Cornmeal or Gunpowder?

I'm going with cornmeal. Hell, I can roll ammo every day on my reloading press, but I can't eat bullets.

A few weeks back, I called the current situation a hurricane, but with lights and power.

So very wrong, that analogy. The same colleague who asked about prepping just got garden produce hand-delivered, at an acceptable social distance, to his front door. Yesterday, while going to our closed-down campus for a few books, I made my egg-and-greens deliveries that usually get dropped off at academic departments.

First difference: one does not self-isolate during a hurricane.

My university, friends, is a ghost town. The few students left are being cared for, as we prepare for getting them home. As for those already home, we are using technologies I know well to provide remote learning.

I can come in to the office as often as I wish, to an empty building and campus. Food service will close when the last students leave, so I'll pack lunch.  If I'm still healthy, I'll ride my bike around in what may be a cruel April.

Meanwhile, I get edgy reports of increased gun sales, mostly by folk who never before owned one. Oh, what could possibly go wrong? Even at online forums for reloading, no hotbed of gun-control sentiment, there's a good deal of concern about these folk who are prepping without much of a plan.

Hence, my call for cornmeal, not gunpowder. While shopping with my normal weekly list, recently, I noticed a curious phenomenon: in addition to predictable shortages of cleaning supplies and toilet paper, folks out here in the country had run low the stocks of corn meal, wheat flour, oil, sugar.

Good on them: Southerners may be recalling Granny's stories of hard times past. These are basics, like beans or rice, that keep body and soul together.

People might learn how to cook again. I will never forget, on my part, my dad's tales of onion sandwiches in the Great Depression. He was not overly fond of onions, afterward. My mom told me how dad and his Lebanese mother would go to a big field, now the site of a downtown Lowes, to pick dandelion greens for dinner.

We are far from that point, but I'd say that I see hopeful signs in pieces like this from the New York Times, about how cornbread is making a comeback during these uncertain times. Closer to home, Joel Salatin wrote one of his stronger posts about how the pandemic might be a time of close reflection upon what is essential: keeping a larder, staying home with loved ones, avoiding frivolous expenses, and the like. Joel and I disagree on many things, but with that post I'm with him 100%.

You can learn to cook, as the cashier at my local organic/local market told some fretting Gen-Zs who had no experience. When the restaurants close, you'll have YouTube and allrecipes.com.

Use them. And for God's sake, instead of spending money to binge on some TV show, get some DVDs free from the local library. That closed? Read a good book.

Next up for me? After Amin Maalouf's Samarkand, I'm going to embark on a virtual tour of London with Peter Ackroyd’s London: A Biography. I'll get back to that favorite city of mine, in time. Every journey teaches me something, especially the ones through the seasons of the year. This was our first winter with lettuce and greens, all through the cool months (we did not have snow or a real winter). We used a low tunnel to stretch the fall into March.

So will these times we are in. How about learning to make cornbread?

Pandemic? Huh? Oh, Yeah, Like a Hurricane. With Lights and Water

In all seriousness today, a colleague asked others at our lunch table "you guys prepping yet?"

He is stocking up on food. With two young children, it's not a bad idea. COVID-19 shows every sign of a national outbreak. I figure in a week, the first widespread cases will emerge, and then the masks will go on and panic will set in. I'm certain we'll see a few supply-chain disruption and some empty grocery shelves. Americans do not handle emergencies well, in my experience during hurricanes.

For our part, we have enough non-perishable food to feeds two humans for at least a month. Since I spend a good amount of time in harvest season canning and dehydrating, we are set on that count. Unlike surviving a hurricane, even in a widespread outbreak we'll have power for the house, for tools, and to pump water from the well.

I live by the adage that my nephew Chris, an employee of Homeland Security, shared: every family needs clean water and food to last them two weeks, in the case of a natural disaster. In winter, if you live the country particularly, you need a backup source of heat (our woodpile more than suffices). If one approaches a scary situation that way, matters get much less scary. Spend a bit of time looking over likely emergencies at the CDC Web site's page on planning. You may feel a bit better after.

One thing we decided, however, was to stock up on food for the animals. Our two dogs go through about 80 pounds of kibble and 10 pounds of dehydrated treats in a month. Our cats might eat 10 pounds of dry food. So their needs are paramount. Humans do not consider it often enough, but these creatures who give us so much and ask for so little live at our mercy.

