LoL, my fingertips are numb from all the thorns, nettle, fire and rope burn :D

The water pressure in our house isn't really great, especially in the summer and especially if anyone else in the building is using the tap, so lately the pump that ought to start the heater isn't working, leaving us with cold water to shower with. Mind, it's still early April, so that's not really an option, but once you get it to start, then it's fine. The past two days I had to heat up some water and used a bucket to rinse myself, while the damn pump played hookie. It was necessary, because we've been working upon the vineyard hill again and we weren't only filthy and muddy, but also stank of smoke. Why, yes, I was burning things again. Some things more successfully than others. 

         The main objective was leveling out the beehives platform, which is what G and Rockstar did, the dogs basking and dad chainsawing anything that refused to run away from him. Later we all made effort to dig up, untie and re-set the posts that keep the grapevine line in, well, line. They tilt inwards over the years and re-setting them takes ages, like, an hour for each line. (And there are over 40 lines), and it's exhausting work. But it's been raining, drizzling and foggy, with completely wet grass and young trees everywhere, so it was ideal for burning the waste piles from pruning and forest-line clearing ... IF I managed to get them going. The problem is not small rain - I can burn anything in the rain and it's very helpful, safety wise, especially if there's zero wind - you minimize hazard to a null that way, if you know what you're doing. Problem was that both piles were completely fresh - family's made no effort to stack cut off branches upon old piles, which would enable me to ignite dry stuff within. Normally I pride myself on being able to start a fire using nothing but a single match - very rarely use any kind of paper, especially since there's plenty of old spruces and dead shrubbery in the woods easily collected for kindle, but you can't start a fire on fresh wood - in the rain. You can, and then the dry stuff you ignited just burns up and nothing else happens. Trick is, to burn something fresh AND wet, you have to dry it while heating it up. Build a normal fire underneath first, and feed it paper, very slowly, one ribbon after another, until the temperature is fit, and wet old wood will start to join in. Then add more and more wet old wood and once that is going, keep pulling the fresh branches onto the pyre. It can totally be done, but you have to constantly keep the flames alive, keep blowing into the embers, keep adding spruce dead branches (full of sap) and keep heating the rest of the pile up. The surrounding area of the pile was carpeted in young nettles, I was of course constantly on all fours - and most of the shrubbery around there has thorns. 

         Hence the title of this post. :D It was great fun, we got plenty done, second day in a row, but I can barely freaking type :D And I still smell a bit smoked. (Dad's rule is you can't really have smoke, the fire needs to be hot and clean, but dude, I was working with wet rotting old leaves and grasses.) 

I think if people ever just flipped through my paint test sketches, they'd probably think I'm schizophrenic or have DID ...

Successfully managed to stab myself in the finger with a pen ... It takes a special talent to achieve that. Pro level of clumsy with a pinch of retarded. Should we count that as my fifth tattoo? Time will tell. 

This morning, while the able saw to the cow (who tends to prove a stubborn and resilient little beastling), I offed in another direction, exploring a dirt road I've never checked out before. It led me pass a very cool looking farm (through, actually) - cluster of houses, some as old as primordial, some brand modern and new, plenty of kids' toys lying around, so there must be plenty of young people keeping it ... then down a valley through the morning mist and up again through a small forest. I saw a young deer, cocky and curious, who simply didn't find me all that threatening and continued to graze on the blueberry shoots despite the fact I stood rather close and observed it. Later I came out at a village football field and three female deer played there and again, they stopped, stared, I stopped, stared, and they gradually decided to walk past me, back into the woods. Not much survival instinct in these pregnant hussies - I could have hit them with a stone if I so desired, let alone a rifle. Their coats are still dark grey and their bums snow white. Fuzzy silly little creatures.

Further up I passed a tractor workshop and climbed the hill with a familiar church to veer back home. I hate all religions for their crimes against intelligence and humanity, but I gotsta admit they make for wonderful landmarks. Even while I was making my way through the woods I could tell where I was for the sound of their bells ringing in the distance. 

I was going to draw a zombie teddy bear, but I googled 'zombie teddy bear' and found I am way f* behind my time ... and level of f*-upness. Respect! I want one!!

Am gonna watch Glass now, the endings as they are, and is it just me or did James McAvoy go from scrawny Mr. Tumnus to The Beast in a remarkably edible way? Dayuum. Boy got thick.

Huh :D

Looking down on my watch, this is what it showed just now :D

   6: 02
   3-  4

Cute. 

Love + Death + Robots

Watching the anthology series on Netflix, or a least starting to, with the funny cute episodes, not the gnarly soul-crushing horror episodes I'll leave for last. The obvious first choice: Three Robots. Because y'know, philosophical robots with a dark sense of humor. 

Sketching some more ...

Today the cow we are trying to help (set her back onto her feet), the one's whose labor went tragically wrong for her calf took too long and was far too sizeful, wasn't doing so well, so G sent me to occupy myself elsewhere and I veered into the forest, tugging my camera along. The forest is still asleep, hardly a shootling or sapling in sight, but it was beautiful. Peaceful. Momentarily I thought I saw an animal much too large for realism, as the largest animals around would be bears and those are rare and you'd have to be lucky to find one if you were looking for it for a long time. Boars and occasional elk, sure, and plenty roe deer and rabbits, but nothing the size of what I paused to try and identify. I didn't get any closer, in case it turned out to be just a stack of rotting logs and shadow. I enjoy imagining things large enough to fuck you and eat your horse lurking in the deep dark woods. 

Regarding the poor heifer, I have a friend who's a vet and she told me her mentor's philosophy regarding animals (he was talking about a cat in this instance: If all of her bones are in the same room, chances are she's going to make it.) We've managed to move the poor thing outdoors and again, we're back to waiting. My least of all favorite parts. Back tomorrow morning to see if again we can do anything at all that time and nature couldn't. 

G is starting to smell like bee's vax, as the work in the hive is getting closer to the moving date. Since we've started sleeping naked once it got warm enough, that is a good thing to smell like indeed.