowly. I rolled down the window.
"There's a pig!" the driver called.
I looked ahead in the patches of headlight glare. A young woman was just trying to snare the beast with what looked like a brassiere. The pig jerked its head away, snapping the flimsy garment. I pulled in behind the car in front of me. The cellist put the emergency flashers on as I got out.
The woman who had been trying to snare the beast asked, "Do you have any rope? My bikini top just isn't handling this."
Do I have any rope? We could probably have woven a sturdy and sizable net out of the amount of rope I typically have stashed in my car. In this instance I pulled out a piece about 15 feet long that's thick enough to tow a car. I know this because I've used it for that during a snowbank mishap or two.
"Is it yours?" I asked.
"No," she said. "It belongs to my neighbors up the road." She gestured in the direction we had all been headed on our way home after a long day.
"They went to get help," she said.
The young woman seemed very confident and capable. That was good, because I did not feel like going to the mat with 100-plus pounds of porker. I tied her a lasso and handed it to her.
The pig had its own ideas. We shadowed it and nearly got a line on it once or twice, but it evaded us and went into the woods. One more herder joined us from a truck that stopped. Then when the pig went into someone's yard, the couple in that house came out to join us. At that point the pig changed course and started heading back toward where the young woman told us it lives.
I kept hoping the cavalry would show up so I could retrieve my rope and go on home. Instead we gained more recruits as our straggling chase took us several hundred yards along the road.
One pair of guys had a snare with them that they intended to use on the pigs foot or snout. The couple who had joined us from their house had brought out a bucket of grain. We tried to bait the pig with it, but a few fumbled snare attempts ruined that gambit. The pig went into another yard and made another stand in front of the house.
I knew this house. An enormous Saint Bernard had lumbered out from it once and bitten me as I rode by on my bike. I'd chatted with the owners. I wouldn't call us friends, but we parted cordially. Still I wondered how they would react to an impromptu pig rodeo in their yard at 10:30 at night.
They actually didn't wake up for five or ten minutes while the herders urged each other with suggestions and instructions and dove in unsuccessful tackles that the pig greeted with outraged squeals and thrashing escapes. We ended up all the way behind the house before the homeowner stepped out onto the deck to see what the hell was going on.
As luck would have it, the pig turned out to be his. We had inadvertently returned it to its home after all. We declared victory and dispersed.
The cellist had left me so she could go on and take care of our friend's cats. I set out in the warm summer darkness to walk the rest of the way home. As the other herders passed me in their cars and trucks they called out friendly good nights. I have no idea who they were. We just did what needed to be done.
The cellist was able to take care of the cat chores and still make it back to retrieve me by the Pine River Bridge. Now for a shower and some sleep before I get up at dawn to test rivers.
I'm thinking about bacon for breakfast.
"There's a pig!" the driver called.
I looked ahead in the patches of headlight glare. A young woman was just trying to snare the beast with what looked like a brassiere. The pig jerked its head away, snapping the flimsy garment. I pulled in behind the car in front of me. The cellist put the emergency flashers on as I got out.
The woman who had been trying to snare the beast asked, "Do you have any rope? My bikini top just isn't handling this."
Do I have any rope? We could probably have woven a sturdy and sizable net out of the amount of rope I typically have stashed in my car. In this instance I pulled out a piece about 15 feet long that's thick enough to tow a car. I know this because I've used it for that during a snowbank mishap or two.
"Is it yours?" I asked.
"No," she said. "It belongs to my neighbors up the road." She gestured in the direction we had all been headed on our way home after a long day.
"They went to get help," she said.
The young woman seemed very confident and capable. That was good, because I did not feel like going to the mat with 100-plus pounds of porker. I tied her a lasso and handed it to her.
The pig had its own ideas. We shadowed it and nearly got a line on it once or twice, but it evaded us and went into the woods. One more herder joined us from a truck that stopped. Then when the pig went into someone's yard, the couple in that house came out to join us. At that point the pig changed course and started heading back toward where the young woman told us it lives.
I kept hoping the cavalry would show up so I could retrieve my rope and go on home. Instead we gained more recruits as our straggling chase took us several hundred yards along the road.
One pair of guys had a snare with them that they intended to use on the pigs foot or snout. The couple who had joined us from their house had brought out a bucket of grain. We tried to bait the pig with it, but a few fumbled snare attempts ruined that gambit. The pig went into another yard and made another stand in front of the house.
I knew this house. An enormous Saint Bernard had lumbered out from it once and bitten me as I rode by on my bike. I'd chatted with the owners. I wouldn't call us friends, but we parted cordially. Still I wondered how they would react to an impromptu pig rodeo in their yard at 10:30 at night.
They actually didn't wake up for five or ten minutes while the herders urged each other with suggestions and instructions and dove in unsuccessful tackles that the pig greeted with outraged squeals and thrashing escapes. We ended up all the way behind the house before the homeowner stepped out onto the deck to see what the hell was going on.
As luck would have it, the pig turned out to be his. We had inadvertently returned it to its home after all. We declared victory and dispersed.
The cellist had left me so she could go on and take care of our friend's cats. I set out in the warm summer darkness to walk the rest of the way home. As the other herders passed me in their cars and trucks they called out friendly good nights. I have no idea who they were. We just did what needed to be done.
The cellist was able to take care of the cat chores and still make it back to retrieve me by the Pine River Bridge. Now for a shower and some sleep before I get up at dawn to test rivers.
I'm thinking about bacon for breakfast.
Monday, June 21, 2010
Beginning summer with a chore for winter
Wood is not a heat source for the indolent. This summer I actually got motivated to make drying stacks from the unruly pile dumped from my firewood supplier's truck. What you see in the picture took nearly four hours. I have more to do, but I got tired. The job gets old long before it gets done.
Wood pellets have become fashionable, but pellets are a manufactured product. Their price and availability fluctuates radically. Pellets and wood chips also contribute to forest loss. They seem at first like a great way to use more of the tree, but the removal of slash and treetops from logged areas contributes to soil loss as more organic material is carted off and turned into carbon dioxide and soot in heating and energy systems instead of being left to rot.
Firewood won't work for everyone. If too many people used it, North America would become a desert in a matter of months. There are simply too many people. For now, it works for some of us. Other energy sources came to dominate for good reason. But there's no fuel like and old fuel, when it's right for the job.
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