Good day today.
Warm sun, blue sky, no wind. Spring is awesome.
Cut some brush, stacked it on the burn pile in the back forty, admired the improvement in the "view".
Adding bodacious "beer butt" chicken slow cooked on the grill to the tune of a cold adult beverage just made it better.
Ya gotta love it!
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Bunkhouse Weeds
Gardening requires lots of water - most of it in the form of perspiration.
(Lou Erickson)
Last weekend, the bride and the ole fat ranch hand went tooth and toenail after the forest jungle of weeds in the flower beds around the bunkhouse. (Then took two days off for the ache/pains to subside enough to contemplate the next "move"?)
This morn's dawn invoked the soothing auditory blanket of rain as it cascaded from the roof onto the ground. The heaven sent moisture peppered thru the budding tree leaves and whispered to the fallen leaves below in order to softly wick to the thirsty soil.
The cycle of nature continues thru its millennial journey of seasons. Life is renewing.
This week the ritual planting of the Tin Star vegetable garden shall occur thus signalling the onset of our annual waltz with voracious deer, invading insects, and the ever pending specter of drought.
Ya gotta reckon that a safe bet is a man should never plant a garden bigger than his wife can take care of?
(Lou Erickson)
Last weekend, the bride and the ole fat ranch hand went tooth and toenail after the forest jungle of weeds in the flower beds around the bunkhouse. (Then took two days off for the ache/pains to subside enough to contemplate the next "move"?)
This morn's dawn invoked the soothing auditory blanket of rain as it cascaded from the roof onto the ground. The heaven sent moisture peppered thru the budding tree leaves and whispered to the fallen leaves below in order to softly wick to the thirsty soil.
The cycle of nature continues thru its millennial journey of seasons. Life is renewing.
This week the ritual planting of the Tin Star vegetable garden shall occur thus signalling the onset of our annual waltz with voracious deer, invading insects, and the ever pending specter of drought.
Ya gotta reckon that a safe bet is a man should never plant a garden bigger than his wife can take care of?
Monday, March 15, 2010
Life Is Good!
Fishin' was a passion for the ole ranch hand for as far back as he can remember.
Awesome summer days spent in total bliss without care or a sense of the passage of time.
Just a young boy, some crude angling paraphernalia, and free bait worms dug from the rich soil or grasshoppers captured amid the pasture grass. Watch that cork disappear, feel the throbbing surge of the wriggling varmit on the opposite end, and life was good.
Never "owned" a fishing place. Just always dreamed of it.
Near bout four years ago the Tin Star became home. It came with a pond of sorts, but it was silted in from eons of drainage down the creek bed and overgrown with brush.
Finally scraped together enough coins to have the tank cleaned out and reshaped only to find central Texas in drought (think dusty dry pond).
Started raining a few months back and has steady rained since to the point that the pond has been flowing over the spillway for quite a spell.
Now the good part: Went to the feed store in Florence this morn and ordered 100 hybrid bluegill bream, 100 hybrid bass, and about 500 fathead minnows for delivery in about three weeks. Yeah, they will only be 3-4 inches long to start, but it will be a life long dream fulfilled.
Life is good, JRM!
Awesome summer days spent in total bliss without care or a sense of the passage of time.
Just a young boy, some crude angling paraphernalia, and free bait worms dug from the rich soil or grasshoppers captured amid the pasture grass. Watch that cork disappear, feel the throbbing surge of the wriggling varmit on the opposite end, and life was good.
Never "owned" a fishing place. Just always dreamed of it.
Near bout four years ago the Tin Star became home. It came with a pond of sorts, but it was silted in from eons of drainage down the creek bed and overgrown with brush.
Finally scraped together enough coins to have the tank cleaned out and reshaped only to find central Texas in drought (think dusty dry pond).
Started raining a few months back and has steady rained since to the point that the pond has been flowing over the spillway for quite a spell.
Now the good part: Went to the feed store in Florence this morn and ordered 100 hybrid bluegill bream, 100 hybrid bass, and about 500 fathead minnows for delivery in about three weeks. Yeah, they will only be 3-4 inches long to start, but it will be a life long dream fulfilled.
Life is good, JRM!
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Brush Dancing
Our lives are better left to chance
I could have missed the pain
But I'd of had to miss the dance (Garth Brooks)
The ole ranch hand lucked into purchase of the Tin Star mid-year 2006. At that time, the Star was a brush infested jungle of cedar, oaks, elm, and steroid induced briers.
