We will never give in

I want to make a coonskin cap! Part 1

2011-04-09T11:29:00.000-07:00

One of the fondest memories that I have as a little guy was the day my uncle Wolfie walked out of his big black van, handed me a coonskin cap, and told me it was mine. After I had a son of my own I got to thinking that no boys life can possibly be full without owning their very own coonskin cap. Taking a great deal of pride in making things myself I decided I would like to make my son the hat myself instead of buying him one. Also, I thought while I was at it it I might as well make one for myself and my nephew Josh. I began looking at coonskins on line which lead me to trapping and snaring sites. After visiting these sites several times I decided that I might as well trap, skin, flesh, and dry my own hides as well. How cool will that be I thought? My son and nephew will have a hat that they can look at and say "My uncle or dad trapped, killed, skinned, and hand made me this." It has been a very exciting and educational first year. I have fallen in 15 feet of fast moving water with a 50 lb. pack on and had to pull my self up the 8 foot drop on the river bank by tree roots. I lost my glasses when I went under but my hat stayed on and I stayed out and finished setting traps. I have gained a great deal of respect for raccoons and much knowledge regarding their habits during the cold weather months. At the end of the season I had trapped 22 coons, 1 mink, 1 beaver, and two skunks. Yes, I did get sprayed by the first skunk. Sorry about that Luke!! I have taken my coon handling time form 3 hours on that first coon to about 15 minutes (5 to skin and 10 to flesh.) I even sold some of my coons to a local fur buyer.

As far as excitement goes I thought I would share with you the most fun filled story I have to share from my first season. I had set a small line up and I left early in the morning to check it before welding school. I decided to check the trap that was furthest from the road and here is what I found.

As you heard me say in the video I closed down the recording to dispatch the coon. After the dispatch I reset my trap, threw the coon in my bucket, and headed off to check two more sets. As I approached the next two sets I was able to see from about 50 feet away the first one was empty. I had these two traps under a road bridge kitty corner of each other on opposite banks of the river. About the time I noticed the first trap was empty I heard the muffled sound of a coon growling and picked up my pace coming within site of the next trap. I had another coon waiting for me.

About this time I heard another growl and realised that the coon on the trap was too far away to be growling this loud. This lead me to look down at the coon I was carying in the bucket to notice that I had not been successful in dispatching him. In fact, I had not even come close and my efforts had only mildly stunned him and really pissed him off. About the time I put all of this together the coon jumped straight up and out of the bucket in my left hand towards my face. My reflexes kicked in ad I did what I always do when something comes a flying at my face aggressively, right jab. The punch sent the coon flying through the air. He landed on a bush and ran seemingly unharmed up a near by drain pipe. I set there for a couple of minutes with the adrenaline running not believing what had just happened and then, like I always do, I broke out into laughter.

I made my way over to the next coon, dispatched it (made sure this time), and headed back to my car. On the way up to my car I remembered something I had read about raccoons being one of the few animals that is successful at backing away bears and wolves in the wild. I thought about what a shame it was that the nice coon I had caught was sitting up a drain pipe out of my reach. I decided there was really no good reason why I shouldn't grab my catch pole and crawl up the pipe after him. It was a hairy situation to say the least, but it is true when they say victory favors the bold. The video below below was filmed after I exited the pipe.

Does this make me more stupid or more brave than the average bear? I don't know. All I know is I got both of my coons.

I love you Babe.

2010-03-23T22:57:00.000-07:00

Hammer Project

2009-05-30T11:53:00.000-07:00

What is the hammer project? It is a project to get the Dept of Veterans Affairs to recognize the Thor's Hammer as a religious symbol that may be added to the headstones of our fallen .

There are Asatru followers who are right now in Iraq and Afghanistan and others that will be deployed shortly. They and their families deserve to know that if they should be killed Thor's Hammer will be allowed upon their Dept of Veterans Affairs provided headstone.

Who am I asking to sign this? Everyone, heathen or not. Those of you who know me know that I am Asatru. Although I have not served in the armed forces there is a chance my children may do so in the future. There is a high probability that my children will also be Asatru. This being the case I would like to ask you to sacrifice a small amount of time to sign a petition to help us in this struggle. This will help assure that those who make the greatest sacrifice for our sake will not be forgotten when it comes to there final resting places.

Please visit the following link http://www.hammerproject.org/ and make sure you sign the petition!

Your help is greatly appreciated!

New Baby Girl

2009-05-24T09:41:00.000-07:00

I just wanted to take a moment to post some pictures of our brand new little girl. She is the first girl born to carry my sir name, in our clan, in 36 years. She is the first direct blood descendant to carry the name in over 50 years. Hail Michael Rose Adelaide E.! Born on 05/19/09, she was delivered at 39 weeks and weighed 8lbs. 15 oz. She would have hit the 9 and a half mark if she went 40 weeks like her big brother. She was named after my wife's brother who she lost 3 years ago and my grandma Jones who we love dearly and miss terribly. She will go by Michael Rose in memory and honor of you both.

Daddy loves you sweetie!

Finn's Favorite Song

2009-04-19T20:21:00.000-07:00

Finn now makes me bounce him on my knee for an hour at a time while we listen to this song. He acts as if he is in a trance. It has been one of my favorites since I was young so I can think he gets this new obsession from dad. When we are listening to the song Finn looks at me as if he needs me to answer some question but can't speak the words to ask. Turn it up and listen.

Where does the time go?

2009-04-16T20:44:00.000-07:00

People ask me "why do you care? You'll be dead and gone." Please have a close look.

Do you want my advise? Make sure you don't miss a second with them and know that what you do today can mean the world to them when you are dead and gone.

