Does this still work???

Does this still work??? How could it?

You're Losing Me, Barak, One Bone At a Time.

Today our first African-American, duly elected president, coalition-building genius that he was, declared his whole-hearted support for nuclear power, and the whole sinister machine that fuels it. The passing reference in his first State of the Union address of the necessity for our nation to pursue "safe nuclear energy" was a shot across the bow, and now he’s opened up the howitzers and started blasting away at the very vessel that carried him to his inauguration. He dedicated 8.5 billion of our tax dollars in the form of “loan guarantees” for the nuclear power profiteers in the energy monopolies.

I don’t know if it’s an effort to appease the same powers who hold all the cards with the Piggy Banks, the auto industry, Big Insurance, Big Drugs, and Big Oil, or the Republicrats in Congress, but his efforts to achieve “reform” and accomplish “change” are about as effective as his half-hearted advocacy of “openness,” which have feebly resulted in him seeking the same shelter of executive privilege endlessly enjoyed by his predecessor. --(to be continued, this is going somewhere, I promise)

Victory at Black Mesa Against Peabody Coal

Comment posted to their website-


Marco Good Jan 9th, 2010 at 12:37 am

Good work! This gives us new hope. We are currently in a struggle to stop copper-nickel sulfide mining near the east end of the Mesabi Iron Range in Northern Minnesota. The iron mines are depleted and depressed here and the old mining communities and politicians are eager to undertake the inevitably toxic acid pollution of our pristine water supply here at the top of the East-West Laurentian Divide, directly adjacent to the Vermillion Anishinabe reservation and the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness and Lake Superior’s North Shore. Please see my blog linked to the above website, or google friends of the boundary waters wilderness. We would so appreciate any tactical advice or contacts you might be able to offer. Thank you. Marco Good, Grand Marais, Mn.

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1. 1 Black Mesa Wins! Peabody’s Coal Mining Permit Revoked : Intercontinental Cry Trackback on Jan 8th, 2010 at 3:56 pm

Polymet/Franconia Sulfide Mining-Embarrass

The Ely Timberjay asked for comments on the proposed copper/nickel mines on the Iron Range. Here's what I came up with so far:

Like every one of your neighbors human, animal, and vegetable in Northeastern Minnesota who are not motivated by greed for minerals and disregard for the true value of our resources, I must register my adamant opposition to the further consideration of the Polymet and Franconia Sulfide Mining operations being pushed by "The New generation of Mining in Minnesota."

The assertion that removal of sulfide ore here at the very top of the watershed for the North American Continent can somehow magically be done in an "environmentally responsible" manner is simply absurd. If there is a proven way to isolate, contain and remove sulfuric and hydrochloric acid from the water and land from which it is extracted, it has never been demonstrated anywhere these mines have operated in the world. There are plenty of examples of the opposite: Vast yellow-orange acid-killed wastelands where nothing green will grow, rotten-egg stinking streams of acid devoid of fish, fowl, and fauna forever. We refuse to let our year-round and vacation homes and international wilderness be laid waste like Sudbury, Ontario which was for the sake of employment in Copper/Nickel mining and smelting turned into a moonscape devoid of any living thing except the humans in that "industry."

The jobs we have in tourism and forestry are too valuable to discard for this short term gain and eternal damage. Besides that, it is just not right. The past, present and future defenders of our Boundary Waters will never allow this vicious assault to proceed.

Any truthful assessment of these operations' environmental impact without including the words "horrific", "devastating" and "irreversible" have to be drafted by the mining corporations themselves. Oh, wait, "truthful assessment" and "mining corporations" don't really fit in the same sentence, now do they? Those who have worked in the mines ought to know that by now. Remember the pensions they promised?

Sincerely, Marco Good, Grand Marais, MN.

Where'd THAT ol' Summer go?

Since I (with Jack and Julie's help) managed to patch things up enough to finish out the season, I've been too fascinated with freakin' Facebook to spend my writing time here on me blog. The sleigh sits on skids at the farm, thanks to a little help from Roger Bodger. She really needs paint and I'll have to switch out the front set of bunk and runners before I can paint all that up and slide it back under the box. Summer has officially come to a screeching halt here. I need to get ready for my Bloomington gig, too.

The text size and style seem to be freaking out on me. Maybe a WordPress blog would work better. What do you think about that, mister Blogger Cookie?

I also hate composing in this little tiny window that only takes up a quarter of the screen.

