Lights Fantastic

Written on Wednesday, Jan. 25th, 2012. Sherwood Forest, TX.

Last night we watched the most fantastic lightening storm I’d seen in quite some time. It didn’t seem like it would rain that evening when, while walking home after a visit with Ryan, I stopped in the clearing to stare at the stars.

Because Sherwood is practically in the middle of nowhere there is no imminent light pollution, and so on a clear dark night one can look up as I did last night and see a sky filled with stars. It is almost as starry as a desert sky. It made me miss Arizona.

However, the clear night didn’t last long. Soon, clouds rolled in and we heard distant rumbles. I went to sleep, but woke up often through the night, and each time I awoke, the weather had advanced a little more. First, I woke up and noticed lightening far off to the south-east. I woke up again to see the lightening on the edge of our camp. The third time I woke, the lightening flashed right above us.

While the lightening flashed above us I lay there and wondered about John’s computer, which was plugged into Squatch’s power and sitting on a chair on the deck of his shop. His shop is covered, but the roof is very high. I figured the computer would be okay so long as it didn’t storm like crazy.

Then it started to rain, a light, pleasant spring drizzle. I thought, “This isn’t bad, I shouldn’t worry.” Well, around 5am it began to pour and John got up and we decided to rescue the computer. I dressed him in a hippie rain-coat – a trash bag with a hole for his head – and sent him out. He got back just as the real nasty bit of storm hit, the computer perfectly fine thanks to Squatch’s considerate thought to throw a blanket over it.

We stayed up, listening to the storm. The rain battered against the roof of the van, the wind howled and roared and up in the sky was a pyrotechnics show like nothing I’d ever seen. Light flashed constantly, lighting up the world like a disco party on acid. It hailed for a few minutes, and after that I waited in tense anticipation for the wind and the rain to suddenly cease, and then to hear the characteristic train-roar of an approaching tornado.

The storm swept past by around 6am, though, and no tornado visited, though we heard of warnings the next morning at breakfast. When I looked into my stock-pot I left outside that night, at least three inches of water sat in it. We fared well in the campground, however; we’re pretty much on a hill, so all the water drains away from us. We’re not sure how our shop – still in Toon Town – fared, however, considering the last time it rained like that down there, the creek came within three feet of Squatch’s yurt, and water flooded Ryan’s yard.

I’m positive the shop is fine. It’s not like that steel is going anywhere.

Right now it’s drizzling and cloudy outside. The temperature dropped a couple of degrees, but it isn’t a chilling sort of cold. Mostly, it’s just damp. Tonight, however, may be a two-blanket night. Colder weather to come, for sure, before this show is over.

Stay warm!

Peace.

Pineapple Twist

Today (Wed, Sept. 7th) is the first day the rain’s let up in two and a half days. A long storm system moving striaght up along the Appalachians ruined what should have been a great 3-day weekend. Instead, we had two okay days and one really crappy Labor Day. We showed up at the blacksmiths’ shop really only hoping to complete a bit of inventory and hopefully make enough to buy something warm to eat.

We wound up making a little bit of money – just enough to make the day worth it. I stayed nice and damp, despite the heat from the forge. Then, a bleak day turned into a really awesome day when a master blacksmith from the area (who, incidentally, used to be the blacksmith of the faire back in ’03) showed up, saw the patterns on our war hammers and figured out what we were actually trying to do.

You see, for some time we’ve been trying to make something called a “pineapple twist,” a complicated-looking twist that, when done correctly, comes out looking like a closed pinecone. It looks something like this: (Pic.)

Ryan saw this twist done once before, but since he didn’t do one himself shortly afterwards, couldn’t remember how it was done. We figured we’d have to go online and find a video demonstration. Hallelujah, we didn’t have to! Kurt – a local blacksmith – showed up and heartily offered to show us. Kurt fits the blacksmith stereotype as far as appearances go. Over six feet tall and barrel-chested, he stood tall and relaxed with his thick thumbs hooked into the loops of his shorts. His round, almost boyish face, thick black hair and full beard completed the outfit. I half expected him to put his hands on his hips, throw his head back and let loose with a belly-shaking guffaw.

