A dusting of snow on the ground in the morning was good motivation to do some cleaning up around the plot, picking things up that we don't want to have buried in snow.
Kai got his roof boards on and covered, and he's been building an awesome fence out of junkpoles. Kai's economy and sense of aesthetics is truly inspiring. The fence he's building looks nicer and uses less material than the fences I built. If it works as well as it seems like it will, I think the next fence I build will be Kai-style.
Sir Chops was an intact boar, and during life he carried a distinct odor. While frying up some of his flesh, this odor returned and permeated our nostrils. 'Boar taint' is one name for this phenomenon. Despite the pungent smell during cooking, the meat itself tasted just fine, and I'd even go so far as to call it delicious. Then again, some folks have a more refined and sensitive palette than yours truly. Sir Chops did his best and for that I'm grateful, but next time we cook some of his meat we'll probably do it outdoors.
We started salting two legs and a big hunk of belly today too. If all goes well, then we might have pork hanging from the ceiling for years to come. Long live Sir Chops.
Just read a majority of your log in one sitting. Feels like I'm working with you. Great job so far. Hope everyone is prepared for snow! Thanks for the inspiration for my upcoming adventures.
I have raised both boars and Barrows (castrated males) and rotated them on grass with quality non gmo feed and not have boat taint. But I had a different breed and only raised them to 10 months. So you CAN raise boars without taint depending on factors but castration usually takes care of it. I like keeping the m boars but it was a risk that people wouldn't buy your meat when it smells like that.
I had an older boar I got from someone else. His sausage and bacon was good, the rest was not edible to me. So if you have a question, cure or sausage it all.
After much consideration, I don't think Siesta can be finished the way I want it to be this year. The window of time wherein I could have buried it in dry dirt has passed. The ground is wet and getting increasingly cold, and if I bury it now and cover it with an umbrella then the dirt may never properly dry out. On the other hand, if I just go ahead and build the end walls and put in the windows and doors before burying the structure, then I'm concerned that when the dirt is applied later that the settling might throw things out of whack or even break the windows.
On the downside, I was really looking forward to living in Siesta this winter. And now I need to figure out alternative living arrangements through the cold months.
On the upside, the roof and sidewalls are built and thoroughly tarped, there's plenty of air flow through and around the structure, and the drainage ditches are redirecting water away and down the hill, so it should stay plenty dry through the winter. Also, the ant village challenge has been pushed back a year, so there's no pressure to spend this winter here and I can take the time to do it right before the challenge is on next winter. Also also, I've been gifted with the opportunity to stay in and work on Mike Oehler's ridge house this winter, and also perhaps to do a bit of traveling and sightseeing. Plus there's plenty of other work to do to continue developing Ava. Regardless, I intend to keep up this dailyish log, so stay tuned for more homesteading and permaculture adventures!
Speaking of staying tuned, thanks again and again and again everybody who's been following along thus far! All your kind words and appreciation are encouraging and truly heartwarming. I'm so glad that people find this log useful or at least entertaining. We've got a treat for all y'all real soon: Sharla's been hard at work editing our Patreon launch video, so when she posts it here in just a moment, y'all can totally watch us making fools of ourselves in an attempt to garner material support for our endeavors, and y'all can totally tell all your friends and acquaintances about us too! If you want, you can even leave out the part about how I'm such a slacker I didn't even finish my house this year.
Speaking of staying tuned, thanks again and again and again everybody who's been following along thus far! All your kind words and appreciation are encouraging and truly heartwarming. I'm so glad that people find this log useful or at least entertaining. We've got a treat for all y'all real soon: Sharla's been hard at work editing our Patreon launch video, so when she posts it here in just a moment, y'all can totally watch us making fools of ourselves in an attempt to garner material support for our endeavors, and y'all can totally tell all your friends and acquaintances about us too! If you want, you can even leave out the part about how I'm such a slacker I didn't even finish my house this year.
We really enjoy staying tuned to your adventures! I especially dig the plants, insects and homesteading, my children especially dig the excavators and their repair issues. I'll share your video with my peeps.
