Dumpster Diving?

Is it still dumpster diving if you pulled it out of the ditch?

Periodically we have a problem with people dumping trash along the county road going out to our house. A fridge here, washer there, etc... It's really not that common, but it does happen. Eventually a county maintenance crew finds there way out there and hauls it off, but sometimes it can take several weeks. I can honestly say that I've never been tempted to stop and pick anything up out of the ditch... until today!

When we were going out to run in the canyon this morning we noticed one of those battery operated cars in the ditch along with some other trash and decided to go back and check it out. It didn't look to be in too bad of shape so we loaded it up and brought it home to clean up and to figure out if I could get it to work or not.

I'm trying to charge the battery with a trickle charger so that is taking some patience, but everything else actually seems to be in working order. This evening Eli and I cleaned it up (hopefully it can get wet, cause I used a hose!) and played around with it some. If he pushes the little gas pedal you can push it pretty easily, but if he lets off the gas pedal the wheels lock up so at least that part seems to work. It has a few scratches, but overall it seems to be in pretty good shape. Not sure why someone would leave it in a ditch 3 miles from town, not sure if they didn't want to buy a new battery or what. Of course I thought about it some more and maybe they stole it and didn't have the charger so they just tossed it in the ditch. It doesn't really look that big in the pictures, but it is probably too big to fit in a normal sized dumpster.

Oh well, it will be interesting to see if I can get it to work or not. A new one costs $350 and there is no way we would have ever bought him one new. A replacement battery costs $56 and a charger is only $18 so we might spring for those if everything else works.

Here's some pictures of Eli playing with it.He is turning into quite the ham. He's smiling for the camera here.
And here's the current mode of operation for it!

Been a long time since I've picked up someone else's trash with the intention of using it myself, but Eli seems to really like it and the price was right! Hopefully we can get it working without spending too much money on it.

I've been working out, getting ready for elk hunting in just under a month. Got in 2 - 4 mile runs and a 30 and 35 minute hill climb session on the elliptical for the equivalent of about 14 1/2 miles this week. Last week I peaked at 18 miles in a week with a 6 mile run so I think I'll get there pretty easily this year. At one point I had a thought of running a 1/2 marathon this year, but I think I've had second thoughts on that. It will be good to be in decent shape bushwacking through the brush in Wyoming though.

That's it for now. Nathan

Whirwind...

Well, I just got back from a whirlwind trip to Austin and back. 375 miles each way!

I left the house at 4:45 this morning and made it back at 6:00 this evening pulling our new to us travel trailer!If you don't know me, you might be wondering why in the world I drove to Austin to buy a used travel trailer. If you do know me, you already know why I drove to Austin. For a Deal! ;-)

It is a 2007 model, a Cherokee Lite made by Forest River. It is an 18' travel trailer and only weighs 3,700lbs empty so it is supposed to be fairly easy to tow with a 1/2 ton pickup or even an SUV. I was able to tow it back relatively easily, but the truck did have to work at it a bit.

It would have been smarter and easier to just rent one in Wyoming, but I'm not always very smart and I tend to make things harder than they need to be!

Here's the other side.
And here's a picture of the storm that I drove through just before I got home. I don't have a weight distributing hitch or sway control bars yet, and I was thinking I might not need them until I got into the gusty winds coming through the storm. It wasn't too scary but I got down to 50 mph at one point in some heavy rain. It seemed like the wind was behind me, but the trailer really pulled hard going through the rain. I think it was more of a cross wind when it was all said and done.

I think that trip gave me a decent test for the trip that we will be making in just over a month to Wyoming and the reason why we bought the trailer in the first place. People don't think that Texas has much in the way of hills and that is true for much of Texas, but they don't call the area around Austin the "Hill Country" for nothing. That, and the fact that Austin is around 500' elevation and Lubbock is at 3,250' elevation means that I climbed more in that 370 miles than I will climb from Lubbock to Denver! From Denver to where I'm headed in Wyoming isn't much of an elevation gain overall, but there will be several ups and downs before it is all said and done.

I pretty much stuck to 65mph and the truck handled it pretty well. I kept it in 3rd gear pretty much the entire time and the truck runs right at 2,500 rpms at 65 mph in 3rd gear. It dropped down into 2nd on a couple hills and runs at 3,500 rpms at 55 mph in 2nd gear. If the hills had been much longer I might have had to slow down some on the biggest hills as it peaked at 99 degrees outside on the drive home and the truck started to get a little warm toward the top of one of the longest hills.

I was hoping to get 10 mpg and I did on the first part of the drive, but as I started climbing I got a little worse mileage. Overall I ended up getting 9.3 mpg for the trip home. I got 17.1 mpg going down there so pulling the trailer makes a little bit of a difference!

It is too tall to fit in our barn, so we're not sure exactly where we are going to park it permanently. Here's it's temporary resting spot out beside the barnWe looked at several different floor plans before pretty much deciding on this basic layout. Pretty much all the RV makers have a floor plan like this. There is a couch that folds out into a bed up front, a dinette and the kitchen stuff in the middle, and a double bed with a single bunk above it and the restroom in the back.

