Never Again Part IV

"I know. We'll figure something out. Now that you're functioning on all cylinders again I'm sure we'll work it out together and he'll never touch you again."

Ed sat on the grass in the yard across the street and watched the house. The new tenants weren't home so no one told him to leave. He had already noted the locks had been changed and he couldn't find a spare key to get inside. He had a brown bag with him with a bottle showing out of the top. He drank heavily from it. Probation violation number two, or is it three, he wondered, since he wasn't supposed to be near either of the women and he was certain Janelle was in that house. And what was Eva doing home anyway; she was supposed to be at work? Damn the bad luck!

"He's still there and he is drunk," Janelle said. "He is real mean when he's drunk."

"He's real mean when he's sober. He's dangerous when he's drunk. I have an idea though. Go unlock that back gate."

"What?"

"Just unlock the back gate," Eva said. "He's going to try to get in eventually and we'll be waiting."

The women turned off the lights and sat in the kitchen. On his third bottle now, Ed was staggering drunk and they knew from experience, about to pass out. The neighbors were actually on vacation so they had never come home to run him off the property and empty bottles were now scattered at his feet.

"Are you sure this is going to work?" Janelle asked Eva, whispering.

"There are a lot of witnesses that he is drunk. Someone is selling it to him; so he's on a surveillance camera somewhere staggering around. Did you see him the last time he left for more booze? I'm surprised he hasn't passed out by now or that the other neighbors haven't called the cops. They all know he's not supposed to be in the neighborhood."

"Most of them don't want to get involved. If he does something again, they'll bear witness that he was here, but beyond that, they'll stay out of it," Eva said. "They all know how mean he is and they don't want to get hurt."

A noise in the yard brought them on high alert. Ed had indeed come in the back gate. Eva had placed a bottle of liquor out on the picnic table where he'd be sure and find it. She wanted him passed out drunk. He staggered around until he saw the bottle on the table. He muttered something about the gods presenting manna from heaven and opened the bottle. The women shook their heads and watched in amazement. He turned the bottle up and downed the contents without stopping.

"Are you sure he isn't trying to kill himself with alcohol poisoning?" Janelle asked Eva.

"At this point, I don't know," she answered, "But I'm not taking any chances. Are you?'

"No," Janelle replied. "He's too volatile. I might be dead the next time and I can't hole up here in the house forever and neither can you. I'm glad they gave you a few days off from work though. You must be about out."

"I am out. Someone else gave up some time off so I could get off a few days while we see what Ed is going to do."

"Good friend," Janelle commented.

"Very good friend," Eva agreed.

Ed tried to yank the door to the porch open and the women jumped. The lock held even though he tried several times. In his drunken state he no longer had enough strength to yank it loose from the wood. They eyed each other, watching as he staggered backward and fell over. He didn't move and they watched him closely for a good twenty minutes. He didn't so much as twitch a muscle.

"You think he's dead?" Janelle asked.

"I don't know, but we'd better check. I don't want a body in my back yard."

She eased out into the yard and checked for a pulse. Suddenly Ed snored and she jumped and tried not to scream. Back in the house she told Janelle he was out cold but not dead.

"You know, he almost got that lock pulled loose anyway!" Eva told her.

"Damn," Janelle said under her breath. "What now?"

"Load him up, just like we planned," Eva said.

They wrapped Ed in an old and cheap tarp Eva had used to cover her floor when she painted and together they struggled to lift him and put him in the back of her car. They drove out to his favorite place in a wooded area at a local lake within walking distance of their home, and after unwrapping him; they pushed him into the lake and held him under. He never woke up or put up a fight.

"May God forgive us!" Janelle said wracked with sobs.

"We definitely have some penance to do," Eva told her, patting her shoulder, "But he was like a rabid dog, Janelle. He had to be put down before he killed us."

"I know, but can we live with it?" She wiped her face on her shirt tail.

"We'll see," was all that Eva could say. She rolled the tarp back up and stuffed it into her car. On the way home she stopped at a dumpster and shoved it inside.

There was knock on the door the next morning. Ed's probation agent was standing there. "You ladies look like hell," he said when Eva answered the door and let him inside.

"We'll Ed was across the street drinking most of the day and half the night, so no, we didn't get much sleep for wondering when he was going to break in," Eva said.

"I saw all the bottles in the yard over there as I drove up. He do that?" the agent asked.

"Oh yeah," Eva said. "He was staggering around so much I'm surprised anyone sold to him."

"Well, tried to check on him last night to tell him to stay away from here, but he wasn't there. I guess I should have guessed he was still here after you called. Why didn't you call again?"