So I spent the whole summer roofing a little with the Lonnie-Blaster, and taking a lot of naps in the recliner. Never thought I'd have to be working on the roof again, but there ain't a whole lot more going on these days Hardly got any sawing done, but I did go get a couple of neat little LaCroix Indian pony-boys named Makwa and Eddie. I'll have to post some pictures which currently reside on my other computer. I never once went fishing, and only twice got out rowing.

Tonight I am proud to report significant progress on Mr. Dwyer's log bench, and a little maple cut up for firewood. Onward.

Who knows how long it will stay nice like this. No bugs, no rain, hot as it's been all damn summer.

Coconut's Colic Continues

So, where were we...traveling home after Coconut's IV froze up at ten below in the unheated barn in Esko. We headed out from there at about 11:00, it must have been. Midnight McDonald's and gas at Holiday, arriving at Man Elverhoy's heated garage around 1:30. We hooked up the IV to the catheter, and with somebody standing on either side of him so he wouldn't move around, we slowly dripped the two five-liter bags of Lactated Ringer's Solution into the jugular vein of the horse, all night long. The third bag had drained itself almost out onto the floor of the back seat of Jim's pickup when the needle fell down. But after we had done all this, at five AM, a little wet green biscuit fell on the floor. We were elated, we had what we were looking for. I went home for two hours of sleep, swung by the hospital for 3 liters of Ringer's, which is what they could spare, and one liter from Kim before I returned.

When I got there Solveig and Kari had been walking that horse around all day without any sleep, and we tried pumping that into him. A retired big animal vet who was up to go XC skiing stopped by twice, and assured us there was nothing else we could have done. Along about dark, we loaded him back in the trailer. He hadn't eaten or drank a thing. We took him home to Solveig and sister Kjersti's new place, where Gepetto his pasture-mate hollered to him. Coconut spoke back hoarsely. We took him to the water tank where he stuck his nose way under water for several seconds, but would not drink.

Solveig and I followed him around the yard there, and he laid down three or four times, groaned, and got up. The last time he laid down we knew he wasn't getting up. Before he went down he was coughing or blowing up brown fluid from his lungs, but he just laid down then, with his old horsey head in our laps and his breathing sped up and slowly faded. He died right there. I never have been with a horse when it died. We were both overcome. I sobbed like a little kid, passed around some tobacco I had, Solveig said, "Just think, Marco, I was with you when I met Coconut, and I was with you when he died." The sunshine girl speaks the truth.

Coconut Continues

I'm back from more-than-full-time sleigh rides and repairs--did ya miss me? (I'm chillin' at the coffee shop with a pair of reading glasses John was so kind as to loan me) That time ten years ago when Solveig and Ashley were out helling around by the sewer ponds at night, there was just enough snow to make it slippery, and one misstep sent horse and rider head over heel.

That night ten ears ago we were there in the barn at Lutsen, Jim, Kari, Me, Solveig, and Coconut with a bashed-in head, we called the vet in Cloquet and he sent us The Bute and Banamine he needed to reduce the pain and inflammation. We had laid some triple-antibiotic eye ointment and bandaged the eye with gauze and tape which had to be changed every day for a month, and pumped a bunch of Penicillin into him for a few days to keep it from getting infected.

It all went pretty well, considering how severe the trauma was, and we saved the eyeball, but he lost the sight in that eye from having that part of his skull caved in. The old piece of cloth taped to the section of his halter that covered the eye was a trick I had learned from our farrier friend Bruce Campbell which had saved a scratched eyeball on Jose', another of the "original Mexicans" who were the blue-collar bedrock of our saddle-string at the time. If you can get them some antibiotics, use some of that opthalmic ointment, and change the dressing every day, you can often save an eye that would otherwise be lost.

You should have seen how that eye was bugged-out and the whole fist-sized section of his skull was caved in, and how Coconut just was so tolerant and never fussed over all that treatment and pain, and how you never really bond with a horse like when you have to help them get better from something like that, and how they never really bond like that with you until they need you to help them, and they know it. It's all pretty hard and scary and rewarding if the outcome is positive. But my old buddy Byron the vet from Bigfork always says to me, she'll either live or she'll die and you can either help her or you can't.

It's hard to find a good old-school large-animal vet in rural Minnesota any more. We had a guy here for a couple of years who was great, just like Byron, there to help you do what you could do, and not charge you more than the horse was worth to do what you couldn't. Carl Wall, I sure miss him at times like this, with the colicky horse. Those folks are a treasure, not just there to skim the cream off of the dog and cat market, never being available even when your dog is poisoned on the weekend. It's rare to find a vet who'll give a "farmer" credit for knowing what he/she knows and being able to do what they can do for themselves. Here on the North Shore there are a lot more horses than you would think there would be, but I'm sure there are not enough for a large-animal vet to live on for sure. And now I still can't finish the shaggy-dog story yet 'cause Ray needs help with a sewer-pipe job...

