adventures of GutterMan

So I tried to email this photo unsuccessfully to several people yesterday from my phone, much to the confusion of many people. Anyway, the picture doesnt do it justice, we are 35 to 40 feet in the air and Dodge City Street Dept were good enough to shut down the street for us so that we could go up and over the power lines, which the power company was good enough to shut down for us as well. As hilly as Dodge City is, we were able to see the tops of grain elevators from this point

For those of you who know him, that is "Good-Man-Fearless-Driver-Downspout-Crasher" (native american name) Clifford Nininger in the basket, but that is another story...

on sin nature, and dont pet the wet cats.

While the 3 older kids and wifey are at NBS, (Nightly Bible School, as they have to do it nowadays, apparently-grrrrr) I stayed at home with Stu-Jack. In order to alleviate some of the pain of being left behind that I can sympathize with since I am a "youngest" as well, I kinda switched it around on him and told him that we were going to banish everybody except the 2 coolest members of the family so that just Stu and I can hang out. He thought that was pretty cool and we did the obvious things that Man and Boy do together, eat ice cream, (Downstairs, even! Whoa!), sit at the table without our shirts, slop hogs, chase chickens, look for cats for Stu to pee on, watch Cowboy Pooh, turn the music up really loud and dance, and all the other normal stuff dads do with their boys. (I guess)

Mostly, though, we did whatever Stu wanted. Whenever he expressed himself, I just said "Whatever you want- today is Stu-Day!" and he was pretty impressed. At first it was very foreign to him, being the natural humble youngest child that he is, used to never getting anything you want and having to scrap for anything you do get, whether by sheer and sudden intensity of all the force his little body can muster against larger and more selfish older siblings (naturally), or by natural youngest-born charms. But, it only took him about an hour and a half before he fully realized the implications about his new found position in the universe, made evident by his yelling for me while he was in the bath. I came in at his perpetual insistence and asked His Nibs what he needed. He informed me he needed another toy, so asked him what toy he required. In reply, he pointed to a toy just out of his reach on the ledge of the other side of the bath. THAT was the end of Stu-Day.

When Wifey got home from VBS, everyone came in the house except Isaiah, so I went towards the back door to find him. Wifey beckons me over to the window to watch something and there he was, trying to pee on a cat. I stuck my head out the door and asked him if he had any luck. His quiet pride in his shy way showed through when gave his little smile and said: "they are pretty quick, but sometimes if you are fast, you can get them a little bit". I am very proud of my boy. I am proud of his modesty, I am proud of his hunter-spirit, and I am proud of his aim.

Disclaimer:
Just as a side-note, I would like to say that I do not pee on my cats, and as far as I remember have never told them too, but I exercise discernment when considering petting the wet ones...

Some stuff is too gross to feed to the pigs; So I ate it...

Last week good friend, neighbor, renowned culinary artist, and quite intrepid food taster, Gaylord, was at my house and we happened to be wandering through the garden when he spotted the disgusting pus-looking fungus stuff growing out of the top of the husks of corn. Not just growing, but BURSTING forth out of. He made a comment similar to how lucky I was to have that because it was worth quite a bit of money if sold for food.





I was a little dubious at first, not because I don't typically believe Gaylord, but mostly because I couldn't imagine anyone actually eating it. But if anyone would know something as obscure as that, it would be him. (Did you know that you could eat Queen Anne's Lace? I didn't, but now I believe him) And as my curiousity grew, so did my internet searches, and I disovered one of two things; either he was right and people do eat it or he is the master of practical jokes and went to a lot of trouble to prank me, because there is actually a lot about it on the internet. Often called "Mexican Truffles", they are basically a mushroom that feeds off of the corn. But dont take my word for it; check it out for yourself.
Remarkably, I couldn't make any of my family try it out with me, execpt an unwilling Wifey. Grace's remark as she was staring at it in horror was: "It kinda makes me shiver when I look at it". Here's some more pictures:



After eating it, I have to say, the looks of it and the name of it (according to wiki it translates into something roughly "raven poop") are the most defining things. It mostly tasted like slightly musty sweet corn, with a lot of jalepeno, to help my digestion, of course. It was mostly unremarkible in taste; my only regret about this cooking experience is that Gaylord is working nights and I never know when I can call him up and have him try something. You should have tasted what he did with a huge snapper-turtle I caught last month!

on my restlessness

After the wind blew the end wall out of the shed, I found myself milling about aimlessly and restlessly while the insurance company decided what to do about my shed. One thing that Wifey hates is aimlessness; so she aimed me in the direction of the backyard. She had been talking about a patio area next to the house for some time now, and so we grabbed our chance one weekend. Here is a series of pictures showing progression, starting with the "before" picture:

First batch- Go, Mama, GO!! Look at those muscles!!

I got the easier, but more frustrating job! "MORE MUD!!!!"

And, finished product. Turned out alright for a couple of home-owners, I thought.

And here is a picture of Brynn's mosaic artwork made of 100% post-consumer, recycled dishes that her and her mom have been saving for years. The "stash" of broken dishes ran out and she had me stopping at Good-Wills and garages sales looking for just that right color. She is actually much nearer to completion now, but hasnt had much of a chance to do it this weekend, on account of the 9" total of rain that we have had this weekend. She complains about the tedium of the white.

Then, the kids have been pestering me to building them a tree house or something; so I opted for the "something". I told them when they finished playing on that level, I would build them another one, then another one.



And then, Stu-Jack and I decided that even us big boys needed a nap every now and again!!!

new family members!!!

