Fall is here

Tags

Chateau Clingman, garden, Racine WI, Wayne Clingman

The last few weeks went by very fast. Now with the leaves are turning, we are now thinking of the first snow fall and I for one am not looking forward to that not being a fan of Winter.

So looking back with events here could have been better biggest short coming was the Garden

Potatoes Goal was 100 Lbs harvested about 30 Lb due to Clay Fill in the lot garden that is an easy fix with the use of Compost with Rabbit Manure

At experiment One a rush to dig to soon next year be more patient

Bed 1/2 trying to get by with out using Seed Potatoes and not using any compost this is an easy fix more Compost and wait longer

Bed 4 needs to be changed out removing and giving the Asparagus roots to a a pal who is looking to add to his garden. The rest of the plants will be post in Compost Bed two to better deal with Weeds

On the good side the experiment to grow mushrooms at the Lot Garden was proven to work just need to scale up and place the rest of the Spawn I have in the lot even with the cooler days will see some running this will help to ready for spring planting.

The war on the wild grapes will continue will use rebar driven in the ground to better hold up the Arbor

BUT NO JAPANESE BEETLES!

 

Fail Forward

Tags

Chateau Clingman, Wayne Clingman

And what does this even mean?

For me its quite all right to work to goals knowing that you might screw things up and that is fine, just understand what went wrong and fix what you can stand up and drive on.

My biggest issues as I see it is to stay focused avoid the shiny.

Messed up bad in not doing what I needed to do with my domain when I had it was bummed out, what was I going to do then I discovered I still had this!

Then its like wow need to fold both Root River Pirates and Dr Fortune within the Chateau Clingman and just get over it will doing so confuse others yes will I lose Followers on twitter sure, will I live? Yes

Why the worry Ego I think I can live with a bruised ego, I must I Must I MUST do more to restore this home and its OK to fail just: Fail Forward.

 

233

Tags

garden, Kate Remington, Potatos, Soil

 

So at first the Head wife thought doing anything more then plant Sun Flowers at 233 be a bad idea from a range of issues such as poor soil to no long term control of the property, we have now started to plant a Garden.

so far I have planted Potatoes, Sweet Corn, and prepped  an area for a Herb Garden, story is that Tomatoes will be joining the rest of the veggie when the wife buy some Tomato plants, a long time pal Ms. Kate Remington came by with a huge bunch of Sun Flower seeds, Thank You Kate!

I am only using the old seeds to plant and only out own created Compost at 233 I am not going to invest funds in a area I do not have control of and we could lose the use of anytime that be silly.

If all goes well we get I hope 200 Lbs of Potatoes and a few DZ ears of Sweat Corn Herbs for the Kitchen and Magic Shop.

The above for about $5.00 in Seeds and a few hours of work a week not bad.

I let my neighbors know what we are doing and offered my help if they like some or even some of my old seeds, they are about at the end of their useful life so why not let others use the rest what we may not?

Here I got Peppers started wife has Cucumbers going, also expanded the Potato experiment in the shade going using some very old seed Potatoes we will see what happens

And the roof leaks we will get into that far more trust me.

 

1st Soccer Game and Clean up of an empty Lot on Jones

Tags

jones st, Racine Parks, Racine WI, Soccer, West 6th St

 

The Dogs let me know this morning at 06:30 that the first Soccer  game of the year at Claton Park was going to take place today.

They did so by raising a fire storm how dare ANYONE even think of walking in their park without the Dogs O.K. or better yet coming by to pet them give them treats first!

I like seeing the games in the Park for not only when the kids show up to play the games do the Drug thugs stay away but afterword the teams clean the place up far better then they found it, no disrespect met to the Racine Parks not only with the Mayor’s budget cuts are they short staffed but how can they even think of keeping the Parks clean when we have thugs more then happy to just toss trash away on the ground as well as try and use the Parks to dump everything from Tires to old T.V. sets a sad sad piece of work.

At least the mostly Hispanic Teams do a great job in taking care of the Park when they are there many kids come to play since any of the drug thugs that show up are say convinced to go someplace else.

Again good to see, glad they are playing at the Park.

Hope to find a way to get a Porta-john down there so they have a place to use I know the City cant do much for: 1) The City has no money 2) Being mostly Hispanic no way I see our Mayor doing anything for them after all they just might come to the Downtown and scare the White folks!  Yes, IMHO he is that much of a Raciest.

 

Wife and I took the time since the temps got warmer then expected to clean up the lot across the street, that lead to cleaning or starting to clean up the Wood line on the South side of the lot into the Park a start only a start

The Lot gathers trash that not only blows around from the street but the trash from some of the Neighbors on Frank Ave who may not know how to close a lid on a Trash can.

