Tag: shed

To the Dogs

~ johnbrandall ~ 1 Comment

1

A couple of dogs were here yesterday when I arrived, and they have stuck around.  

I have been giving them food, so I can’t be too surprised that they have stayed.  I had an old can of soft food stashed away on the upper shelf of the corner kitchen cabinet.  It didn’t look too bad; they ate it.  They’ve also gotten a few of the heart-shaped Newman’s-brand treats, which are basically doggie biscuits.  And I’ve given them some kibble I had tucked away in a mouse-proof bucket back in the main bedroom here at Farm, dateline Traderight, MO.

I’ll give them what food I have, for as long as they are here, and then I’ll restock with some fresh food when I return.  Whether the new inventory will be for these two on some later visit or for my own dog Hugo or for some other rando dogs that might appear somewhere down the road, who knows?

They slept out front last night.  They growled and barked a few times.  Somewhere around one or two in the morning they woke me with barking and I had to pee anyway so I went outside.  Even before I stepped out the front door I could smell something dank and rich and garlicky, a very deep and funky body odor let loose into the wild.  Skunk.  There was no doubt about it.  Like a bomb had been released...


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June in the Vespiary with the Push Mower

~ johnbrandall

I.

I'm out at Farm. Yeah, I know, surprise, surprise. Small green bugs—gnats, aphids—swarm the lightbulb overhead. They cling, somehow, upside down to the ceiling, making a marina out of faux-wood paneling.

It's finally dark out. June bugs fling themselves against the front door. Something dots the back of my neck, I try to chase it away. Today, June 14th, Flag Day. I'm here to mow, an insane endeavor depending so much on a car, a push mower, gasoline, and this forty-year-old body. Wall sounds, probably the pack rat. My approach to this old farm house, earlier today, descending the gravel road, sent two groundhogs scurrying across the front yard I would soon get to clipping. They disappeared to somewhere, probably into that hole slipping under the front of the house, just west of the stoop...


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Encounter with an Iberian Woodrat

~ johnbrandall

Like the jigsaw puzzle suddenly nearing completion the pile was virtually gone. I had used the tarp to drag the piled debris to a new bonfire-to-be in the pasture. After the pile down below went up so easily yesterday afternoon I figured we could easily get this pile ablaze before dark.

The locust limbs split and hauled away, the thorny vines extirpated and lofted onto the pile, the only element of debris remaining where the brush pile once sat was a collection of tree detritus: twigs, leaves, the maroon pods of the honey locust. It was a curious collection, somewhat familiar-looking. I was grabbing at this melange with gloved hands and tossing some of it on the tarp to be hauled away. Doing this I stepped into a depression, wide but shallow. I started to get an inkling that I was disturbing a nest...


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Pages from An Old Woodshed

~ johnbrandall

I've been clearing out part of the shed. One of the bays. I think of it as a future café, or perhaps even a place to sleep. I'll show ya. I'm taking certain old items—tire, rim, an old heavy plow, pure iron, the weight—and moving them into a different shed. A junk shed.

Now I'm taking my drill out there to reinforce the structure a bit. This is my playground, my school, my office, my church.


To read much more, including a new theory of the universe, continue here...