Trouble in the Woods

Tonight Coconut has left this world, and Ken has three cracked ribs.

There's a big storm coming (so they say). This could be the two-footer again. When it snows, it dumps sometimes. The day before last, that would be Thursday morning at about nine o'clock, Solveig called to say she was having trouble with her little horse, whom she found lying down and cold. With some trouble she got him up, but he wouldn't eat or drink. She took him up to her neighbor Claire's house and Claire brought him right in the kitchen to warm him up.

Solveig called me, and they started to walk him up and down the road like you should with a colicky horse which it looked like he was. I brought "Dog Butt," our animal thermometer, and the box of outdated Banamine, Bute, and Pennicillin with miscellaneous syringes I keep in the fridge. She'd been on the phone with Jennifer, her vet from Ely, getting some instructions on what to do. We rigged up an enema for him twice, the second time deeper than the first, which produced only three small pieces of poop and a string of mucous. Since I have never really tubed a horse, we tried to pour some canola oil down his gullet, of which we could only get him to swallow about a pint. He had a temperature of 101.7, which is very slightly above normal. In between procedures, we offered him water and feed and hay, none of which interested him in the least, and we walked him up and down the road all day long. About dark, we decided to borrow Claire's wonderful two-horse trailer and head for the Twin Ports Equine Clinic, where we had spoken with Dr. Stacy, and she told us it would cost three or four hundred dollars to examine and treat him for colic.

We arrived there about 8:30 and without a word Dr. Stacy began the exam. After listening all over with a stethescope she sedated him and tubed him, pumping most of a three gallon bucket of water down, in stages blowing into the stomach and smelling what was there. Then she put the glove on and palpated inside carefully clear up to her upper bicep, producing one tiny piece of manure. Then she discussed her observations matter-of-factly, asserting that he was severely dehydrated, and should be on I.V. fluids, and that he may be surgical, meaning that there may be a displacement of the intestine, or an obstruction, which could be $2,000-6,000.00 worth of surgery in Anoka or at the University. She offered to try to biopsy stomach fluid, and attempted to do so, producing no fluid at all, which told her that he was so dehydrated that there was no stomach fluid. We asked her if she could set up an I.V. for him, and she did, but the Lactated Ringer's froze in the needle and you could see it freeze up the coiled clear plastic tube toward the five liter bag. She had inserted a catheter into the jugular vein, which had a rubber stopper to receive the needle, but it would have to be flushed with 10cc of saline (I found out later it should have been heparinized) and then the I.V. line needle inserted. Solveig jumped right in to the conversation (as if she hadn't been in the center of it all along) and said, "We can get him into a heated space and do the IV ourselves, right?" "Yeah," said the vet, "You could." So she sent us with the apparatus and the catheter stitched in, and wrapped around his neck with Vetwrap to cover and protect it, and three 5 liter bags of solution. "Good Luck" she said, charged $430-some bucks, which seemed pretty reasonable. It was somewhere between 0 degrees and 10 below, and a little before midnight.

So we loaded him back up on the trailer and headed back for the Shore. That's Jim and Solveig in the pickup and me and Kari in the car. We had some experience, this same exact company, just about ten years ago, in the freezing subzero barn at Lutsen when Solveig and Coconut rolled over, before there was a lot of snow as I recall, caving in a fist-sized section of Coconut's skull around his right eye, not hurting Solveig somehow at all...TO BE CONTINUED...

I'm Blogging Here

I was lucky enough to kill a couple deer in the meantime, and they pretty much flash-froze before I could get them skinned out. So there they hang until I can get them into Betsy's basement and thaw them out one at a time enough to handle them, get them quartered and head on down to Ricky's in Schroeder for the big cuttin' party. That was exciting, especially when I had the second doe in my sights, the fork horn came out and I shot him, but only after I remembered to pull the hammer back, click, then put a shell in the chamber, then shoot the deer, and while he's breathing his last, this bigger buck comes out and does a lap around the stand 35 yards out the whole way around. I was just too amazed to do anything but sit there and watch him. He even stopped on the hill above my stand and looked right at me, then just strolled away. I didn't think about shooting him for Mike or Jim to fill out their tags. Next time for sure.

Thanksgiving tomorrow. To Duluth and back on Friday. Time's running out and I have two more loads of hay to haul before snow comes in a serious way.

