Your thoughts will soon be wanderin'

Once again, I'm caught between the waking world and the world of Nod. Couple of updates. I have to plan a trip to IL in June, apparently there's a wedding or something. Bailey's planning on coming out here for a couple of days this weekend. Once again, I find myself in the heartbreak hotel.

I suppose I shouldn't be all that surprised that I'm back to being a single low-income under 25 male. It hit Sarah harder than it is hitting me, but I don't feel all sorts of happy about it. I'm keeping myself busy so I don't have to think too much, but she called me today. I think she was trying to mend fences, but she threw about six bags of salt into a re-opened wound.

She asked how I was doing to which I answered honestly, "I'm sitting in moldy water." After she asked me to explain why I would be doing that I told her that I was helping tear out and install dishwashers out at the farms. She asked if I had a minute to talk, which I did since we were cleaning up and just telling lies. She asked for my train of thought on the break up to which I answered, "I'm not." Since I'm really trying not to. She waited me out till I put in an on the fly two-cents saying, "As long as once of us is happy, I'm sure it's for the best." She didn't like that, said she was worried about me and how all of her friends are taking her out to Champaign this weekend to have a little shindig.

"Great," I said, "Bailey's planning on making trails out this way, and knowing the two of us we'll probably have a fair bit of shindigging too."

"Oh, I thought you have a tournament this weekend."

"I do, 6-9 on Sunday."

"Oh, ok. I meant to ask, whatever happened with Bailey's dad?"

"He died." Thinking that would stop that line of questioning. I was wrong.

"Really? That's why you went to Kankakee and never visited me?"

"Yes, plus you were in Minnesota. It's not like I went to have a good time. I went to support my friend and his family."

"Yeah, but how did it happen?"

"I hopped in my truck, drove down to 55, then hopped on 66 till I hit 17."

"Smartass. I meant his dad."

"I don't know all the details, all I know was that it happened quick and sudden."

"I guess it doesn't really matter that much."

"Um...Excuse me?"

"I don't know, it just doesn't really matter that much."

"Ok, one of the guys that I would do pretty much anything for loses his old man, and you say it doesn't really matter that much?! Are you kidding?! Let's not forget the fact that this is the third parent of guys I call brothers that I was able to be around for in three years. That matters a hell of a lot more than you think."

"Yeah, it must be soooo tough for you."

"You know what, I gotta go to work. Enjoy getting drunk."

I share that bit of dialog with my friend KT when she called me with her wedding date which got moved up to accommodate her brother being called up to active duty. She replied with, "She's not allowed at my wedding."


Maybe I'm feeling sentimental so I can't sleep. Maybe I'm kicking myself for not being closer with the people I care about before they aren't there so I can't sleep. Maybe I'm just a bleeding heart so I can't sleep.

I don't know.

It'll be good to see Bailey again under better circumstances. I'm very happy for KT and Phill, even if it does mean that I'm going to have to take time off of work. But maybe I can kill two birds with one stone when I'm in town. And the light is always on for me in the Heartbreak Hotel.

Buck.

Balmy Ia

The high today was right around 24. I was practically sweating in my bibs and thermals. If we get up to the high 30's that WHO is predicting I might have to throw on a pair of shorts. Gotta make some more girls cry at practice tonight. Last night I had seven out of eight crying. Not to bad, if I do say so myself. NOTE: I had dispensation from all of the parents to break their daughters. I don't do it for fun, even if I do enjoy it.

Jerky

So, I didn't use the AB method of "jerkifying" my jerky. I ended up using the "baking" method which entails slicing the meat and laying it on cooling racks on top of jelly-roll pans, or cookie sheets. I set the oven to 168, the lowest I could get it at convect back for eight hours. 10 hours later (turns out that with an electric oven the door has to be closed, or a prop set in the door to keep the latch closed for it to work)I have delicious jerky. I used a marinade of 2 Tbsp of liquid smoke, 1/3 of a cup of Worcestershire sauce, 1/4 cup of soy sauce, and 1 1/2 Tbsp of honey with about 12 turns of the pepper mill on coarse grind.

I let it marinade for a little over eight hours, just because I was running around and didn't get to it until after noon. Turns out that the eight hour mark is when every turns from perfect to a bit to salty. I figure in the future, if I do this with a flank steak from the butcher, I'll cut back on the soy sauce a bit just in case I have to put off getting the meat out of marinade.