All kinds of trash from pop cans to mail, from beer cans to baggies… The Photo above is the amount gathered in the first 15 or so minuets lot more to do. Will be doing more pick up in the A.M. for if we are not going to do it who will?

Chickens and Food Deserts

Tags

Racine WI, Urban Chickens, West 6th St

So we got Urban Chickens in Racine.

Up to 4 Birds no Rosters pay a fee, get inspected very simple should be no issue to do and yes the Eggs will cost more then if you bought them in the Store.

The process took less then a year and unlike the P.C. Nutcases of the first effort I did not drop the ball nor when the fad fade away do something else the new in fad to hang out with my pals at Wilson’s in West Racine drink Coffee, as the in crowd prepares to micromanage the kids life and wonder why my husband has quit touching me.

Oh the new P.C. effort by the rich White Women? Ending Animal Agriculture it’s for the kids right? If they are not talking about that it’s talking about what they can do to make Meatless Monday minatory from no meat served in schools not allowing kids to bring say Sloopy Joes in the lunches and of course compelling Restaurants not to serve Meat after all again its for the Kids.

I simply worked with the Racine Heath Department The Bord of Heath and City Fathers, spoke at a few City Meetings talked to a few Aldermen.

There were two votes by the Aldermen for the 2nd Vote the pro Chicken side even picked up more Yes votes.

It’s not a perfect law in time perhaps we can change parts of the law such as allowing rental properties to have Chickens with the Landlords O.K.

Life to some is just a P.C. Day dream, I did the effort to get the Chickens here mainly as a gift to my wife since I will not get her on a Farm this life I can bring parts here and we will use the Eggs perhaps more interesting accounting efforts make our 4 Birds seam to be more like Six.

In a real TSHTF world be hard to keep any birds unless we used the Chamber in the Basement an area we could keep a few birds away from the outside safe from others.

More interesting to me this A.M. is living in a Food Desert is. See in West 6th St area in Racine in you do not have a Car getting fresh food for your family will be trying.

Today 4/25/15 being a Saturday there is no Bus to take you to a Store the nearest one: Save A Lot over a mile walk each way. Think how do you bring say 30 Lbs of food home maybe you have a Cart you can use perhaps you get your older kids to help or perhaps you simply use the Gas Station as your Food Store why buy Milk when Pop is Cheaper? Why buy fruit when you can buy  fruit flavored drinks its the same thing right?

Books have been written about Food Deserts the long term heath outcomes of the population living in them and I will not even begin to talk about what happens three days after the Gas Stations run out of Chips.

Of course the City of Racine who ended the Bus service due to cost has no clue after all the Population does not vote or is active in City issues act as well a population that consume services vs contribute to the over all function of the City and A population IMHO our Mayor would love to drive away from his White Downtown.

The Joys of living in the inner city  Racine WI

 

 

 

Lost

Tags

Chateau Clingman, Home improvement, Roof

How do I start this?

You might have guest what is coming next, yes, the Roof still leaks,

After we spend a bunch on money, used Roofers found on Angie’s List (and for the record INHO it’s next to worthless) followed the advice of experts on the tree’s around the home and possible issues of wicking  into the upper areas being carried out, I have no idea what is going on or what do do about it.

Some might suggest, to sell the house others simply pack up and walk away, let the bank have it.

Then too some folks are well silly. Better are them who used my efforts to save the home as a way to attack me for backing Scott Walker as if Walker had anything to do with perhaps dishonest contractors or a Goverment program exist to do something for everything that may happen.

I will say that the hit of 5K we must spend in added heath costs due to Obama Care is doing us no favors, nor the ever sky rocking taxes in the City of Racine

We have Home insurance with a great company I will be seeing if the our contact may have an idea or perhaps can offer a recourse to the poor workmanship. We will see.

Got a couple of idea here to look into but right now looks bleak

 

Easter

Tags

Chateau Clingman, City of Racine, Home improvement, Rabbits, West 6th St

 

Happy Easter to you and yours!

Spring is here, by the end of next week the ground should be thawed, be able to do more in the Gardens.

Lot of paper trash to clean up but that is an everyday thing. Far too many just toss the trash on the ground the wind gets it shows up here and well I get to clean it up.

You think after 16 Years of living here I be used to it but we are not gets real old real fast.  On a weekly bases I guess I must pick up a large Garbage bag of trash from gum wrappers to Junk mail tossed.

