Itching, War, Farm News

First to the comment below on cold water on the itch for poison ivy: Cold water does “cool down” the itch. Hot Water, on authority from my sons, and then from my own experience based on their advice: in the shower use water as hot as you can stand on the places where it itches. The itch increases and increases and then suddenly goes totally away. Finish with cold shower. Itch stays away longer than just with the cold water, HOWEVER … read on.


The problem with the hot water is that it opens your pores so much, that (especially if you have been scratching just a little - or more) it also opens those pores to potential infection, like staph. In my case, I got an infection and needed an antibiotic to get rid of it. So be forewarned….

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Listened to Morning Edition on NPR, interview with Rachel Maddow on her new book “Drift” on why we go to war this morning. Her thesis (paraphrased by me) is that because we have a large standing, professional army and military industrial complex, (we have drawn down less and less after every war since WWII), we tend to try solve problems with our military instead of using other means. Ironically, (she being a liberal) she quotes pre-president Jefferson on the virtues of small government.

I make sure my children before they graduate high school have all read the Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers, (something my hs and college education lacked. We read about them, but never read them.) One of the points the Anti-Federalists make is Rachel Maddow’s very point: countries with standing armies are more likely to engage in war, and strong, centralized, governments will eventually maintain a standing army.

This is why we need to understand history-not merely dates and events, but the thoughts behind them, which are most evident when we read the original documents and not just commentary on those documents.


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Drying off Penny (aka New Cow) for her pending freshening in June. Litter of piglets due later this week. More peanuts planted and one more section of peanuts to go. Almost finished with the broccoli; radishes gone; Swiss chard being plentiful; corn coming on strong-just a few more drops of rain needed! Eight turkey chicks hatched by momma turkey this week: 7 survive first week! Small Engine repair course ½ over, already fixing 4-cycles right and left. Number One son graduated tops in his EMT class!!



Oremus pro invicem!

A week ago we had two below freezing frosts. I was worried about our sweet corn. We had planted it in four rounds about 2-3 weeks apart. The first batch was over my knee; the last was just poking above the ground. Two mornings in a row we had lows of 29°F. We had some browning, but didn’t lose any. Surprisingly, some of our broccoli (we’ve been eating off it since Easter) and early peas showed frost damage.

We’ve been eating lettuce from the garden and some peas-the peas should really come in starting this week. Radishes have been more plentiful than we can consume, but the pigs love both the greens and the radishes. Swiss Chard should be ready to start harvesting in a week or so, as will some rutabagas.

Poison Ivy itch is not gone, but is getting better. My method of relieving the itch was to take a cold shower every time it got out of hand. Night time was the worst, with me sometimes taking as many as 3 quick showers between 2 AM and 6 AM.

We had our (sort of) annual square dance on Saturday. We roasted a 120 pound hog on our homemade grill, putting it on at about 6:30 AM Saturday morning. We ate lunch at half past noon and then danced until milking time. Local folks, families from our parish, and old friends from Columbia all came out. I think we all had a great time. Of course the long-line Virginia Reel was the highlight for many. It is a real family day. Lots of interest in watching the boys milk the cows at the end of the day. Plenty of pork left over in the freezer for more feasting to come.

We’ve finished planting the first half of the peanut field. We do have another section to plow and plant, but it has gone so much more quickly and smoothly this year so far.

Once again, with all these happenings, God has blessed us much more than we could have imagined.

Oremus pro invicem!



Poison Ivy!

So, two weeks or so before Easter two of my sons got poison ivy. One case was extreme as it always is for him. I was with them cutting wood for next winter, but I only had a little spot on my arm. It never itched and I wasn't even sure that's what it was.

Fast forward 10 days later to spy Wednesday. Older son, who had worried the poison ivy would keep him from serving at the altar during Holy Week, was recovered enough to serve, as was his brother.

My little spot itched a little, but I thought nothing of it. By Good Friday, both my arms were crazy with itch. To make matters worse, Mrs. Curley caught it from me! By Monday, I had the itch from shoulders to ankle. Mrs. Curley went to the doc Monday and I went on Tuesday. We started a steroid last night. Some people in the family get "difficult" on prescription steroids. The joke around here is whether Mrs. Curley and I will still be talking come Friday!

