Building the Orchard: The Saga Continues

When I first started the orchard all I could think of is eating peaches and pears until my stomach burst. I knew I had to cut down a few trees and thought clearing tree stumps would be a quick get-er-done. Not so. I was able to get a few stumps  out but I still had about 30 more that needed clearing. I finally gave in and hired a stump grinder. He was out this morning and ground out the 30 or so stumps in one day, something that would have taken me a month of Sundays to clear with the backhoe. But at least it is done.

Each ground stump left a four foot mound of sawdust. My good buddy came over with his tractor and leveled it out. Looks pretty good now. While he was doing the leveling I thought I would take a trip to the lumber yard and get some wood for a deck I am building. I got a little down the road when I heard a vaguely familiar thump-thump-thump, the trailer tire blew. I drove back to the house with that tire flopping as I drove down the road. So much for getting a head start on the lumber. Took me 4 hours to get that **** tire off the trailer.

Hopefully tomorrow will go better. The trees are blossoming and look beautiful….and need to go in the ground as soon as possible. I still have to make wrap for the trees to protect them from the deer. They will eat those tender green leaves in a heartbeat. There is an end in sight, though. I can almost taste the peaches now.

Creating the Orchard (oops, I found the water line)

Well, I finally got a backhoe over to the house to start clearing out stunps. My wife was saying at the rate we were going we'd be harvesting fruit long before the trees were ever planted. Talk about pressure. Nothing like a doubting wife to get a job going.
I jumped on that machine and started digging at a big stump when water started coming up from the ground like a geyser. You'd have thought we were at Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming. Worst part was when I turned off the water we had no water to the house. No water to drink, no shower, and, worst of all, no coffee!
I have to hand it to the wife. She was upset but took it in stride. No yelling, no fussing, just "How are we making coffee for morning?" About that time she remember a couple of gallons she had stashed for emergencies and no coffee in the A.M. constitutes an emergency.
Well, early this morning I got the water going again and spent the day digging up stumps. Still have a lot of work to go but at least a portion is done. I can see an end in sight now. I can plant the trees and build a carport for the wife. The rest will come in due time.

Papa’s Got Water

Living in the woods means helping your neighbors when you can. For me, it means whenever a friend has a problem I drop what I am doing to help. It also means whatever I am working on takes three times as long as it should and my honey-do list rarely gets done. Aggravates the wife a little bit so I try to do that stuff when she’s working (not that I help others but the honey-do list never seems to get shorter). When she’s off I’m all business on my own stuff. Looks good.

Papa is an old friend who lives up the road from me. Nice man but won’t ask for anything or a bit of help no matter what. His grandson got in a little bit of trouble a while back and had to move in with him. When he did he found Papa’s didn’t have indoor plumbing. He was using a thunder bucket that his girlfriend would dump every day.  I was pretty upset that he didn’t have the plumbing and told my wife I would help him. When I told my wife about it she didn’t seem too surprised. Not about Pap’s not having plumbing or me wanting to help.

Now you might think “Aw, poor old man living alone in the woods without a toilet.” Not so. Papa has his girlfriend living with him. There is an unwritten law in this world that says a man might not have looks or smarts but can win a woman if he has a few bucks. His girlfriend is 35 years younger than him, young enough to help him spend his money and give him bragging rights. Ask him about her and he just gets the biggest shit-eating grin you ever saw. Nuff said.

Well, anyway, the plumbing was for Papa. He’s got water again and still has his bragging rights.

While I am at it, here’s a couple of things I did get done from the honey-do list.

Vintage Red Metal Shelf

 

Vintage Mint Green Display Shelf

Post by Dan Patterson of MetalWoodsnWater.etsy and MetalWoodsnWater.artfire

A Little Bit of Tail

It's been a while since I posted anything here but things have been pretty busy in the garage lately. My nephew came over to work on his truck, took off the oil pan and the pick-up tube was in the pan. Not good at all. Tried to tell him not to run the truck through the mud but when his girlfriend batted those lashes at him and said "Aww, baby, I just love going through the mud," the boy was mush. Couldn't remember a think I said. Took a week to get that truck out of the garage. Then someone else had a deck that needed building, another friend's pump quit, well, you get the picture. At the same time, the wife brought home some things for me to work on. Add it to the honey-do list.
Well, I finally decided to do something for myself and that something leads me to the title, a little tail. No, not that kind of tail. Like everyone knows who knows me, I like to hunt and I save the deer tails. I like them, that's why. Each one is a little different. I found one, though, that is beautiful made a keychain for myself. I used a small antler point with a hole drilled for the key ring to fit inside the tail. The entire thing is 11 inches long. Maybe a little big for my pocket but it will look damned good in the truck.

Let me know what you think of it. You might want a little tail, too.
A man needs a little tail every now and then.

Post approved by Dan-the-Man of MetalWoodsnWater.etsy