Sunday, February 06, 2022

Its been a while...

 The kids came home and then left. We've had 2 litters of pigs, 2 snow storms, 1 ice storm, and lots of other things. We have another litter due this week.

We are in the midst of Spring garden planning - some things should go in the ground VERY soon.

We have finally finished collecting wood for this winter and are working on next winter. I won't be caught so short again. 

We have been working on pruning muscadine vines which have been over grown since the day we moved in here - finally getting them under control.

I hope to document more progress this spring - but who knows?

I finished a few books recently: Anthony Esolen's "Defending Boyhood", a book (can't recall the name) about hunting and fishing in SC-a personal memoir. Now reading RJ Snell's "Acedia".

Last year was sort of a homestead disaster, between my work schedule and my weekend commitments away from home on pig business. We are trying to regroup and refocus on why we are here. (We are also thinking again of getting a milk cow????)

Stay tuned.

Oremus pro invicem!

Saturday, December 25, 2021

Merry Christmas!

 May the Nativity bring peace and joy to your family and throughout the Earth!




Oremus pro invicem!

Sunday, December 12, 2021

Old ground covered

 I know everyone has covered this ground, but......

So Food Lion is selling "Holiday Trees"! Really? Which Holidays are they? New Year's Trees? Hanukkah trees? 

Radio stations playing "Holiday Music". Which Holidays are we talking about. In this case, there are a few generic winter songs, but the rest - Christmas!

I really don't have a problem with someone saying "Happy Holidays" as this does historically encompass Christmas, Holy Mother of God, Epiphany, and minor feast in between.

BUT Holiday trees? 

Sorry for the rant.

Oremus pro invicem!



Thursday, November 25, 2021

Happy Thanksgiving!

 Our children are spread all the country this Thanksgiving - on G is home, and my in-laws are here. Two days ago we had a bonfire so we could use the "hole" for target practice.


This morning we put in our 28 lb turkey, which G was invaluable in helping with, in the oven.




Oremus pro invicem!

Friday, October 29, 2021

Supply Chain and Gift Giving

Mrs. Curley and I have been talking about Christmas this year. There was a year in the tight Requiem Press days where we made all (or just about all) our Christmas presents for the children. The shop and sewing room were very busy that year. As I recall there is a Little House on the Prairie episode which inspires this kind of Christmas gift giving.

We have been talking about the supply chain and lamenting out personal dependence on it and China. But I read this at Front Porch Republic this morning. Here is the "money quote", although you read the whole thing.

With the supply chain tangled, we have what may be a brief moment to consider its flaws without being blinded by the glare of its surface efficiencies. Perhaps, we can craft a Christmas experience not dependent on plastic molded an ocean away. As David Cayley, author of a fine introduction to the work of renegade priest Ivan Illich, noted on a recent B.S. podcast, we should beware of an institutionalized Incarnation. The more we farm out our expressions of affection to things and entities designed to do the work for us, the more we miss the point. More gifts rooted in real engagement and fewer dependent upon shipping containers could be one of the benefits the broken supply chain delivers.

Mrs. Curley and I had already discussed moving back towards opening the workshops for this Christmas. (I hope this doesn't set out panic in my children - if any of them even bother to read my blog anymore.)

Oremus pro invicem!

Wednesday, October 27, 2021

Busy days ...

Last week we drove up to Pelzer, SC and bought a couple turkeys (Thanksgiving and Christmas). Then we drove down to Kinards, SC and bought a couple bull calves. 

Now when I buy bull calves, I always ask whether they got colostrum from their mother. People do lie about this, but there is no reason to deny the calf the colostrum. You can't use the first day or more of the milk from the mother because it is all or mostly colostrum. 


Well, we have raised a bunch of calves here in the past. I am pretty sure these two did not get colostrum. We have been fighting the good fight all week to save them. Probiotics, electrolytes, Re-Sorb, using bottles and fluid feeders. It looks like we are winning. At least one calf seems to be back to normal. The other is improving every hour. 

We are still cutting wood, but now are burning it occasionally too. Two mornings we have taken the chill off with a small fire in the wood stove. More to come....

Weaned another litter of pigs this week. What an adventure! The sow kept breaking away from the breeding pen to get back near her pigs. This from a sow who was digging holes under the fence daily to let the pigs out! Now pigs (rather hogs) from her first litter (now 160 pounds) are trying to suckle off her - and she is letting them. I have never the seen the like. Wish I had a camera with me.

Oremus pro invicem!


Friday, October 15, 2021

Convergence

Sometimes unrelated articles converge to an idea or conclusion. So this past week I read Phil Lawler's piece on the state of the public schools and his advice: 

Educate your children at home, if you cannot find another school. Find other parents who share your concerns and will match your commitment, and start your own school. Scrimp and save and do your best; it will not be perfect, but it will be better for your children than the indoctrination program that now confronts them.

Don’t wait for the next outrage. Don’t wait until your children are seriously hurt. Get them out of the public schools. Now.