Our chickens have plenty of feed, and in an emergency we'd do what our grannies did every day: set them out further to free-range for bugs and greens. We might lose one or two to predators or a bad weed, but the flock would not starve.

What are you doing to get ready for what seems inevitable?  Are  your Plan B skills up to snuff?

Boots Update: One Barge Sank. The Other Sailed. Redwing Flew!

Footwear makes or breaks hard work outside.

I wrote late in 2019 about my experiment with Barge contact cement.

I'm still a believer, though one of my sets of boots blew out after a month. Here's why.

My Statesman Wellingtons have a thick rubber sole attached to a flimsy boot bottom, some of it no more than a layer of fabric. Despite clamping the boots after gluing, it was only a matter of time before they blew out again. Off to the landfill for them!

My Cabelas slip-on low boots, however, are far sturdier, in both the lower portion of the boot just below the upper and the material of the sole.  They have held up to two months of walking and really hard work after some Barge and a few furniture clamps, overnight.

I won't miss those cheaply made Wellies. Instead, I'm going to try a heavy waterproofed leather boot with a Vibram sole. I've a lot of experience waterproofing leather, something that will need to be done every few months.

Mending is still better than ending, but sometimes you have  to cut your losses. No glue can fix "cheapass."

And no one in their right mind would call Redwing boots cheap, let alone cheapass. I've owned two pairs since I began my crazy apprenticeship with Big Ed, my father in law, in the early 2000s. I knew I'd want the best possible boots for working outdoors, ones that had steel toes and shanks, and ones that could be repaired.

That's where Redwing comes in a cut above other shoemakers (Mephisto comes to mind, but I've yet to see their work boots). Both companies share a belief that their shoe is so useful, long-term, that they'll recondition them for substantially less than the purchase price. Redwing offers a variety of repairs. The photo at the top shows my newer (grin) pair of Redwings. The bottom photo shows how they came back to me. I didn't expect brand new; these are not boots you wear to a formal dinner.

What I did except, and got, were new soles, repaired grommets, reconditioned leather, and new laces. Redwing packed all that in a new shoe box and included a can of their leather conditioner.

Price, with shipping? About $125.

On my older boots, not pictured, they capped a toe that had been worn down to steel. These Jed-Clampett stompers are my backups now. I should have them bronzed.

The test of any shoe, of course, is how they feel outdoors, in all weathers, for a long day's work. While the Wellingtons are not the ticket for that, the Cabelas and Redwing boots are top notch for eight, even twelve hours of work.

Still searching for a slip-on, knee-high snakeproof pair of boots. Or perhaps knee-high gaiters to go over the Redwings. Too many close calls last year, and my Kevlar chaps get hot doing brushwork in high summer.Working hillside, where a Copperhead might be above me, I'll still wear protection up to the waist.

Shop accordingly, and for the long haul. Happy stomping!

2019 Wrapup: Things for which I am thankful

Folks, it's been a momentous year. So here goes: the things for which I'm thankful. They are somewhat in order. As always, I am most thankful to my wonderful and tolerant spouse, Nancy.

1) I am thankful that I didn't die "in nasty ways," to quote Monty Python. The year began with me having heart palpitations, and that led me right to the doctor. My blood sugar was dangerously high. 40 pounds lighter and much happier, I'm glad I listened to medical advice and got on a low-carb diet.

Second, it was a "year of the snake," which me dispatching four Copperheads dangerously close to me or our animals. A fifth one bit one of our livestock dogs right on her big nose! She endured and is as feisty as ever.

Then there was the trespasser, armed with a 9mm handgun jammed in his jeans and a flimsy story, wandering around our property. Thanks to a notice and then help from my neighbor Tim, we convinced him peacefully to leave and then called the sheriff. He's never come back (and I know his name and employer).

Friday the 13th in December got me rammed by a Dodge Ram. I was not even shaken, but my beloved Honda 2004 CRV of 14 years ownership was totaled. Better than me getting totaled!

2) I am thankful that I helped restore a meadow for native birds. Nan has long dreamed of the field across from us going into wildlife management. I am thankful that I found a $450 seeder for $150 cash that makes the job a LOT easier.

My in-laws agreed to let me manage six acres of open space. The photos show the process of mowing, plowing, and seeding cover crops. We worked with our extension agent on a management plan that will reduce or eliminate invasive species, without spraying an ounce of herbicide.

