2026, Farming Update, Theatre

LOQUACIOUSNESS!

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This week on the farm / in the theater from Ben

Thursday we got 1.23” of rain. Then Friday was cool and windy and partially cloudy with a freeze warning for the evening. It’s MEA weekend and we had scheduled hayrides for daughters PossAbilities groups on Thursday and Friday. Well, first we postponed Thursday’s, then that evening, figured it was going to be so cold and windy that it would be miserable for riding out on a wagon. I’d be fine in the tractor, but it’s not about me. I suggested we postpone Friday as well. Next week looks to be a much nicer week.

It’s troublesome that it’s dark by about 7:00 PM these days. It’s hard to get much done at home. Good thing Padawan 2 added those extra lights to the back of the one tractor this summer. Last weekend Kelly was picking up sticks. I was using the tractor loader and grapple bucket to pluck larger branches and piles and move them to the burn pile. The plan might be to move “this” pile, but then there’s “that” log and pretty soon I’ve moved quite a bunch of other stuff. Once again, I had to remind myself, the tractor and loader is NOT A BULLDOZER. I told myself that right after a hydraulic hose started squirting oil. A very lovely arc six feet tall. But only when I closed the grapple. Turns out just a connection had come loose. No damage done. Whew.

Then down to the barn and the cow yard and the old, worn out fence separating the former calf pen, from the cow yard. There’s about 5’ of elevation difference, the calf pen being higher, and the fence had tilted over the years and posts broke off and it was just a mess. Covered in weeds because of the hill and rocks and it was hard to get mowed. This wasn’t a barb wire fence, it was cattle panels, sixteen feet long (that’s a standard) and about five feet tall. They were all beat up. Some random cow or bull trying to climb over once too often. I used the grapple and just lifted them up out of the weeds. Made a pile that I’ll crush down and haul into the scrap yard at some point. I picked up some new (to me) cattle panels at an auction, just need to get this fence out. And make new holes. And build a new fence. Easy Peasy Lemon Squeezy! I have a trailer with scrap on it, I’m just trying to decide when to fit that into my schedule. Won’t be until after I get this play at the college open.

Over MEA, I painted the stage floor a light blue color base. It was a five gallon bucket of discount paint from one of the big box stores. Then my usual texture over it. Mostly brown, then some red, green, and blue. Have I mentioned, we’re doing “Dragons Love Tacos”, which is a pretty popular kids book. And there are Red, Green, and Blue dragons.

It’s not done yet

I was talking to Kelly one morning about how daughter will try to tell you something and her explanation goes back to yesterday and lunch or something that, in my mind, has nothing to do with what we’re talking about now, or the question at the moment, and I can’t figure out how it’s relevant, and I said to Kelly my attention span isn’t that long and I never know what we’re talking about. Kelly said daughter is definitely mine. And I blinked. And the reality smacked me in the face. I sort of tried to object, and Kelly said we were both very verbose in our explanations of things. Huh. Damn.

Verbose: wordy, long-winded, talkative, effusive, garrulous, rambling, bombastic, pompous, pretentious…

I saw a FB post the other day that said “I didn’t know parenting the Me out of my kids would be so hard” Yep. I have said before that daughter is stubborn and opinionated and thinks she has to have the last word, just like me and it makes me crazy. Just hadn’t thought about the talking thing before.

I picked up some new shirts from Savers the other day. Took them down to the costume shop. I didn’t have time to be pulling seams and swapping sleeves, so I just hemmed some up and cut some off. When I was a kid, I liked having the western style shirts with snaps. I have found a few of those lately and it’s kinda fun to have the snaps again.

YOU EVER HAVE BUTTON FLY JEANS? (I Had one pair on some army surplus pants. What a pain!)

WHAT HAVE YOU GOT FROM YOUR PARENTS? OR GIVEN TO YOUR KIDS?

31 thoughts on “LOQUACIOUSNESS!”