Thank god he didn’t, because I think I might have freaked out a little…

I’ve noticed working with blacksmiths, that master blacksmiths in particular turn into giddy little children whenever they get a chance to crawl into someone else’s forge to “compare hammerblows,” so to speak. Anyway, I watched in rapt fascination as Kurt instructed and assisted Ryan in making a pineapple twist. He gave us plenty of great tips and reminders; showed me how not to fear the cross-pein hammer. (As a result, I pumped out a handful of throwing spikes today at the forge!)

Kurt was a great guy and we might have to swing by his shop someday to drink beer and swing a hammer. (Because beer and hot metal go together for the same reason pizza and beer and cigarettes and beer go so well together. By the time I left Colorado, I had written recipes for half a dozen “blacksmiths’ drinks.”)

Learning the pineapple twist made that rainy, slow, potentially crappy Labor Day Monday worth getting out of bed and suffering wet garb for. Ryan’s now using the pineapple twist whenever he can, and I’m eager to try it, too, once I get more stock to make throwing spikes.

And, for all the apprentices out there just like me that want to try this twist, too, here are the basic steps in how it’s done:

Steps in making a pineapple twist, labeled Fig. A - Fig. E, from left to right.

1. Mark a deep groove down the center of a piece of heated square stock. Make this mark on all four sides of the stock. (Fig. A)

2. Place in vice and make a 3/4 twist. (Fig. B)

3. Square all four sides on the anvil. (Fig. C)

4. Punch another groove down the center of each four sides, as in step 1. (Fig. D)

5. Untwist in vice 1/4 twist. Watch the twist to see if it looks right. True up on anvil with a wooden mallet. You now have a completed pineapple twist. (Fig. E)

Have fun with that! ❤

Peace.

Port-A-Johnology

See, even Dr. Who uses Port-a-Johns every now and again! LOL!

You’ve seen ’em. You’ve probably had the pleasure of using one at some carnival or outdoor festival. If you were lucky, you got to use one at least once a day for work, or, if you’re really priveledged, you get to use them on a regular basis like we do.

Usually, we only get to use the standard Port-A-John, y’know, where you not only get to view your own previous masterpiece, but everyone else’s. The weekenders (the local participants of the faire who don’t have to worry about leaking tents and noisy campgrounds) in Scarborough (a Texas Faire, not a town) disliked the sight of their own excretions and so piled up toilet paper over it. As a result, by the end of the two-day weekend those toilets were literally overflowing with shit, they reeked, and attracted clouds of flies.

You have to understand that the whole purpose of the blue liquid inside the johns is to sanitize all that dirty crap so that the above does not happen. The weekenders didn’t understand that by filling up the toilets with paper not only wasted paper, but created the perfect breeding ground for billions of septic bacteria.

The incident happened again in Colorado, or tried to. To nip this in the bud right away, I wrote a cute, colorful little paragraph about why it was a dumb idea and how the guy camped right behind the porta-johns was “slowly asphixiating on the highly toxic fumes produced by the 8-million bacteria flourishing in your [the offender’s] Toilet Paper Tower.” Of course, due to immaturity, someone built a T.P. tower in that one john the very next day. However, the kids camped behind the toilets were very flattered that someone considered them.

Yes, two kids actually camped behind the port-a-johns at Colorado. At first, we all thought this was a joke on the camp director’s part. At least I did. He really did put them there, telling them it was the last available spot. Well, we all had a giggle over it, then by second weekend, after a couple of prime spots opened up down in the Pit (the heart of the campground, basically), we finally went up and said, “Look, guys, you know you CAN move…?”

The kids said, “Yeah, but we’re gonna stay. The bears won’t go anywhere near us here.”
“Maybe, but after 8 weeks, they’re gonna reek…”
“Nah.” And so it was during the Bear Wars [link to Bear Wars post} no bears disturbed them or tried to rip into their tent.

