It was a good day

Great White Dispatch
Notes From Damn Near Canada
No. 31
7/04/09
23:32


Red Wing puts on quite a nice Fourth of July show. The whole town turns out for a day of patriotic music at the brand new outdoor auditorium nestled in the middle of a gently sloping, shady park. After the music, the city displays a movie on an outdoor screen. Independence Day, no less, shown completely without irony. A good chunk of the town turns out for that, and after Jeff Golblum uploads his computer virus, the everyone strolls over to the river's edge to watch the fireworks shoot out over the water. It's all very Stars Hollow.

My office building is probably the nicest place in town. It looks like a tiny version of Wolfram and Hart, what with the perty oak trim and open staircase and no-expense-spared decor. And we have a pretty goddamn nice rooftop, which meant Airika and I had the best seat in town for fireworks today. Four stories up, overlooking the river. Totally the thing to do.

Hell with all that noise.

Our day:

Slept in. Drank some damn fine coffee with my Lucky Charms and the weekend edition of USA Today. Screw you. I like my news bite-sized and color-coded.

Cleaned the house. Because when I have nothing to do and no plans to make, this is what I do. Weirdly relaxing.

Spent two hours at a wedding reception. Only hiccup of the day. Although I did hoarf down three shredded chicken samiches, some tasty homeade pretzels and a pile of soft cookies. The food made it nearly worth getting dressed in my finest denim leg coverings.

After a quick exit, we hit Caribou Coffee and came home, where we sat on the porch. All night. Surrounded by tiki torches and Citronella candles, we watched the deer and the birds. The dogs failed (once again) to catch everything they chased. Airika read about chickens. I read the second volume of the Starman Omnibus. Random tunes wafted from the iPod dock out to the porch, mingling with the distant cracks and booms of rednecks gambling with fingers.

After dark, we strolled out to the prairie and watched home-job fireworks displays dot the sky from all directions. More impressive was the night, and how it was so bright you could read by moonlight alone.

It hasn't been very often when I experienced an Independence Day and really felt anything close to independence. Never, actually. The holiday's always been kind of a joke. Forced to run around, see people, have a picnic. A day off always turned into an agenda. But today. Today was different. Monday morning is careening back around again and I know that it will bring everything that shackles me in annoyance and worry. But today? Yeah, I feel free. And I don't need a goddamn fireworks display for that.

Dirty little birdy feet

Great White Dispatch
Notes From Damn Near Canada
No.30
6/14/09
19:25

A couple months ago, a fat little brown bird started buzzing me every time I went into our garage. Airika says it's a phoebe, and I just have to take her word for it. I just thought the bird was kinda mean. Turns out, she'd built a nest in the rafters. It's a beautiful nest, very solidly constructed out of moss, grass sticks and even some string that she likely liberated from a Tilly turd. And unlike the retarded robins, who build their nests where any one-legged pygmy sloth can get to 'em, she built it in a place inaccessible to anyone without feathers, and actually pretty hard to approach even with feathers. To get to it, you have to navigate up, down and around my broken garage door, which must be like the Death Star trench run for birds. This is a shrewd move on the phoebe's part, because we have a murderous sharp-shinned hawk who's been lunching at out various feeders. And the hawk ain't getting into the garage.


The phoebe eventually dumped a few eggs, and two weeks ago I noticed a breathing gray mass of feathers. It was hard to tell how many chicks were in there, because they were piled on top of one another so tightly, I half expected to find a dead one at the bottom.


Not so. Last week five of them were scrambling along the rafters. Not yet flying, but too fat to fit in the nest. By Friday, they had taken flight, ping-ponging around the garage. They don't seem incredibly afraid of people, so we can get pretty close when the mother isn't around. By Sunday morning, they'd figured out how to get outside, and I was actually a little sad to not see their freaky bug-eyed faces staring at me from behind a beam or door. They did return that night, but I know it ain't gonna last. This shouldn't depress me, but it kinda does.


And while we're talking birds, meet Stick Bird. I built a chicken wire fence around a rock path I'd laid, and Stick Bird claimed one of the posts. When it came time to take the fence down, Stick Bird's stick remained. He spends all day either on his stick, serenading anyone who'll listen. At least when he's not harassing the bluebirds.


Plenty more photos at http://www.flickr.com/photos/vangoat

Rednecks, fat people and power over nature...just another Saturday in Minnesota

Great White Dispatch
Notes From Damn Near Canada
No.29
6/10/09
19:25

Sometimes, things just work out.

As I seethed, sitting still in a traffic jam on a rural Minnesota backroad, MFing anything on wheels, I never woulda guessed that maybe there was a reason for all this shit. Maybe this inexplicable bout of dumb-assery that Airika and I were experiencing was going to put us in the right place at the right time. Maybe…this was going to save a life?