Now comes four years later after untold hours of sweat, blood, aggravation, and the pure joy of temporarily taming the "beast".
Sweat: Try July/August on the business end of a chain saw with no breeze in sight?
Blood: The old fat boy has a "wound" down the side of his neck this morn from the brush biting back yesterday while engaged in the act of doing battle with nature (and the total "wound" count is legendary).
Aggravation: Run a good chain saw on large timber all day long and it will sing. Ease it into small brush and watch it disintegrate before your eyes. True story, brush will eat a chain saw, spit it out, and stomp on the operator?
Joy: Ain't nuthin' better than sittin' back with a cold adult beverage at the end of a hard day and experiencing the visual pleasure of measuring one's progress in concert with the land.
Yeah, it's just "dancing" since the spring rains will bring the brush back with a vengeance, but simple pleasures are the best kind when one has no intention of ever "finishing" the job (and it amply makes the pain worthwhile!).
I could have missed the pain
But I'd of had to miss the dance (Garth Brooks)
The ole ranch hand lucked into purchase of the Tin Star mid-year 2006. At that time, the Star was a brush infested jungle of cedar, oaks, elm, and steroid induced briers.
Now comes four years later after untold hours of sweat, blood, aggravation, and the pure joy of temporarily taming the "beast".
Sweat: Try July/August on the business end of a chain saw with no breeze in sight?
Blood: The old fat boy has a "wound" down the side of his neck this morn from the brush biting back yesterday while engaged in the act of doing battle with nature (and the total "wound" count is legendary).
Aggravation: Run a good chain saw on large timber all day long and it will sing. Ease it into small brush and watch it disintegrate before your eyes. True story, brush will eat a chain saw, spit it out, and stomp on the operator?
Joy: Ain't nuthin' better than sittin' back with a cold adult beverage at the end of a hard day and experiencing the visual pleasure of measuring one's progress in concert with the land.
Yeah, it's just "dancing" since the spring rains will bring the brush back with a vengeance, but simple pleasures are the best kind when one has no intention of ever "finishing" the job (and it amply makes the pain worthwhile!).
Monday, March 1, 2010
CHICK FLICKS
The ranch hand's bride absolutely LOVES going to the moving picture shows. The ranch hand mostly don't because:
1. The beautiful child bride chooses "chick flicks" almost exclusively.
2. The ranch hand's bladder will no longer endure an entire feature film without relief.
3. The price of the theater groceries would make my Wright City dad swaller his chaw.
4. The "dark" in there makes negotiating the stairs a "trip" (remember the bladder?).
5. The best part is when it is over.
Of course they is advantages:
1. I gets to sit by the most beautiful woman in the world and hold her hand.
2. The bladder thing gives me the excuse to walk around in the lobby a couple times per show.
3. I can eat two gallons of butter soaked pop corn and nobody seems to care.
4. It is so dark nobody can see the ole fat boy "fidgeting".
5. The best part is when it is over.
The bottom line: Going to movies with the wife is a romantic dating ritual that I hope never ends!
1. The beautiful child bride chooses "chick flicks" almost exclusively.
2. The ranch hand's bladder will no longer endure an entire feature film without relief.
3. The price of the theater groceries would make my Wright City dad swaller his chaw.
4. The "dark" in there makes negotiating the stairs a "trip" (remember the bladder?).
5. The best part is when it is over.
Of course they is advantages:
1. I gets to sit by the most beautiful woman in the world and hold her hand.
2. The bladder thing gives me the excuse to walk around in the lobby a couple times per show.
3. I can eat two gallons of butter soaked pop corn and nobody seems to care.
4. It is so dark nobody can see the ole fat boy "fidgeting".
5. The best part is when it is over.
The bottom line: Going to movies with the wife is a romantic dating ritual that I hope never ends!
Soulful Pleasures
Ranch weekends are almost indescribable in their purity of form and substance.
Of course, "weekends" are only a focus because the ole fat boy is still toiling in the salt mine of an employer Monday thru Friday?
This past Saturday morn dawned with a brilliant sun, azure blue sky, and just the slightest wisp of occasional cloud to season the day.
