Posse vs Poop - Part ONE

I have started this post about four times.  It just never went anywhere.  How interesting can you make bags of pack rat poop?  So, I just decided to start and hopefully it will make sense.  It's in 2 parts to accommodate all the photos.

If you've read last week's update, you know that the Farmhouse Posse was riding in to help us start to clear out the big tin shed so we can start to build our first studio, which happens to be glass!  Well, let me tell you that we made a serious dent in the mess.

So, this is where we started.  The shed has two sides and one was full of old business records that packrats had been having their way with for a very long time.  We found cancelled checks and sales receipts from 1969 stuffed inside the drip pans of gas stoves circa 1940 - 1950.  Nests of twigs, pieces of mattress and lots of paperwork stuffed in every nook and cranny in old appliances.  Yum.  Believe it or not, I hope to restore one of these old beauties and put it to use.  Really!

Anyway, we only concentrated on the bigger part of the shed.  Among the more interesting things we found were my Dad's first lighted sign from a business, two car axles, about 25 windows of various sizes and styles and a spider egg sack the size of a golf ball.  I thought Hunnyman was going to shiver right out of his britches when I showed it to him.  Spiders like him.  He does not like spiders.  Most especially BIG spiders.  Thankfully it's inhabitants appear to have grown up and moved away long ago.  Still, it was pretty creepy.

So we decided to start making separate piles as we removed things. We didn't move any of the appliances because those old ones are unbelievably heavy and we don't yet have a plan for them.  We did make a pile of scrap metal that the junk guy will pick up -- mostly rusty stuff.  We are going to try and be as green as we can on re-using, re-purposing and re-cycling all these old found objects.  That being said, don't be surprised if you see my collection of Bullseye frit stored in an old propane refrigerator in the near future!  I credit Deuce (Sandy S) with that suggestion.  Brilliant!  Two camper shells may just become mosaic covered gazebos.  That's white trash art at it's finest.  I suspect some cool treasures in the side we didn't get into yet.

So here are Bob, Sandy R and Barbara all dressed up and ready to rumble.  Which they did, indeed!  Bob and I ended up putting on coveralls but Sandy R and Barbara just braved the piles of poop and spiderwebs, jumped in and got busy.

It was a nice day for shoveling what we were shoveling - overcast at times and breezy.  We were all very careful to wear our masks and even Karen wore hers while she manned the trailer and packed our landfill bound booty.  We pitched and she caught.  Karen and I have been doing that together for over 10 years at Artistry.  I sort of miss that, even though no one really thought unloading glass was fun.  That was because I had not yet shoved, bagged and loaded rat poop.

 

Here's Bob in his Bunny suit.  Sadly, there are no picture of me in mine (it was a lovely shade of cobweb vs. navy blue).   That's Barbara in the back clearing some brush from the old corrals.  Once upon another lifetime, I lived out here and have always loved it.  I had a horse in that old corral and chickens in the coop.  I hate roosters, but we had one.  Until we didn't.  I think he knew I was scared of him.  I don't like things that jump and fly unexpectedly, which is what roosters are prone to do.  That SOB would hide and wait for me to come gather the eggs.  He must have thought my legs didn't have enough texture because he would jump on me and rake those nasty talons down my legs and one day I had just had enough.  I waited for him.  ...With a 2 x 4 that was about 4 feet long.  I figured that was a good length because I wouldn't have to get too close, but I could still have excellent control of my swing and swat.  That's just what I did.  I swatted that rooster like a great big fly.  Then he just disappeared.  I told the other half that the coyotes must have got 'im.  You know what?  Chickens don't need a rooster to lay eggs.  Imagine that.

On Saturday we spent lots of time in the shed just cleaning.  As I said, we didn't move any of the appliances.  We're doing our research on what the best thing to do with them -- I'll keep you posted on that progress in a later entry.  Sandy shoveled, swept and bagged.  Barbara and Karen loaded boxes and bags until the trailer and truck bed were full.  Then Bob, Barbara and I headed off to the landfill and emptied our load.  Roger had to work on Saturday but he made up for it Sunday.

Once the inside was clear of everything except old propane refrigerators and stoves, most of us moved outside and continued clearing brush and trimming or removing trees.  Sandy R brought her own chainsaw.  You gotta love a gal with her own power tools.  She ended up burning that saw up on Saturday.  Luckily, Roger had a backup so there was no time lost! 

Continued on Part Two!