Of course some in the family are totally against me taking any medication to end this torture. They say, "Dad, just think of the North American Martyrs!" They may have a point, but I go forward none-the-less. I will let you judge my character.

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In lighter news, I sold a story to Back Home Magazine. It's not available online yet, but really long time readers of this blog (I mean back to the first few entries) will recognize the background issues involved in building better chicken coop protection from predators-including your own.

He is risen! Oremus pro invicem!

He is Risen!

Alleluia!

The latest at CL

Just a little article on Catholic Lane that I wrote. Here's a snippet:

But to go back to those healthy couples who choose to surgically or artificially limit the love in their families, I want to ask them: What if God limited His love, that is His creation, to just Adam and Eve? Those first two, after all, were a troublesome pair. They didn’t obey very well.

Read the whole thing here.

Oremus pro invicem!

Plowing the field

Update: Here's some pictures:

We’ve started plowing the field with our new walk-behind turn plow. I will say it is easier on the horse. He can plow more land in a session.

But it IS NOT easier on the plowman. If I keep plowing, I will lose a hunk of weight and get in better shape. It’s a real workout.

Will try to get some pictures this week.

Oremus pro invicem!

I made corned beef from the brisket of the dairy cow we had to put down this past August. I used the recipe in Charcuterie (rapidly becoming one of my favorite books-borrowed from a friend) minus the garlic.

I have never been a big fan of corned beef purchased from the supermarket, it is just too salty; you can’t soak or boil enough salt out of it. This corned beef was just right. I think it is the first time I really enjoyed it.

We also had pigeon this weekend. A friend was thinning out his racing pigeon herd and told us they were good to eat. They were okay. I think I overcooked them, but even so they were okay, very dense meat. Half of them I wrapped in homemade bacon and baked. The other half I soaked in milk and then battered flour and spices and fried. I think the one wrapped in bacon turned out better-but what else would you expect?

We started plowing a portion (~ ¼ acre) of the field we are leasing this week. I expect we will be planting some peas there by weeks’ end. Today I am purchasing a walk-behind horse/mule plow board with a turn plow, sweep, and shovel attachments. It is very good working order and reasonably priced. He had another which possibly had never been used, but it didn’t have all the adjustment features as this one does.

Our horse does a good job with the forecart plow, but it is an awful lot of weight to be pulling. We are hoping that the walk-behind will conserve some of his energy so that we can actually plow more territory in a day. However, this will present some new challenges. I believe a mule or a calmer horse would walk straighter lines than does our quarter horse. When plowing with the forecart, it is fairly easy to keep the wheel in the furrow, but once we get to cultivating, the horse doesn’t seem to want to walk those straight rows. So we will see how it goes. If we can get him to walk straight rows, the new sweep attachment will greatly assist us in cultivating and keeping the pigweeds down.

There is a big working horse and tack auction in Troutman, NC this coming weekend. Many of the horses/mules are Amish trained. AND I am told if you wait around towards the end, you can get some great deals on dead broke to ride and pull animals. Unfortunately I don’t think our budget will allow it this spring.

It has been so warm we took a chance and put a small patch of sweet corn 2 weeks ago. It is up now and looking good. We put in another patch this weekend. In another 2 weeks we will put in our final bit of sweet corn.

The warm spring makes me think we are behind in planting, but really we are doing okay with peas, lettuce, broccoli, radishes, etc already in and up.

Oremus pro invicem!

Weaned some piglets this weekend. Put the sow in with our new boar. If he works out, we can bring some of Tarzan's daughters into the herd and expand from our best sows (if that's what we decide to do.)

We should start getting our leased land ready this week. First we will cut down the tall, but dead weeds, remnant from last year. We will rake (plow) the field and then start plowing in earnest. We will start with a small portion and get in some early peas and then get going on the rest.