It hasn't been licensed in a couple years as the previous owners hadn't used it much at all. The interior looks pretty much brand new.

Here's the jackknife couch at the front.
And the beds in the back.
The dinette and the stereo. Not sure why all the RV's have to have a fancy stereo but they do.

I took a picture of the bathroom, but then decided against posting it. It pretty much has a commode and a tub/shower. Nothing special, but it should be functional.

That's pretty much my Saturday. 750 miles with 1/2 of that pulling a travel trailer.

I'm about ready to go to bed.

Nathan

Procrastination...

Well, I have a ton of stuff to post on about the past week or so, but I'm not getting around to it very fast. I did get a neat picture of a young buck moving past my hunting blind on Saturday morning that I thought I would share though. It was still early in the morning and the buck was moving so the background ended up blurred behind him. It was mostly by accident that it turned out that way, but I thought it ended up being a pretty neat picture. (You can click on the picture to make it a little larger if you want) I also got some more pictures of the tall 8 that is now the tall 11. I think the antlers look so cool when they are in velvet. They are pretty much done growing now, when the tips end up in a point they are done, when they are still rounded on the ends they are going to still grow some more.
He really is a pretty deer. There used to be a mineral rock at this spot and that's why he's nosing around on the ground there.
Last picture of him. Hopefully I will be able to pass on him this year and he'll make it through the season. He will be a monster if he makes it to next year!
I've been procrastinating at work too, and have a bunch to get done so this will just be a short post. I may be around to posting more on the last couple weekends at the land, but it was mostly just manual labor and some mishaps so not much in the way of pictures that I can share.

That's it for now. Nathan

What a difference a year makes!

Well, I've been pretty bad on posting lately after doing so good there for a while. I've been pretty busy, just haven't had a chance to really post on things.

I've been down to the land a couple times in the last week already and am going back down this weekend to get some more work done. I'll try post on that next week.

Last year I called this buck the "Tall 8" (He is on the far left in this picture). I saw him nearly every time I hunted and found both of his shed antlers last year. If you give him a spread credit of 13" he scored just under 100". Maybe just a little better than normal for a 2 1/2 year old around here.

This year I guess I'm going to have to change his name to the "Tall 11". That's the same buck in the middle of the picture this year. He has a split G2 on his left side and although his G4's are pretty small he still might grow a tiny bit more this year. I think he would score close to 130" this year as a 3 1/2 year old.

Hopefully I'll be able to pass on him again this year and hopefully he will stay on my property enough again this year that he won't get shot by a neighbor. There are a couple other bucks I'm getting occasional pictures of that would be higher up my hit list than this guy. If he makes it to next year he will be REALLY nice!

I haven't gotten any pictures of Stickers in a few weeks so hopefully he hasn't already abandoned my property for the season. Most of the work I'm doing is designed to try to keep the mature bucks on my property but it may be a case of too little too late for him.

I'll report on my progress next week and post a few pictures.

That's it for now. Nathan

The pond is looking good!

Well, I usually just post on my projects as they are in progress and rarely post on them after they are finished, but when I went out to the pond at the house yesterday to feed the Koi the water lilies were out after the rain so I went ahead and took a few pictures to share.

Here it is looking back toward the east. The pond is about 17 feet long and 12 feet wide. It's just over 3 feet deep at it's deepest point and levels out to just a few inches deep on the far west side.

And a shot of it looking toward the west. Not much of a waterfall, but it serves it's purpose of aerating the water.

Here's a closer view of the water lilies. They started out at 10 small plugs that I bought 3 years ago.

Another shot of the lilies. Some of the more colorful ones actually weren't blooming in this picture. There are pink, yellow, white, orange and some bright pink/purple ones that aren't blooming in this picture.

And lastly a couple pictures of some of the fish. Most of them are about 5 or 6 inches long but there is one that is close to a foot long and one that is pushing 18 inches.

The water isn't crystal clear, but one of the dogs loves to swim in it and I don't really put any effort into it, so I'm happy with it the way it is.

The pond is actually about 150 yards from the house on my CRP property. I was required to establish a permanent water source for wildlife when I put in for the contract so I figured I would go ahead and go all out on it. It can be a pain walking out there when it is hot and windy, but you don't have to feed the fish in the winter so at least I'm not having to go out there in the cold.

That's pretty much it. When I went out and saw the lilies in bloom I thought it looked good enough to take some pictures and share.

Nathan

The pigs are back...

Well, I went down to the land last weekend with Eli to check the trail cameras and fill the feeders and am just now getting around to posting about it.

We got some rain on July 4th so the pond is no longer dry, but it isn't exactly full and overflowing either. It probably is about 1 foot deep or so right now but that's a lot better than being dry! I'm debating on whether I'm going to put in some irrigation tubing and put in a small watering hole for the future in the event of another drought and possibly to water some trees and stuff as well.