A labor of love is one that satisfies the soul, provides tactile and visual evidence of its existence, and leaves the world a slightly better place for its doing. The ranch hand indulged his soulful pleasures on the recent sixth week day by stacking previously harvested brush on the back forty burn pile. A task simple in its execution, mindless in the transition from its slain earthbound position to atop the "burn" heap, yet soul satisfying to the miscreant performing the actual labor. Dad used to say when approaching a cemetery he maintained, "Ya'll got to excuse me cause it is time I cleaned yall up". This would be "rancher" intuitively understands that call to nature for forgiveness of the human alteration of the landscape of the land.
Yesterday began with a trek to the front gate to retrieve the Sunday newspaper and the unexpected morning trumpet of the resident turkeys calling after their night's slumber in the Gabriel river bottom. Happy to greet another day, the grasshopper wranglers were joyously gobbling their love of life.
Such are the Lord's reminders of all that the humble ranch hand is blessed with on his small patch of earth bound heaven in Gabriel Mills, Texas.
Of course, "weekends" are only a focus because the ole fat boy is still toiling in the salt mine of an employer Monday thru Friday?
This past Saturday morn dawned with a brilliant sun, azure blue sky, and just the slightest wisp of occasional cloud to season the day.
A labor of love is one that satisfies the soul, provides tactile and visual evidence of its existence, and leaves the world a slightly better place for its doing. The ranch hand indulged his soulful pleasures on the recent sixth week day by stacking previously harvested brush on the back forty burn pile. A task simple in its execution, mindless in the transition from its slain earthbound position to atop the "burn" heap, yet soul satisfying to the miscreant performing the actual labor. Dad used to say when approaching a cemetery he maintained, "Ya'll got to excuse me cause it is time I cleaned yall up". This would be "rancher" intuitively understands that call to nature for forgiveness of the human alteration of the landscape of the land.
Yesterday began with a trek to the front gate to retrieve the Sunday newspaper and the unexpected morning trumpet of the resident turkeys calling after their night's slumber in the Gabriel river bottom. Happy to greet another day, the grasshopper wranglers were joyously gobbling their love of life.
Such are the Lord's reminders of all that the humble ranch hand is blessed with on his small patch of earth bound heaven in Gabriel Mills, Texas.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Saint Fido
Saint Vitus (dancing mania) was a social phenomenon that occurred primarily in mainland Europe between the 14th and 18th centuries. It involved groups of people, sometimes thousands at a time, who danced uncontrollably and bizarrely. Men, women, and children would dance through the streets of towns or cities, sometimes foaming at the mouth until they collapsed from fatigue.
Saint Fido has recently decided that he should "dance" on his hind feet while attempting to manipulate the door handle on the back door to the house with a front paw.
He's getting close, but he aint' quite got the door to open yet? If he does and tunes the TV to "Dancing With The Stars", we might have to get that varmit tested or sumpthin?
Saint Fido has recently decided that he should "dance" on his hind feet while attempting to manipulate the door handle on the back door to the house with a front paw.
He's getting close, but he aint' quite got the door to open yet? If he does and tunes the TV to "Dancing With The Stars", we might have to get that varmit tested or sumpthin?
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Yard Poop
Fido (stray dawg) recently "adopted" the Tin Star as his principle abode.
Seein' as how the beautiful bride has apparently declared semi-permanent residence for the cretin, the ranch hand has been trying to put a positive spin on the situation.
Maybe creating a partial list of perceived "advantages" to the other male at the ranch might help?
1. The varmit tracks mud in the house with FOUR feet (covering the tracks of yours truly).
2. His shameless farting allows the transference of blame when he is proximate.
3. Watchin' the dude "sniff" wimmenfolk is a hoot.
4. It wags, shakes, shivers, moans and groans with pleasure at the slightest kindness
(makin' me wish we had trained our kids better?)
5. Both of us think the postman mostly brings crap, so we are suspicious of him.
6. The dawg seems trainable, the ranch hand long since AIN'T.
7. Fido's mom has never tried to visit at the ranch.
8. He NEVER goes shopping.
9. The ranch hand only has to dump table scraps in Fido's bowl to feel like a culinary genius.
....and the ranch hand's personal favorite: he don't poop in the yard!
OK, that's enough, the moocher can stay another day or three?
Seein' as how the beautiful bride has apparently declared semi-permanent residence for the cretin, the ranch hand has been trying to put a positive spin on the situation.
Maybe creating a partial list of perceived "advantages" to the other male at the ranch might help?