Am thinking of taking a small engine repair course this spring. I work on our cars now, but usually with lots of local advice. It would be good to become very good at small engine repair and get some income fixing mowers and chainsaws and tillers etc. Of course many around here to a lot of their own work, but I think this may work out.

Speaking of chainsaws ... this being a mild winter was a blessing since it was our first using only wood for heat. I hope I have enough wood cut later this spring to get us through a tougher winter next year. Here's a picture of Number 4 son with wood and a not so good pic of our stove taken during the Christmas season (as should be obvious from the background).

Oremus pro invicem!

Thanks for all the prayers regarding our "big decision". Don't you all know that I haven't let loose with the news to keep readership?

Without going into all the mechanics of it, because the whole process (not our doing) dragged out much longer than human patience can imagine, late last week we decided to stay here. I immediately approached our neighbor about leasing 6 acres again this year (affirmative answer).

God then immediately blessed us through two local farmers who offered us the equivalent of 10-11 truckloads of turnips from their fields if only we would harvest them. (Not a complete diet for the hogs, but every bit helps.)

Again, thanks for the prayers. The whole process made us revisit why we are here and how to go forward. God has been very good to us.

Oremus pro invicem!

Seen

on a Church (I think Methodist, but it could have been Luthern) billboard on the way home from Mass on Sunday:

Lent

It’s not just for bellybuttons!

Now, for most of us, this just doesn’t make sense. However (and it may be peculiar to the midlands of SC) there is an common accent which renders the short “e” sound as a short “i”. Therefore, for example: “pen”, is pronounced “pin”.

So here, “Lent” is rendered “Lint”, and thus how it makes sense-at least to some. We had a laugh because of the occasional miscommunication that has resulted with our friends over this regional accent peculiarity.

In truth we didn’t get it right away. We did a doubletake and then got it.

Oremus pro invicem!

The new view

Mentioned in the last post was that we had moved many of our pigs and breeding hogs to the front yard. Here is the new view from our front porch.

And here is one of our roaming gamecocks and game hens. The game hens lay and hatch 20-30 chicks each year without us doing a thing. They rustle their own food. We have almost 30 hens and some 8 cocks roaming around now. We need to thin them so they won't destroy our garden. With 8 hens and 2 cocks, they won't do much damage. We will sell a few and put a few more in the freezer.

Received our ashes this morning. Impressed by the homily's call to fast from entertainment and desserts so we can make more time for prayer. Here's to an initially painful but eventually uplifting Lenten season!


Oremus pro invicem!

First, no news related to my last two posts. We thought things would be settled by now, but I guess some wheels turn slowly. That being the case, we just need to plow ahead with our spring agenda.

We rotate our hogs from pen to pen and plant in open pens as much as possible. But there are some areas which have seen only brief breaks over the years. Our garden has been primarily in our front yard with some exceptions (most notably the tremendous corn we had last year in an old hog pen). This year we are rotating things a bit more. Since we have scaled down to three sows, we have more open areas and more options. So in the past few weeks we have been moving all of our pigs and hogs onto the front lawn/former garden. There is still some gardening space, but a good third of it is now occupied by some growers and most of our breeding stock.

Moving our breeding stock on Friday turned out to be quite an adventure. Moving hogs in recent years has usually not been a big deal. We have some experience and know the best way for each sow or boar. But our youngest sow, Sal, gave us a run for our money on Friday. We had a trailer which we backed up to the pen gate. Normally a hog will follow food into the trailer. We moved our boar and then our first sow with no problem. Then came Sal. She just wouldn't cooperate. First we tried to lure her; then we tried to push her; then we tried to back her in with a bucket over her head and a rope tied to her back leg. She didn't want to have any part of it. I now recall her mother used to be the most stubborn hog to move also (although now reformed). Finally we moved Sal into the shoot area between the gate and the trailer. But instead of moving forward, she overpowered the shoot wall and escaped. Two of the boys grabbed at the still dangling rope from her hind leg and quickly wrapped it around a tree-but not without some rope burns first. Finally, we hemmed her in with some hog panels. Since, the overgrown area she had escaped to would have been difficult to manuver the trailer into with the truck, Mrs. Curley and I disengaged it and manually pushed it over rough terrain to the ad hoc holding pen. Finally, here Sal decided she had lost, and boarded the trailer.

