A little older now, but still runnin' against the wind...

Unlocks from the Outside Only

It's been a little while since our last post, partially due to a mountain of things going on, and partially because I didn't want to blog for the sake of blogging. I'd kind of felt like it was starting to become a babble fest and no one wants that. So thanks for hanging in there, I hope your winter has been a warm and cuddly one, regardless of the weather outside.

Things have been motoring along at the Keltic Kreek home front. The new entrance has been installed for the in-law suite and most of the flooring torn out. Next move is to tear out the bathroom to prep for an entirely new one and begin the task of plumbing for the kitchen. One of the guys I've made buddies with at the weekly poker game is a plumber, so it should be no big deal. Most of it I can do but if you can stand on the shoulders of geniuses, why wouldn't you?

Rack to Torture Garlic

The shop is taking shape. This is a separate building we have on site, with a hydraulic lift and tons of space inside, it's like 40 x 80 or so. I'm going to build a seedling room inside to start some of the veggies, a carpenters section for renos/building projects and a large portion for farm stuff... the 'stuff' to be determined as time goes on. The goal is to let it develop organically, and so far the first farm project is a drying rack for garlic and onions. Again with a tree hugging maneuver, it's made from a metal futon frame I drove past on the way home from a seed buying mission. Saw it in a snowbank and pulled over to scoop it. No, there wasn't a blanket or pillow with it, the homeless couple had moved out already. My detective skills, based on the other garbage out there, says it was a tenant who did a midnight move and the owners of the house were recklessly tossing out all the furniture. There was a desk chair and other items, but frankly who needs small town bedbugs. The side rails of the frame are now shelves above the dry rack, and the rack will swing out from the wall when needed and tuck away when the dance cave opens, or not in use...

Hmm... Shovel or Snowblower

The weather has not been friendly this year. We moved from a small condo downtown, where everything was taken care of by hired help and by chance, old man winter was on vacation for a couple years. Well, he came back and wanted to remind us he is still in charge. I'm one of those wierdos that actually enjoys shoveling snow, but this year is pushing it. Our area to shovel last year was 7 steps and a 6 x 12 patio on the roof. Now it's a driveway that fits 20 cars, a 1000sq ft deck and a meandering path leading from the house to the shop. Not to mention now we are a couple degrees further north and have gone from 1/2 inch of snow all last year, to probably 36 inches so far, the last big one was 18 inches in 1 day. I know there are Eskimos that deal with more but that's their problem. We've been lucky with great neighbours who have helped out a bit until we get some machines. Perhaps I should say I've been lucky, I do 99% of the snow work and would have keeled over in a  snowbank left until spring thaw came.  It's about 36 days until spring and no one is looking forward to it more than this guy right here...

Sentinel Cooper

Cooper is still alive... for now...

Life Lesson #118: Take a good honest look around you. You are the sum of your 5 closest friends, so if you're not impressed with that you see, make a change... 
   

 

Emancipate yourself from mental slavery...

To our legion of fans who have waited on bated breath for the next installment, we want to say thank you for your patience and our apologies for the delay. The fact that our legion is most likely 2 people doesn't remove the sincerity of the statement.

It has been a while since our last post, and I promise you short of a foreign invasion we will never be away that long again. The reality is you can count on it happening within the next 6 months, but we will try not to. I could go on in this post for awhile to catch up but I will most likely cut it into 2 or 3 mini ones. Mostly just because we all have short attention spans and I like to keep everyone on point.

So in our last post we were heading away to Jamaica. The trip overall as great. Weather was perfect, the food was great, the booze was top notch and everything was smooth and painless. As mentioned before we have been a to Jamaica a couple times so we knew what to expect. The fact language is not a factor and that most of the laws are pretty loose is always a plus for us. I just don't feel as comfortable when there are military personal on every corner or I'm the in situations where I'm not sure if I ordered a beer or traded my wife for a mango. It could happen...

We ended up going to a place that was a little on the plus star side and I couldn't have been happier with how things ended up. Fact of the matter is I let D take care of it all. I show up and get in line like 3rd grader on a local museum trip. If you gave me a fruit drink in a box I'd probably nap while doing a thumb suck.

What made the place really great was how laid back most of the rules were. Usually we go to places where you have to line up in the morning for special dinner reservations and the beach towels are treated like royal jewels. This place was open season in every way and it was just what we needed. No reservations for dinners, the room bars were stocked with everything you could need and if you wanted 10 beach towels to build a fort, all the power to you.

Our room was the best on the whole resort. We came to this conclusion after doing a recon and taking everything into consideration.