How’s that for a teaser? Clearly, I’m setting you up for a letdown.

In which we plan to knock out Minnesota landmarks, ho.
I spent most of last Saturday pissed off. Our plan for the day wasn’t the best one ever concocted, but it was certainly doable. The idea was to drive southwestish for an hour or so, check out the Minnesota Cabela’s (Hunt! Camp! Fish! Kill Zebras!), shoot north up I-35 and check out the Mall of America (I mean, people take entire vacations here. It’s worth at least seeing, right?) and then head home for an early night in.

Anytime we decide to take a roadie, we have an eight or nine hour drop-dead round trip time because anything longer means we’ll arrive home to find that one of the K9s has expressed her displeasure by turding up the joint. Our plan this Saturday was solid. Three, maybe three-and-a-half-hours of drive time, maybe. That left four or five hours for us to dork around Redneck Central and The Greatest Freak Show on Earth.

Of course it was cold and raining. A Minnesota June consists of five days a week of beautiful weather – while you’re at work, staring out the window and contemplating triple-pane suicide- and two days of shit. And it changes like clockwork. Awesome all week, then just in time for Friday evening, everything gets all Ohio on us. Which is why we were planning to spend Saturday at the Great Indoors.

In which we are traffic jammin’
Cabela’s is maybe 40 miles away as the crow flies, but this being Minnesota, there ain’t a good way to get there from anywhere. So it’s 60 miles of back roads- a really nice drive when it’s not monsooning- just to get to the highway. ‘Course, once we actually make it to I-35, signifying that our destination is a mere ten minutes away, we find the road to be closed. There’s no warning signs or anything. Nadda. Just a closed onramp, a detour and a horrible friggin’ backup, because I-35 is the one direct route from the Twin Cities to everywhere else in the South Central.

So there we sat. Rain smacking down. The wipers, which weren’t able to keep up even though we sat still, somehow managed to squeak with every pass as if the windshield was dry. Mocking me. Cows ambling past were covering more ground at cow-speed than we were in the goddamn car. I steamed, which irritated Airika, which in turn irritated me. Half an hour of this shit. It was like being back in Akron.

The great outdoors, except with more dead animals
Eventually, we made it to Cabela’s, which is like Gander Mountain on crack cut with Skoal. I can totally see why every Willie Nelson fan for five states makes a bimonthly pilgrimage here. This place would make Woody Allen grow a mullet and carry a spit cup. Just walking in, I wanted to like, buy knives and kill shit. Instead, we bought fishing poles, which I knew was ten kinds of wrong even as I plunked down the duckets. Because now I own a canoe AND a tackle box. Clearly, something is amiss.

Also. If you’ve ever wanted to know what a particular animal looks like dead, check out a Cabela’s. Because if it once breathed, they’ve got one stuffed and mounted. They even had a Snuffleupagus. I think he was killt with a crossbow.

In which Crocs run rampant
Anyway. The power of spending brightened my mood a little, but by the time we got to the Mall, we were way behind my schedule and I wasn’t in the mood for people watching. Suddenly, the roiling sea of curd-chuggers in sweatpants and Crocs that is the Mall of America on a Saturday night wasn’t funny so much as annoying. We covered maybe half of the beast before calling it a night. To truly experience the Mall of America, you need a whole day. You need to take your time. Really slurp up the experience, because that place is chock FULL of giant ugly blonde girls and people too fat to live. There will be more on MoA in a future Disptach.

The ride home was long. I was antsy because I was expecting to find that Tilly the Dog had turned the hosue into her own private urinal crystal. And of course it rained. Airika’s car is like a hovercraft when the roads are even slightly moist, so I spent most of the drive just trying to not wakeboard into a guardrail. By the time we turned onto our road, the sun was down and the deer were out.

In which I play God
And that’s when we saw the baby deer. Like every night at dusk, deer were skedaddling off the road and into the cover of the woods like our car was one of those Terminator tanks.
But there was one doe who stuck around close to the drive as we rolled past, which is totally undeerlike. Bravery is not a trait that deer know well. Turns out, she had her reasons. On the other side of the road, stuck in a fence, was a tiny white-speckled baby. (Not the one pictured, by the way. That's just an example, because like a moron, I once again neglected to take our camera on a road trip)

The other property on our road is enclosed by an ancient fence, one of those home jobs made of galvanized wire mesh and hand-cut posts. Trees and bushes have grown up around and through the fence, but there are gaps in the vegetation that the critters have carved. The fence is maybe 5-feet tall, and the deer generally treat this obstacle like it ain’t even there, barely skimming the rusty barb-wire topper as they glide over.