Then the Faire ceased all port-a-john cleaning one entire week before the last weekend. Thanks to a handful of moronic Rainbow Kids in one incident, the faire’s owner hates us all, most especially the hippies, and that was his first hint that he wanted us gone ASAP. You can’t imagine the horror of those toilets. The clouds of flies that poured from the doors and again when you lifted the lid, like something out of a Shayamalan flick. Not to mention the stench. I can’t believe how I managed to use them the few times I did and DID NOT VOMIT!

As far as keeping the bears away, well, apparently they’d gotten quite used to our reek after 8 weeks, because my boy saw one traipse right past the kids’ tent and past the johns on it’s way out of the camp. Finally a bear decided to check their tent out, going in through one wall and out the other. Then it promptly rained.

Another fun port-a-john incident occured during one of Colorado weather’s little spastic temper tantrums. I was busy holding down tarps and protecting our food from blowing away to notice all the commotion the wind caused down the hill. I hear people shouting down at the taco cookout, but take no note until I hear a crash, another bang and a whole lot of people whooping and cheerin’ and hollerin’. Figuring that someone’s tent went flying and that, after Arizona, I wasn’t missing out on another tent flight, I ran down the hill just in time to miss all of the action.

I asked someone at the cookout what was going on and they explained that the wind blew so hard it knocked the johns over. “It’s a good thing no one was in them,” I said. “That’s the thing! There WAS a girl in them! Soon as the johns hit the ground she came flying out like a ninja, arms and legs flailin’ all over screamin’, ‘NOT ONE DROP! NOT ONE DROP!’ She didn’t get a single speck of shit on her!”

“Yeah, apparently when [the campground director] called the company to let them know about it,” someone else told me later, “the girl on the other end asked, ‘Did it fall forward or backward?’ and he told her and she’s like, ‘Oh, thank God!’ because apparently, if the john falls backwards, the liquid falls into a chamber in the back and nothing gets on you, but if it falls forward, then you get it ALL on you… plus you’re trapped!”

Which is a good thing to keep in mind when pulling college pranks.

Here in Pennsylvania, now, there are, as of yet, no port-a-john’s in the campground. We’re reduced to either digging holes in the woods, risking thorns up our asses, quite literally, or walking all the way into sight to do a #2. In the campgrounds I carry a half roll of toilet paper in my back pocket. Yet, I’m lucky, because they put a brand-new john right next to our booth where I’m at all day.

The johns they’ve got in the faire site are state-of-the-art plastic toilets. The latest thing. They’re built with a bowl to the toilet, with a hole where wastes can slide right down in the collection chamber and nobody has to ever look at them again. Plus, it flushes! You stomp on a large button on the floor and it shoots a spray of blue sanitation liquid into the bowl to wash the wastes away. They’re cleaner and they smell a lot better for a lot longer than the standard model john. We get this the whole show, too, yay!

I hope your john is as nice as mine!

Peace.

Illanoying and Indianus – The Drive to Pennsylvania

PA countryside - surprisingly beautiful.

Interstate 70 across the US is a largely uneventful drive. Once we left home we didn’t stop much except to pee, stretch the legs and switch driving every two hours or so. I tried to sleep on a number of occasions, but that never happened. We drove across four states: Illinois, bypassing St. Louis and it’s lovely view of factory smog hiding the Arch, Indiana, Ohio and the topmost nook of West Virginia before reaching Pennsylvania.

Illinois just seemed long and drawn out and the folks there are somewhat annoying. We stopped at a rest stop for a little down time away from all the other people parked there. We go in and it’s a lovely rest stop, yet some of the guys on John’s side were complaining about the stall doors behind too narrow. Well, fellas, try losing some of that beer gut! Then as we got back into the car for a little one-on-one, we’re interrupted when a big red shiny new truck pulls up right next to us – sideways, taking up about five parking spaces. Now, I could understand this if the truck was pulling a trailer, but it wasn’t. Some not-so-handsome dude and his butter-faced blond woman pile out of the car and stare at us like we’re the idiots parked all retarded. Then they bring out this ugly sharpei type dog and proceed to walk it all around our car. Retarded.

