End of the Year

No great thoughts or resolutions; just the end of the year. Walked, cleaned, baked, cooked, did laundry, kept the woodstove going, scolded dogs, fed chickens and rabbits today -- Lisa's gone to Florida for the week to visit her dad, so it's just me and the boys.

An unholy bunch of snow on the ground, with another foot coming tomorrow. We probably got 10 inches today, on top of the 20 inches already this year. It's about what we got during all of last winter. Tourists are out in force, with all the subtlety of a Bastille mob. There were out-of-state SUVs lined up five deep in front of the gas pumps at the main store this afternoon.

Which is a not-too-elegant segue into Kunstler's 2008 predictions. Even if you don't agree with him, he's a hell of a lot of fun to read. I think you might see his photo in Webster's, under "schadenfreude."

For the tiny fraction of people who actually pay attention to real events -- those, for instance, who know the difference between Narnia and Kandahar -- the final hours of 2007 leading into the fog-shrouded abyss of 2008 must induce great racking shudders of nausea. Has there ever been a society so exquisitely rigged for implosion? The whole listing, creaking, reeking edifice stands like one of those obsolete Las Vegas pleasure palaces awaiting a mere pulse of electrons to ignite a thousand explosive charges perfectly placed to blow away the structural supports.

The inertia holding everything together that I described in last year's forecast finally melted away at mid-summer and events began spooling out of control. Specifically, the massive tonnage of debt-backed securities circulating through the financial sector stood revealed for the mostly worthless bales of paper they truly are, and the investment community was left suspended in mid-air, grinning unconvincingly, like Wile E. Coyote thirteen yards beyond the edge of the mesa, with a sputtering grenade in each hand and an anvil tied to his ankles ...

I suppose I do have a couple of minor resolutions -- more time with the kids, more production on the day job, finish my books, grow more of our own food, a speedy and complete rehab, etc. -- but nothing really too terribly profound. Hope that's not jinxing things somehow.

Here's to a decent 2008, anyway.

Postscript: Wouldn't you know it. The folks down the road are doing their own fireworks show. And Pepper is now sitting on top of my head, shaking like a damn jackhammer. A good dog, but not excessively fond of loud noise.

Sloshy

Rained a good chunk of today, then warmed up. Snow melting into sloshy stuff all over the place. Not terribly cold, though. Went for a moderate walk this afternoon, probably for another one tonight.

Spent most of today talking with Lisa about plans for 2008. Four pigs or six pigs? What kind of seeds? Hard or soft cheeses? To tap maple or not to tap? More chickens, just for meat? Thinking about going to the NOFA-Massachusetts winter conference mid-month. Frustrating part will be getting bunches of really good knowledge -- beekeeping, preserving, sugaring -- and probably not being able to do anything about it for six months. Sigh.

Also am thinking about how I'll want to spend my rehab. It's looking as though it'll be a month (and maybe two) before I can even think about training, looking at a computer, writing, cooking, or working on the land; in other words, any of the things I do with my time. I suppose I'm very capable of sitting on my ass, getting fat and watching endless loops of "Law & Order." About the only series that I haven't seen that I'm interested in seeing would be "The Wire." I'll hope for a good Amazon or Craigslist deal.

All in all, I suspect my best bet will be to whip out the library card and pick up a ton of books next month, maybe a trainer stand for the bike. That'll help, but there's got to be something I can do to keep from going completely batshit. Maybe some sort of volunteer work that only involves one arm?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Me and a bunch of guys from Iraq. I got no problems, I know. Wah. Poor me. And bright spot! The collies and I are back on speaking terms. Actually, I'm on speaking terms with Pepper. She seems very pleased. Stink is still ... a Stink. With a capital 'S.' He isn't sorry in the slightest for having eaten the better chunk of a Christmas ham.

On the frugal front, here's an interesting concept -- energy resolutions for the new year.

Off to do some writing.