I love being a father!

Dawn of the Mustache

2009-03-17T19:05:00.000-07:00

It is hard to believe that it has been just two short weeks since I lost my original manstache. It seems like I can't grow these new whiskers fast enough. As you can see by the picture I have gone from clean shaven to the dirty, Pioneer Park, homeless man style. I can already feel my strength increasing again. Although I am but a shadow of my former self strength wise, in comparison with my mustached self, I am definitely feeling stronger. This other picture is of what happened when I decided to trim some hedges over the weekend. In my clean shaven past I would have barely been able to fill a single wheelbarrow. As you can see, a little stubble makes a whole lot of difference in man strength. Clean faces are for women. I am sure glad that I did not decide to trim the hedges with a mustache. There might not be any yard at all!

Hand Made Heavy Duty Dog Collar

2009-03-09T18:09:00.000-07:00

We had a problem for a while. Our 135lb. rottweiler Zeus kept climbing our fence to take afternoon strolls through our neighborhood. I thought it was pretty funny when I would go to get him and see him cruising down the side walk like he was the king cock of the block. Unfortunately the people who were crossing fifth east when they saw him headed their way did not get the same laugh out of the whole thing that I did.

I just love aircraft cable, pulleys, and rigging. You can trap anything with the stuff! This being the case I decided I would make a tie off to keep Zeus in our yard. I drilled a hole into one of the roof beams for our porch and put a 4" long hook bolt in it. To the hook bolt I attached a spring shock absorber, up to 800 lbs. I then strung a piece of 1100lb load cable to it with bolt clamps. I secured the other end to our fence post across the yard. To do this I used a piece of chain with connector link to loop around the post and connect to a 400lb load cable rigging ring. I then secured a carbine clip to the other end of the cable and hooked this to the rigging ring to make the cable removable. A pulley is threaded onto this line with another cable running off of it. It is the cable that runs off of the pulley that attaches to Zeus' collar.

I thought we were good to go. It took Zeus a week to bend the rigging ring from a circle to an oval, bend the hook bolt to angle, and snap his supposedly indestructible store bought collar. This being the case I decided that if I wanted a collar made the right way I would probably, like most things, have to do it myself.

The pictures you see here are the finished product. I used a 1 1/2" 9oz. piece of latigo leather strap, the same thing the use to make the strap on the saddle that goes under the horses belly. I punched a hole for the buckle and doubled the whole strap over to make it twice as thick. This collar is held together with heavy duty copper bur rivets, 16 in all. These are the same rivets used in saddle making. Noted the nice D-ring for securing him to the cable. you guessed it! more saddle hardware. I know he is not breaking this collar. Now I am just waiting for him to rip the fence post out of the ground or tear my roof off.

The Betrayal (Murder of a Moustache)

2009-03-03T19:10:00.000-08:00

(A lion of a man displays his mane! ROAR!!)

Today a great act of brutality took place. Loyalty has been repaid with bone chilling, cut throat treachery of the vilest sort. I can no longer look in the mirror without seeing that I must come clean and confess that I alone am the perpetrator of this hideous crime. Yes friends, it is true. Last night I went to bed with the trust of a devoted companion and this morning I woke up and drove my electric sheers deep into his back. In a selfish fury I hacked away tossing him into the waste basket and putting him out to be picked up by the garbage man like piece of burnt toast. I must come clean. The whiskers are on my hands and the guilt is to great of a burden to bear for one man without being crushed. I did it! I cut off my beautiful lip curtain. Now, ashamed and mustacheless, I realize there is only one thing that I can do to set this right. I must grow once more my mustache and document it here for all to see!

Along the way I will do some serious soul searching in order to try to understand this tragic event. In the process I hope to inspire you to grow a moustache of your own. I am doing this in the memory of my late moustache and for all of the young men and women who have thought about growing a fury companion before but have not done so because of fear of the unknown. I hope to lend you support in your endeavor so that you too may be a proud and Mustached American. Please see my before and after picture above and make sure to check back weekly for updates on project Moustache Revival.

A man without his mustache. A shadow of his former self!

Spring is coming!

2009-03-01T21:52:00.000-08:00

I do not doubt that we will have another snow storm or two, but we have had plenty of sunny days lately. This week I took part of the day off work to come home and watch my son so that my wife could try to rest and recover from the stomach flu. Looking for a way to entertain young Thorfinn I decided we would go out into the backyard. So i got home and changed out of my office clothes, put a jacket on the boy, and headed out to our backyard.

Looking for away to focus the boundless energy of a 19 month old and keep him out of the dog poop lead us into the containment of our fenced garden area. I lead Finn in and he immediately began throwing handfuls of dirt into the air. I grabbed the hand trowel, a small spade, and the garden weasel. I began turning over the dirt with the hand trowel but was soon relieved of this duty by Finn so I went onto turning the soil with the spade then running through it with the garden weasel, Finn trying his hand at all of these activities but being most successful at the hand trowel.

I was filled with pride looking at the soil full of organic matter and earth worms. Just three short years ago the soil was hard and clay. We have succeeded in changing it into a nice loamy texture. We managed to prepare 1-4X4, 2 -4X8, and 3- 1X3 raised beds. Finn loved helping throw the rocks and branches to the side. In the pictures you will notice the Swiss Chard beginning to sprout up out of a bed still covered in leaves and grass clipping for its winter nap. Swiss Chard can be cut down close to the soil in the fall and covered with mulch to protect it from the winter. It will produce another crop in the early spring before bolting to seed with the warming weather. It is a great easy to grow alternative to spinach and can be used in any recipe calling for spinach. It is a heavy producer and one of our favorite vegetables to grow and eat.