After a month long absence the pigs are back and they brought some friends with them! I got 18 pigs in one picture!

The deer are really hitting the protein feeder and it was completely out of pellets for a couple weeks based on the trail camera photos so hopefully they will come back around now that it is refilled. I'm getting a decent amount of bucks on camera, but I'll have a much better chance of identifying exactly how many different ones once their antlers grow a bit more.

Stickers is a couple weeks behind last year on his antler development. Since I didn't get pictures of him until he had already dropped his antlers this year I'm not sure if he dropped his antlers late this year or what, but hopefully he'll grow as big as last year and hopefully keep his kickers and stick around for a bit during hunting season too!

Here's about the most recent picture I have of him.

I ended up with 2 cameras at feeders that were either out of food or not working properly and I accidentally turned the flash off on my other camera that was at a feeder that was working properly the whole time so I didn't get many consistent pictures for the entire month between checking cameras. I still got quite a few pictures though.

Here's a couple younger bucks. I think the one on the right is a 3 year old this year.

Here are 3 younger bucks hanging out together. The one in the front should be decent this year, but if he makes it to next year he'll end up even better.

I'm pretty sure this doe was still pregnant when this picture was taken on June 25th. Whitetail deer have a gestation period of about 200 days so if you go backwards that means doe would have conceived the 2nd week of December or later. This either means that the rut was later than some folks think for that area, or there were more does than bucks and this doe was bred on her 2nd cycle. More than most of you wanted to know I'm sure!

I haven't gotten any pictures of fawns yet this year, but I did get this odd picture of what appears to be 5 does together going by one of my feeders that wasn't working at the time. It seems odd that the does would be together this time of the year so I'm not really sure what to make of it. Some appear to be smaller and they could have been yearlings last year and they might not have fawns of their own this year but it still seems odd to me.

I got pictures of a bobcat, coyote, armadillo, skunk, raccoons, turkey, deer, pigs, quail, dove, squirrels, etc. this month so plenty of activity going on.

If you want to check out some more they are at http://padens.com/v-web/gallery/album08?page=6 and the new ones start at the bottom of page 6 and go onto page 8. On the 4 cameras I had out I actually went through over 2,000 pictures and most were obviously left on the cutting room floor.

That's about it for now.

Nathan

More work in the barn.

Well, I got a little more done in the barn this week. Nothing major, but things I've been meaning to do for a couple years now, so I'm glad to have them done for the most part!

Along with all the light fixtures that I got when we remodeled our accounting firm's office, I got several cabinets as well. Of course they've just been sitting in the barn ever since. I was able to use the regular counter top ones, but the wall cabinet one had been sitting upside down in the way for a couple years and the one with a sink had also pretty much been collecting dust.

One issue I had to overcome was the fact that when we poured the slab I put the incoming water line near the front of the barn and put the drain line toward the back with the thought that I could just run it over there inside the barn after it was finished. The issue was that there was an 8" I-Beam right in the way and it was going to be a pain to run the water line around it. After checking with a coworkers husband who is a structural engineer who designs steel buildings, I decided to drill a hole through one of the I-Beams to run my water line through it.

It doesn't look like much, but drilling a 1 inch hole through a 1/4" thick steel I-Beam isn't exactly easy. With the help of some oil to cool the bit and some patience, I was able to get it done without much issue though. I did have to enlarge the hole just a little bit with a dremel to get the 3/4" PVC to fit through it though. You can see some of the metal shavings under the hole in this picture. The next step was to actually hang the wall cabinet. The problem there is that the only structural support on the wall of the barn is the C Purling at 7 feet and 12 feet and some angle iron on the floor. To hold the cabinet I had to first put up something to hang it on. My simple solution to this is to cut 2x4's and screw them to the C Purling on the top and to the angle iron on the bottom. With self tapping metal screws it is a pretty easy process and the 2x4's seem to be pretty sturdy. Once I had the 2x4's up, it was a simple matter of holding the cabinet up while Cathy was helpful enough to put a few screws in.After 3 trips to Lowe's I finally had the parts I needed for the plumbing job. I have boxes of PVC fittings but they never seem to be the right ones. It was also a pain to find the right parts for the sink trap since at some point this sink had a disposal on it and not the normal extension.

Here's the plumbing roughed in. (The kitty litter is from me spilling the cup of oil I was using to cool the drill bit when drilling the hole in the I-Beam).After that, just a few more fittings to install and I was up and running. One of the few projects were I actually got it done without a single leak!

I still need to figure out how I'm going to attach the lower counter cabinet to the wall though. It isn't perfectly stable and it will be a pain to retrieve items from behind it if they fall back there. Since the plumbing is running behind it I can't push it up against the wall, but I'm thinking some pressure treated plywood left over from my hunting blind project might do the trick.

Here's the finished project. And of last but not least, a picture of the sink with water running! I still need to redo the top on a couple of the counters but I'm really nearing completion on the barn. I may start working on setting up a workshop area sometime down the road, but for now I think I'll just enjoy it the way it is for a while.

That's it for now. Nathan