Instead of a 15 minute job, we spent almost 3 hours just on Sal. We had planned to slaughter a hog Friday afternoon, but it was too late (and we were too spent) to continue our plans. Such is homestead life. Plans are always thwarted.

We will (if all goes according to plans - ha!) put some onions, broccoli, romaine lettuce, and peas in this week. Our collards from the fall (planted late) are now doing well and are all that is left from the fall garden. I did harvest a small batch of carrotts last week. I didn't plant near enough-I never do.

The start of Lent always (at least nearly) coincides with the start of planting. I think it seems quite appropriate in some ways. The spiritual work we do in Lent (or lack thereof) results in the harvest of Easter. Likewise, with planting.

Oremus pro invicem!

My thanks for all the prayers. No decision yet-it'll be another week or so at least as we gather all the data.

Oremus pro invicem!

I've had a job offer which would be a full-time position. It would pay well, but would require a move and an end to all but the simplest of homesteading activities. Much to think and pray about. We haven't had "benefits" in years and certainly haven't had the kind of salary in the offing.

A friend was extolling to me all the pros of going back into industry full-time. He made many good points. He ended the sales pitch with this: "and all you'd have to give up is your freedom.", and then he chuckled.

Ah, but that last is the point. Please pray for our discernment and acceptance of God's will with joy!

Oremus pro invicem!

Something to think on ...

From Friends & Strangers by John Medaille over at Front Porch Republic :

I start my meditation with a true story that will serve as a parable. On his 21st birthday, the nature writer Francis Thompson was presented by his father with a bill for all the expenses of his upbringing including the costs of his birth and delivery. Francis paid the bill, but he never spoke to his father again. ...

We are immediately repelled by this story, yet at the same time, we have to concede a strange kind of justice to it. There is no doubt that the father was correct to point out to his son the obligation that he had, but in quantifying that obligation, he converted it into a debt, for that is the difference between an obligation and a debt: an obligation becomes a debt when you can put a number on it. “I owe you one” is an obligation; “I owe somebody $10″ is a debt. Obligations bind people together even after they have been “paid.” But debts bind us only for as long as the debt exists. The relationship dies on payment of the debt. We might say that obligations bind us together, while debts drive us apart. By quantifying the obligation, Thompson’s father offered him the opportunity to dissolve it, to discharge it, and in doing so to end their relationship; his son took the offer and was no longer his son.

I never thought of the difference between a debt and obligation in these terms, but in contemplating it this morning, I have found it to be true. I am so happy to be involved in so many obligations (one way or the other) among my friends and in our rural community.

Oremus pro invicem!

I'm tired of ...

calls from Mitt Romney and postcards from the superpac supporting him. It must be nice to run a positive campaign while having a superpac doing a hack job on everyone who might take a vote from you.

Unfortunately all the M.R. calls are recordings so I can only hang up. I can't get the satisfaction of telling the caller I will never vote for Romney.

Oremus pro invicem!

From The Church and the Land by Fr. Vincent McNabb:

It would be well to enumerate these primary needs if only for the sake of realizing how far we are from finding them provided by the present Industrial System. Our primary economic necessities are: (1) Food - i.e., bread, vegetables, milk, meat, malted liquors, etc.; (2) Clothing - i.e., woollen, linen, and cotton stuffs, well tanned or untanned leather; (3) Housing - i.e., a home of sufficient rooms, a homestead, fresh air, etc.; (4)Fuel; wood, coal, etc. All other things belong to man's secondary needs.

Now it may be startling to some men to be reminded that the present Factory System of Industrialization produces none of the primary needs of human existence. The land and the land alone gives us the simplicities of Food, Clothing, Housing, Fuel. Factory methods cannot give us these necessities of life; but they can give them a quality which makes them controllable by a small group of men who wish to make money by controlling them.