"It didn't seem to do any good the last time," Janelle stated. She had been trying to stay quiet, but she clamped her mouth shut tight afterwards.

"Yes, and he was over there; not here. He was five hundred away. If he'd come back to the yard, I would have called the police," Eva said.

"When did he leave?"

"I think about ten. We tried to keep track of him, but that's about when he disappeared. I figured he finally got drunk enough and went home, wherever that is these days."

"He has an apartment rented by probation. He didn't go there last night. He has a roommate and he didn't see him."

"Then I don't know what to tell you. If he comes back we'll give you a call."

"Okay. Meanwhile I'll check with the bus company. He can't get here walking. I made sure he was too far away for that. It's the only way he could have gotten here. From the looks of that pile of bottles, he didn't pay for a cab; he didn't have that much money."

Three days later Eva opened up the newspaper about the time the phone rang. She read the headline as she answered on the fourth ring. MISSING PAROLEE FOUND DEAD IN LOCAL LAKE.

It was the probation agent. "I wanted to talk to you before you got the paper. We found Ed."

Too late. "Really?" Eva said, as if she hadn't seen the news. "Where's he been?"

"Dead," was the reply.

"Really? What happened?" she said as if surprised.

"The coroner says his blood alcohol level was lethal but he drowned. You know that lake near your place?"

"Yes," she said. "He liked to fish there. Is that where he was?"

"We think he must have staggered there while drunk and passed out in the lake. He was so drunk he never woke up."

"Oh, dear," she said, as if she thought it a tragedy.  "I certainly wanted him to go away, but dead? Never thought that would happen."

"Yes ma'am. It's being ruled accidental," he added.

"I'll let Janelle know. She's not up yet."

"Thank you," he said, and they ended the call.

"Well? Did they find him?" Janelle asked from behind her.

"Yes they did, and we are in the clear," she answered. Both women smiled.

Odd Phenomenon? Or Just Good Reading?

This morning was like any other freezing, cold morning in Wisconsin, except it wasn't actually snowing and it wasn't overcast, as it has been a lot lately. The closer I got to town the more I saw a strange thing that most would have thought was quite lovely and amazing. Light was dancing around like billions of tiny mirrors floating though the sky. It fairly snowed with it, only it wasn't snowing. It actually was quite distracting, and driving down an icy road, distractions one doesn't need. Still, even though I did keep my mind on driving, this otherwise lovely phenomena was strangely unsettling. I couldn't put my finger on it. Finally, I arrived at my job (a little early) and I was able to just concentrate on the massive swarm of glitter in the air. Glitter. That's when it hit me. Maybe I read too much, or maybe I just have way to good an imagination, or I should switch to decaf, but it reminded me of something; I just had to figure out what. There was something down deep in the recesses of my mind I had to retrieve. I must have looked totally ridiculous standing there with all my stuff that I haul into the office everyday, not moving, my eyes darting around just studying the glitter dust floating in the air. I wondered if it would get into my lungs, although most likely it was just caused by moisture in the air from the local paper factory freezing and reflecting the sunlight. I'm pretty sure that's what it was.

At last my frozen brain remembered what it was trying so hard to pull to the forefront. Several years ago I read a science fiction book by Michael Creighton called Prey. They described clouds of nano-particles that resemble glass dust or glitter, floating through the air as would a cloud of insects. Theses nano-particles invaded individuals, copied them exactly and then killed off the host while they pretended to be the person, animal, object, they replicated. They were supposed to go in and cure diseases, but instead began thinking for themselves and craving power. It was quite strange. And then of course all I heard about everywhere was nano-technology this and nano-technology that, and it was really creepy. One develops a real appreciation for the science fiction writer, because as anyone who has ever been exposed to Star Trek knows, science fiction is only fictitious until someone comes up with a way to make that non-existent invention reality. If you need evidence of that just think of cell phones and Bluetooth technology, or earwigs that hear and transmit in the same nearly unseen piece of equipment.

Not enough sleep? Too much coffee?  Maybe. I don't know. But...here's to good reading and great imaginations that stick with you even when you're finished with the book.

Stop! Drop That Cupcake!