But deer ain’t too bright, and in their haste to run away from whatever threat they were running from at the time, they forgot that the young ‘un, who stood maybe two-feet tall, wasn’t getting over the fence. However, jumping is pretty much all the deer have, and the baby leapt as high as he could and ended up parking his spotted ass in the middle of the fence, dangling by his tangled back legs.

So I get out of the car. No idea what to do. Reasonably sure that deer aren’t one of those species who abandon their young after any physical human contact, but not entirely sure. Not that it mattered anyway, because from my vantage point, illuminated in the driving rain by our headlights, this little guy wasn’t going anywhere without assistance. Which meant he was coyote-grub unless we got involved. I figured he already had two busted back legs. I just hoped that his crazed flailing would bust his neck and end it, so I didn’t have to do it myself.

So I get closer to further inspect the damage. This is when I notice the mother deer just on the other side of the fence, stomping her foot and hissing. Now I’m worried about getting charged and hoof-bludgeoned. The good news is that the baby’s legs don’t actually appear messed up. The bad news is that when I get too close, the damn baby bleats like a stabbed goat. An air-horn in my ear, accompanied by insane, Exorcist-style flailing. And more stomping and hissing from momma.

I back off and regroup, if only so baby deer doesn’t kill himself. No idea how I’m gonna free the little bastard, because I don't have any tools on me. I could run to the house and get some bolt cutters, but I’m pretty convinced that this guy will be David Carradine dead by the time I get back. Screw it. With Airika more or less smothering the deer with her body so he’ll stay still enough for me to work on his legs, we attempt to untangle him by hand. It’s pouring, deer are hissing and screaming, and I’m working with wet barbed wire in the dark in what is likely a lost cause.

Somehow I manage to make some slack and free his feet without cutting myself or getting Airika hamster-bit or bum rushed. There’s a moment where everything freezes. I’m breathing heavy. My hand throbs from the deep wire indents. Airika’s practically hyperventilating. The tiny deer is still. Even momma has stopped her stomping.

Then the baby bleats once, wriggles free and shoots off into the park. Momma, being a retarded deer, runs off in the opposite direction, but I know she’ll find her kid without a problem because the little bastard is wailing like a fire truck.

I gotta give the deer some credit. They take care of their own. The mother stuck around, even though I could have capped her ass at any moment. Pretty nutsy.

Anyway, we’re soaked and kind of exhausted. Airika’s still on the verge of having a stroke. We slump back into the car and just sit for a second. Then Airika looks up, a Joker-grin on her face. “I got to hold a baby deer!” she squeals.

Broads.

Just another Saturday in Minnesota.

Brain Dump

Great White Dispatch
Notes From Damn Near Canada
No.28
6/01/09
17:30
More photos at www.flickr.com/photos/vangoat


The only good thing about the long Minnesota winter is that when it's over, it's over. One day you're hunkering around in your goose-down parka and the next some ninny in jorts cuts you off on his rented bicycle. Around here there's none of this sloppy grey area in March and April when winter and spring bicker about the handoff. No, like a Chris Brown backhand, spring just hits suddenly.

It's like everything- people, animals and greenery- is just so ready for the end of winter that it all appears at once. Dogs and bicycles are everywhere that tulips and motorcycles aren't. In our yard, newly-nubbed deer and turkeys rule the daytime while skunks, coyotes and raccoons take over at night.

We've turned the yard into a sort of bird-nirvana. Finches, orioles, bluebirds and woodpeckers fight over feeder facetime with cardinals, grossbeaks and bluejays (the white trash of the bird world!). A gang of turkeys spends most mornings pecking away at whatever corn the deer left the night before.

Airika's named the turkey gang 'The Parliment', which makes this guy 'El Presidente' almost by default.

Also, I caved to the pressure and bought a boat. And by 'boat', I mean a vaguely canoe-shaped fiberglass husk. I never intended to get a boat, mostly because I'm of the strong belief that if I was meant to be surrounded by water, I'da come with gills. But living this close to the Mississippi, staring at it all day every day at work...it does something to you. Makes you want to float away.

So I found a drunken Wisconsonite who, in his Milwaukee's Best-soaked stupor, accidentally cut his price in half and now we have the World's Worst Canoe, which is great because it perfectly matches the World's Worst 4X4. It's not much, but at least we can tool around the buttload of ponds and lakes in the 'hood, taking pictures of beavers and muskrats and pissed-off geese. Also, I have a method of escape when the Mighty 'Miss inevitably floods.

The surest sign of spring is when a robin farts out an egg or two. We have a nest built just beneath our deck, so we've been able to track two birdlings from their gummy origins to the noisy, flappity, constantly needy mouths they are today.

Hey...that's robin-egg blue! Look closely and you can see a dirty little birdy feet.