1. The varmit tracks mud in the house with FOUR feet (covering the tracks of yours truly).
2. His shameless farting allows the transference of blame when he is proximate.
3. Watchin' the dude "sniff" wimmenfolk is a hoot.
4. It wags, shakes, shivers, moans and groans with pleasure at the slightest kindness
(makin' me wish we had trained our kids better?)
5. Both of us think the postman mostly brings crap, so we are suspicious of him.
6. The dawg seems trainable, the ranch hand long since AIN'T.
7. Fido's mom has never tried to visit at the ranch.
8. He NEVER goes shopping.
9. The ranch hand only has to dump table scraps in Fido's bowl to feel like a culinary genius.
....and the ranch hand's personal favorite: he don't poop in the yard!
OK, that's enough, the moocher can stay another day or three?
Sunday, February 14, 2010
OBITUARIES
Ever noticed how "ole folks" read the obituaries more religiously than others.
The ranch hand used to think that was curious. Now he are one?
Ya see folks you knew, folks you wish you had known, and weird stuff?
However, wouldn't it be more interesting if obituaries included more information:
Ya see a picture of a long hair, tattooed dude with a "f*** you" look on his face and wonder if the "obit" should say, "Booger John was drunk on his ass when he mounted his Harley, handed Imogene his beer, and said, watch this shit cause ain't nobody gonna believe it!"
Ya see a pic of a sweet ole woman with an angelic face and wonder if there should include verbiage about her wild college days where she bucked common morals by raising her skirt to knee length and exposed her arms to a tanning sun while secretly sipping a prohibition era adult beverage? (and did she pre-date Booger John in getting a tattoo, but kept it hidden all her life?)
Ya see the heartbreaking image of a child and wonder about the lifetime of experiences that will be missed.
Nothing too deep here, just some random thoughts from an ole fart who has become an habitual obituary reader?
The ranch hand used to think that was curious. Now he are one?
Ya see folks you knew, folks you wish you had known, and weird stuff?
However, wouldn't it be more interesting if obituaries included more information:
Ya see a picture of a long hair, tattooed dude with a "f*** you" look on his face and wonder if the "obit" should say, "Booger John was drunk on his ass when he mounted his Harley, handed Imogene his beer, and said, watch this shit cause ain't nobody gonna believe it!"
Ya see a pic of a sweet ole woman with an angelic face and wonder if there should include verbiage about her wild college days where she bucked common morals by raising her skirt to knee length and exposed her arms to a tanning sun while secretly sipping a prohibition era adult beverage? (and did she pre-date Booger John in getting a tattoo, but kept it hidden all her life?)
Ya see the heartbreaking image of a child and wonder about the lifetime of experiences that will be missed.
Nothing too deep here, just some random thoughts from an ole fart who has become an habitual obituary reader?
Saturday, February 13, 2010
BAD DECISIONS
Bad decisions make good stories.
As a yonker, the ranch hand decided "stealin'" papuh's watermelons would be more fun than just asking him for one. (didn't figger on falling in the bull nettles in the dark while carrying out the purloinment of the free fruit?)
Became a teen and was hell bent on being "grown up" by smoking cigarettes? That is a special kind of first time "sick" when ya suck down an unfiltered Camel or two?
Got "full grown" as a baby Trooper and figgered could wade into a crowded mex bar in south San Antone and "whup 'em all". WRONG!!!!!!!!!!!
Tackled all ya could eat menus, tried to out-figger Gene Waller, and reincarnated a 1959 Willis Jeep into a Chevy powered "jump the front wheels off the ground" pavement pounder?
The miracle is that the ole fat boy lived to tell the "tales". Who woulda figgered?
Bad decisions make good stories?
As a yonker, the ranch hand decided "stealin'" papuh's watermelons would be more fun than just asking him for one. (didn't figger on falling in the bull nettles in the dark while carrying out the purloinment of the free fruit?)
Became a teen and was hell bent on being "grown up" by smoking cigarettes? That is a special kind of first time "sick" when ya suck down an unfiltered Camel or two?
Got "full grown" as a baby Trooper and figgered could wade into a crowded mex bar in south San Antone and "whup 'em all". WRONG!!!!!!!!!!!
Tackled all ya could eat menus, tried to out-figger Gene Waller, and reincarnated a 1959 Willis Jeep into a Chevy powered "jump the front wheels off the ground" pavement pounder?
The miracle is that the ole fat boy lived to tell the "tales". Who woulda figgered?
Bad decisions make good stories?
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