• Distance from main lobby and loud entertainment stage
• Distance from food and prime beach location
• Height off the ground in terms of bugs avoidance vs total stairs 
• Fact it had a hammock (only 1 of 12 on entire resort) 
• It over looked the nude beach section of the resort adding to the entertainment

In the end, we had a great time. Retrospectively I wish we had done more things. It seemed by the time we had rested up and were ready for some free water-skiing, the wind picked up a little and the trip was over. I blame myself, as always. D is very accommodating to my boisterous and sometimes laid back personality. I fear she accepts more of my crap than she should but I'm working on that
not happening.

What tips do I have when traveling you ask? Well let's see...

1. Make sure you know the currency situation. We met a young couple who had exchanged a boat load of money into local and also unneeded currency. US dollars worked very well. 
2. Bring your own thermos mug for the hotel bars. Small plastic cups are a pain. 
3. Bring your own toilet paper. Enough said... 
4. Chat up the front desk people, they can get you interesting deals on trips you may not know about. 
5. Save yourself the hassle, no one cares about what your wearing. Bring one pair of sandels and a pair of runners, that's it. 

Actually surfing the net here...

When we got back home all was well. Cooper had chewed a couple chair legs but overall the place hadn't burned down and all the animals remembered us. We looked forward to coming home for sure. The road ahead is so exciting on the new farm. How could we not be just as happy to be home as we were on a beach surfing the net in a hammock...



Life Lesson #559: Don't expect anyone else to support you. Maybe you have a trust fund, maybe you have a wealthy spouse; but you never know when either one might run out...

Families are like fudge, mostly sweet but there's a few nuts...

When I was in grade school, we lived with my grandmother for a few years. She lived down the road from the same school my mom and most of her 11 brothers and sisters went to growing up. My brother was 4 years older so he went to school by himself without his snot-nose little brother tagging along. That was fine by me because I had my own companion to walk me. Our dog Kelly was a Border Collie mix and pretty much the reincarnation of Einstein. Every day he'd walk me to school a couple kms. through traffic lights, over a bridge and passed numerous other dogs, cats and scrambling animals and then, at lunch, he'd come back by himself, get me and walk me home. Twice a day he did this, he was never late, never forgot and never complained.

For whatever reason we moved to an apartment and had to give Kelly away. I had no vote in that decision and was devastated, but I never forgot how great that dog was. I vowed to one day get another Border Collie mix and they'd watch over my kids too. (This was reinforced by an article I read recently about BC mixes being best dogs to own) D and I presently live with 2 cats in our condo, both are rescues. Mojo would be mine and BiBi (aka Scarface) would be hers. Take a guess as to which one is the cuddly genius and which one is basically a rug we feed and clean up after...

Bibi "relaxin"

Mojo "chillaxin"

So when D and I were midway through our courtship I casually let her know that one day we would have a BC mix. The idea was to wait til our kids were 5ish and then find a pup. D has had dogs before but we both knew this condo was no place for a K9 so I shelved the idea but brought it up here and there to ensure it worked it's way in like a bad jingle. Again, D takes the bragging rights when she comes home a couple weeks ago and she found a guy who has BC and Blue Heeler cross puppies 2 hours north of us. This is the kind of thing that makes me love her more. I had no idea she was even scouring the net watching for this. 

Obviously when you're just buying a farm and starting a family, throwing a dog into the mix is just a bad idea. However sometimes if you're going to mix it up in life, you might as well get it all over with at once, especially when it carries with it the trifecta of positive points:

1. This guy up north had a fresh a litter of 11, which is important to me. I like to have a choice of many. I'd do a fancy whistle or kissing sound to see which one responds, runs over and ends up being the lucky winner of our family unit. 
2. His price was reasonable compared to most we've seen around. (see previous post about saving $$) 
3. Because of the puppies birth date, we can't even have the dog til 2 weeks after we move into Keltic Kreek, giving us time to settle in before he/she craps all over the place. 

Short story long, we drove up today and went to find our newest family member. The guy was a nice enough older gentlemen farmer type with ducks running wild and a few cows gnawing the fence line here and there. He had the pups all caged up with the parents watching closely nearby. Overall we were pleased that it didn't seem like a puppy mill but my attempt at an ultra primal link with one specific puppy via whistle or kissing sound went out the door because they were all constantly chewing at my jean pants and growling playfully. We ended up deciding we wanted a male which narrowed our choices from 11 to 3. Next I wanted one that stood out in terms of markings and didn't seem too runty. And if they could look like a pirate or little rascals dog that would be a bonus.

And then there were 5... We are happy to announce, to our 3 readers, the newest member of our family, we pick him up in 4 weeks.
**(Name Withheld for Security/Indecision Reasons)

Future Chicken Wrangler

Life Lesson #112: Children aren't that different from puppies. When it comes to raising good ones, start early, be firm and stay consistent.