And then I read the seemingly unrelated piece by David Cooney explaining why the unlikelihood of capitalists being woke is really not so surprising:

Conservatives will claim that it is because the news, education and entertainment industries have been “taken over” by liberals or leftists, including many socialists, who indoctrinate our children in school and the public in general through education, biased news reporting and the underlying message of our entertainment industries. There is an element of truth to this observation, but it doesn’t really explain how they were able to accomplish all of this.

In my view, the blame for that is mainly the conservatives themselves. It was the conservatives who failed to learn the lessons of recent history. Every socialist regime that has arisen in the last century has employed the same tactics of taking over education, news and entertainment and ensuring that only one point of view could be presented. Taking control of educational institutions was always a high priority because the socialists knew that they might not be able to change the minds of adults, but that they could use schools to indoctrinate children to believe things contrary to their parents beliefs and values. Conservative capitalists knew that liberals and socialists were “infiltrating” all of these arenas in our societies. We know they knew it because they have spent decades complaining about it. Yet, they did nothing significant to resist it.

So here is the convergence. Why and the solution, but immediate and for the future. Will anyone answer the call?

Oremus pro invicem!

Monday, September 27, 2021

Songs of Sion

Many homeschoolers over the years have used the Fr. John Laux series for high school religion class. See the series (TAN) here. I th ink I posted on this some years back.

In several of the books in the homework assignments, Fr. Laux references another of his books, Songs of Sion. I have searched for this book for years. Now that I no longer need it for our homeschool, it comes up in one of my outstanding searches.

I ordered it and got it. 

Fr. Laux provides a biref introduction to the Psalms and then groups them according to type: Pennitential Psalms, Messianic Psalms, Gradual Psalms, etc. And he provides a short commentary on each: what it is about, where each psalm may be useful for our prayer.

If I still ran Requiem Press, I think I would try to reprint it.

Oremus pro invicem!

Saturday, September 25, 2021

This morning's work

I am starting to feel better about the winter as the night temperatures are getting cooler. Not too comfortable, though, as much of this wood, which we cut and split this morning, won't burn well until at least February.



Oremus pro invicem!

Friday, September 17, 2021

More Pigs! Red's 2nd Litter

Update: Red had 11 piglets! All are doing well.

It was quite a pig day. I was going out to cut wood and noticed one of our 100 pound pigs was wandering around the yard. I went to his pen and all 5 were out. They had busted through the old gate. It took a while, especially since most of my children are too far away to help, (Wyoming, SD, and OH) but we finally got all five in an old farrowing pen. 

Meanwhile our litter which was born in August are always escaping their pen. Mom lifts the fence and they all get out. I put it back down, but after they get back in and she feeds them, she just lifts it up again. I think she is trying to tell me something.




Came home yesterday to Red's 2nd litter of pigs. Boar (Daniel Boone) is a Berkshire and Red is a

Hereford with some other red pig mixed in. 

I think she had 11, but I will be able to tell better this morning. Here are the pics:




Oremus pro invicem!

Thursday, August 19, 2021



 Woke to another litter of pigs. Opal's first litter. 




Finally finishing Contagious Faith. I can't endorse this book enough.



. Oremus pro invicem!

Sunday, August 15, 2021

Science?

It is ironic that in the "age of science" (I say this in the context that science has become the new "god"), science is the first thing to be sacrificed at the altar of Co-Vid.

For just one example, wading through everything out there, it seems clear that the way you can get Co-Vid19 is to talk face-to-face with someone (with Co-Vid) without masking at a distance less than 3 feet (1 meter) for a prolonged time (generally considered to be about 10 minutes). This is how CoVid is passed according to the experts. (Obviously there may be exceptions, but this is the pretty much what has been determined.)

If this is truly the case, where does transmission actually occur? I would venture it transmits in close relationships (family at home or close friends), maybe at parties, road trips with a business associate, at work occasionally depending on the nature of the work, at recess or cafeterias.

Is there a documented case of someone contracting CoVid as a customer in a grocery store? At Mass? At the library? These seem VERY unlikely places for transmission (with or without masks), especially if grocery carriages etc. are being sanitized. (How long the virus lasts on surfaces seems to be still unclear, or at least reports are contradictory.)

At the three colleges I taught at face to face (with masks-sometimes worn properly, but not necessarily social distancing) during fall 2020 and Spring 2021, not a single case of classroom transmission of CoVid was documented. Classrooms (set up traditionally) are not likely places for transmission.

Heard on the radio Thursday, (paraphrasing) "Israel has the highest vaccination rate per capita in the world ..... and the highest daily rate of increase in CoVid cases." To me this says something about the effectiveness of the vaccine? Yet we have to get it? 