  1. When being issued my initial set of fatigues by the Army in 1969, I was given a stack of five trousers of the “right size”. They all fit in an Army sort of way. One pair had a button fly. Occasionally, over the next few years, I’d run into another.

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  2. I had several pair of button fly when I was in college and right after. They didn’t seem too cumbersome to me and for some reason I thought they had a certain… cachet? None since though.

    From my dad – my curiousity and desire to know stuff. From my mom, my organizational skills. My love of reading from both!

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  3. A sense of humor meaning occasionally coming up with original material but mostly appreciation for the work of others which I will shamelessly quote or adapt (steal?).
    Yesterday morning, I had a “conversation” with ChatGPT. It began with an unsolicited prompt from the AI that it could tell my favorite color from earlier questions.
    “Ok. Go.”
    ChatGPT said forest green because of my interest in spirituality, history, and science. I wanted to know the whys and wherefores of matters.
    “How did I do?” asked ChatGPT.
    “Favorite color is blue which allows me safe passage over the Gorge of Eternal Peril.”
    ChatGPT’s answer was highly amusing.
    First a laughter to tears emoji.
    Then direct quotes from Monty Python Holy Grail.
    ChatGPT: “Here I was being all serious in analysis when the answer was with Monty Python. You may now safely pass on the Bridge of Death.
    Just dont ask about the air speed velocity of laden swallows.”
    Who knew that AI has a sense of humor?!

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  5. On one hand, I’d say I don’t know that I gave much to the s&h, but on the other, we are in agreement that he has been the beneficiary of my “troubled” childhood. I often marvel that I ended up with a competitive distance runner (I am NO athlete) about to land his MBA. But I guess his approach to both feels familiar. Can’t really explain that. I guess I did give him a fairly nimble brain and some resilience.

    I don’t know that I ever had a pair of button fly pants/jeans, but i’ve “built” a few in my costuming life. Lot easier to sew a button back on than replace a zipper!

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  6. If I ever had button fly pants, it would have been college age or right after, but I don’t have a real memory of that.

    I got musical abilities (tho’ unfortunately not her high voice) from my mom, and her ability to talk to ANYone (which son Joel seemed to take on, too).
    I think I got some listening skills from my dad, and a sense of practicality.

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  8. Daughter was at a grocery store in Tacoma last week buying the ingredients for an apple cider glazed pork shoulder, and the people in line with her began asking what she was going to cook, and had her send them the recipe.

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  11. Rise and Shine, Baboons,

    I had a pair of button fly hippie pants. They are the pair that still reside in my cedar chest, which will soon be leaving my possession. (If anyone here needs such a thing, I no longer want it.). Those pants are low hip huggers covered in patches, a la hippie days, and are incredibly worn. They are not the pants into which sewed a generous insert in the leg. Those I did not keep. These pants now would not even fit over my leg. I was skinny when I wore them.

    I have characteristics of both of my parents, by I more strongly favor my dad’s side. I have his small, high arched feet that are quite prone to plantar fasciitis, unfortunately. I have his verbal facility and his effective way of interacting with others. I also have the height of his grandfather. My mother never forgave me for this. She was quite petite, like her parents, and I was a very long baby (22.5″) and apparently I kicked her persistently and uncomfortably. (She also wanted a boy which was the beginning of her dissatisfaction with me as a person. How I was responsible for these traits, I will never understand). If I do not take good care of myself and give myself down time, I can be irritable, demanding, and difficult like my mother, which I find abhorrent. My son tells me I was not at all like her as a mother, thank goodness.

    DAd’s family were Quakers until the local Quaker meeting closed its doors around 1900. The following is a brief history of the abolitionist arm of the family. I feel these characterists described in the last paragraph to be mine, as well:

    Daniel Stratton(3) (David[2], Mark[1]) was born in Evesham, New Jersey, December 15, 1750. By Trade, he was a carpenter and cabinetmaker. He married, first, in New Jersey about 1774. In October, 1779, he was at South River Monthly Meeting in Virginia, as a “Visiting Friend.”