The tubby mother robin has an issue with her babies being photographed. Or maybe her issue is with Tulip the Dog trying her damndest to dig through the wood and gum some tiny bird beaks.


This cat lives in our garage. Only sometimes he spends a significant portion of his day hanging from a poorly-posted telephone pole thanks to Tulip and Tilly. Yeah, you go ahead and look pissed off, cat. I'm hoping an eagle snatches him.


Just a note for all you recent graduates: This is what happens when you roll in coyote shit.


And finally, your obligatory deer and eagle pictures.

Some snaps

Great White Dispatch
Notes From Damn Near Canada
No. 27
5/09/09
17:52

Just some pics from the weekend. Plenty more can be found here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/vangoat

Airika's been on a 6-year mission to lure Orioles to the yard. Finally, she sniffs success.



We checked out our eagle only to discover he had a baby. The snap sucks because the baby's head is elusive and I had to take what I could get. He's yellow like a Muppet.

Tick...Tick...Tick

Great White Dispatch
Notes From Damn Near Canada
No. 26
5-7-09
22:10

When we moved to Minnesota last August, I probably hadn't seen a tick in 20 years. As a kid, bumping around the woods, high-stepping through cricks, playing hide-and-go-seek in corn fields, ticks were a relatively common occurrence. See one, burn its ass and flick it off. Whatever.

Then, I started working, got a driver's license, stopped digging mud bogs just for the hell of it, and more or less became civilized. And once I moved to the city and woods and scrubland turned into parking lots and expressways , even the idea of ticks just became....eew.

An now I find myself in the goddamn tick capital of the world. They're everywhere up here. Literally the DAY the grass peaked through the snow, Tulip the Dog showed up with one of the little assholes hanging to her neck. A couple weekends ago, when some friends from Ohio were visiting and we actually had reason to venture out of doors, nightly tick-checks were a must. Last night, I found two on my head. During my morning 'period of contemplation' in the bathroom, I found a bloodsucking bastard on my hand, which I then accidentally flicked onto my pants. Awesome. Nothing like screeching like a smacked baby while in a quiet office shitter.

I'll be the first to admit that I'm squeamish when it comes to bugs. And spiders...let's just say that two of my favorite hobbies as a kid were flicking field spiders into the pond just to watch them try to swim before the bass snapped them up, and going after the same spindly jack-offs with matches and a can of hairspray. And what is a tick but a spider that drinks your blood? Christ on a bike, that's creepy. Just the idea that you could unknowingly spend a whole day eating for two, and your dark passenger might look like a black widow crossed with a water balloon...makes my balls try to hide up behind by spleen. Rotten little parasites. Two words that really never needed to be thrown together: Vampire Arachnids.

Just didn't want you to think it was all cute deer and party hats up here. Sometimes, you have to dig another living thing's head out of your ass cheek. Garrison Keillor never talked about that.

The Sweet Sounds of Spring

Great White Dispatch
Notes From Damn Near Canada
No. 25
5/06/09
19:10

Last night, just after midnight, I was jerked awake by the sound of howling coyotes. No big deal. We hear coyotes all the time. They usually aren’t howling right outside our bedroom- I mean, just on the other side of the wall, six inches from my sleeping face- but whatever. Wild carnivores are just part of the deal out here. Back to sleep I went.

Take me to your Oreos or the railing gets pooped on.

Not even an hour later. Thump. I jerk awake. Ah. Just the raccoons jumping to the back deck. From the roof. See, they’re too smart to just use the stairs. No, they have to make it complicated, like a game of Mouse Trap. They scale one of the big elm trees, leap to the roof, then drop down to the deck railing, where they skitter around, overturning anything that might contain bird seed or Oreos. One of them usually leaves a present. And by present, I mean a turd. But the ‘coons are nothing new. I block out the sound of their nails on the wood, and even the school-girl screeches of the bastards arguing with each other over who gets to squeeze out the steamy ‘coon dump on my porch doesn’t beat out sleep.

One of these buttholes will soon drop a dog-sized stink link.

Another hour or so. Tulip the Dog, from her pillow in the corner of the bedroom, lets loose with a mighty, droning dog groan. I get up, make sure Dawn of the Dead hasn’t broken out (and that I didn't just hear my old dog's death rattle), and then stumble back to bed.

Not even a half hour later. Bats. Again, just on the other side of the bedroom wall. Chittering in such a high pitch that I can only hear it at certain angles. Sounds like someone rubbing two pieces of old Styrofoam together. At certain head tilts, it sounds like they’re actually inside the house. Not being a huge fan of the rabies, I get out of bed, flip on the lights, determine the place free of winged rodents, take some aspirin, mash the pillow over my ears and fall back asleep. Until 5 a.m., when the birds wake up.

Nature, you are a noisy, ill-timed bitch.