Duck Eggs Too!

This is so fun! This morning I went out to see if the chickens had left some more eggs in the nesting boxes... when i noticed a little nest built underneath. When I looked closer I realized my lady duck has started laying some eggs! The brown ones in the basket are the chicken eggs, and the white ones, only slightly larger in the ground nest are duck eggs.

So amazing, i did not gather them up yet, the nest with it's two eggs was so beautifully made, so beautifully set... and I have more eggs then i even know WTF to do with.

But of course, i am going to have to do a taste test ASAP, i have never eaten a duck egg before!

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You can see only the slight difference in the chicken and duck eggs, in the pic below:::

(duck egg on the left, brown chicken egg on the right...)

XOXOxooox

7 Eggs!! I Am Rich!

OH myyyy GAWD! My chickens are actually laying eggs! Last summer they were dry as a bone, hardly a chicken could do a thing it seemed. I had almost lost hope in the flock, i thought maybe they were too old, too inbred, too many bought at auction.
But alas! Warm weather and alot of free range fun = seven eggs this morning.
What is even cooler, two of the hens appeared to be setting (both the Rhode Island Reds)... i let myself get pecked as i pulled all the eggs from the nest to put in my basket.
I will let them have the next batch --- if they make babies too, I am going to explode with excitement!
xoxoox

Dancing In The Woods

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Dancing is a good release. Music is too, just on it's own. Hiking/walking in the woods, running, yelling into vast nothing-ness, getting shit accomplished, laughing at a good joke, having a crush, taking a hot bath.
But dancing... it's really the best. :)
So is this weirdo song...



xoxox

Injured Or Sick Crow

Today when i went to take JuJu the donkey for a walk, we came upon a big crow laying on the ground. At first I thought it was dead, i thought the movement in it's body was orchestrated by a million maggots and bugs eating it's insides... till I realized it's eye was actually blinking at me. I bent down and immediately touched it, so the black crow flapped it's good wing and favored the bad one that appeared to have scrapes on it.
I don't know much about crows, but after nursing two sick chickens this winter until their death it seemed the end for the crow was near. Pointing it's head into the air, something called "star gazing"... a creepy spiritual sort of movement they do when life is leaving their body. I still took it to my spring water to see if it had interest in drinking, and it did. That gave me a glimmer of hopeless hope.

I put the crow on some leaves in a box where it could be peaceful and safe, I started feeding it with a dropper- water and mushed up food, rice milk... anything it seemed to like.

It knew when i was going to feed it, and opened it's mouth like a baby in a nest.

Eventually it's one eye that wouldnt open, opened wide and it became very alert, less lethargic. But still the head turned around, pointing to the sky continued.....

My cat toots was curious about who was the latest patient in the blue box...

JuJu the donkey was more jealous the curious... she tried knocking the box over, stepped on my camera and also tried stealing the mushed up food for the crow.

Then once I spent far too long helping the crow, JuJu of course ran away!

The beautiful crow is still blinking it's eye at me, still breathing... but I expect not for long.

xoxoxoox

(Not Trespassing): Mr. Teacher's Trash Treasures & Dead Deer

Earlier today I got a call from a neighbor down the road, let's just call him Mr. Teacher. Mr. Teacher said during the night someone had shot a gun in front his house, turned out they had shot a young deer which was slowly dieing in view from his window. He called the police and the game warden, but no one ever showed up... so his third choice was me? :)
When I got there the deer was a bit bigger then i expected, very dead, and was getting too stiff. After checking out all the peculiar marks along the deer's side, we hefted it up into the back of my truck.
Before leaving and investigating the scene a little further, i wanted to walk around and see all the neat things Mr. Teacher had on his land... land handed down to him by his grandparents - which is land bound to hold stories and treasures.

In his mildy overgrown pasture there was an amazingly demolished old car.....

it seemed everything i touched would fall apart, metal cracking with rust, broken bits of what was once a tanker of a vehicle decaying in ruins...

Mr. Teacher also has a ginormous beautiful old barn. The kind with a rock foundations till in tact, one that was well cared for and used. Clean even. Many old things were in there still from days of old...

stacks of tobacco tieing strings and even the baskets they sold tobacco in at the market!

wood so stunning & antiqued that Mr. Teacher says people come and ask to buy the barn wood, and dismantle it. No way! is he not going to do that - he feels selling the land or doing things like that would dishonor his grandfather.

And the deer....

we came back around to the dead deer sitting in the back of my truck making me wish i could bring it back to life like the alien man does in Star Man! It was then i noticed more clues as to what happened in front his house -- broken pieces of headlights, fur scattered in the grass, and empty cans of alcohol where the person who hit the deer had opened their door. They must have shot it after they hit it, then drove away. But they didn't bother to shoot well enough to kill it and it still took hours to die. The deer was still able to walk 15 feet or more before collapsing.

Amazing, at how wasteful people are taught to be these day , they could have taken the deer for meat, for food, for leather.

Amazing that so many people drive with guns ready in their cars.

Amazing, they they attempted to put it out its misery and didn't bother to even shoot it in the head.

XOxoxooxX

Ritual-less Ritual

Change. It's not just the seasons... it's another one of those things that happens inside me, something that feels like I made it over a hurdle I didn't even know i was jumping. Then i am free'd by the feeling of my feet hitting the ground. Not Running. Standing still, seeing, watching, learning.

All my life people have thought I was a free spirit and most my life I have felt largely trapped by this, that and the other... something always holding me back (usually I could blame the stagnation on my health). It's not some kind of hippy thing, like I am going to fee myself by joining a nudist colony & OM'ing... it's inside me. Something that says, I am free to have what i deserve, free to seek what interests me, free to look in the mirror and like what i see no matter what the world may see, free to love what i love, free to run around a big fire with headphones stuck in my ears & dance. And no one is watching. No needs to be.