There’s not much to see driving through the rest of the state besides corn fields and… corn fields… In Indiana it’s not much different, but the people there are a whole new brand of odd. We stop in a McDonald’s run by semi-retarded teenagers that don’t know how to pay attention (then again, I think that accounts for about 90% of teens these days. Granted I’m sure my generation was retarded in its own right back then, but Jesus, these days they don’t know how to use a can-opener!). We sit down to eat in a quiet corner and stare at the french fries on the floor the next table over.

We notice that everyone patronizing the McDonald’s are either old, overweight and dressed in Sunday clothes at 10pm. Then a group of teens walk in – two boys and two girls both in dresses. As they pass us by the first girl grabs the second by the shoulders and points us in our direction. I guess they’ve never seen hippies before, even though we were dressed like any other Joe that just got off work and are dirty, tired and travel-weary. I waved and said, “HI!” in my most annoying voice, and of course they hid like being curious is a shameful thing. Thank you, public schools.

So we giggled and joked about it and John was sorely tempted to run up behind the girls and give them a big ol’ hippie hug. Then, when their boyfriends said something, he’d give THEM a hug and tell them how much cuter than the ladies they were. Ha, ha! I love that man. However, we left them alone. Instead we watched some dude with purple-tinted windows and pimp lights drive four times around the McDonald’s and park in the back lot. Creepy. Weird.

We saw the most cops on the highway in Ohio. Not just regular cops, but dog units, but we weren’t worried. All we had to do was follow the flow of traffic or just jump in behind a semi, which by law are required to drive five miles below the speed limit. Its a good tip to know about when you’re unsure of what the speed limit is on a highway.

We stopped in Indiana, just inside the Ohio border for the night. We realized we had some extra cash, so we found a coupon and crashed at a nice hotel for the night. We watched about four hours of cartoons. Incidentally, King of the Hill is a very accurate portrayal of Texas and it’s people. For example, the episode we watched was about Bobby’s school getting new history textbooks which didn’t cover the Alamo, which of course bothered Hank. At the end, Hank is telling Bobby more “history,” listing Texas as a continent along with the US and Australia. I got a kick out of that because Texans – and most of the rest of the US – think of Texas as a different country. (Watch how people react to a Texan when he tells them where he’s from and you’ll get my point.)

But I’m not trying to talk about Texas, I’m talking about Ohio. So we overslept and missed breakfast. Damn. I threw a fit, smoked a cigarette and ate some more of John’s mom’s delicious zucchini bread and back on the road we went.

Ohio is famous for “Skyline Chili,” which is sold in cans there, but I’m told is nothing at all when compared to momma’s homemade Skyline chili, which has dark chocolate as one of its ingredients. The Ohio kids tried to make some for us in Louisiana, but it didn’t come out right because of something to do with not having the right kind of beans. However, it is delicious and unique and if you’re ever through there, try to get yourself a bowl.

The bridge into West Virginia is very pretty and West Virginia – all 20 miles of it we visited – is lovely and green and lush. I can’t say much more on it, because we weren’t there long. We’ll be driving through it on our way south after this show, however.

Pennsylvania is surprisingly pretty. We drove through a veritable tunnel of towering hardwoods and low, rolling mountains. The elevation rarely exceeds 1000 feet. Every river you cross supports a thriving river town, complete with boating docks and floating barges and ancient brick factories and steel mills, many of which are still operational today.

The state is packed with people. According to the Rand McNally, it ranks 6th in population. There’s people and cars everywhere. The roads are crazy and twisting, full of one-ways and short on-ramps. Some of the ramps have stop signs instead of yield signs, which gets really annoying after a while. It’s very easy to get lost and mixed up and turned around. My sense of direction was ruined the first day we stayed here, and everything, even the big Wal-Mart parking lots, are on a hill.

I’m surprised at how pretty this state is and how green it is for how old and populated it is. The air is fresh at our camp and the water tastes good, even though we’re just on the other side of the mountain from the largest coal mine in the United States. Every day at noon we hear them test the air raid sirens and every night we listen to trucks riding their gears down the highway. There are coyotes here, too, and their songs are wild and looping like a bunch of drunken frat boys at half-time. I missed the coyotes and welcome their voices back in my life.

And I hear there are many great hiking spots close to us, too. I’m going to like it here.

Peace.