After a bit of rain and then freezing rain, it started snowing. But not just any old snow, these snowflakes were huge! Like quarter-sized flakes!
We were invited to another lovely feast down at base camp! Thanks Paul and Jocelyn!
Jocelyn had me shredding carrots for some coleslaw and another yummy carroty dish. So much carrot-shredding!
The main course was pulled pork courtesy of Sir Chops himself. The consensus around the dinner table was that there was no discernible boar taint in the taste of the meat. I believe "Mmmm... delicious..." was the exact expression. Of course, I'm sure Jocelyn's expert spicing and slow-cooking had something to do with just how perfectly moist and flavorful the pork turned out.
Sunny stepped out into the cool clear night air. He looked up at the stars while he peed on his garden. When he went back into the house, Bjärn had disappeared, along with the bowl of acorns that used to sit on the dining room table, Sunny's pipeweed, his finest silverware, and that stash of chocolate mints Sunny was sure he had hidden so cleverly.
"Well, I'll be..." Sunny decried.
Over the next few days, he found that he was also missing a few books, but couldn't be totally sure if he had actually just lent them out to someone and forgotten about it. Having been robbed caused him to be more aware of his possessions, which were considerable in quantity, Sunny being a bit of a pack rat. Useless trinkets and items of purely sentimental value cluttered shelves and filled drawers throughout the house.
Sunny thought a lot about his encounter with Bjärn Völtzhammer, (if that was his real name,) that kleptomaniacal Pïking, (if there even was such a race of peoples called "Pïkings.") When he told Tom what had happened, Tom didn't believe any of it, but thought it perfectly stupid of Sunny to have let such an obviously tall ne'erdowell into his home.
Nevertheless, Bjärn's stories stayed stuck in Sunny's head. A pack of lies though they may have been, Sunny felt compelled to write down the key points as best he could remember them.
"Pïkings, fierce people of the far north, sail an inland sea surrounded by tall mountains and impassible cliffs on all sides. Sea freezes over in the winter and Pïkings take refuge in castle built into a volcanic island. Master artisans build huge ships throughout winter by putting down layers of wet sawdust, allowing them to freeze solid, and repeating, forming a substance called Pïkrete. During warm season, Pïkings set sail, visiting seven ancient forest gardens along the coast and harvesting key products: nuts, fruits, berries, and game for food, wood for furniture building, sawdust for Pïkrete, giant spider silk used for ship's rigging, Pïgarikon mushrooms which they combine with algae to form a lichen whose decomposition produces hydrogen. The lichen is added in specific patterns during ship-building to create tubes that channel the hydrogen into a giant silken zeppelin. The zeppelin inflates as the lichen decomposes and is flown like a kite to catch the high altitude winds towards the end of the season, just in time to help steer the ship back to the island refuge. Biologically immortal dragonflies are trained to help the Pïkings hunt, and since they continue growing until they are killed the most ancient and gigantic dragonflies are ridden as flying mounts. Pïrates, being rogues and outlaws, are banned from the volcanic refuge, forced to eke out an existence on the edges of the frozen sea. Epic sagas have been written about the battles between Pïkings and Pïrates, including one such battle wherein the legendary lord admiral Väul Överbear ignited his ship's zeppelin and brought it down like a fiery hammer onto a fleet of Pïrate ships."
As outlandish as this information was, and as unreliable as it's source seemed to be, Sunny couldn't help but want to believe in it. Surely Bjärn couldn't have made all of it up, even if parts were embellished, it had to have some truth to it, right?
~~~~~~~~
Day 217
In anticipiation of everything being soon covered in snow, we did a bit of tidying up and reorganizing. There was a tarp I had strung between a couple trees to store firewood and other stuff under, and while it was temporarily useful, it was always an eyesore. It felt so nice to take it down. Now the view of the fire ring and Kai's awesome herb spiral is unspoiled. Most of the things are stored in Siesta for now, as it's the driest space on Ava by far.
Underneath another unsightly and less useful tarp that had been cluttering up the grounds, I found growing some kind of mushroom snuggled up in between a couple rocks. Cool!
4