Freeze-Up at the Farm

Well, sir, it sure is freezing now. Not even close to zero, except one night when it got down to single digits over a week ago. I almost have my excavations completed for the electric lines underground to the waterer, and the underground fence wire on the other side of Elisa's garden, so I can let the horses in to feed in the garden again. There's still a lot to do before the snow piles up, like move 4-500 little round bales from Bloomquist Ranch, now that the field has set up enough for my bald tires not to get the whole damn deal stuck again. I broke the trailer coupler, dont'cha know, but after looking all over hell for a new cast-iron piece, ol' Farmer Don came along and welded a stainless nut on there where it broke, so after hunting in the morning I'm fixin' to go out to the field and put it back together for some hauling.

Does this Bus go to Duluth?

Trip with Davey to Duluth yesterday. We left the farm at noon. Betsy fed us a great lunch of herring and potatoes and Mike's homemade applesauce, we got the hay out to the horse-asses, and we blasted off in the Stealth Schnaab for shopping for garbage cans and dog food and light bubs and such, where I had hoped to spend a dollar less on each purchase, and maybe save enough to buy gas. I'm a fool, I know. I should have hauled hay instead, because it's raining today. I wanted to burn the burn-piles at the farm today.

Anyhow it was fun bumming around with Dr. Grin. I got a mouse for my laptop. We ate at Arby's in Cloquet near the Farm Store, couldn't find even one wool shirt (that's dumb), tried out some orifice chairs at OfficeMax, and then went into Home Depot twice, because I forgot stuff right there on my list, and then Menard's once for the caulk I forgot on both trips into HD. They even have the Miller Hill Menard's closed for expansion, so we had to go 'way back down to West Duluth. The price of gas was 2.09 in Two Harbors on the way down, 2.07 in Cloquet, 2.29 all over Duluth in the evening, which I paid to fill up, then 2.19 on the way home in Two Harbors.
What the hell?

Dare I divulge David's constant agitation to go to Best Buy (whom I have pledged myself to boycott, onnacounta the bad service Marce got on this puter here) where we finally went anyway, which resulted in him buying a teeny little laptop that has amnesia, but is supposed to work on the internet. I told him not to do it.

We finally made it to Beijing for my favorite General Tso's Chicken with Chinese Vegetables. Washed it all down with a quart of Root Beer from the TH gas station. What a day. We got home after midnight. Now it's raining. It hasn't rained a lot this fall. It never warms up enough, and the days are not long enough to dry out when it does. This is pretty much of a soaker.

Movie Night at Betsy's

We watched a movie on the big screen arranged by Davey with his puter. Bobby brought the DVD to share with a few of us. The movie was called "Why We Fight" and it reviewed the development of the military industrial complex since the Bomb fell on Hiroshima, in spite of Eisenhower's admonishments. It was a very graphic review of the carnage caused by Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld and Ashcroft and Wolfowitz's demonization of their former puppet Saddam Hussein. I got rid of the TV in the cabin shortly after 911, so I had never seen a lot of that video. It made me sick. It made me cry. The military made it happen, because they have to do something, just like Homeland Security, even if it is wrong. And most of it is.

Hey! Rides!

Yesterday Bessie and Julie took some little kids and their folks for a big ol' wagon ride down the Cardinal Road west through some muddy tracks (it was quite bouncy) and came out the North-South road by Surbaugh's driveway, and back on the Pike Lake road. The horses, who have not done much work yet this season, needed about a fifteen minute breather at the top of the hill on the undeveloped part of the Cardinal Road. It was a bit of an adventure. Thanks to Ray for his help all afternoon starting to frame up the wagon benches, and to the lovely Surbaugh family for booking a wagon ride, giving me a deadline to get that up and running for Will's birthday party on Saturday, the day before. Thanks to Don Noyce for the trailer we turned into a wagon, as well as the forecart he framed up for me this spring/early summer.

The Oars Are Here--Yay!

After a pretty long wait--you can't rush an artist--the 9'6" Sitka spruce spoons arrived in Thunder Bay at the DHL terminal. All the folks I talked to on the phone there couldn't have been nicer, more on the ball, or more helpful. But their 800 number and their email communication couldn't have been less helpful, slower to respond or more discombobulated. it took me seven calls over two weeks to get the address and the phone number, one from some dude in Vancouver and one from some chick in Texas...aaarghhh! And then there was the email guy or whatever he or she was--Sumair Ashraf. Write me back after seven days apologizing on behalf of DHL. Paul Bagshaw at least kept me posted on the progress of the oar making.