In two years, it will be in wildflowers for quail and whippoorwill habitat. Though our bee hives had a difficult year, we now have ample forage for them: I sowed buckwheat in summer and rye-grass cover crop for winter. The weather was difficult: a spring rain so heavy I got my brother-in-law's big tractor stuck, and a fall drought so severe the rye took a LONG time to germinate. Thankfully, it did.

3) I am thankful that I found the best fishing since the 1980s for me, and I began hunting a bit more. This year I got serious about fishing, again, and I was able to locate a perfect spot (it requires a State Forest Use Permit). I won't tell anyone where it is. My kayak is getting a workout, and we enjoy dinners of panfish.

My neighbor Tim, a fellow hunter, has been out deer-stalking with me a few times. It's great to have a hunting buddy again after 30 years. We have not been a danger to deer, but eventually we'll fill the freezer with venison.

4) I am thankful that I found a farm helper, Quentin Harris, who has carpentry skills. We have worked on a barn roof, jacked up and reinforced a run-in that threatened to fall into a ravine, and cut up a grove of Virginia Pine that fall over a lot in wind because...they are Virginia Pines and that is what Virginia Pines like to do.

5) I am thankful that got an item off my bucket list, one that corresponded with some success as a writer. I have always wanted to drive a manual-transmission car, and a black 99 Mazda Miata nick-named "Marco" came by way in late Fall. I'm enjoying it and so far, the gears and clutch are holding together. I'm still at work on my 74 Buick Apollo, due for priming and painting in 2020, all by me.

I also began writing with a by-line about this and other matters for Hemmings Motor News. That's a great source of pride for me, as great as the anthology of essays I co-edited with my friend and colleague from VCU, Brian McTague.

To add whipped cream on an already high-carb sundae, Fran Wilde (shown here with Lamar Giles, for a reading of stories based on Edgar Allan Poe) visited my campus for a VCU / UR workshop on voice in writing.

I'm also lucky that that when I was doing a story for Hemmings about the car-focused display at the Richmond Folk Festival, my old college buddy Chris Cosner came to visit. Here he and designer / restorer Marty Martino pose with a Jetsons' flying car Marty is making. Yes, Marty even had a friend with a hovercraft offer him the running gear.

I don't know where the road will take us, but may all your friends have hovercraft in 2020. It's about time!

Old-School Tools: My Favorite Stick-Um

Contact cement is nothing new; many cyclists have mended an inner tube with one. After airplane glue and white glue, it was my first encounter with the magic of adhesives. The superpower of contact adhesives, to me, is precisely the  relatively long working time before the glue sets up. The repairer has the freedom to make certain the bond is solid before going back to work. Rubber cement does set up quickly, at least for bicycle repairs.  Super glue, in its many forms, works great for many applications, but it sets up nearly instantly.

For Barge Cement, however, the miracle occurs long after the DIYer walks off, leaving items in a clamp.

I found this glue highly recommended online, especially for shoe soles and other nonporous uses, but local stores didn't carry it and the big-boxes would have to order it. So I went online and did that, getting free shipping. My original plan, one to be carried out this holiday, was to glue think leather over plastic seatbelt-retractor covers on a 1974 Buick Apollo I am restoring.

Then my expensive Wellingtons, a must for muddy time, blew out a sole, right at the toe. After cleaning up both sides of the rubber, I put a thin layer of Barge All Purpose on both surfaces, waited about 10 minutes, then stuck them together, using furniture clamps to hold the bond overnight. A month later, the boot works good as new, as does a pair of shorter Cabelas slip-ons that lost a sole. I had forgotten them and went to another chore. An hour later I came back, saw the boots, cussed a bit, then decided to clamp them overnight, as I had done with the first pair. They are holding up well after a week, in wet and dry conditions.

I don't know that shoes worn daily would hold up; I'm willing to try as long as I have a spare pair at work.

Give Barge a go, whenever everyone associated with Black Friday wants you to buy something new; it's not expensive and may save many hundreds of dollars lost when an item gets discarded. Let me know how it works for you.

All Things Must...

Why a skylight? What on earth does that have to do with rural life and DIY projects?