I was browsing MSN the other day and came across an article that made me want to gag. Of course I read it! If you are eating a commercially made baked good, you might want to put it down and consider learning how to bake from scratch- I don’t mean open a box, dump it in a bowl with an egg, water, and oil; stir and bake. I mean measure out all the ingredients yourself: flour, sugar, baking powder, cocoa, etc. The article for your reference can be found at: http://todayhealth.today.com/_news/2012/10/17/14489629-8-ingredients-you-never-want-to-see-on-nutrition-labels?lite , and it is called 8 Ingredients You Never Want to See on Ingredient Labels. Of all the ingredients they labeled, which really were disturbing, I nearly tossed my last meal when I read about one of them: Castoreum. Castoreum is actually from the scent glad (an anal glad) of the beaver. (What?) You might not even see it on the ingredient list because it can be simply labeled as a ‘natural ingredient’. Well, yeah, I suppose it is ‘natural’ since it isn’t created in the lab!

Okay, so, I want to know how this came about. Did someone in some lab playing around with studying the effects of drugs (like marijuana) suddenly decide to try it on themselves and then the participants start thinking something like this:

Guy One: “Hey, dude! Look at that flat tailed critter over there in the cage. I wonder what would happen if we played with that thing man? Ping Pong!”

Guy Two: “Man you ain’t right! Ha ha. Let’s play with his butt!”

Guy One:  “Cool.  Look! He’s spraying something out. Whoa! That smells dude. But look at the color!”

Guy Two:  “I wonder if we put that in food it will hurt someone. Let’s try it.”

Guy One:  “Gross idea; let’s do it.”

Then these two knob-heads bake a cake and put in this ‘extracted’ substance (I really don’t want to know how they did that. Do you?) And, then they decide they like this cake.

Guy One:  “Eureka! We’re on to something here. I wonder if the FDA will approve it for commercial use.”

Guy Two: “I don’t know. Let’s see.”

I want to know who in the FDA decided that it was a good idea to even test this as a legitimate ingredient. Did someone not ask why someone would want to put an ‘extract’ from a beaver’s butt into food in the first place? Or did they just say, “Sure, we can see if this will sicken people over time,” and send out the approval?

Personally, I have always preferred homemade, from scratch baked goods. My husband, not so much. Not that it isn't good; he just thinks it's softer or less expensive, or easier. I wonder if now I can convince him that he should eat what I do- the homemade bread (not from a mix) and cake from scratch. How about you?

Never Again - Part III

Ed made a plea deal with the district attorney for a six-month term in the county jail and three years' probation.

Eva went over to the house while Ed was in court and used the spare key he had hidden under a dead plant to get inside and collect Janelle's clothes and her few belongings. Ed had broken or burned most of everything that had been Janelle's so there wasn't that much left to get. She just shook her head in disbelief.

Janelle was in a rehabilitation hospital learning to do simple things again like holding a pencil and writing. She walked slowly and had a slight drag to her left foot that she was told might go away as her brain healed, but she more than likely was going to walk that way for the rest of her life. She wasn't completely disabled, but it would take her some time to get back to being able to do things she used to. She often cried and feared the day Ed would be released.

Eva took Janelle home to her house. The one she had shared with Ed was up for rent since Ed was in jail and could no longer pay the rent. He had been fired after he made the deal to go to jail and would have nowhere to go once released. Janelle feared that most of all. She knew he would try to move in with her so she filed for divorce but Ed refused to sign the papers when her attorney took them to him in jail.

"We'll deal with that when he gets out. Don't worry so much," Eva told Janelle. "There will be a restraining order against him so if he shows up his probation will be revoked and he'll go back to jail; this time he'll have to finish out the sentence for three more years."

"He won't care," Janelle said slowly, trying to think of the words she wanted. "Just paper," she added.

Eva ruffed Janelle's hair. "We have six months to figure out how we're going to stop him then and by that time, you'll be well enough to fight back."

Janelle took her cousin's hand and held it to her heart. "I love you cousin."

Eva smiled. "Don't worry so much."

Ed was released from jail and as predicted, showed up on Eva's doorstep. "I want to talk to my wife," he said angrily.

Eva stood at the door with the chain in place. "Not going to happen Ed. And she isn't your wife anymore. The judge granted the divorce without your signature and he made you responsible for her hospital bills."

"I am well aware of that. I was notified. Ain't going to happen. She is my wife and I don't give a good goddamn what any judge says. You got that!" he said angrily.

"Go away Ed. There's an order against you. You aren't to come near either one of us."

"Where is my wife?" he said separating each word slowly as if she didn't understand him.

"Go to hell, Ed," Eva said and shut the door and locked the dead bolt she had installed. She called his probation agent about the violation and he said he'd talk to Ed. She hung up and shook her head. "Talk to him? What good will that do?"

Janelle came out of the bedroom where she had been hiding. "I'm sorry Eva. I told you he'd come back."

To be Continued...