So Davey and I took the oars out on the big Norse pram, and they are actually about a foot too long for that deal. Hands crossed over, but I really liked the way they pulled. Now I need to get my boat away from its eternal residency at the motor-repair shop, so I can at least row that around a little bit before it gets nasty out. A little fall fishing would be great.

Row, Row, Row Some More

Last evening I took the smaller of the two Norse prams out for a bit, just out to the end of Artist's Point and back. I liked the fact that I could place my feet just right for pushing off of the stern seat. After about 35 or 40 minutes out, however, there was about two or three inches of water amidships. Since we have gotten no rain now for a month or so, the boats have been high and dry on the boat-slides there at North House and could probably use a dunking. There were a couple of streams of water pouring back out where the floor planks join the transom when I pulled her up on the beach. Dryers are done. Gotta go.

Rowing with Rain & Kris & Ben & Miles

After having a campfire down on the beach last night, and musical beds last night on the hottest night of the year, and after a couple of great pony rides on Frisky the Magic Pony, and Mary just wiggling and eating constantly, Ben Cervenka came over for a visit, and then about 4:30 we headed off to the harbor to take the Batteau out in the rollers coming on over from Michigan. Rain and Kris really got the boat moving and Ben too. Miles (three going on four now) was sitting up in the bow cuddled up with Ben and singing his rowing song out on the wind. The Professor came sailing by and showed us the bungie-ties he rigged to hold the oars back in the thole-pins. That really helped. We stayed in the harbor, but we went around both ways before we decided to head in for smoked salmon, whitefish and trout, and some creamed dilled herring. Damn, that was good. What a nice weekend with the kids!

The LOONNNG GOOODDBBYYYE

So there it is. The last show of How to Talk Minnesotan the Musical was yesterday afternoon. It's so transitory, that live theatre thing. We struck the set last night, it took about 2 1/4 hours to demolish the illusion of the Lost Walleye Lodge. I was surprised how much more time and work it was doing a musical than a play. These nice folks who came yesterday said, "that sort of silliness is just what we need right now." It's funny how material as irrelevant and vapid as that becomes popular in hard times. "The Grapes of Wrath" it isn't, but there is a certain value to celebrating our ordinary understated customs and ways of thinking and talking, traditional foolishness the way it used to be. To quote Lucy Humde, "That's just the way it is, so we do it." I sure enjoyed singing those sweet harmonies and sort of "dancing" in the show. It was fun. Goodbye until we meet again, Miller Johnson, part of the Muskies.

Hotdish Hallelujah and Tall Ships

We had our pre-brush-up rehearsal "cast party" tonight with like ten different versions of the Minnesota standard fare. There was some good ol' comfort food and six different bars I had to try. I'm still stuffed to the gills. It was out in the yard in perfect (70s) weather, and it just so happened that one of the tall ships was heading to Duluth just off Artist's Point.

That thing was flying. Dennis Bradley and (I think) Stephano Man went out to meet them in the "Black Hjordis" as little Andrew likes to call it. They only had half of their sails halfway raised, and they just flew by those tiny boats. Maybe with the fuel situation like it is, shipping may have to go with wind power again. It sure would be more of a "beautyway." Blog entry over.

Gone to see Craig

Instead of the H.S. reunion, which could only be upsetting, I'm heading over to Remer to see Ole Bodson, whom I haven't seen for 19 years. He's camping out with his family (I remember his sister Sherri made thin sliced potatoes roasted in tinfoil with Laury's Seasoned Salt over there at Mabel Lake campground.) I have to bring some rice. I also have to take Kostya, the 19 year-old boy that lives with us, to work at 5;45 AM. Guess I'd better quit this then. Should be fun. Then I have to come back in time to make hotdish before our brush-up rehearsal at six o'clock the next day. It's tater-tot, with Eye-talian sausage and Jalapeno sausage. The oars are coming soon, I hope, from Island Oars in Nanaimo, B.C. I'm hoping I can pick them up at the truck terminal in Thunder Bay. The boat is at the shop, because the motor overheats. I can't even get my own website up on this stupid dish here, on either computer.

Non-Beautyway Enterprise

So now "How to Talk Minnesotan the Musical" is up and running, then. I'm playing the part of Miller Johnson at the Grand Marais Playhouse. It's the first musical I've ever done. We're having fun with it, now that we're done struggling. To quote Miller himself, "It's hard. It's hard!" One number, "If a Guy" kept us guessing right up through the opening. It's sort of a silly thing, but clever in terms of identifying how language directly reflects the character(s) of the culture that uses it. It's a great hardworking cast and band and crew I'm lucky enough to do this with. "Though, Yahbut...'nough said!