Last month, I learned that Om On, a little Yoga studio near my job, will close in December. It's a sweet space, and Kelly the owner has made us all feel welcome for the better part of a decade. My time on the mat there helps ease the aches and pains of both my physical work on the farm and the sedentary life in the office. I don't know the reasons for the closure, but the studio lacks space to expand, rents high, and competition fierce. I do know that I'll miss the skylights.

The skylight shows the changing late afternoon sky when one is doing reclined poses. At times the view is such a deep, clear blue beyond the skylight that it makes my heart break. There's something spiritual there, a letting go of the sort I suppose we all have to face (or ignore, at our peril).  Given those feelings, I selected a spot so dear to me for a skylight view that I get to the studio early to set up and stake my claim. My usual teacher on Friday, Twyla, knows about my crazy ways and I've explained to her that I just don't like change all that much, at least when it comes to physical space. I hate it when old buildings I've known vanish; every change of that sort seems a slow erasure of one's very life.

When my old pal Steve Gott passed in October of 2013, I consoled myself by playing George Harrison's opus, All Things Must Pass, almost constantly. I highly recommend it as perhaps the strongest project album of the early 1970s. That's a lot coming from a guy who was always more a Stones than Beatles fan.  Harrison's deep Hindu faith led him past the end of the Fab Four into considering the very erasure I just mentioned. I'm no Hindu, but I see a real appeal in the cycles of death, rebirth, and evolution of the soul there. As with the monotheistic notion of an afterlife, there's a sense of renewal present.

We can, of course, hoodwink the Reaper, a bit. I've had a health scare that put me on a low-carb diet; 40 pounds lighter, all aspects of my life seem renewed. It's an extension rather than a reprieve, like the sturdy low tunnel I built to let us finish our butter beans, plus protect tender lettuce seedlings and young broccoli that I hope will take us into and perhaps through the winter. Of course, it only prolongs things until we can plant our Spring crop.  Elsewhere our greens will just have to overwinter as best they can, a type of outdoor veggie crisper for our table.

It's no accident that George Harrison was an ardent, and talented, gardener. I don't know about his Yoga practice, but I suspect he'd appreciate how I feel about that skylight. He'd also remind me to let it go, to cherish the memory without clinging too much. Attachment is something we learn to respect, guardedly, in Yoga, non-attachment a virtue we cultivate.

It cannot always be summer, or even a lovely Fall when the rain finally came after drought. I managed to snag all the last Thai Dragon Peppers, cutting off the plants at the ground, piling them onto a blanket, and hauling them into an unheated building just before the first frost. Then I could harvest them at leisure. The dry weather earlier made them fiery, just what our customer wants.

Paying attention to the weather helped me avoid a disaster. I could have lost 20 pounds of fruit.  But nothing would stop the cold that night. As Winter comes, that's a good lesson. All things must pass.

Rain at Last!

One of the saddest facts about human-caused climate change is how easy it is, for urbanites and suburbanites, to ignore its effects on other living things. In Richmond, most folks seem to only notice our ever-more-common dry spells in early Fall when their monoculture lawns die off, or the city limits watering.

In the country, however, those not on deep wells began to fret this year about the time of our State Fair. That's usually when we get rains to break the dry, hot weather.

Not this year. Even our 2000 gallons of stored water did not seen likely to outlast this drought. As of last week, about half of that had been used for garden and perennials, plus some recently planted trees we were struggling to keep alive.

With a high-pressure system the size of a small nation parked over the East Coast, even tropical systems steered around it. That's a salutary side effect, with one aspect of climate change battling another. We living things, both animal and vegetable, got got caught in the middle of this clash of titans. And yet hardly a drop of rain fell in my part of Virginia for eight long weeks.

Now, thankfully, we have a real soaker, just in time to save the small trees that have been so stressed on our property. We've lost a few, but others we kept going with watering bags of various sorts.

I hope we see more rain like this, on and off and not in deluges, in 2020. This recent day of rain may have broken a pattern but it did not do more than dent the drought. I checked a six-acre field that I needs to till this weekend. Below an inch down, the soil seems as dry as the deserts of Mars. Yet there's more rain in the forecast for Sunday. Hope, unlike rain, does seem to come upon us through an act of will.

We need other changes, too, if we are to address climate change's pernicious and, ultimately, civilization-ending dark promise. Let's get busy on that and vote for sense. Virginia has an election in a month, an I plan to vote against the party of environmental destruction. I hope  you do, too.