Incongruinty @ Harmony Part I

   Where to begin? The man of the household who's a control-freak, self-centered, self-denominated prophet and is anxiously awaiting the 2012 apocalypse? An introverted wife willingly heeding his calls, who dabbles in amateur hypnotism and accepts alien abductions and the existence of leprechauns, among other creatures to be truth? How about the dozen or so ailing animals, that I came across, prescribed homeopathy remedies in place of well-accepted veterinarian practices? Or there's the foreman/illegal immigrant unflaggingly performing ninety percent of the farms work without a lick of despondency, in order to support his wife and three kids. With all that's passed off as quality television nowadays, the ass-backwardness nature experienced in my three weeks at Harmony screams to be included in the bunch. Supergrass's Strange Ones could be the opening theme.


  My main intention at the farm was to get a feel of livestock, so its only right we start there. Upon my arrival, I was thrown into the proverbial 'deep end of the pool', as I assisted Carlos in putting the animals back from the fields to their respective sleeping quarters. Not surprisingly, as soon as we unleashed the quadrupeds from their roaming spots they immediately rushed back to the barn for the food we had placed earlier. For our feathered friends, the shaking of a pot partially filled with feed did a reasonable enough job coaxing the fowls from the adjacent pond and field to the duck, turkey and chicken houses.


   Even for the experienced farmer, its nearly impossible with such an abundance of birds, to con them all at once into their houses. At the end a good day, about ninety percent would follow us all at once. We'd have to make sure to close the doors of the coops as we exited or else risk them following us right back out believing we still had food to give. For the ones who decided not to follow, we had to chase, corral, and/or corner them till we were able to capture and carry em back to their homes. Through Carlos' broken english I learned that it was fine to let any ducks and geese stay outside and they could generally fend for themselves in case any coyotes came by. It was the turkeys and chickens we had to make sure were inside at night. The con pot was pointless on days when it rained and/or we waited till dusk since the fowls were already in a rush to get indoors.


   Now onto the four-legged friends category. The glutinous goats are hands down the biggest eaters pound for pound. I could not get the two adult females to milk without bribing them with feed. Additionally, the two young and adult female goats were able to clear an area of blackberry bushes, approximately 100 ft by 25 ft, in about a week with only the skeleton branches remaining.  No wonder goat owners in Washington State rent them out to keep control of landscaping along some Department of Transportation Right-of-Ways. On another note, its never a good idea to have the same amount of bucks as females. With the combined testosterone competing for the same female prize, the males will take their aggression out by other means if they are unable to be procreative. Though two of the males were still in the juvenile stage, they were speedily maturing during my stay.


  Ananda, the sole cow, was like a ginormous dog. She loved to be pet and was definitely the friendliest of the bunch. The only cow issues I had were: 1) Walking.. er.. pulling her with all my might by the leash to a designated day spot. Every 20 feet along the path she came across a new grassy spot she deemed worth sampling. 2) Her unknowingly stepping on my feet on separate occasions after getting startled from Moon, the owners dog. On the livestock's morning walk to the field, the dog frequently liked harassing the animals.


 The two sheep were the messiest. I'll be a happy man if I never have to do sheep shit cleanup doodie, I mean duty, in my life. Every couple weeks, a few hours are reserved for unsoiling the stables and coops. Not recommended for the faint-hearted.  Half the time spent clearing the area of manure was exhausted in the 8 by 8 sq ft sheep pin. The alpacas and pig largely kept to themselves during my stay. They were not required to stay in stables at night, largely roamed as they pleased and were happy enough as long as their respective food and water dishes were filled....


   Stay tuned for the harvesting and remaining animals, ie the man and woman of the house.


Road Trip Tunes:
Janes Addiction 'Nothing's Sacred' (Nothing's Sacred)
Cat Power 'The Greatest' (Love & Communication)
Johnny Cash 'At Folsom Prison' (Send A Picture Of Mother)

Busing to bantam Buxton

   October 4, 2010 was the date I set the course to Buxton, Oregon from Seattle, Washington. 4 weeks earlier, while visiting my mom in Piers Island, British Columbia, and after the $30 membership fee for the online WWOOF directory was paid, e-mails were sent out to several participating farms in Oregon & California for the months of October & November, respectively.

   If I wasn't such a procrasinator and got on the ball writing to host farms earlier in the summer, more than 4 may have responded back. Out of the host participants who did, Harmony Farms struck me as the most alluring in Washington's south-adjacent, neighboring state. A workable 45 minute drive west of Portland, the 40 acre, partly forested, completely verdant property sustains 1 cow, 1 pig, 2 alpacas, 2 sheep, 7 goats, couple dozen ducks & geese, 50+ turkey, and well over the century mark for number of chickens. Oh yes, and an ivory mutt named Moon. With the abundance of its living creatures, Harmony felt like an unequaled crash course into life with livestock. As an added bonus in my wish for sustainable living, Larry Matthew, man of the Harmony household, also e-mailed that he hoped a solar panel system would be up and running shortly before my expected arrival date.

   Not fully registering in significance until after my arrival, Larry penned in his original e-mail to me weeks earlier, "I do have one full time employee, Carlos, who arrives around 7:30AM and leaves around 4:30PM. I  own a retail fireplace store and I am not home alot during the daytime. Generally my wife is home Sundays and Mondays and I am home on Wednesdays". As you will discover, my occasional neglect to detail has a great track record of making me pay justly.

