Rosemary's babies

My nanny goat, Rosemary, gave birth to two adorable babies on Saturday. They both look just like her.

Ice Ice Baby

In case you haven't heard, a big storm swept across the Southeast. Snow to the north of me. Rain to the south. Freezing ice here in the middle with me.

Spenardo del Sur and surrounding regions have been encased in a candy coating of ice for three days and counting.

(Click to embiggen)

On Monday, traffic halted. State troopers declared all roads in Randolph County and seven others as impassable.

One neighbor took advantage of the empty road and turned Pet Kittle Hill into a monstrous 2500-foot sledding hill. He drove his son up to the four-way stop on his four-wheeler and then let the kid slide 2500 feet back down. He'd follow his son on the four-wheeler and then take him back up to the top again.

I shot some shitty video from the porch. Go ahead and skip to about 30 seconds in. Imagine Helter Skelter playing in the background.

On Tuesday, one of my neighbor/cousins took matters into his own hands and hooked up the front loader to his tractor and plowed the road himself.



On Wednesday - today - some semi-official looking guys showed up to shovel gravel off the back of a truck.

It's not supposed to get out of the 30s tomorrow so I suspect we'll still be slippin' & slidin' here at Spenardo del Sur for another day or two.

If I squint just right, it kinda looks a little like home.

Can't prove I'm poor

There's some kind of state program here in Alabama that helps poor people pay for propane in the winter. I tried to get in on it last year but couldn't find my Social Security card. Alabama requires you to show your hard copy Social Security card for everything. I'd lost mine 20 years before moving here but never needed it for anything. Nobody ever asked to see it. But I couldn't even get a driver's license in Alabama without showing the card. Had to get a new one from Michigan.

Anyway, I tried again to get in on the free winter gas program. Chickenfight Girl gets it for her family and her elderly father-in-law. She's the one who told me about it.

Went down there today to do the initial paperwork - having found my stupid Social Security card which they didn't even ask to see today. This time, there was a different kind of paperwork I was unable show them.

My problem is that I cannot prove that I am poor.

I told them I was self-employed. They said they wanted to see my employment records. Employment records? I don't need no stinkin' employment records! This dude paid me $20. This lady paid me $20. I sold some silver jewelry. I sold some crap on eBay. I don't have any records other than my PayPal account and some chicken scratch on my calendar.

She looked at me, exasperated. There was no little box on her paperwork to check off for me. A little lightbulb went off above her head. "Do you get food stamps?"

"No."

The little lightbulb exploded above her head.

Truth is, I collect no government stipend of any kind. No food stamps. No unemployment. No disability. No nothing. I either scrape up $250 a month or stuff starts getting shut off. If I come up with more than $250, I can buy something extravagant like cheese or popsicles.

The lady behind the desk rolled her eyes and sighed, as if to say how could she help me if I wouldn't even help myself. "You really should get food stamps."

I just wanted to fucking scream "I DON'T NEED FOOD! I NEED PROPANE! ME WANT PROPANE STAMPS!"

But I kept my cool as she flipped through page after page of regulations, looking for the one that applied to me. Finally, I was told that I had to go to all the people who had paid me twenty bucks here and twenty bucks there and get notarized statements so as to provide detailed records of my income in December.

Fuck it. I may just cut more wood.

Year-end round up

Been lots going on and nothing going on.

Since my last post I've been working a lot around the old homestead. I also helped Chickenfight Girl butcher a hog - turning it into 172 pounds of delicious sausage. After months of putting it off, I finally killed my rooster, Philosophy, and served him up with pasta to an Alaskan friend, Hal Gage, who came to visit.

On an cold and icy day, a woman slid off the road and crashed her car into a stand of trees in front of Frankencoop. I just happened to be on my way to check the mail when it happened so I got to be first responder. She ended up in the hospital for two days and the car was totaled.

A photo I submitted to Skulladay.com last year was among those chosen to be in their upcoming book. Another photo I posted to the blog a couple years ago is going to be used in an episode of A&E's new forensic reality show, Bloodwork. Sadly, there's no money in either of these transactions. Just the glory that comes with a credit.

I missed the lunar eclipse but got to have some cool close encounters with hawks and armadillos. The parents came for a short visit. One of the cats died. One of the goats delivered two babies a month early - one was stillborn and the second lived for ten minutes.


Grandma Guthrie passed away yesterday. She was 89 years old. Her funeral is tomorrow, New Year's Eve.

I've never really posted a photo of Grandma Guthrie - at least not one where you could see her face. But today I will. It was taken this past summer while we were sitting out on her carport.

She was wearing a skateboarding t-shirt that her grandson gave her. I cracked up the first time I saw her wear it and asked "Can I take a picture of you in your boarding shirt?"

She got all huffy and blurted out "No!" Then she muttered "Besides, I don't even own a bathing suit!"

Once she understood what I meant, she consented to the photo.

Grandma Guthrie 1921-2010

I'm not real big on New Year's resolutions but I resolve to post more in 2011.

The story thus far...

Okay, so Grandma Guthrie went into a nursing home. She's very unhappy about it and I can't say I blame her but neither of us got a vote in the matter.

I was a bit apprehensive about losing such a big percentage of my meager income heading into what's going to be a very lean winter. The garden sucked ass this year, thanks to 4 months of almost no rain. The big freezer is only half full. At least I put in a bunch of extra hours during the two weeks preceding Grandma Guthrie's incarceration so I was able to have all my utility bills paid up before going into a budgetary lockdown.

Fortunately, I snagged another job immediately afterward - picking vegetables at a small organic farm. Unfortunately, I am currently only being paid in food. If I can hang in there for a while, there is some paying work down the road.

I was introduced the the organic farmer at a local Slow Food gathering where I finally met the secret underground group of cool people who live in Randolph County. It took almost four years to find the cool cabal here but I finally did it. I was beginning to think they didn't exist. You'll surely be reading more about them here in the future.

My other assorted odd jobs earn me enough every month to scrape by for about three weeks. Property taxes are due soon. So is the property insurance but that bill will just have to go in the shredder because there is no room for it in the budget. Not to mention (but I will anyway) that my car has been out of commission for what seems like forever.

In a couple of weeks I'll be helping Chickenfight Girl and her husband butcher a couple hogs and will get paid in large quantities of meat. At least I will not starve this winter.

So far, the worst part has been being out of coffee for the last two weeks.