I never was good at religion, rituals, worship or agreeing with the Pope. And I'm still not. I wouldn't even make a good witch. My religion is watching the fire with a smile, having enough food and being thankful for it, having a place to live that reminds me of what heaven would be like (at least during the better seasons), and hell during the winter. Trials of sacrafice and empowerment in simple tasks, like staying warm, finding friends in a remote location, getting behind the wheel of a car and finally being able to drive again.

And freedom for me = i can get my feet dirty. Completely black.

XOxoxoxoX

Heather's House

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My friend Heather sees the beauty in all things.

Heather's House from Militia Chick on Vimeo.

xoxoxo

Cabin FEVAH, the signs

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things I think may indicate I have cabin fever ::::

1. thinking too much

2. feeling like my body wants to jump out of itself

3. wanting sunshine so bad it feels like i lost a lover every day it's cloudy

4. my dancing becomes more angry looking and spastic (alot of hair swinging)

5. getting snippy with my cat when she claws up my leg

6. a hot bath feels better then anything in the world when the first foot goes in

7. continuous thoughts of running away, far far away

8. wishing for vices that would make me knocked out or drunk

9. spending too much time on the internet

10. wondering what all the other people my age are doing at this very moment

11. wondering if my life is passing me by cause i am not standing up and doing a project at that moment

12. contemplating how important brushing my teeth is if no one is coming by, but forcing twice a day

13. urges to drive all the way to town in the snow just to get a rice milk & see cute boys in the check out line

14. checking my arm pitt smell and analzying what it means

15. Ovulation becomes a tragedy of cabin cleaning and lust

16. i remember i am only human

xoxoxo

Composting Toilet Reality Check

Over the last year of living at the Luck Cabin I have been able to learn about how some sustainable ideas work in reality.... and not just how they work in the manufacturers description. Which may be where the first problem starts - things that have to be manufactured have a chance of costing a bit much and not really being the easiest thing to work with.

I wanna start out with saying I do not regret having a composting toilet system , a septic system is destructive & i want no part of putting one on my land - I do however have some things to share with those who are considering a similar composting solution to mine.

(Not all composting toilet methods are created equal!! You can spend anywhere between $10 handmade to over $2,000 mega system.)

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REALITY CHECK:::

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#1: the urine container fills up fast. For just me alone it fills up in a week or so. If people come over, it has the chance of overflowing if I dont think to empty it right before they get here.... which i am here to say is GRROOOOSSSSSsssSSSS. So gross! JEzuz, and i dont get grossed out very easily, as ya'll should know. I can skin a dead chipmunk, but urine splashing out onto my face is another monster all together!

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#2: You will be scooping poop! The thing is it is supposed to be nice composted poop turned into garden goddess blackness, but there are times when this plan doesnt work out, and also what about the very last shit you took before you are about to clean out the poop container??? Yeah, that one didn't have time to compost. This is when i really think a Humanure system, handmade with a bucket that can be easily pulled out and dumped is MUCH better then any permanent system (if you are in a cabin, obviously not in a boat!)

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#3: Winter = Cold = Poop ain't gonna turn to dirt! My cabin was not warm enough to keep up composting temperatures, so basically what happened during winter was the poop was kept at a really nice cold temp that kept it fresh! mmmMmmMm! Perfectly preserved poop waiting for me to scoop out!

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#4 : When ya scoop it out the container, if it didn't compost good enough your whole house will stink like poop but worse. Enough said there.

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#5: Who's gonna clean up after? I know this sounds minor but the reality of it is a bit different, I have to use plastic bags or something to cover my hands and arms to scoop out the poop (cause remember some of it wont be composted), then i use a shovel to scoop it, and then a bucket to poop the poop in. So once all these things have poop on them, you have to find a way to clean them. Spray a hose outside, of course.... and have poop splatter back onto your clothes when it flings off the bucket.

I have chose to let time take care of these things, in the rain. I leave the buckets, shovel out in the weather to clean it off.

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NOTE :::: ALL of this is way more intense (I believe) if you have more then one person using the composting toilet... I am by myself, mostly dealing with my own waste. Decide how much you love your partner ahead of time and be prepared to dive your hands into their poop if you want this kind of system.

Again --- BUCKET! Easy to remove trays! something, anything.... is better then scooping! Find a composting system that makes the removal of the waste as simple as possible, because in a ideal world it's black dirt, in the real world someone took a shit yesterday and it didnt get a chance to become black gold.

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My vote is to have two systems ideally. Depending on your situation of course, but if you are in a cabin (aka not in a boat, RV, or tiny house on wheels) use a easy bucket humanure style toilet, and build an outhouse for guests during parties.
At least.... that is what I am about to start building this summer.

Xoxoxoxo

I Love Big Rains and Big Winds

It's really that simple. I feel soothed by a big storm, the bigger the more soothing. It might be in my DNA since I grew up in New Orleans... on the hurricane coast. This spring is coming early, maybe cause the ground hog said so, maybe cause we collectively begged for it with all our might, or maybe for the real reason... chance & luck & natures choice.
Either way, i enjoy the fog after the pour and the way the creeks rise with power and deafening noise.
I think one reason nature is never boring is because you can never ever see every bit of it, and it keeps changing with the weather, the temperature, the seasons, the sun, the clouds... it's like a painting that will never be complete. Or much like the library... you know you will never read all the books there are, you'd have to live many lifetimes to see it all.... even if you settled to only read all the good books.
The creek can be a trickle, it can be frozen into a so many shapes, spikes, bubbles, and then with a rain it can become a waterfall so powerful it would knock you out. I really like them all.


xoxoxox