Bit salty, but delicious. Thicker cuts of meat which I like for jerky. Could use some more pepper and some more smoke flavor. Paprika maybe?

The plan is once I have the meat on the racks I'll sprinkle both sides with a combo of smoked paprika and pepper. But it will be with beef flank steak, so a different flavor.

Volleyball

This next weekend my club is hosting the first of two tournaments this year. These tournaments are held at four different sites and eight different courts. I've been helping move equipment, food stuffs, tables, scorers tables, etc. to these different locals. All except one. The one location that my team is supposed to work at. This morning I had 16 emails asking for directions to this site. That's one email from every player and one of their parents. Now I can understand a mass inundation if I had said, "I'll get you the information in a timely manner." I have not said that. I didn't even know where we were going to be working until three days ago.

But, I calmly called and asked the director to help a poor-lost-navigationally-challenged-newcomer- find his way to the site. To which she said that all directions are posted on our club's website. I meekly said, "Well, don't I look like an idiot?" She laughed and then got very serious and a little scary, "It means a lot to me, to Curt, and the rest of the board that you help out so much." The only reply I could think of was one that Lutheran modesty has beaten into me, "I don't do anymore than anyone else would." She laughed and said I was full of crap. Hung up the phone and went on about my morning, running errands and what not. Gave me warm fuzzies though to know that some one appreciates effort.

I went out to the store today to get some groceries and refill some empty spots in my pantry. Great sale on juice, concentrate cans for 39 cents a pop. Very happy with that. Then I got to the milk and cried a little. But, I'm brining some venison that one of the hunters donated to the blauhaus. He dropped off a good 60 pounds of mixed meets, which made Sam and I very happy. Naturally I started scouring my new cookbook for all sorts of backwoods deliciousness. I'm bring 6 pounds of the chuck that has been cut into 1/4-2-4 inch segments, I have to wait another couple of hours to make sure the cure takes, rinse them off. Douse them in black pepper, then I have two options.

Option 1. Bake at low low low heat (~120 degrees) for 4-8 hours with oven door open.

Option 2. Get some furnace filters lay the meet on the furnace filters, lay the furnace filters on a box fan. Fan until jerky.

Option 1. iss something that makes a lot of sense to me. Kind of like the smoking that we do at the farm, just a much shorter time due to the difference in mass.

Option 2. is something that I really want to try. Alton Brown who is a food science guru advises that any type of heat application will actually cook the jerky leaving you with leather. Whereas the cold application with air movement leaves you with meat that still has tenderness.

Who knows.

Buck

Sheep and snow

The sheep have been huddled up in the back lot of the 'hundred farm for the past two months. Since I wake up at unspeakable hours and with nothing to fill my time other than planning things that can't be planned, or waiting 20 minutes for the engine block of the truck to warm up; I take this time to walk down towards the farm and check on the animals, and make sure that all of them have water sources that aren't completely iced over. I've come to enjoy the way that the sheep are terrified of a human in their pen. I realize that that statement sounds a bit sadistic, but for my part the enjoyment comes from the psychology of it.

There is definitely an alpha ewe that all of the herd takes their cue from, including the ram. I'll hop over the fence in the horse lot and just wait. At first they all scatter back into the barn and wait. After ten or so minutes this ewe will pop her head out of the barn to see if I'm still there. She sees that I'm sitting in a snow bank just waiting for them to continue munching on the hay, or over by the water tank paling out some fresh water...either way I don't pose a threat to the flock. She'll come out and eye me up and down, saunter around the hay bale that is still frozen from the first cold snap, and stop three feet from me. At this point I give a call of "sheep", which the flock from the '5o farm understand and recognize, and come up to me expecting corn. I scratch some noses, hold out my hand that has some corn in it and watch the alpha ewe. She still hasn't warmed up to me, and I've been doing this routine since prior to Thanksgiving.

This morning though was different. We had another storm come through and the sheep were all in the barn to start the morning. I hopped the fence and landed on my rear in a snow drift, which wasn't very graceful. I got up cussing the snow, the cold, and the ice, and looked up to see the ram staring me in the eye balls. That was a bit unnerving let me tell you what. I "sh-ed" at him trying to back him up and he just blew steam through his nose. More unnerving. Finally after a couple of minutes I stamped my foot at him and scared him back a couple of feet, enough room to hop on the fence-line if I needed to. He snorted again and went over to the hay bale to munch on the frozen goodies.