Winter on the Farm

Living in Northern Wisconsin is a lot of fun for a lot of people. I am not one of those people. I do not enjoy snow or the sports one would engage in when it snows. I like to fish, but there is no way I am going out on a frozen lake to do so. I'm from Florida, so the cold and I do not get along, and I absolutely do not like snow.

That being said, for farmers wintertime should be a time of semi-restfulness, right? Don't count on it. Crops have to be planned for spring planting and equipment needs to be maintained so it actually works come spring and summer. Animals have to have extra care, especially if they are kept inside a barn, after all, either way, they can't feed themselves and there isn't any grass to graze on. If a farmer has a dairy, forget about any rest. As much as snow gets in the way and adds more work, it is also a necessary evil. Economic impact on the community that depends on it aside, snow, and a lot of it, is needed for soil moisture when planting time comes around. A good layer of snow is needed to protect hay fields. It keeps some warmth in and the freeze out. Doesn't make sense, does it? Snow also helps weigh down the grasses so that the freezing cold and ice isn't able to heave the delicate plants and kill them off.

We got some snow, but not a lot and it got really cold. Then we got the January thaw, which is temperatures in the forties that got rid of what little snow we did have. Then it got cold again, as in way below zero. I'm going with the notion that all that nice alfalfa and clover we planted is not going to come up this year. Also the unseasonal warmth we had last year during January and February sent our fruit trees for a loop. They bloomed out and then the blooms of course froze when winter returned and we got no apples. It affected the entire state's crop of apples and cherries and other berries and fruits that grow up here. There is a good possibility of more of the same this year.

Now comes the 'fun' part. It got so cold last week that our entire water system froze. We've been having to take a torch to the cow watering system, as in pipes, bowls, and mechanisms so they could drink for several weeks now. We have a barn full of cows so that is a lot of water bowls and pipes. When I say the entire system went down, I mean no water to anywhere, including the house. We had to use an old drag-type spray rig to water the animals by hand (think buckets) and buy water for the house. Thank goodness we have relatives nearby so we could get water for the animals. After finally giving up getting things going on our own, we had to call a well company to get the ice out of the lines. I give up using the automatic watering cups for the cattle though. Until it warms it a bit, I'll just have to keep on using buckets. Even though there are a lot of cows, it takes longer to thaw the lines than to just give them a bucket and babysit them to make sure they don't dump it over accidentally. The barn cleaner chain also froze down so we couldn't run the chain to clean the beds out. I thought we were doomed to the old Armstrong method (two strong arms, a shovel, and a wheelbarrow). The tractor can be used, but it still has to get to the tractor, which cannot fit into the bottom of the barn where the animals are. My poor husband spent hours with a sledge hammer breaking the ice loose so we could get that cleaner going again. He's not too keen on the Armstrong method either for cleaning.

Next week, it's due to get way below freezing again and we might have to do this all over again. Thankfully we got some snow and so we pushed a nice pile around the building where the well is to keep some of that heat we keep going in there where it belongs. So, wish us luck.

Think this is unusual? Probably not. Farming is like that. On good days, the work is not too bad, the equipment works the way it's supposed to and things go smoothly. I do enjoy my cows in spite of all the work, and bucking hay and scraping stalls is some great exercise. But the bad days tend to be really bad, and most farmers know what I'm talking about. Like to gamble? Skip the casino- go into farming.

Never Again- Part II

Eva sat beside her cousin's bed at the hospital. A nurse came in to check on Janelle and eyed her curiously. "You should see the other guy," Eve told her, when she saw her staring at the now black and purple bruise on her cheek. She wasn't smiling. Janelle had been in a coma for a week and the doctor's didn't know if she'd come out of it or not. She spent every moment she could at the hospital after work.

Ed made bail, but he was not allowed to go near Janelle or he would be revoked. He was charged with attempted murder of Janelle and assault and battery on Eva. The district attorney was waiting to see if Janelle pulled through. If not; the charges would be upgraded. Ed had also been put on administrative leave from his job due to the incident. The two conditions made Eva wary of going home as Ed just sat glaring at her through his living room window and drinking himself into a stupor. He made a gun-shooting gesture at her once and the deadly serious look in his eye made her shiver and run for her house. He had just smiled an evil, self-satisfied smile. Eva was told by the deputy that he couldn't do anything about Ed since he hadn't pointed an actual gun at her.

Eva often wished Ed would go on and move since he only rented his house. She was buying hers and it would be more difficult for her to move. It was just a small and modest home, but it was all hers and she'd be damned if he was going to run her out of it, the miserable, drunken son-of-a-bitch.