Well, we are far from relying solely on the land for our primary economic necessities, but we are farther along than we were 8 years ago. Virtually all our meat and 70% of our vegetables come from our land. Most dairy comes from our land. Bread .... well we don't grow or grind our own wheat, but we make at least some of our own bread. Clothing ... well, here is progress. Number 2 son had been hard at tanning deer hides this winter. Not much clothing has appeared, but it is in the works. And this year we are on all wood heat for the first time.

It is not that I believe one has to obtain all of his primary economic needs from the land as opposed to from the Industrial System, but doing so, or knowing how to do so as much as possible does provide some freedom.

Oremus pro invicem!

Happy Christmas!

Yes we are still celebrating. Mrs. Curley bought me a wonderful and useful gift: a Rapid Brew brand coffee percolator. We are also sporting a new red heeler puppy. Mrs. Curley also got me a book I have been longing to read: The Church and the Land by Fr. Vincent McNabb. Have just started reading it, I surmise it won't take me long to get through it.

Cold weather came in today. The pot belly stove is keeping up.

Not to brag, but I made a delicious duck sausage with lots of sage and a roasted garlic paste, courtesy of the book Charcuterie. It's a great resource. Several months ago I made some Canadian bacon also relying on Charcuterie.

This is really hog slaughter weather now-although we do it year round, we really get going now. And many new recipes to work on once the pork is in the freezer.

Oremus pro invicem!

I heard a supposed holiday comedy bit on the radio last night which reminded of some events in my own life long ago ....

Before Mrs. Curley and I were married, or even dating, we worked at a small high tech start-up. We didn't work much together, but somehow we seemed to be always kidding each other about one thing or another. She and a small crew worked 2nd shift. I was the shift problem solver or consultant but wasn't really part of the shift as I had other work to do. I was just there for them in case of need.

So one Christmas, the 2nd shift decided to do a Secret Santa deal where you picked a name out of the hat and bought a modest present. It was all to be secret until the present exchange.

Leading up to the name selection I gave Mrs. Curley a hard time about her planning on stuffing the hat with her own name so she'd get lots of presents.

When it was my turn to pick a name, I immediately turned to her and said, "So you DID stuff the hat!" In fact I had picked her name, but didn't let on other than an occasional kidding about fixing the game.

On other days, I would come up to her and say, "I'm having trouble deciding what to get my secret Santa; what do think of those Chia Pets you see advertised on TV?" She would raise her eyebrows and look at me with some skepticism, but say, "Oh I don't know. That might be okay."

Well Christmas came and I delivered a gift-not a Chia Pet. The following year we were both laid off and started dating. Now almost 20 years later and 7 children, I am still tempted to buy Mrs. Curley a Chia Pet when I see them in the store.


Oremus pro invicem!

I have been wanting to get in the shop to craft some Christmas presents, but so far my sons have been monopolizing the shop and my tools. There is only room for so many cooks. But I promised them I was kicking them out starting tomorrow as time is running short-although, I don't feel too much pressure to have everything made and finished by the 25th. Christmas is after all, a season.

Even better, I have been toying with the idea that I will have each one help me make their own present. The time spent together working and teaching may be more valuable than the gift itself.

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A great friend of mine lost his mother in September and his father this week. We attended the Requiem Mass for the father yesterday in Columbia, SC. It was only the second Requiem Mass in the Extraordinary Form (TLM) I have ever been present at. A priest from the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter flew in to offer the Mass.

My sons being some of the few altar servers at our small parish, I go to several funerals every year. Very often there are very few communicants at these funerals. No wonder, we live in an area with few Catholics, so friends attending are often Protestant. But often times many of the family members themselves are not communicants. It may be the case that the deceased was a convert to the Faith, but also, I suspect, sometimes, the family members are no longer practicing Catholics.

This wasn't the case yesterday. The deceased had a large family and there were many, many communicants. Praise be to God for a life well-lived and a great passing on of the Faith to his children! May his sould and all the souls of the faithful departed, rest in peace!

Oremus pro invicem!