  Wishing primarily to get a scope of the general Buxton area and secondly to get a relaxing taste of the outdoors before work commenced at Harmony, I chose to depart Seattle one day earlier in order to camp in the nearby L.L. Stub Stewart Park. To be fair, the term 'camp' is used loosely. 1) Cell phone service was a go. 2) I slept in the surprisingly comfortable makeshift bed in the back of the Vanagon vs. a tent. There was a campfire, though. Complimenting the alighted event was some Deschutes Jubeale; a winter seasonal ale well worth waiting the first 3/4 of the year for.

   Laying my head to rest that evening with my mind racing, wondering what was in store, never could my wildest thoughts envision what would take place at Harmony in the next three weeks. To be continued....

    Deviating from my usual Ipod shuffling while road tripping it, I decided to listen to my albums in full thru the VW's cd player. Below are the artists and their respective albums listened to on the way to Buxton. Additionally included is a selected track you can listen to via the link:


    Menomena 'Mine' (Dirty Cartoons)
    Queens of the Stone Age 'Lullabies to Paralyze' (Long Slow Goodbye)
    The Flaming Lips 'Transmissions From the Satellite Heart' (Turn It On)
    The Black Keys 'Chulahoma' (My Mind is Rambling)
    My Morning Jacket 'It Still Moves' (Run Thru)
  
  

Intro Part II

....Seattle will always be one of my favorite cities in the US.  It's hard to beat a setting with two mind-blowing mountain ranges bookending the east and west of the skyline and killer Puget Sound. What's more is the liberal activism, rocking music scene (both local and national bands that continuously gig the area), lip smacking cuisine (both on the cheap & for a night out dressed in 9's), and mouth-watering microbrew (Mac & Jacks, your Amber will be missed).

   Yet, for all its pros, 5 straight years of Metropolitan life-style got to be a handful for a dude who grew up, went to high school & college in small towns. The best cure-all for the desk-job blues was blowing money on the weekends on latest toy gadgets, over-priced drinks and the trendiest clothing. Have we really gotten to a place in humanity where the deeper v-neck shirt a man wears, the superior his manliness? If you didn't keep up, it could be difficult to compete for the attention for a female counterpart with all the other wannabe alpha males on the prowl. eHarmony provides convenient services in the date department, but takes all the fun/headaches out of meeting people spontaneously and/or having friends introduce you to their available friends. Besides I'm too cheap to pay for online dating memberships.

   The club bar scene got old for me real quick and soon enough I gave up on finding a partner and dedicated all my attention on the band. Originally after quiting the job, the plan was to go on tour with State of Murdoch along the west coast and southwest. When the other two bandmates couldnt save enough to go on a prolonged tour, I went ahead with leaving the company and sought other adventures available along the road. Instead of limiting myself to the originally intended western portion of the country, the first solo road trip of mine transformed into one around the country. You only live once right?

   Weekly visits to the Ballard Farmer's Market in Northwest Seattle piqued my interest more and more in sustainable farming and a random google search into volunteer opportunities on organic farms uncovered the world of WWOOF'ing  (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms). The goal in WWOOF'ing is to volunteer 30 hours a week on a farm and in return get free room & board, along with meals. Most importantly you learn a valuable lesson in its inherent sustainable agriculture practices. My conscience determined awhile ago after reading Michael Pollan's, 'Omnivore's Dilemma', that the just way to eat livestock was to learn first hand the ways of raising animals the way evolution designed them to be. There's a long list of reasons factory farmed meat is unethical and disgusting in my book. More over, eating produce, which I could have hand in, came across a new refreshing, rewarding experience. If I'd be getting a free place to crash and eat, I could prolong my journey across the country even longer. Win-Win!

FUZZOLOGY 101 is a recap of the knowledge learned from farming thus far and other thrills which have taken place on my series of sojourns. With enough luggage for all 4 seasons, a REI Novara Rivet Cyclocross Bike, my trusty Martin DC16 and an entire CD collection to get me along every major highway without one disc being repeated all packed into a 1990 VW pop-topped Vanagon, the trip was a go. The first stop on the journey was a 3 week stop in Wikipedia's one-paragraph-summarized Buxton, Oregon, a 45-minute drive west of Portland and situated just on the foothills of the Oregon Coast Range.

Stay tuned tomorrow for the beginning of the craziness. It should be noted that some names of people met & places travelled may have been changed for protection.

Intro Part I

Brian Rede Murray. Aka Murdog, Murphy, B, B Money, B Ready, Babyfaced Asshole, Hippy, Pinky (long story dealing w/ a girl I had a thing for) or most commonly: The Fuzz. I've been reveling a series of sojourns & corresponding random thrills since quitting my Geotechnical Engineering (Engineering of Soils) job on July 29, 2010.

   Why would someone with a secure position, with great benefits, terminate his employment in the current economic downturn and the uncertainty of it's recovery in the near-future? First off the desk job was boring as shit, particularly when you're the youngest Staff Scientist by 15 years. Every morning you walk thru the front doors, your inevitable, bleak future stares right back at you in the faces of your bitter, mid-aged co-workers.

   With a position as a Staff Geotechnical Engineer, the primary task was producing numerous soils reports for foundation support, which didn't deviate a whole lot in substance from one to the next. Monotonous tasks do not bear challenging experiences, nor a sense of potential room for career growth in the future. Plus the male to female ratio was 9 to 2, in an office of 11. Combined with the 4 years at Clarkson University, and it's 5 to 1 ratio, a change of scenery seemed only reasonable.

   After factoring in the weekly 20 to 30 hours spent fronting and booking shows for local band State of Murdoch (currently on indefinite hiatus), the usual chores, my obsession with cooking all but one meal from scratch (restaurant meals accounted for the non-homemade meal), and regular running, it's not unreasonable to see how burnt out life was getting.