Walkabouts and Bad Dogs

Quiet Christmas. Boys got books, video games and clothes, mostly. I got Lisa a plane ticket to see her father in Florida and another Bohus sweater kit; she got me a workshop at the New England Cheesemaking Supply in Ashfield, Mass. Looking forward to it, though it'll have to wait until April. I have a feeling my shoulder's not going to be up to pulling mozarella and cutting mascarpone in time for the February class.

Been walking quite a bit lately, two and three walks a day. Don't feel like running, swimming, or biking. It's been nice outside, not too cold -- about 30 degrees or so -- and no snow, sleet or ice expected until tomorrow. Big full moon and quite a few stars. We've got about a dozen houses on our block (two full-time residents), and only a couple of families up for the holidays. Always amazes me that people will shell out hundreds of thousands for a place and never visit. Not that I'm complaining.

The good deal about the walking is that it's helped me sleep a bit better. I generally get to sleep around midnight, and my shoulder wakes me up around 430a or so. The walking put me out like a light last night -- went for three walks -- but the shoulder got me up around 5a. That, and the sound of chomping in the kitchen. Went downstairs to investigate, and the collies had managed to get on top of the kitchen island and chow down on the Christmas ham bone.

Bad dogs. Very, very bad dogs.

Went by the post office today. Seems like the garden catalogs are as bad as the Christmas ones. Probably won't see spring for another four months, and they're already flooding the mailbox. I'm pretty sure it's Seed Savers Exchange for us this year.

Lots of work to do this week. Taking vacation from the day job, but I've got a couple of book deadlines looming, a computer monitor that needs fixing, and a ton of cleaning to be done.

I also want to take some walks and not think about the shoulder.

Christmas Eve 2007

Peace on earth. Goodwill toward men. Etc.

Except at our local market, which was mayhem late this afternoon. And it was just my own damn fault. Truly. I'd gotten everything we needed for Christmas dinner, except cheese and broccoli (the cheese being the really important thing).

Drove to the market -- you'd think there'd been a simultaneous evacuation of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, judging from the parking lot. And it was asshats on parade, with some lady from God knows where (not here) screeching into her cell phone because there was too much ice on her driveway.

Perhaps she was expecting sand dunes?

Anyway, I grabbed my cheese and broccoli, and then Gordon, the owner, saw me.

"More eggs?" he asked, pleadingly.

Yikes. I'd brought eight dozen down on Friday. I looked at the egg cooler, and they were ...

"Gone," he said.

Holy crap. Green Mountain Eggs and Ham is doing well. Went home and cleaned a couple of dozen eggs. I had four dozen and change, but I had five turkey eggs, which rounded things out to five dozen. So everyone gets a turkey egg. At least, everyone who buys the next five dozen eggs. And Gordon (who's open tomorrow) hopefully has enough eggs to last another day.

All I'm thinking is, the small Arucana flock had better start laying, ASAP.

It'll be a low-key Christmas this year. I'm a little preoccupied and damn near overwhelmed by the shoulder mess. It's been a busy -- and so far, not terribly productive -- time for the day job and book-writing. Financially, we're in the same boat as a lot of people, just hoping for no big waves. So we didn't go overboard this year on the kids, certainly not on ourselves or anyone else. I have a feeling a lot of people went the same route, which is maybe not such a bad thing.

I'll hope for a bit of peace and quiet tomorrow. It may be asking too much, but I'll hope, anyway.

Could've Been Much Worse.

I could, for example, have passed out in a Wal Mart. Which I almost did.

Sorry. Can you imagine anything more simultaneously horrifying, mortifying and depressing?

I digress. I was at Wal Mart because it's next to a video game store, and Will wanted some replacement video games for Christmas. As long as I was there, I thought I'd get light bulbs and a cat box. No particular connection between the two, it just needed doing.

