A nice cup of coffee in the shelter of the front porch, in our newly laid out table and chairs set up as a gathering place in the sunlight and the fresh air, there is a breeze blowing in from the north, with cold air to follow tomorrow as I sit in the lamplight and think of what to report on here. I stop and look at the horseshoe that was thrown by a passing rig earlier this evening. It is placed upright in the front window of the porch, so the luck won’t drain out. This year is hard, and the forecast for the summer remains so on everyone because of high inflation and high gas prices. We could use the luck of the horseshoe! If the gas prices stay high, we could probably use the horse, too!
Nobody in the middle class and below is doing very well at the moment. There is the war in Ukraine, and the punishing sanctions against Russia for waging it, and there are the oilfields producing low quantities of oil due to the residual effects of the pandemic while things ramp up again to meet demand. There is the incredibly low unemployment rate, and the higher wages being offered, putting more money into the hands of consumers, and that demand being so high. All this and more has culminated in high costs of goods and services, and the fuel prices is only inflating everything even further.
I just filled the tanks on the car, and about three quarters of the truck, as well as the mower and garden tool gas cans. Now it is time to sit it out till next payday, going as few places as possible, and buying as little as possible. It won’t drive down the prices of everything, but it will help us not spend so much. Only, I need to get firewood at every opportunity, lest we freeze over winter! It’s the most important thing I have learned in rural living, prepare for tomorrow. We have to be able to have feed for the animals and wood for the stove over winter. Like it or not, with the costs of hay so high right now, I am scything down grass where I can on the property, then collecting it and bring it to the livestock after it has dried. Drying takes three days, so I have to stay ahead. Where it is meant to be cool tomorrow, if there is no lightning around, it might be a good time to get up and clean the chimney ready for next autumn and winter. If I cannot get out to pick up more firewood, I do have lots in the service yard to split till I can go.
Atop of everything, I have been dealing with the pain that is being me. I have had constant joint pain for as long as I can remember, and lately it has been difficult to even walk. Doing all the chores I mentioned above has been hell. Yesterday I tried taking some Glucosamine for it, for the first time. This morning I woke up feeling like a new man. I was twenty years younger! I felt it, anyway. That can’t be good news for Missus! I picked up a bottle of my own while we were out shopping today, and if it continues to work, then I guess I am a pill popper at last! Missus grabbed me some vitamins, too. I have not been faithful to those since I was on Flintstones when I was a little kid! I guess it is as good a time as any to get started again. If nothing else, I would like to feel better to do the things I want to get done this summer.
So, what are my goals for this summer, besides shopping firewood? I want to get some maple trees from the mountains so I can put them up to dry, and get them on the lathe later when they are. I have been building little stools when I can from firewood pieces, all in practice to soon make a chair. I have most of the tools I need. I need to get electric put into the shop in proper fashion so I can work out there without the worry of not having enough power to run a couple of tools at once, such as a sander and a shop vac, or whatnot, along with the freezers. I consider this as building my shop, and once it is done, I have a few things I want to get to work on! I have some things that need building for the house, some chairs I want to make, as I said, and a few flourishes for the house and garden that are wanting to improve the atmosphere here. Examples include a cabinet for the kitchen, a gazebo for the herb garden, and some finish moldings for the house.
All this said, then I have to look at my reality. Heck, I bought four new 100w equivalent lightbulbs for the dining room light fixture today because it seemed so dark in there the last couple of years, and I realized, I have like 40w equivalent bulbs in there! Gee-wiz, self! Have you been so distracted that you cannot even think of upgrading light bulbs to brighten a dark room? Problem solving, problem solving, problem solving! Why not do the easy solution? Just do it! I feel like I let myself down, and every pour soul that has had to suffer that dark room! But then, I am pretty sure we all have days like this. But months and years?
I woke up last night at half three. I lay there a while trying to go to sleep before I gave in and decided to scroll through Facebook a minute. It had been a while, and I think I scrolled twice on my tablet before I remembered why I don’t go there. Someone was saying about having been pulled over on a traffic stop recently, and the cop asking if he had a firearm. He said he forgot his at home. The cop apparently told him that all law-abiding citizens should be carrying these days with all the crazy going on. This flagrant appeal to authority was a bad effort to argue for gun rights, and I could not help but laugh at the irony and wonder how a law-abiding citizen had got himself caught up in a traffic stop? I mean, I respect the guy as a decent man, and a good human being. I just couldn’t help but to laugh at the logic. Then I decided to close Facebook down and forget about it a few more years. How do we determine who is law-abiding?
I think the goats are being hammered with water from the neighbor’s irrigation. They have started yelling back there. I better go check and get ready to walk the dogs before their bedtime. I don’t know how I have made it awake this late. I think I may lay down to sleep with the dogs!