The two lots where we had homes that the City took down are starting to gather trash, Public Works in theory is cleaning up the lots but its theory the realty is with the Cut backs in City staffing there is no one to do the work. I guess I could but why should I when the City can find the $$ for our Mayor’s law suits (yes we are being sued yet again) but not the basic job of City Goverment.

Now that I have the issues fixed on doing Podcasting here I am thinking to restart the one I did on the Chateau in the day, with podcasting many obstacles I have in blogging are dealt with going to see what happens.

We got about 2 quarts of Syrup from the trees this year we have info that will let us get more next year.

Got a Angora Rabbit to learn how to use the Fiber of to learn how to make cloth. So far so good He has not eaten anyone yet     We will be bulding him a bigger pen The head wife thinks we can use one of the old dog pens outside to allow him to eat grass and perhaps a Rabbit tractor.

The Chicken Law gets voted on the 21 of the month

 

End of March

Tags

Chateau Clingman, Racine WI, West 6th St

Well as the UNIT said come nice weather, we would see fools park on the lots of the torn down homes yes we have, followed what we where told I.E. call the police and NOTHING!!!

Seems it’s O.K. to park on others property and the police in Racine are powerless to do anything.

Worse in this case the owner can’t be contacted for a no consent to trespass due to living in a nursing home not being competent could be quite the to do for this.

My Dad would have took a Baseball bat to the headlights but we will work with Law enforcement.

Mind you we would not care if next up be the Car owners changing oil doing work on cars dumping oil etc  making a huge mess not picking it up and I for one do not want Gas/Oil etc going into My Wood line or the Park.

Will be following up with the UNIT to see the status of the effort to prevent more parking. Looks like everyone over 18 owns at least one car some two or three our neighbors next door have 4 cars for three adults all together in the duplex has 8 cars for 6 adults and a two car driveway.

The ground is still frozen so nothing going on outside in the Garden area. Found the Seeds I still have left. Will put the Rabbit Pellets in the Compost, that should help with bettering that and perhaps add the pellets in the soil too a few weeks before planting.

 

 

 

Things change in Spring

Tags

Bankruptcy, Detroit, Prepping

You will see many changes in the blog with the starting of Spring, a lot of reflection over the Winter and the early days of this Spring has shown me one fact and a major one at that, this being that in  long term the City of Racine will be going the way of Detroit in perhaps 5 years perhaps 10 years but it is going in that direction.

When Racine files for Bankruptcy, this will have effects on the County and the State of Wisconsin.

I, like so many others simply chose to disregard the facts from our high rate of Debt service, the loss of population, the poor still declining schools, with a newspaper who IMHO is not only not reporting bad news BUT not even checking the basic facts of our Mayor’s statements as he runs for reelection.

Now the decline of Racine did not happen overnight lots of folks had a share of blame in the turn of events in the events over say the last 20 years.

I do NOT plan to document that here I have done so in other blogs. I will make sure I put up the links to them.

However with my new believe of the strangeness to come, the effort here will be to restore the home as an Island in the sea of chaos to come. Not as some Bunker but as say a refuge a last stand a place of I hope safety as long we can do so, after all unlike many others who have fled and will flee we got no place to go.

If we are to die in place in our Chateau I plan to make a fight of the last days and to die on my feet not as a slave

This effort will be what is reflected here

 

God Bless you all

That was a Winter!

Tags

Snow Pack, Spring, WE Engeries, winter

Did you hear that I hate Winter right?

Well now that it’s mid March with the last few days being about normal, the snow pack in the yard has quickly melted, the mud mostly dries up.

Snow is still in the Raised beds the clear area still a muddy mess. So it will be a bit before I get in them to set up the cold frames, will resist getting ready to go too early that would not go well.

The Weather will get cold our nights are still below freezing heck its still Winter no big rush, still there are actions I can do such as sharpen tools get an idea what the wife wants in the Cold Frames that sort of thing.

We got the Maples taped, this year the Head Wife tapped one of the Walnut trees too She understands that syrup can be obtained the same way its gotten from the Maple trees, we will see right.

Thinking that the Basement was too cold for the Earthworms that is a set back same with the Mushrooms.

We simply could not keep the Basement at 60 with the high cost of energy, no blame just the facts.  Have to try something else. next Winter, we will see.

With the nicer temps more Sunlight my Moods are doing better but so much my Blood Pressure Oh well. Maybe if I made better food choices.

Going to plant Bee friendly flowers on the two empty lots on Jones St here and perhaps Frank Ave too, seeds are cheep.

The Chicken Law comes up for a vote soon I hope for the best but not invested in the idea be far too costly to do for us, my neighbors who do it now will not follow the law and for the vast majority of Racine will think the same thing. It is a start should it pass can be changed.