Janelle stirred and it made Eva jump. She had nodded off holding onto her cousin's still, cool hand as she hadn't gotten much sleep lately. "Janelle? Can you hear me, honey? It's Eva," she said. She pressed the call button on the bedrail that went to the nurses' station.

"Is there a problem?" a nurse asked a few minutes later answering the call.

"I think she's waking up," Eva called out. "She's moving around a lot all of the sudden."

"I'll be right there," was the reply.

A minute later the nurse came in followed by an intern who checked Janelle's eyes with a small pen light as the nurse checked her vital signs. He nodded at the nurse.

"Well, is she waking up?" Eva finally asked.

"Yes, she is trying to come out of it," the intern answered. "We'll have to wait a bit longer for her to become fully awake before we can check for any brain damage. She may have some rehab to go through; learn to do things over again."

"What things?"

"I don't know. It depends on how much damage was done. She might be just fine or she might have to learn just a few things. She also might have to learn to talk and walk and use her motor skills all over."

"Oh, God," Eva said. "I should have used the cast iron."

"Excuse me?" the doctor said.

"I stopped her husband with an aluminum skillet; I should have used the cast iron one," she replied.

The doctor raised an eye brow. "How did he turn out?"

"I guess he's fine." She indicated the bruise on her face and her cousin lying in the bed. "I'm not giving him the chance to do this again. I hope they put him away for years," she added with a shake of her head. She wiped away a tear.

The doctor cleared his throat and nodded. "You should go home and get some rest yourself. You look tired. We'll call if there are any more changes."

Morning on the Farm-What a Way to Start the Day

It's a great way to start the day. You go out to the barn and something just seems--wrong. It took a minute to figure it out. Someone was missing- Black Jack the steer. Suddenly there he was, on the wrong side of the barn in the feed aisle. Oh man! He had somehow managed to unhook the clip holding his neck chain. They seem to be rather talented in that area of late.

First one must catch the naughty fellow, and believe me, he is not all that small- about 300 pounds. He also has decided he just isn't ready to go back to his stall quite yet, so he ran up and down the aisle with me calling after him. The aisle isn't that big and it's not worth chasing a cow around the feed aisle, you just have to wait for him to calm down a second, although every time I walked up to him to put the rope on his head, he took off again. Hmmm. He's being extra naughty today. Usually I can get him the first time, but then, he has made quite a mess of things and he may be under the impression I'm going to get onto him somehow. It's a cow; it doesn't do any good, as I have told my husband repeatedly. Finally, I got the rope the on his head and he decided at that point to just drag me down the aisle, only I jerked the rope to one side as one would a rein on a horse and he stopped in his tracks. "Now, if you're quite ready to go back home," I told him, "I can clean up this mess and feed everyone." I also told the other cows to give him a hard time since it was his fault they wouldn't be fed for a while as I had to clean up the feed aisle. Yes, I know it doesn't do any good to say such things to them, but it made me feel better.

He still wasn't ready to go back home but I got him out of the feed aisle and into the center walkway, so I tied the rope off in his stall (which thankfully is literally across from the short walk aisle between stalls on the side where he had taken refuge.) I got behind him and gave him a little smack on the rear to get him motivated. He tried to turn and run down the walk aisle but when he reached the end of the rope, he flipped completely over. I just smiled and chuckled a bit. "So, are we ready now?" He got up and went to his stall. I had to motivate him to go on and cross the gutter and move forward enough to hook him back up, but he went.

My goodness, what a mess he made! He managed to knock down five of six bales of hay we had thrown out of the hay mow the night before and pulled the hay string off of two of them, scattering one all over the place. The hay that had not been eaten was no longer fit to eat as he had hygiene issues (that's safe wording right?) in the hay so I had to spend twenty minutes just cleaning the hay out of the aisle and making sure I could actually give the cows their grain before haying them again. At least the concrete was not in need of disinfecting since it all managed to land in hay piles. (That was good trick too.)

Since we have a doorway (minus an actual door) leading to the silo room (we aren't using them) we blocked it off with a piece of plywood and some old straw bales to insulate the barn against the cold. It is at the end of that walk aisle between stalls I mentioned earlier. The water lines and bowls tend to freeze there if it isn't blocked off in the wintertime. That rascal pushed on those bales until he broke the cords holding the plywood up and knocked it over. The bales actually stayed in place, thank goodness. After the mess was cleaned up and the rest of the chores were done, I went outside and around to the other side of the doorway and put the plywood back up, only this time I nailed it to the framework and them braced it with some long two-by-four lumber. Let's see him knock it over now!

Have you ever had days like that?