    The certificate which he presented these shows that he was then “of Evesham.” He moved to Virginia soon after, settling in Campbell Couty, near Lynchburg. The South River Meeting Records contain the birth of six of his children. October 10, 1901, Daniel Stratton, with wife Shady, and children Margaret, John, Mary, Daniel and Elias, were given a certificate from South River. This certificate was presented at Westland, January 23, 1802. They settled on the Western Reserve, in Logan County, Ohio, not far from West Liberty *

    * = In 1787 the famous ordinance for governing the territory of northwest of the Ohio contained a stipulation that “religion, morality and knowledge being necessary to good government, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged, and hereafter, forever, there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in this territory except as a punishment for crime.” It was this ordinance that encouraged so many Quakers to leave Virginia for the Western Reserve.

    A granddaughter, still living (aged 90 years) remembers seeing Daniel Stratton when she was about nine years old. He had come on horseback from West Liberty to Clinton County to visit his son Mahlon.

    She remembers him as a tall, slender old gentleman in Quaker dress. He was a man of strong convictions, very decided in his ideas of right and wrong. He had lived for twenty-two years in Virginia and left there on account of his intense dislike of the institution of slavery. He died January 14, 1836, aged 85 years and 19 days. +

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  12. OT: Oh my, I just read the mink story that Linda provided the link for, yesterday. If you have a good half hour, it’s worth reading all our stories in the comments. There’s some wisdom there, lots of humor; and you get to hear the voices of the departed, and folks who no longer regularly walk the Trail.

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  13. Yes, I had a couple of pairs of button fly jeans and a pair of khaki green army fatigues that I got at the Ragstock store. I really loved those army fatigue pants and I wore them thin. They were so comfortable and soft. I got used to the buttons and they didn’t bother me.

    I got a lot of physical characteristics from my mom: everything about my eyes except the color, scoliosis, my sweet tooth, and a certain naïveté about people. I got my introspective nature from my dad, as well as my love of books. Unfortunately, I also got his tendency towards irritability when he needed to be alone and couldn’t be. My brother got Dad’s physical (health) problems. I’m glad I didn’t get those. My dad died at 60. My brother has had to focus on his health since he was in his late 30s, and his son had a stent placed at 15 for atrial fibrillation.

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  14. October 18, 1963 is Fèlicette Day.
    It commemorates the first and only cat astronaut. French Parisian tuxedo cat, Fèlicette becomes the only cat to reach outer space and return alive.
    Sadly, Fèlicette was euthanized for further testing.

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    1. I know! That special day led me to videos of weightless cats (NOT space!) and how the studies of them helped human astronauts learn how to move in real space. It’s not like learning to swim.

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  16. OT: WP is actually being pretty nice to me. It seems to be keeping me signed in, and it’s letting me like things without signing in each time. Kinda refreshing, WP!

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  17. my high school girlfriend wore levis 501 with button fly. i had to buy them at schatzleins on lake. she taught me how to unbutton then completely with one quick tug down and toward your left shoe. thanks for the smile remembering that
    i inherited my dads ulcer prone digestion
    my kids inherited my adhd even though that syndrome was unknown at the time. i inherited a strong judgemental work ethic, sense of humor, appreciation of the arts and good brain. kids and grandkids will do well with my gifts i hope.
    theres a sing in there somewhere.
    ill let you know when/if its ready for being played.

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    3. Ah to be young! I knew a girl that would stare you in the eye and unbutton your shirt with one hand. It was mostly her way of having fun and flirting.

      Of course being able to unhook a bra one handed was a desirable skill to have!

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  18. I have a pair of jeans with a button fly. Which reminds me, they are in need of patching. I started cutting the fabric for patching and then got distracted. I have to get back to that project.

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