Got about 10 minutes into the store and the shoulder blade felt like it was just getting pulled off my back. Started to get very dizzy from the pain and almost pulled down a rack or two of clothes. Which would've been nothing unusual for Wal Mart at Christmas -- "He was just overcome by the excitment of it all!" -- but, still. Ugh.

Made it home, barely. Lisa took care of the chickens, and I poured myself into a really hot bath, took a monster ibuprofen and a big, fat, prescription pain pill. Which I hardly ever do. I'm kind of in the ether right now. Damn, I have got to get this fixed. I don't think this slushy, wet weather helps the arthritis any.

New Year's resolution to self: Get this fixed. Rehabilitate. Seriously.

The boys are putting up our Christmas village, which is one of my favorite things to watch them do together. We started out buying little ceramic stores, etc., when we lived in Westchester in 1998 -- drove all the way up to East Arlington, Vermont, for our first ones. The East Arlington store has long since closed, but we try to add a couple of pieces every year. So it's more like a Christmas metropolis.

I think they know that watching them work on something together is one of my very favorite things in the world. It's really all I need for Christmas.

Hmmmmmmmm.

So John has a shot at another job. He was going to work at the mountain, but they never returned his call about when he could start. I offered to take him down there and stake out the Human Resources office, but he said if they didn't want to return his call, he sure as hell didn't want to give them any of his time. Good boy, no? Anyway, one of the local inns said they'd give him a tryout as a dishwasher. He'll have the job if The Hair doesn't become an issue.

The shoulder report is done, and it's pretty depressing. Scheduled surgery for Jan. 21. A few bone spurs are going to need to be removed, rotator cuff resewn in one and maybe two places, labrum resected, and oh, hell, I can't even remember it all. About the only silver lining is that it can be done arthroscopically. I'm going to be in pain for two weeks, useless for four to six weeks, left-handed for two to three months, and out of rehab in six months. I might be able to do a very small August or September race, but it's going to be a long, slow trip.

Quite the spectacle yesterday -- the firewood guy was delivering a cord and went off our driveway into four feet of snow. This normally wouldn't have been a problem, but he was in a one-ton dump truck. We pulled all the wood out, dug around the truck, tried pulling with a truck ... no dice. Finally had to call a large tow truck in and have him pulled out. He was not happy. He said he'll come back with a skidder and knock the snow banks back three or four feet, though.

Hope he comes soon -- more snow tonight.

And finally, this game is just crack:

No Kidding

Been waiting for this to happen, courtesy of the NY Times:

December 18, 2007
Food and Fuel Compete for Land
By ANDREW MARTIN

Shopping at a Whole Foods Market in suburban Chicago, Meredith Estes said food prices have jumped so much she has resorted to coupons. Charles T. Rodgers Jr., an Arkansas cattle rancher, said normal feed rations so expensive and scarce he is scrambling for alternatives. In Oregon, Jack Joyce, the owner of Rogue Ales, said the cost of barley malt has soared 88 percent this year.

For years, cheap food and feed were taken for granted in the United States.

But now the price of some foods is rising sharply, and from the corridors of Washington to the aisles of neighborhood supermarkets, a blame alert is under way.

Among the favorite targets is ethanol, especially for food manufacturers and livestock farmers who seethe at government mandates for ethanol production. The ethanol boom, they contend, is raising corn prices, driving up the cost of producing dairy products and meat, and causing farmers to plant so much corn as to crowd out other crops.

The results are working their way through the marketplace, in this view, with overall consumer grocery costs up roughly 5 percent in a year and feed costs up more than 20 percent.

Now, with Congress poised to adopt a new mandate that would double the volume of ethanol made from corn, ethanol skeptics say a fateful moment has arrived, with the nation about to commit itself to decades of competition between food and fuel for the use of agricultural land.

“This is like a runaway freight train,” said Scott Faber, a lobbyist for the Grocery Manufacturers Association, who complained that ethanol has the same “magical effect” on politicians as the tooth fairy and Santa Claus have on children. “It’s great news for corn farmers, but terrible news for consumers.”