Timothy Birdnow

Gather 'round children from hill and from dale
for I have for you another Ozark Hilton tale.

Actually this one should be fairly short as not much happened - a good thing for me, a bad thing for all of you as it's the disasters and tribulations that make the stories interesting. But I got one of those rare times - everything went right. You have to bask in them when they happen.

It was another fall day in August and so I packed up my gear and headed down the trail. It was overcast and a bit rainy but I actually welcomed that; some of my best times are sitting in the cabin or on the porch on a drizzly day! I didn't even have to stop at the Birdnow Memorial Outhouse so I made great time! Traffic was bad on the Interstate but once I got off onto 67 it spread out and I could enjoy a wonderful country drive, and not worry about some joker swerving into my lane and my not seeing them (a constant worry when I'm on the road as I am basically Mr. Magoo these days.)

I arrived at the cabin about 3 and set about the basic chores of the place. I really need to plan to go there and do some serious work but I just didn't have it in me. Never do anymore; one of the curses of age and a bum ticker, I guess. I really DO need to work on the place; it's still a disaster from the thieves, and worse rats have made huge nests which need to be removed. I already did that once but they have been busy. I could hear a rat in the debris all night; if I got rid of their cover they'd have less reason to remain there. I fear I will have them all winter if I don't poison them.

I hate to do that for a variety of reasons. For one thing there are animals that will eat the dead rats and themselves get sick and die, I assume. For another I really don't blame them for wanting to use a perfectly good, uninhabited shelter. They figure it's squatter's rights. I figure it's mine by virtue of the fact I built it. But possession is 9/10ths of the law.

At any rate I will probably have to poison them. I see no other option but to let them remain -and who knows what diseases they are carrying. Mice would be a lesser problem but still a problem. I wish that big old Black Ratsnake would come back for an extended visit; HE'S always welcome!

So anyway I cleaned up a little bit, unloaded my stuff, and planted my posterior on my chair on the porch. (My chair is a wooden dining room chair someone was throwing out. It's surprisingly comfortable and I can sit for hours outside on it. I have to put it in the cabin when I leave though or it would rot.) Rain is starting to hurt the place; I need to roof the porch and repair the roof in the "new cabin" - that outer room I had once used as a big porch but have since enclosed. I was broke when I built it and used what I could scrounge. I used mostly cheap plastic garden roofing and it's now starting to disintegrate. I can't get on the roof so there is no way to fix it. I wouldn't try even if I had my big extension ladder - another casualty of the thieves. The very last time I was on a ladder down there I fell and landed on a floor joist and shattered my ribcage. Man that HURT! I still feel pain where the bones didn't quite heal properly.

At any rate there are things needing doing that I would do. I did stuff some pieces of vinyl siding in the holes in the roof that were obvious; hopefully that will slow the water's entry.

Mostly I need to clean the cabin out completely and burn what is no longer usable or remove it. Big job. My old futon mattress is still in the cabin and it weighs a ton. It should burn nicely though. I just have never had the energy to haul it out and burn it.

At any rate I just sat on the porch and enjoyed the day. It was drizzly and very quiet. The only insect about was a single bee which kept buzzing around me. I guess it liked the smell of my soap? I don't know but he was getting on my nerves so I lit up a cigar and smoked him away. Other than that fellow it was eerily quiet. No bird noises,no animals, no insects.

I started working on my lamps about six. They always require work; trimming the wicks, filling them with kerosene, washing to globes. Since the thieves stole all but two of my lanterns I now carry four down with me. The two they didn't take were still usable, just required some creativity. The small one had a broken globe but I can still burn it as long as there is no wind. I set it up behind the front door where it is shielded. The other required a new wick. I had a bunch of wicks in a drawer inside the main room, but they stole almost all of them. I did manage to find one single new wick and put it in the lantern and it's worked fine! I still leave those two down there though; the thieves will probably assume they are still not working. I just can't cart EVERYTHING down there!