I also note that when the country was shutdown, cases only increased (see likely transmission occurrences above), and when masking became the widespread policy, cases continued to increase. Now this is all anecdotal, BUT there is scientific reasoning (CoVid particle size versus typical mask void sizes) and several-to-many documented studies (going back to the '70's) showing masking does not impede spread of viruses. The exception may be a medical mask (N95?) in conjunction with gloves and other sterile garments. (For example see this article: https://www.aier.org/article/masking-a-careful-review-of-the-evidence/ )

There is much, much, more that can be said on these topics, but it is ironic that in the "age of science", science is dashed upon the rocks, and we are being bullied with fake science.

Oremus pro invicem!


Wednesday, August 11, 2021

The Homestead....

I have never been so late in getting wood for the winter heating season. My goal is always to be done by the first week in March for the next winter. I feel I have written this before. In any event, I started cutting and splitting wood today (now yesterday).

A small start....

I have a lot of work to do.

The summer garden was a disappointment, but understandably so. We got things planted, but then I got kidney stones with complications. Then I brought our youngest daughter to Wyoming Catholic College and got sidetracked with visiting my beautiful granddaughters and moving my middle daughter to South Dakota from Wyoming. In any event I got back after what seemed like 3 weeks, but just over 2.  

So we've had some really great sweet corn, but small and not much of it. The cucumbers were good, but few, and by the time we got back they were pretty done. The beans - who knows? The cantaloupe never appeared. Just a few okra. But the tomatoes (cherry and Roma mostly) have been great.

So besides getting wood, it is time to prep for fall garden and move pigs to clean up the garden areas we are not planting in until next year.

Of course we are short-handed. Only my 15-year old and Mrs. Curley (who is having knee problems - hopefully soon to be fixed.) We also have a young man visiting us for at least a few days.

But things are working out.


Oremus pro invicem!

Thursday, August 05, 2021

4975 miles

That is, to Wyoming and back with several cross state (WY) trips in between. Great to see my kids and grandkids, but it is also good to be finally home. 

I spent a good bit of time in Moorcroft, WY, near Devil's Tower - which is a unique (or largest of its kind on earth) geological formation. Got to take some pictures of it, and actually recorded a remote lecture with it in the background for my Earth Science class.



Oremus pro invicem!

Friday, July 02, 2021

More pigs!


Lots happening here. More pigs last night. A small litter, but if she raises them all, it will be okay. 


Kidney stones ..... not too fun, but not as bad as it could have been. An 8 mm stone is nothing to laugh at (I am not laughing!), but my kidney is saved - which may have been in question for a time.

I don't know the fall dates yet, but if you are a man and have a son over 12 or a young man you are mentoring, you may want to consider coming to a St. Josephs Farm weekend. 

Oremus pro invicem!

Wednesday, June 16, 2021

What is going on? Is this the end?

Update: Made through the week without further incident! Still reading Contagious Faith by Phil Lawler, and still recommending it.

Saturday I almost blew my head off lighting a propane grill. (I usually cook pigs on wood, but it was raining and I wasn't at home.) Luckily my burns were not too bad. Mrs. Curley is happy one of my eyebrows is much shorter than it was.

Monday I was picking weeds at home and almost stuck my hand in a copperhead's mouth. I did kill it.

Today I was stung by a wasp when moving an old pallet.

Nothing ever happens to me. Is it a warning that I should get my life (my soul) in order?

If the pattern holds, I can't wait until Friday!

Oremus pro invicem!


Tuesday, June 15, 2021

Contagious Faith

 Only on the 2nd page of the first chapter, and I think I will be recommending it.  


Oremus pro invicem!




Saturday, May 29, 2021

I got a glimpse of the future this morning....

It is 10:00 AM on a Saturday morning. I have already slaughtered and eviscerated a 300 pound hog and put it on ice. 

There is a good reason that in days past small farmers (and/or homesteaders) were mulit-generational. I am not old by any means, but as I slaughtered a 300 pound pig this morning, virtually by myself, I saw my limitations in stark relief. I don't know if I have ever killed a hog by myself until today. It has always been a community activity at our place - either the community of just our family or joined friends (and brief acquaintances). 

Historically and culturally in the South (at least) hog-killing has been a community activity. And there is great reasons: for one, a 300 pound hog is heavy. For another, why process a 300 pound hog if there is no community to share it with? 

With the advent of the industrial revolution, not only did the young leave the homesteads and farms for cash jobs, but machinery was created so that people could do things with less help - less community. 

We don't have machinery like tractors to lift and move the hog (although I did drag it with a chain and my pick-up truck to our "cleaning" station.) But even if we did, I would have missed the community. By the end, my daughter and young son did come to help, and I felt the community restored. But for an hour or so I was by myself and wondered why. 

Oremus pro invicem!

Sunday, May 09, 2021

Last night at our table....

 Home grown broccoli and fried chicken. 

Tonight duck breast and pork ribs - with broccoli.

Oremus pro invicem!


Saturday, April 03, 2021

Boone + Red #1

Last night around 11 PM Red (Hereford) finished delivering her first litter. This was the first litter fathered by Boone our Berkshire Boar.

Here they are:









Oremus pro invicem!