Let me introduce to you Wilbur and Olivia, our new family-members/pets/food-source. I recently saw at the local Kroger store that you can buy up to 4 (if I remember correctly) life/health insurance policies for your pets. When the young fella behind the counter saw me reading it as Wifey was paying for our groceries, he piped right up and informed me with a wink that "Hey, you need that insurance, 'cause animals are people, too!" I just thought that cheeky bit of sarcastic advice was pretty funny coming from a 14 year old boy (unsolicited, I might add) behind the counter; maybe the world isn't necessarily going to fill up with panty-waisted mama's boys, after all. I know a few youths that give me hope, as well. :) But I do wonder what the insurance adjuster would say if when he asked you the "reason for loss" you replied "Bacon".

In other news, here is one that is a bit of a blow. Friday morning around 1:00 am, we had a bit of a blow (heh) here at the house. The careful observer will notice in above picture that the East end of our shed is neatly wrapped over our swing set. Even though the wind was almost directly out of the south, the east end of my uncompleted shed blew out and landed directly on our swing set. The whole shed is wracked, or twisted somewhat. My only consolation is that my swing set is still standing. I actually think there may have been some smallish tornado stuff going on because I had several little trees get broken over, and one blown the north, and another to the south. Here is a closer look at it. Notice the total lack of the first truss on end. It snapped off

the end wall posts at ground level and delaminated the corner posts.

We woke up from the noise of the wind sounding like someone laid railroad tracks right up to the house, and Brynn remembered another precious family member; a geranium on the front porch (I wonder if Kroger has plant insurance available? hmmmm) I couldn't hardly be stirred of course so she goes out to save the helpless little bugger. I could feel the air "pulsing" or pressurizing into the house because the door was open. After several minutes of this, I finally dragged myself out of bed to see what was happening. I came out to see Brynn panting, out of breath and shaking, next to the door. She had been trying with all her might to pull the door shut for about two minutes. She had pulling long enough and hard enough that she has blisters and cuts on her hand from the handle, if that gives any idea about the strength of the wind. Anyway, praise God that there was no damage to the house and nobody was hurt! It would be much more inconvenient to live in a half finished shed while rebuilding the house, rather than living in the house while rebuilding the half finished shed.

1st day of spring, 2010

So here is what the first day of spring, 2010 looks like out our back door:


All that snow, plus the 30 mph wind inspired me to finish up a few details of inside projects that I've been putting off for a while, which also inspired me to take a couple pictures in order to show the (pretty much) completed project discussed in a previous post. While I would ordinarily balk at working down in the basement on the first day of spring, when I've got potatoes and stuff to be planted, today it just seemed like a good idea!





This round little "reading nook" was a fun project; notice the round, custom-made seat cushion Wife made for it.

we dont have cable TV...

You see, we don't have cable TV; so out here we have to just make our own fun, instead of watching other people having fun. I happened to be getting our garden ready to till with the weed-burner (necessary because of more of my slothfulness) when I just happened to discover a little fun fact about last summer's dried and brittle gourds:


Yup; we are that Redneck! You noticed the subtle background music didn't you? It is really too bad the video didn't do the audio justice. The mike picked much, much more of the weed burner rather than the explosion. Brynn said she could hear it from inside the closed house quite well. When I was right next to it, it sounded like a rifle shot!!!
Later, one of my children made the mistake of asking why the gourds did that; boy were they sorry later! Anytime a Dad can incorporate teaching their kid something with blowing something up... watch out!
When I was growing up, I was wary of asking my dad questions about how things worked. He was all together too glad to explain it- all of it; in detail that could last for most of the day! As I got a little older,I did finally see the humor in asking leading questions when my siblings were around and would be willing to suffer the long hours of "lectures" just to see the misfortune of my older siblings while in the car; it was even worth the dirty looks, pinches, and sometimes punches I would receive from them. I see the same thing happening in my own kids when their eyes instantly glaze over as I begin talking about heat expanding molecules in pressurized compartments. Homeschooling does give me a new perspective on being willing to explain stuff to them, because without realizing it, I think that I often thought "Oh well, some teacher will explain that to them someday." It takes a bit of that "buffer" away, when you are solely (well dually) responsible for a child's education. But I'm sure that it will give them something to blog about when they are adults...
I am quite proud of what an obviously good job Brynn is doing homeschooling. I say obvious, but I guess I was more like oblivious because I am not really part of their actual formal education process, just more like the administrative discipline guy. But I needed some help holding the "dumb" end of the tape measure when I laid out the pig pen last week, and so Gracie volunteered. She seemed a likely and willing lass, so we put in some rough stakes ,then we came inside with our measurements, I started drawing out the pictures, and we commenced to figure out square footage's, and then how to go backwards and figure out how we could maximize the square footage by changing the shape of the pigpen and using the same amount of linear footage of hog panels.
I was quite shocked to see how much of this that she already knew! And, how quickly she picked up on what I did have to explain to her. I realized pretty quickly that, less whatever people skills I may have acquired over the 27 years I have on her, she could do my job! And my last job as well! (commercial roofing) I just about was blown away, and she is only 8! well at least until tomorrow, Brynn tells me. Anyway, hats off to the kids, and especially Brynn, for a bang up good job on all that! I know it is quite frustrating; I hear about that, but I guess my wife, being who she is, doesn't tell me so much about the successes.
Anyway, anytime any body feels the urge to blow up a gourd, come on out, I've still got plenty!