But the six lights are just barely enough and I have to augment them with a couple of Atomic Beam battery-operated gizmos. As long as the batteries are fresh they are great! But to save on size the makers underpowered them, using AA batteries instead of C or D cells and so they chew through batteries like they are going out of style. I'll run them when I sit on the porch at night (where I really need strong lighting) and when I need to look for something inside the cabin.

Anyway,I took my lanterns from the car and started working on them and one of them has no wick! I thought maybe it fell into the kerosene reservoir but nope; it was just gone! Disappeared without a trace! I looked around for another wick but the thieves had cleaned me out. So I had to bench this lantern. I had long tapered candle that had belonged to my mother - left in the cabin by the thieves because it was broken (they stole about five packs of candles I had.)I broke it completely in half and stuffed half into an old bottle and it produced more light than the kerosene lamps! But it was a fire hazard and I blew it out as soon as I settled in for the evening.

Anyway I sat outside until about midnight then went in and watch 2001: A Space Odyssey on my portable DVD player. I had left my battery down there (I bring a portable jump battery to augment the player's own battery, which only lasts a couple of hours.) As it happens it was fine and still charged so I had no problem with my movie. Thank goodness; after I go in there is nothing to do. I used to read but my eyes don't allow for that any longer. So it's either watch a movie or go to bed.

I fell asleep in my chair, as is my custom. The Futon is in the old cabin room and in summer I shut that place down in favor of the new room, so I just sleep in my chair. I'm used to that; I sleep in an easy chair at home too. My back problems went away when I stopped sleeping in bed.

Up with the dawn and I sat on the porch getting stuff ready to go. I heard something tramping about and to my great surprise and delight it was my old armadillo friend! I haven't seen him in a couple of years; I assumed he had died. His mate had, I am pretty sure; I doubt armadillo get divorced. But there was a big hole that went under the porch and I always suspected that was the armadillo's spot. They had lived under the cabin for years.

He was even bigger now, like a Galapagos sea turtle. I swear he could be ridden! I remember when that old fellow first showed up; he was about half a foot long and making time with his girlfriend. If you want to know what that's like imagine two coconuts banging together! So I attended the little guys nuptials, or what passed for a wedding night for armadillos anyway.

I may be sexist; the armadillo I saw could be the female. I am not sure I could tell even if I got a good look at the critter's wedding tackle, and I'm not going to do THAT even if I could!

Anyway he was a little afraid of me, but only a little. He wanted to go down that hole but with me sitting right there he was reluctant. I spoke soothingly to him "don't worry about me" but he decided discretion is the better part of valor and climbed under the cabin about eight feet down from me.

I'm happy he's still alive. I've been missing him.

Which brings up another point about the rat poison. I know armadillo eat mice and they might eat rats too. If so would they eat a dead rat? If so I might wind up poisoning my little friend. I sure would hate to do that.

Anyway I packed up and vamonosed in short order. Turning around was easy; sometimes it's a real bear to turn that big F150 around inside the woods like that. I've dented it in multiple places trying to turn around (which is a pity; it was a beautiful truck when I bought it.) But I bought it for this purpose. At any rate I had no trouble turning around and headed for home.

It was foggy down by Clearwater Lake but nowhere near as bad as my last visit. I stopped at the state park to dump trash (hey, I'm a citizen ain''t I?) and use the bathroom. Stopped at McDonalds on the way home. Good thing; I had dumped all my water to lighten my load and then felt terribly dizzy and sick. I ordered a large water and slammed it right away and then felt better! This is a common problem for me; I take lasix to keep myself dried out as part of the treatment for my congestive heart failure. My fluid intake is limited and I'm always dropping too low and getting dizzy spells.

But the water did the trick and I soon felt great. Rolled on down the highway without incident. I did get a scare when I zoomed past a state trooper who pulled out and seemed to be waiting for me to pass; I was speeding a little bit, but not as much as everyone else. But he ended up passing me and nailed a guy up the road a way.

And so I'm home now, exhausted as always but it's a good kind of exhaustion. I'm always eager to get back there when I go. I've tried staying for several days but the enchantment wears off after a day or so. It's always good to get home. But it's always good to get back to that trash palace in the Ozark woods.

'Till next time!

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 04:05 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 1974 words, total size 10 kb.