I walked over to the barn to check on the rest of the flock and saw all the ewes and the weather in the stall. This is a bit unusual for this flock, and very much out of character. I took a quick head count and made sure they were all there, then walked into the stall. At that point all but one freaked out and made a bee-line for the door which I apparently was in the way of. If you ever get the chance to get run over by nine sheep...don't. They stink, they're heavier than they look, and their little hooves hurt. Also, they like to defecate when they're scared. Not fun. I went over to the one ewe - the alpha- that didn't get up to make sure that everything was ok. She was shaking and snorting with her eyes rolling this way and that. Now, I'm not trained in any vet practices, and while I knew that my boss, and the 'hundred supervisor were both awake, I didn't want to call them at pre-sunrise asking for advice. I figured, by the symptoms - not moving, shaking, wild eyes, dry nose - that something was wrong and I assumed that it was cold related. So I opened up the house, got some blankets - not the pretty ones, blankets that the Dom. Sup. has in the upstairs - and a warm bowl of water. Brought that out to the ewe, went to the crib and got some cracked corn for her to munch on.

I ended up waiting with her for 3 hours before the 'hundred Ag. Sup. came out to do chores in the morning. By that time she had stopped with the wild eyes, and was back up on her feet. But she still didn't want to go out of the barn to the rest of the flock. T came in and asked me what was going on, I summed up the situation as there was too much to explain - nor did I want to relate my embarrassing entrance. He told me I should have called him, as his wife was taking the day off since the girls didn't have school/daycare because of closings. While we were talking that ewe was following us through the sheep lot like a puppy dog. She was never more than two feet from my right leg while T and I were talking.

Moral of the story is: when it is negative degrees, don't go outside if you don't have too. Also, body heat saves lives.

Buck

Why we do

The True Gentleman is the man whose conduct proceeds
from good will and an acute sense of propriety
and whose self-control is equal to all emergencies;
who does not make the poor man conscious of his poverty,
the obscure man of his obscurity,
or any man of his inferiority or deformity;
who is himself humbled if necessity compels him to humble another;
who does not flatter wealth,
cringe before power,
or boast of his own possessions or achievements;
who speaks with frankness but always with sincerity and sympathy;
whose deed follows his word;
who thinks of the rights and feelings of others rather than his own;
and who appears well in any company;
a man with whom honor is sacred and virtue safe.

John Wayland

2010

I meant to post this earlier...well, prior to New Year's but things turned out that I'm a touch late. Story of my communication life I suppose. I don't get behind those Resolution things because they're evil and no one sets realistic goals for them. When you do you get ridiculed for not having high enough standards. So, in rebellion I'm going to take a different approach to the Resolution thing.

My 2010 hopes and wishes.
1. That my family makes it to 2011 safe and sound.
2. I find a job that I not only enjoy, but I can survive off of.
3. I stop being so critical of not only myself, but others. (That's a big one)
4. I want to save enough to pay off old debts.
5. I want to put enough away to continue with my backpacking purchases.
6. I want to take more me time when I can.
7. I hope that all my friends and I can get together more often.
8. I hope that I don't get in trouble with the law.
9. I wish that I didn't feel so bad about planning on leaving the farms.
10. I hope that Death takes a pass on me and those I'm close to. (Take a vacation dude)
11. I hope that I quit the vices in my life.
12. I hope that I become a better communicator.
13. I hope that my faith and reliance in the Lord helps me through the dark times that I know will happen.
14. I hope I make the right decision when I don't know what to do.
15. I hope that I get to see the old man umpire a ball game that isn't in IL or IN.
16. I wish I didn't have to travel as much as I'm going to have to this year.
17. I hope that influence my team in a positive manner when we're under pressure.
18. I wish I had a mule.
19. I hope that my friends out here understand when the time comes.
20. I hope that all of the animals stay alive.
21. I hope that Sarah Palin doesn't win the GOP front runner.
22. I hope that the Blue Haus doesn't fall down while I'm in it.
23. I hope that I'm making the right decision cause guidance has not been plentiful.
24. I hope that I can dedicate more time to Church.
25. I hope that I make it to March 20.

I suppose that I could keep going, but I think 25 is enough for now. I've got big hopes for 2010.
Don't let me down.

Buck